Review: 75036 Utapau Troopers

Set ID: 75036 Utapau Troopers

Number of Pieces: 83

Year of Release: 2014

Minifigs: 4

Purchased Price: About SGD 25

The Battle of Utapau is memorable to me only for the epic fight between Obi Wan and General Greivous, and the lizard chase, and the rest are just a blur to me. So when LEGO released this set as one of the many (more than 3 is considered as 'many') battle packs, I must admit there is little recollection of how the Utapau Troopers look like, or how they battle against the Octuptarra Tri-Droid, which is also included in this set.

In any case, the Tri-Droid is not the star of the set, the minifigs are. While I am not a fan of Battle packs as I am not a minifig fanatic, the quality of minifigs in this year's range of battle packs has been beyond my expectation.

Building Experience

I was totally hands off in this. My son spent 15 minutes to put this set together, just enough time for me to come out of my shower to write the review. He gave me some pointers to write, but generally point towards "unchallenged", "boring" and "zzz". I do not doubt his words, especially when he was put through the 10188 Death Star challenge with me recently. The scale of this effort is dwarfed in comparison, to say the least.

Two packs of bricks were found in the standard Battle Pack box, one with most of the bigger bricks while the other contains the smaller ones. The content is complete with a cape box, folded instruction manual and a sticker sheet.

Building the Tri-Droid requires everything to be done in three's (duh) so do expect some repetition in the building process. There should also not be any major challenges for anyone 6+ and above. If you do, there's always DUPLO to fall back on.

Tri-Droid vs. Troopers

If this is really a battle between the Tri-Droid and the 4 troopers, it will be a non-contest. Troopers will win. First, there are 4 of them so the droid is grossly outnumbered. Second, this Tri-Droid's arsenal is just pure dumb. I suspect the flick missiles will fire into one another if they are activated all at once. Playability wise, it is also difficult to flick these missiles as they are mounted on the rotating dome of the droid, so every time you push against the missiles, it will rotate the dome and prevent you from putting enough pressure to fire off the missile. Its a classic case of dog chasing the tail, if you get what I mean.


On a positive note, I do like the variation of including of the light brown bricks with this set and the stability of the completed Tri-Droid, mostly contributed by the stiff click joints in the legs.

Minifigs

Since the set is really nothing much to shout about, I bet the most of the focus will be on the two pairs of minifigs - one of the Airborne Clone Trooper and the other, the 212th Battalion Trooper. All four of them come with the grossly oversized blasters with shooting mechanism. As I have mentioned in my previous entries, such weapons increase the playability but mark down on the aesthetics. And I don't think the Tri-Droid will be intimidated by these weapons either. All the four troopers also share the same head piece design. Unlike the early years of faceless troopers, LEGO has evolved to give more credit to these soldiers by giving them a face behind those helmets. Somehow, the troopers now have an identity and an expression.

Airborne Clone Trooper

As these Troopers were slaughtered en masse on screen, it is difficult to remember much, or whatever is remain, of them. Having compared to the online resource, I cannot help but to compliment the mini fig team in LEGO for scoring with this one. The oversized helmet comes with great details and even battle damage. What is also nice is the ability for the head to turn even with the helmet on. This is for pure vanity reason and photo taking opportunities. But it matters to me. Talking about details, the ones found on the torso scores big with me - from the sling of the ammo pouch, to the utility belt, every detail was mooted with the intention of emulating its movie counterparts. If I have to nitpick, the orange right hand and white left are not supposed to be entirely in those colors, for these are actually the colours of only the shoulder pad, without extending beyond the elbow. Mark my words, in time to come, the minifig team will start toying with more details on the limbs, something that they already explored to full extent on the leg pieces.

212th Battalion Trooper

Their helmets have a slimmer profile, due to the leaner design of the ventilation tubes on the side of the chin. The color choices are spot on, except again for the arms of the Troopers. I cannot emphasise enough the details on the torso and leg piece, especially given the lack of space on a typical LEGO minifig. The designers have fully utilised every inch of space to ensure that these minifigs are comparable to the movie counterparts. I can imagine how the traditional Storm Troopers will look pale in comparison to these Clone Troopers if you put them side by side. The challenge will be for the designers to see how they can include more details, without losing the identity of the minifigs.

Conclusion

Buy. But only for the minifigs. You are free to dispose of the Tri-Droid, or take it apart for future replacements of lost parts, I don't care. But if you are a minifig lover, I strongly recommend that you get a few of this set to get a whole platoon of these troopers. Make it a battalion size, if you can.

+ Extremely detailed minifigs. One of the best to date
+ Not that expensive. But this will not be valid if you want a battalion size worth of them.

- Easily forgotten Tri-Droid, totally a no-contest vs. the Troopers.