Naboo Starfighter

Hasbro showed off their excellent new Naboo Starfighter way back in 2011 and it was scheduled to be released last year in support of the 3D release of Star Wars: The Phantom Menace.  It never made it to store shelves in the US.

Although online retailers did have it for sale, usually by the case with a Republic Assault Tank and Jedi Starfighter, the widest release for the ship was overseas in the UK and Australia as well as parts of Europe and Asia.  I missed out on ordering a case online but, luckily, Amazon UK ships to New York.  I received my order yesterday and took a few minutes to snap some pictures of this excellent ship.

The upgrades to this ship, from its original release in 1999, are quite noticeable.  It’s longer and more streamlined, for one, the cockpit slides open and there’s now a working  droid slot.  The electronics are gone, but there’s a launching missile underneath along with two that pop out of the nacelles.

With the currency difference, and shipping, it cost about $50 to have this shipped over.  That’s a little less than current eBay rates and less than buying a case.  The packaging has several languages on it, as it’s the European release, but the ship, instructions and stickers are the same.

Hasbro said at Toy Fair that there’s no outlet for the Movie Heroes version of this ship to appear at retail in the US.  While it’s possible that they could find a release for it in the future, it probably won’t be in the Class II Assault Vehicle line which has been downsized.  If you have an opportunity to pick this up, and not pay inflated secondary market prices, do so.  It’s an excellent update to a prominent Prequel Trilogy vehicle.