Star Wars microfighters — although being a fine source of minifigures — aren’t always the best in terms of both collecting value and building experience, mostly because of their size and scale. We all know: if you’re looking for aesthetically pleasing models, you should go in for sophisticated UCS-sets. I have been sharing this opinion, but only til last night when my eye was caught by a couple of CHIBI (cute-huggable-idiotic-baby-inspired) spaceships by Kim Do-hyun.
Building large Star Wars ships in such a peculiar scale and style is an advanced challenge in itself. However, Kim nailed it — and not at the expense of elaborate greebling. All the dished and tiles on Millennium Falcon are pretty familiar and look absolutely cute. At the same time, the Imperial Shuttle is genius in its simplicity. It’s just a couple of regular and curved slopes and a wedge at the nose that make the shuttle so recognizable. A slight disproportion in the size of its parts gives the model its totally adorable look.
I just want to take both ships in my hands, embrace them softly and never let them fly away. Full stop. Sorry, ewoks, you’re not my favorite any longer.