What can be said that hasn't been? This set is a classic. It's a genius idea executed perfectly the first time around. The build is stable and stays together, the features are really neat, and you get a ton of iconic scenes in one build. This is a must-have IMO. Can't say much more than that.

As a big Star Wars fan specifically the New Hope film is my favorite of the films this was a wish list item for me. Around Christmas, back in 2016, I had made the purchase before making the purchase I had called my local LEGO store, and they had told me that they had sold their last one ever, the set had retired. After that phone call, I was very upset, but I had found it on Amazon for $100 more than retail value, so I jumped on it.

I loved the building process it took me 3 weeks to complete all 3803 pieces, but it was worth it the build looks awesome. All 24 minifig looked great and made for so many hours of playtime. This set has become not just my favorite set but also the center point of my entire collection.

If you are a Star Wars fan and love LEGO this is the set for you, it covers 2 movies and allows you to recreate thoughts iconic scenes. It looks great on display and has great playability. I know the Millennium Falcon, Star Destroyer, X-wing, etc are iconic but the Death Star is one of the single most iconic locations from New Hope and Return of The Jedi this is a must-have for any Star Wars fan.

Who doesn't want to have a Death Star in their Lego collection? Of course the problem is that it is just so incredibly expensive, and rightly so given its immense size. But in reading comparisons between this Death Star and the one that is constantly sold out at the moment that costs $100 more, it appears that not a whole lot has changed, and certainly not enough to justify paying the big bucks to score the new set. However, I'm guessing because the new set is an improvement, you can now get this older set for a considerable discount on the second hand market. It took a long time and many failed attempts at landing this set, but in the end I managed to get this set on eBay for $275 with tax and shipping, and aside from a few missing bricks (all which I can get on Bricklink for well under $1), it is perfect and in great shape. The only thing I didn't get was the box, but I can live with that given the price I paid.

This is my first experience building a UCS model, not counting the tiny 10026 Naboo Starfighter. While I've actually acquired a handful of incredibly large sets over the last year, this one is the easily the largest, well eclipsing my NES set that I purchased barely a month ago. As a result I really didn't know what to expect with this set aside from the fact that I would need to dig through nearly 4000 bricks to find the ones I needed.

The Instructions

So this was an incredible shock to me. I was expecting several books as is usually the case with large sets, however for this set you get a single book that is spiral bound and printed on very heavy 11x17 paper, meaning when you open it you need an area a yard wide just for the instructions! The book contains 200 pages and no fluff. I'm used to these sets containing a several page introduction, but not here, you open it up and straight to step 1. As soon as you complete the model you get the inventory pages and it's over. While I would have liked the usual intro, I can forgive Lego because the massive size of these instructions would indeed make it difficult to read. What I do like is that each step has a considerable amount of pieces, if I had to guess I'd say it averages a little over 10 bricks per step.

Parts

Well you sure do get a lot of them, and for the most part they are very large bricks and plates. This is not a set that gives you a ton of 1x1 studs to inflate the brick count, yes, you do get a lot of small parts, but that's because you get a lot of parts! I'm not sure that any particular part is all that special or hard to find, aside from the ones you apply stickers to, but you do get an interesting collection of parts. My favorite thing is that you get a black hose that dates back to sets from the 80's (think Classic Space) as well as several light gray antennas from the same era. These are parts that I have not seen outside of the sets from my childhood so I was pretty excited to see them in a Star Wars set. While there are a good sized collection of technic parts, I'd say percentage-wise it is relatively small for a Star Wars set. That said, every technic part is for a play feature, they are not used for structure at all.

The Build

Since I got this set used and it was disassembled and placed in quite a few ziplock bags that broke and opened up during shipping, the most time consuming part of the build was of course sorting all of the bricks and finding the ones I needed. Then I had to find room to build this set, I needed a place for the instructions, model, and the 20 ziplock bags that I organized the loose bricks into. The trickiest part was being able to keep the instructions close enough so that I could see them. Well let's just say I took my time in building this which stretched out over several weeks and 9 evenings. Overall, including time spent sorting bricks as well as setting up and cleaning up at the beginning and end of each session, it took me 19 hours and 15 minutes.

Just so you know, this build isn't rocket science, or even space station science, it is pretty much just simple stacking with a limited amount of technic for play features and very little SNOT. While this is a little disappointing, it is not surprising given that it is really just floors and walls, and it is still an enjoyable build. Yes, you can argue it is only building floors and walls, but each one is different so while similar, you do go back and forth a lot, so it never feels repetitive. It also helped that I broke it out into so many sessions so I never repeated similar builds in the same night.

No particular part of the build stands out as exciting or creative, although watching this model grow to such an immense size is probably the best part about it. Of course it is also nice when you build out the components of different rooms as it changes up the build dramatically, whether it is a cannon, or Vader's TIE, or even the very simple trash compactor.

Play Features

I said this is the ultimate play set, and much of that is thanks to the large number of rooms, openness, and quantity of minifigures which allow you to play out pretty much any scene that took place on the Death Star (except for trench runs). However there are also a large number of play features.

My favorite feature is the two part feature of the detention level with a grate that opens and empties into the trash compactor. The trash compactor can then start closing although the long metal pipe thing doesn't bend. The door in the trash compactor also opens (into the elevator).

Another fun one is turning off the tractor beams which is on an elevated platform. I really enjoy how the blue power thing hides inside and being a Classic Space fan, really like the levers are antennas. The way you reset this feature is also well designed.

You do have one cannon on the bottom level that can be aimed and fires a large missile like you have in the new action battle sets. On the top floor you have two more cannons that don't fire, yet swivel in unison which is a very cool effect for when you fly an X-Wing past them.

The main planet destroying weapon can be aimed both horizontally and vertically using stacked spinning mechanisms that are integrated quite nicely into controls directly above it.

You have Vader's TIE that is hangs and can be swiveled, and while very small, it can hold Vader.

You also have a closing blast door between where the Falcon is and where Vader and Obiwan duel, although it simply slides closed in a single direction, although you really can't expect any more given the fact you don't have room for it to move from both sides, and certainly not diagonally.

In the emperor's throne room you do have a platform that can fall, although it doesn't work great. More importantly, you have a pit to throw him into.

The bridge scene is well represented, although the doors don't close. All you have is a rope hanging from the ceiling that allows Luke and Leia to swing across.

Finally you have two elevators, one that pulls you up to the room where the TIE is located, but should really be the room where the Falcon is located. There is also a large elevator running through the central core of the model with openings (not doors) on each floor.

The Model

The model itself looks great. Obviously this set does not represent the exterior of the Death Star, but it's spherical shape is more than sufficient. Perhaps the best visual effect I've ever seen in a Lego set is in the detention cell where the long and seemingly endless hallway is well designed with a series of walls with progressively smaller openings, a narrowing walkway, and a sticker in the back.

Perhaps most importantly is that this massive set, completely devoid of technic to reinforce the structure, is actually incredibly strong and can easily be moved. While it is too heavy to fly across the galaxy, it can be moved easily enough to facilitate play or place on a table.

Overall

I certainly would have loved a more complex build, it is disappointing that in a set of this size you don't actually see any revolutionary techniques. My only other complaint is the inclusion of the TIE. I'm not upset to have it, but I feel a miniature Falcon would have been more appropriate as it is physically present on the Death Star in the movie, the TIE is only a participant in the trench run which isn't included in this set. Anyways, it is easy enough to add a Falcon microfighter to this set to make up for the omission.

When it is all said and done, this set gives you everything you need to reenact all the scenes from the movies on both Death Stars. The minifigure selection is fantastic, no one has been forgotten. This is simply a set that is a ton of fun to build and a ton of fun to play with. The fact that you can get it at a considerable discount over its original price makes it very well worth it, even though it still is expensive. I do highly recommend this set to any Star Wars fan as you will no doubt absolutely love it.

Awesome. Found the subtle shades of grey hard to distinguish in the manual...so I made several goofs in the build, but otherwise just an awesome set.

This is a great set but it does have some flaws that I will discuss in this review.

Instructions

I found no mistakes in the instructions but they can get hard to understand at times.

Minifigures

The sheer amount of minifigures in this set greatly increase the amount of playability but some minifigures are unnecessary such as the many Luke Skywalkers.

The build

Building this set can be exciting at times such as when you finish a large section but most of the time it gets to be quite a bit repetitive.

The completed model

The completed model looks good if you have all the minifigures doing something otherwise it looks deserted and bland and doesn't look very good on display.The circular shape of the frame is as accurate as lego can get. The only downside to the model is the size, unless you have a massive shelf or desk you won't have space for it and it will have to sit on the floor and possibly be kicked by someone.

Overall opinion

This is a great set overall and I would recommend it to anyone that has the money for it.