I bring good news for all you Lego Star Wars nerds: After a decade of multiple sets coming with a crappy, generic Lego Darksaber piece that no one likes, things are finally changing. An upcoming new Mandalorian-themed set will include a more accurate Darksaber piece instead of the current, lacking design, which is just a standard lightsaber piece molded in black plastic.
The Darksaber is cool and I never expected it to become a big part of live-action Star Wars after first appearing in the animated Clone Wars show and its sequel series, Rebels. So many rad and interesting bits of Star Wars lore never escape from the cartoons, or the pages of old novels. And The Darksaber—a legendary laser sword created by the first Mandalorian Jedi—is definitely one of those rad bits of Star Wars ephemera. Unlike standard lightsabers, it’s a shorter and more katana-like weapon with a unique black-and-white glow. And when it appeared at the very end of The Mandalorian’s season finale, I got very excited in a way that I still feel embarrassed about to this day. Later it popped up in a Lego set based on the show, and I was disappointed to see it was still using the same inaccurate, crappy piece that Lego had been using for a decade in Clone Wars sets. But no more!
Revealed yesterday by Lego and Disney as part of a larger Mandalorian-themed week of new merch, the upcoming Spider Tank set (75361) ditches the old piece for a new, sharper-looking black blade that more closely resembles the Darksaber as it appears in the show. I’m very happy.
Last year, I was excited to buy the then-new Mandalorian N1-Starfighter set because I like the character and the show, and the N1 is my favorite Star Wars ship. (Yes, it’s from the prequels, but don’t hold that against it.) However, I was bummed that even after two seasons of The Mandalorian and a few years of Lego making sets based on the show, the company was still shipping that awful black lightsaber piece. In 2022, Lego suggested that it didn’t have enough time to create a brand-new piece for the N1 set, but still wanted to include the Darksaber regardless. Now it seems like the company has had enough time to finally create the new piece.
Yeah, that’s totally what happened. No way Lego saddled a popular set with a crappy piece fans disliked and then added the cool new Darksaber piece to a set that looks pretty bland in order to get nerdy adult Lego fans (hello!) to buy it just for the shiny new Darksaber. Nope, that’s absolutely not what happened. And frankly, I resent the implication.
The new Mandalorian Spider-Tank set is scheduled to go on sale August 1 and will cost $50.
