Today, TNT was playing the original Star Wars, The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi. As I veg out in front of the TV, I decided to dig out several of my old MPC Millennium Falcon kits. All basically the same kit, but retooled each time it was reissued. First is the original 1979 lighted version of the Falcon. This one is unbuilt, and was bought in the early 1990s. It has a rudimentary light set that puts some small bulbs in the cockpit and engine area. It runs on two C cell batteries.
I wonder what eBay would get for this kit?
The second one was the first one I ever got. It is built and painted (poorly) with the sales receipt is dated 7/28/84 for $5. I would have been 20 years old then. One of the rear landing gear is broken and half missing. What a blast from the past.
The third one is the cut away version released in 1996 by AMT/Ertl. It looks like I started the interior missile compartment but never got farther than that. Most of the kit is untouched and still bagged.
The other three are newer Revell kits, a larger Millennium Falcon, Imperial Shuttle and Kylo Ren’s shuttle from the Force Awakens.
The Falcon is listed as 1/92, the Imperial shuttle is 1/121 and Ren’s shuttle is 1/93. I know I got Kylo Ren’s on clearance, and knowing myself, I did to the other two as well.
Along with most of the newer Fine molds and Bandai kits, suffice it to say that I have a lot of Star Wars kits to last me a while.
Rob, I’ve built two of the newer Bandai kits: an A-Wing and an X-Wing. Both superb kits. I have a third on the bench, a TIE Striker, maybe two weeks away from being done. As soon as I can afford one, I’ll be getting a B-Wing. A B-Wing kit ain’t cheap.
Rob: Those sound cool. I’d love to see photos of the vintage ones even if they are wrecks. As a guy who’s more a Trek fan I missed a lot of those. The only ones I had were the old MPC Star Destroyer and TiE Intercepter.
Two of the three Falcons are virtually untouched. The one I bought in July 1984 is built to 1984 standards. I briefly considered rebuilding and refinishing it, but it is a snap shot of my skills as a twenty year old. Besides, it would be easier to just build one of the other two, since they are all the same basic kit.
I believe I bought all of the available MPC kits from the first movie. If memory serves me, the Falcon, TIE advanced (Vader’s), Luke’s X-Wing, R2-D2, C3PO, and Darth Vader.
The Star Destroyer was released during The Empire Strikes Back. I got that kit and the Snow Speeder as well as the AT-AT that came with tiny snow speeders. There was also a Hoth Rebel base with tiny X-Wings, Y-Wings and the big transport.
By the time Return of the Jedi was released, I bought multiple copies of the kits when they were being clearanced at a local department store called Ames.
I’d like to see your first Falcon, too. I built that one, but by the time the next release came out, I was moving away from models and towards girls.
I only ever built the very first “Star Wars” kits, the X-wing and Darth Vader’s TIE fighter. I was disappointed that they didn’t release the regular TIE fighter at that time. Never got the 'droids, either, though I built the Darth Vader figure.
Rob: Hang on to that build Falcon. I have some kits from about when I was 20 or so but they’re kinda beat-up with parts missing. Aka, tanks with missing hatches etc.
Wish I still had some from back when I was a kid but they all ended up beat to pieces and shoved in the spare parts box. So I guess I still have them, they’re just smashed all to hell and gone.
I also built the MPC Millennium Falcon kit, grain of wheat light bulbs, paper engine light diffuser and all. Unfortunately, it was a friend’s model and before digital photography, so no records survive.
I remember the excitement when the MPC X-Wing and Vader’s TIE fighter hit the shelves at the LHS. All my friends bought the X-Wing kit, and we had epic space battles in the back yard! I was a little disappointed that Vader’s TIE was not to the same scale as the X-Wing, and that it was too many years until a 1/48-ish standard TIE fighter came out. But it was all good, since it was before the Dark Ages. Before AMS.
I cut off the safety tips, shaped the missiles to a proper pointed profile, then painted them orange and green for that laser effect. Pew-pew! Lotsa dogfight action in the house! But the Cylons had two shots versus the Viper’s one. Darn Cylons. But they couldn’t hit anything anyway. [:P]
