Today’s unboxing features the Jazwares Star Wars Micro Galaxy Squadron blind boxes!

When the Micro Galaxy Squadron line was featured at Star Wars Celebration earlier this year, we were so excited. We both love Star Wars starships, and have collected them across various formats and manufacturers. For the older lines, like Action Fleet, Micro Machines, or Titanium Series, the vehicles are all pretty much the same size. For this new range, the ship are all in scale to each other, which hasn’t really been done before!

Then of course, we had no idea if the range would even be available locally – so it was fantastic news to find the Micro Galaxy Squadron range stocked at a number of different retailers here in NZ! Of course we were going to dive in and grab our favourites.

One interesting feature of this line – blind boxes for the smallest ‘scout class’ vehicles. We don’t usually go for blind boxes, but we knew we wanted to collect this line, so in we went, grabbing three blind boxes to start with.

We didn’t get scientific when choosing boxes – just picked three and left it to luck. Each box has a case assortment number on the side, and fans have begun to figure out which vehicles are available in each assortment, but we wanted our first experience to be authentic and just see what we got. Subsequent boxes, we’ll take note of the assortment number as we try to narrow down and fill gaps in our collection.

Well, as luck would have it, the first and second boxes contained the same figure – Darth Maul with his Bloodfin speeder bike, as seen in The Phantom Menace. A very cool figure, and definitely one I was keen to get, I just don’t need two.

Minimal paint job on both the figure and vehicle, but very much expected considering the small scale of this scout class range. This vehicle reminds me of the old school Star Wars Micro Machines range, which I love.

The third box contained the Mandalorian! Glad to get a different figure, and one that I really wanted. Again, simple paint job, but more detailed than the Darth Maul figure, with more varied colours to show Din Djarin’s original mix-matched season one brown armour.

I know that the large Razor Crest vehicle also comes with a Din Djarin figure, but that figure appears to be the silver-toned beskar armour version, whereas this speeder bike version is his early season one brown-toned armour. It looks like the chase variant of the Razer Crest (Arvala-7 version) comes with the same figure as this one, but then if you’re collecting chase variants, you probably don’t care about the doubling up on one small figure.

So all up, I think these are great little vehicles from the Micro Galaxy Squadron line, but the nature of mystery boxes make this unboxing a bit of a mixed bag. When starting a new collection, you hope to get a good variety of items before hitting a duplicate or two when trying to complete the set but oh well. At the end of the day, I had fun opening these blind boxes, I like the figures and vehicles, and I know I’ll be back for more to add to our collection.

May the Force be with you!

Check out my full unboxing video below –

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Today’s video features a Funko Pop! Vinyl mystery box! We have really started to focus on collecting Funko Star Wars figures recently (even starting to plan out a new collectible space for them), so we’re wanting to fill out gaps in our collection. A fun way to do that is with a mystery box!

Check out our unboxing video –

Australian retailer PopCultcha has a great range of Funko Pop! Vinyl figures, and we often shop their website to find exclusives that aren’t available locally in New Zealand. Browsing their range, we spotted a Star Wars mystery box, and we were intrigued.

The price of the mystery box equated to two full price Pop! Vinyl figures locally, so we figured we take a chance and see what we got! So opening it up, our mystery box contained –

• #410 Darth Maul
• #422 Qui-Gon Jinn (Tatooine)
• #443 Wrecker
• #460 Iden Versio
• #477 Grogu (Using the Force)
• #500 Jar Jar Binks

So overall, an interesting mixed bunch. A lot of special edition figures, which is cool. A couple of them had some box damage, which is a little bit sad but I get that mystery boxes are for clearing out stock, so it’s not really surprising – and honestly, I’ve seen much worse in some stores with full price stickers!

Ideally, we needed two new figures we didn’t already have, and the price would be worth it. So, which ones did we already have?

Well, we already had three (Jar Jar, Wrecker, and Iden Versio). At first I thought the Darth Maul was a double up, but after I checked, I realised the Darth Maul figure we already had is different, so yay a new one! We didn’t have the Qui-Gon or that version of Grogu, so all up, three new figures for our Funko collection, and three double-ups to add to our Star Wars collection around the house. We call that a win!

May the Force be with you!

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Today, May 19th, marks the 20th anniversary of theatrical release of The Phantom Menace in the United States (in New Zealand, it actually came out in cinemas a little later, on June 10th).

One of our most prominent Episode 1 collectibles is this life-size Darth Maul statue, which we have on display in an alcove that faces our front door… so that he greets all guests that come to our house.

The Darth Maul statues were originally prizes in a competition run in New Zealand at KFC and Pizza Hut restaurants, but in addition to those that were given to competition winners, a large number that were displayed at restaurants found their way into the hands of collectors. I managed to find this one for a very good price at a local second-hand store in 2000. You can read more about the Pepsi/KFC Episode 1 promotion in New Zealand on the SWNZ, Star Wars New Zealand website.

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Released in 2011, the Sideshow Collectibles Premium Format statue of Darth Maul with mechanical legs (‘Darth Maul cyborg’) was available in two editions – standard (edition size 1250), and Sideshow exclusive (edition size 500 – also included an alternate head). The statue featured Darth Maul with Sith tattoos on his head, arms and torso, with large mechanical legs, and a new design of double-bladed lightsaber, and additional cloth robes.

The concept of Darth Maul with mechanical legs, having survived the duel on Naboo, first appeared in Star Wars: Visionaries comic in 2005 (story and art by Aaron McBride; published by Dark Horse). A variant of Darth Maul with his bionic legs, based on this design, later appeared in Star Wars: The Clone Wars animated television series episode “Revenge” (the twenty-second and final episode of its fourth season) in 2012, which was written by George Lucas’ oldest daughter Katie Lucas (Maul originally was resurrected with his spider-like legs, but it was at that point in the story that Nightsister Mother Talzin assisted in the creation of Maul’s bipedal cybernetic legs on Dathomir).

The statue base has a sandy texture on the surface, while the underside features a red and black design inspired by Darth Maul’s tattoos. The official statue name ‘Darth Maul with mechanical legs’ is noted here, along with the edition number, and battery compartment.

The statue measures approximately 54cm tall (including base) – or up to 57cm tall if measured at the highest tip of the lightsaber. The lightsaber blades can light up, with the use of 3X AA batteries in the base, or the included adaptor cable to plug into a wall outlet. The adaptor plugs into the base at the back, which is hidden from view when displayed, and the lights can be turned on with the small button hidden in the cybernetics on Darth Mauls’ back.

Darth Maul’s horns are depicted longer here than seen in The Phantom Menace, as another indicator of the passage of time and his Dark Side-fuelled rage after the duel with Obi-Wan Kenobi.

The whole sculpt rests on just one foot, in a dynamic running pose. The right leg extends behind Maul, which lends a sense of a greater size due to the increased space this pose takes up while on display (especially compared to some of the other Star Wars premium format statues).

Sideshow Collectibles has often produced collectibles based on concepts and ideas. Their popular Star Wars ‘Mythos’ statue line also explored moments unseen in the films – like ‘desert nomad’ Obi-Wan Kenobi surviving the harsh Tatooine environment, set between Revenge of the Sith and A New Hope.

This statue is fantastic rendition of Darth Maul, exploring his story after The Phantom Menace – the face sculpt in particular is very well done.

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