9500 Sith Fury-class Interceptor review, part 1
Posted by Huw,
Here is, then, Darth Malgus, said by many to be the best Star Wars minifig ever.
Now I've seen him for myself I have to agree that he is very cool, and his armour is superbly detailed and painted, but the best ever? Probably not. The main problem is, er, who the heck is he? I'd never heard of him before now, so I don't have any connection with the character, unlike Queen Amidala or Boba Fett.
Anyway, I've teamed up with CapnRex101 again for a review of the set he comes in, and in part one we look at the packaging, parts and minifigs.
Text by CapnRex101, pictures by me...
When LEGO revealed that sets would be released based on The Old Republic game I was delighted as there are some really interesting vehicles and even more great characters featured in the game. The Fury-Class Interceptor is one of these incredible ships and the malevolent Darth Malgus is a truly fantastic new Sith Lord with a unique and sinister appearance. But do Darth Malgus and the elegant Interceptor live up to what one would expect given their excellence in the game? Read on and find out…
The artwork on the box is very good. The Interceptor is flying through the air and launching its payload of flick fire missiles at the city planet below. The background shows the devastated Coruscant cityscape following the Sacking of Coruscant at the climax of the Great Galactic War around which the game is based. We can see the city at night with many buildings lit up including the Jedi Temple which can be seen behind the ship.
None of the minifigs actually appear in the artwork as nobody can be seen in the cockpit and everyone else is either sitting inside the Fury-Class Interceptor or still fighting on the ground. The Old Republic logo appears at the bottom left corner of the cover and is glowing in sparkling gold. The minifigs are all shown in a gallery format on the right edge of the box in a dark blue section like the rest of the boxes from this year. the incredible Darth Malgus is at the top with his two equally awesome Sith Troopers standing below him, all three have the word 'new' emblazoned next to them.
The back of the box is great as well demonstrating all of the features in small images and annotations showing the positions of the various functions on the model. The ship is also shown in a blueprint style from different angles and there are two pictures of the model fighting set 9497, Striker-Class Starfighter over the forests of Alderaan which is nice. There is also an image of Darth Malgus piloting the Interceptor which is suitably sinister.
The instructions share the same image of the ship as the front of the box and I found no mistakes and had no missing pieces. There are two booklets and at the end of the second one is a nice comic strip which shows the set in action and gives a bit of inspiration for how one might go about playing with the model and the possible scenarios which you could set up with it.
I hope this is a continued fixture of instruction booklets in the future. Both of the instruction booklets and the small sticker sheet are packed in a plastic bag with cardboard backing to keep them flat and crisp in the box. I am not entirely sure if all sets have this extra packaging, but I am very pleased that they chose to include it as it keeps everything in perfect condition.
With the exception of new parts for the minifigs, there are no other new parts in this set. However, there are a lot of recently introduced parts, including the new 1x2-1x2 brackets and 1x3 and 2x4 tiles, and I believe the canopy has been printed with a new design.
There are 750 parts, just 20 less than Jabba'a Palace, although many are much smaller.
When it comes to the minifigs, this set just about surpasses any other. I will start with the wonderful Sith Troopers and leave Darth Malgus until a bit later on.
The Sith Troopers have a huge amount of detail and each wear an excellent new helmet which is very reminiscent in its shape of that of Darth Vader. They are both laden with detail. A dark red stripe runs from the front of the piece, over the top of the helmet and all of the way down the back. On this red stripe there is a white Sith Empire symbol which is quite similar to that of the Imperials from the Original Trilogy, which is a theme running through many of the designs of the Sith Empire from The Old Republic. The front of the helmet has silver highlights and some black striping, as well as various grilles, buttons and dials. It fits nicely over a standard minifig's head.
Speaking of which, the head is printed with exactly the same design as Lex Luthor from the Super Heroes theme which is fine as it features a suitably grim expression for an evil foot soldier. The torso is predominantly black like the rest of the figure, but features a similar design to the chest of Darth Vader like the helmet. There is some chest armour printed here as well as several dials and a black belt with silver detailing. The back of the torso is also printed with a continuation of the dark grey armour and the belt; the arms are plain black as are his hands.
Their legs are plain black. What I find very interesting is if you look closely at the second frame of the comic in the second instruction manual, you can just about see that the Sith Trooper there does indeed have some leg printing, perhaps hinting that the legs were originally going to be printed, but this had to me removed for some reason. I would have liked to see some leg printing, but it is looks just fine as it is so I have no real complaints here.
The two Sith Troopers included both carry a regular short blaster. Apart from the lack of leg printing, my only other criticism of these minifigs is the lack of any kind of backpack for them as in the game they wear a rather large pack. However the incredible detailing on the rest of the figure makes up for this in my opinion.
Darth Malgus is absolutely incredible. His Lego Minifigure completely lives up to the high expectations I had. He is utterly flawless and is already one of my favourite Lego Minifigures of all time, not only is the character fantastic in the game so to get a Lego version of him is great, but he has unbelievable amounts of detail and even a brand new mould to form his combined chest plate, shoulder armour and life support mask. If you are not too sure about the character, I suggest you watch the trailers for the game and I think you will be won over by the malignant Darth Malgus.
His head is wonderful with sunken yellow Sith eyes, a serious expression and a lot of scarring on the left side of his face which is seen in the game (in one of the cinematic trailers we see how he gets this scarring). This is printed in brown and the rest of his head is light grey which is accurate. He also features wrinkles and cheek lines on his face which show how withered he has become after numerous epic battles with various Republic Troopers and Jedi during the war.
Darth Malgus does not wear his unique life support pack until he is crippled at the hands of Satele Shan and Jace Malcom, (who both appear in set 9497, Striker-Class Starfighter so you can re-enact that awesome scene from the trailer). Therefore I am very glad that the mask was not printed on his face so you can remove it if you wish. The armour piece is amazing; it is almost an exact copy of the appearance of the life support pack in the game with a highly detailed mould and even more detailed printing of dials, buttons, and lots of red display screens. It is cast in black and has dark grey and silver printing on both the front and back of the piece which is fantastic. This component fits around the neck of the Minifigure and the head can be slotted in over it nicely.
The cape is a brand new piece too I believe. It has only one hole to go around the neck and is not as wide as a normal cape which is completely accurate to his appearance in the game and allows the shoulder armour part to fit comfortably around his neck. The torso is also printed with lots of tiny details, even below the armour where the exact same designs are printed on the torso as on the separate armour piece! Below that there is more accurate grey and black segmented armour plating. This incredible detail is continued on the back of the torso, even though it is totally obscured by the cape. His arms are dark grey and his gloved hands are black.
His hips and legs are both printed too; I think this is the most printing I have ever seen on the hips of a minifig! The patterning on the torso is continued on his hips and looks great, as do the shin and knee plates printed on his dark grey legs with black and grey padding around his thighs. He carries a standard red lightsabre with a metallic silver hilt just like in the game.
Part 2 will cover the build and the finished model.
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38 comments on this article
Cool! I haven't played SWTOR, but I like this minifig!
Those figs are amazing! I don't really need any more bley and black, but those figs are so cool this might be worth picking up anyway.
Very very nice. Right from the SWTOR game and extended lore. Love them.
My only disappointment with the minifigs in this set is..... for the cost of the set should definitely be more figures. At least Malgus's Twi'lek companion and maybe the Bounty Hunter featured in the into of SWTOR would be cool.
I was comparing the heads of the sith troopers to Lex Luther (via the minifig gallery) And they are not the same face. They are the same as Loki and the new Bruce Wayne.
Not related to the content but related to the post: I like the new format of "click here for more," and I like that it is a touch more streamlined now than before with all the black lines (or at least, that is how my screen formatted it before). Having it formatted to click and expand allows me to see more content when I first open the page. One question, is there any way to format it that when you click to read the rest of the content, it defaults so I can start at the beginning of the article? For me, it jumped right to comments.
I really have been enjoying these tag-team reviews. I hope to see more of them. The pictures are excellent and really detailed. Nice work to everyone!
@MaverickDengo - My mistake you are correct. Hopefully Huw can change that. Thanks for pointing it out.
@CapnRex101 - No problem! I'm really liking these reviews! So many good Star Wars sets this year!
@kwilder - I like the new format too!
@kwilder,
Click on the title of the article, or the 'continue reading' link to go to the top of the article page, or on 'comments' to go straight to them.
He looks like a cross between Darth Vader and the Elephant man.
Darth Malgus is certainly a very nice minifig, and certainly not the best one ever. The Cloud City Boba Fett/Skiff Boba Fett combo is still number one in my book.
@Huw: Thanks, that must have been what I did. I was planning to comment how much I like the new format, so I probably did that and then was wondering why I had to scroll up to see the rest of the article. Thanks.
And, since I'm thinking about it now, thank you also for all the effort you continually put into this site to create a quality place for people interested in lego to learn more. I appreciate spending my time at a site that is responsive and interested in creating a good website and experience for the people that visit.
Darth Malgus is a beast...if you guys don't know him..go to the library and read the book. These new line of Star Wars books are incredible and offer endless possibilities for Lego set ideas. Darth Malgus, Pleguies, Bane, Tyrannus, Reven, Malak and that's just some of the "new" Sith lords. I hope they focus on these characters for new sets, b/c they are much more interesting and deeper in perspective to most of the old characters. Boba Fett ois still my favorite SW character but Malgus is the best SW Lego minifig EVER. Over the last 2 years I must have watched that SW cinematic trailer 60 times and I still love in. Whoever said Eleena should have been added to the set is correct. She is Darth Malgus "girlfriend" in the book. I want to buy the $5000 Malgus statue but my girlfriend would kill me...lol
Rather cool figures from the loks of it.
Awesome! Can't wait till these hit the U.S.!
Just got the mail from Amazon, stating it has been shipped. Looking very much forward to it.
This and it's counterpart (striker republic fighter) are the must have SW sets of the year.
OK, you NEED TO SEE THIS: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l1KM3E0emjg
You will now understand how fricken awesome Malgus is.
@LegoboyProductions - The trailers are already linked in the review. Nice Youtube channel by the way, I did not realise you were a member here on Brickset.
The troopers are actually Loki!
Nice review!
Satele Shan? I have to get the game if it connects to the original Old Republic (I'm assuming it is seeing as a character has the last name of the second main character in the first game)
Anyway, really cool minifigs! Although I couldn't say Darth Malgus is the best ever. Still I really like the detail they put on his rebreather. Lego is making some great SW sets this year!
On Old Republic talk, here are some minifigures, battles, or ships I would like to see made from LEGO bricks in their new subtheme for the Old Republic:
http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/X-70B_Phantom-class_prototype
And a few others, but I forgot their names. Maybe someone can help me:
(1) The ships that destroyed the Jedi Temple from the outside in the last trailer,
(2) The one that went right through the front of the Jedi Temple in that same trailer,
(3) Satele's Zabrak Jedi master who was lightsabered in the Sith's assault on the Republic base,
(4) The battle where Malgus got his famous rebreather to match his scar on Alderaan, and lastly
(5) The Sith's flagship they came out of hyperspace in the first trailer.
^^^^^^ @MaverickDengo I wanted to point out the typo first! :'(
@Huw: Just wondering, why did you decide to put CapnRex101 in another review? Also, this question goes to you and CapnRex101, do you both have the striker, because I would love to see it compared to this and Malgus battling Shan, while the Sith troopers battle Malcom in the background.
^^^ I was wondering when you would an account here, but you've had one for almost a year. I love your YouTube channel, but now that I found you have this account, I can contact you through your profile since I don't have a YouTube account.
_______ ____ _____ ____ _____ _______ _____ _
Finally, l\ l \/ / \ l l \ l \ / \/ l \ / lll
l \ l l l l___ l____/ l___ \ / l l___ \ / lll
l \ l l l l l \ l \ / l l \ /\ /
l \l ___/\___ \____/ \____ l \ \____ \/ ___/\___ \____ \/ \/ O
Sorry, it was supposed to say "NICE REVIEW!" in huge-gantic letters. Also, I think this is the longest comment ever written on Brickset. I don't get it, when I was writing the comment it said "NICE REVIEW!" and looks really cool!
@billybobjoe - I do not know specifically why Huw chose to do another collaborative review, I hope because he likes my reviewing style and other people do as well. The way you say it sounds as though you are disappointed that he did feature me in another review... Anyway, I do have the Striker Class Starfighter, but have not yet built it.
^^ @billybobjoe- Sorry! You snooze you loose! :P
^^ Sorry about that, I love you in these reviews. I actually wrote " :'( " in part three of Jabba's Palace because I thought that you wouldn't be writing in another news article review. And I just realized, unless you are going to write thoughts about the striker, it only matters that Huw has it so he can shoot the pictures (with Jace Malcom's gun(XD)!)
^ Eh, doesn't matter. I was still sleeping when you posted that. I was up until 3:00 AM playing http://www.notdoppler.com/strikeforceheroes.php. It's really addicting! Until I threw a chair at my computer because it's so hard XD!
Unrelated, but what's up with all the blue underlined words? I tried one and it's trying to spam up your email address
Figs look great, and in my opinion this is a great set, but JIMMY CHRISTMAS is that price tag atrocious. Maybe if it goes on sale, I'll pick it up.
@Mequel- what book are you referring to?
I agree with Huw, very nice minifig who is not nearly iconic enough to be the best minifig ever (not even the best in the summer wave, as it turns out).
Darth Malgus is incredible. I have to get this set.
Darth Malgus is from Star Wars: The Old Republic, I believe. He's quite iconic in the expanded universe. I agree with Huw that he's not the best LEGO Star Wars minifigure, but maybe top 10 to top 5.
@Margot the book is called Deceived http://www.amazon.com/Deceived-Star-Wars-Old-Republic/dp/0345511395/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1340328862&sr=1-1&keywords=darth+malgus. Pick it up its a great book.
@Mequel- thank you!
i hate old republic, 1000 years before episode 1 but things are almost the same wth
Hey the legs for the Sith Troopers were printed for the Toy Fair display!
http://www.flickr.com/photos/fbtbnet/6865295171/
Maybe there is still hope.
Whenever I look at that darth malgus fig, I expect him to say, "you have my permission to die" in the voice of bane from dark knight rises.
^^Redanubis - Good spot, I wonder why they withdrew the printed legs...
Here's the URL to Wookieepedia's article on Darth Malgus: http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Darth_Malgus