Star Wars: The Black Series X-34 Landspeeder and Luke Skywalker

 

 Well, it’s January, so it’s the perfect time to be thinking about warmer, sunnier climes as well as still trying to march through all of the toys I got last year but never got around to examining. That is a long list, kiddies, and I arrived at the realization a few months ago that I could not and did not need to adhere to any particular chronology with my articles, which was a literal blog life saving realization. Anyhow, as predictions of a fair amount of snow come barreling towards Chicago, let’s look at the ’93 Chevy Cavalier of the Star Wars universe, the 6” scaled X-34 Landspeeder.

Oh, right. There’s a Luke Skywalker figure included in this as well.

Kinda hoping this looks Tatooine-y.

The X-34 became everyone’s first dream car when it debuted in A New Hope as the pretty awesome, but intended to be junker, sweet,sweet ride of Tatooine farm boy Luke Skywalker, using it to gallivant between Tosche Station and Anchorhead and eventually cool part of town, Mos Eisley. Repeatedly framed as being a hunk of junk, a label that will be applied to a few vehicles in the mythos, the X-34 is nonetheless a pretty cool looking, hovering two seat basically car which may be our first look in A New Hope at Star Wars-tier technology made available to the average person, having thus far seen a Star Destroyer and the massive Sand Crawler. It’s the first indication that you, too could have access to a future space vehicle. Because of this, despite it’s generally bland and uninspiring look, the X-34 winds up holding a very special place in the hearts, minds, and imaginations of a lot of Star Wars fans, particularly the older generations of them, although please DO NOT read that in some “true fan” or “real fan” bullshit voice. I remember seeing A New Hope as a real young child, like five or six years old, and eventually thinking, “wow, everyone has cool space vehicles”. Today, I’m a 40 year old, and Star Wars has become cultural currency to the extent that everybody knows Star Wars means cool space vehicles, even if they’ve somehow *gasp* never seen the movies.

The Used Future

The Black Series landspeeder is a real impressive vehicle, one that I skipped on its initial release due to it just screaming unimpressiveness in every picture of it I’d seen, and so it was an easy pass with its $40 retail sticker. Sometime last fall I found this one on eBay, still sealed, for $20, and jumped on it. Also, prior to this past summer, my experience with Black Series vehicles was limited to the First Order TIE Fighter and the Imperial Speeder Bike, so vehicles for this line were sparse and I was generally avoiding them. It was not until the release of other vehicle sets, such as the Dewback and Enfys Nest’s speeder, neither of which have been covered on the Coffin yet, that I developed this interest in the line’s larger pieces. So, predictably, I bought that $20 landspeeder, and when I got it out of the package, I was really impressed. For something that looks so, so bland, it is really interesting and excellently rendered in plastic form.

The landspeeder holds two figures, and has a surprisingly detailed cockpit section. In order to insert figures, the windshield needs to be removed, or at the very, very least, it is easier to seat figures with the windshield detached. This is a super minor inconvenience, but. Things like this sometimes make me worry that excessive use will damage the plastic of the windshield, but that may be more paranoia on my part than any realistic issue on the toys’. In general, the vehicle is accurate to its screen depiction, having a place for Luke’s long rifle to clip on, as well as wear and damage and weathering on the body. There’s even the trademark dent on the front end, the detail that shouts “teenagers’ first car!!” to the observer. 

 

 

There are also a trio of opening panels on the vehicle. The first is the landspeeder hood, which opens to reveal the engine, which is nicely detailed and well painted. Another panel opens to reveal some more engine-ish parts, and the third opens to allow for accessory storage. Convenient, as the Luke this vehicle comes with has a handful of small accessories. The landspeeder also has a clear plastic stand, which plugs in to the underside of the vehicle, allowing it to look like it’s hovering, which is really great. The Imperial Speeder Bike has a similar stand, as do other Black Series vehicles where it would be appropriate, and this is a really nice touch. Unlike the stand for the Speeder Bike, the stand for the landspeeder does not allow for the vehicle to tilt, so any dynamic, action “poses” for the vehicle are not possible. While this makes sense, given that we only see the landspeeder standing still or traveling in a straight, flat line, it would have been fun to be able to display the vehicle in a tight turn or doing a sick dive or something. No real loss, but we did just host our annual Fast and the Furious themed party last weekend, so wild driving and racing are still fresh in my mind at the time of this writing.

As for the figure, Tatooine Luke Skywalker is also included, and is fine. Frankly, this is my least favorite version of Luke, including Last Jedi Luke for all the extreme haters out there (we WILL eventually get around to talking about The Last Jedi here, I promise. –mr), so right out of the box I was none too amazed by this figure. It’s a perfectly fine and standard Black Series figure, but it’s pretty much just Luke in his karate gi, with some bonus pieces. He has his big desert poncho and floppy hat, neither of which I can bring myself to be excited about, as well as huge space binoculars, the previously mentioned long rifle, which has to be like a space flintlock or musket, and of course, a lightsaber. It’s a completely fine A New Hope Luke, but it’s just not a very exciting figure.

While I cannot say that this is a mandatory piece for any Black Series collection, I was, and still am, shocked at how much I appreciate owning it, and how much enjoyment I get from looking over in its direction and thinking, “I’m glad to own that.” It was released alongside Rey’s speeder from The Force Awakens, a piece that I really have no interest in, but would certainly buy if the price were right enough (read: low enough. –mr). I really do like the vehicles in this scale, and have noticed that they do take pretty drastic hits in price once they sit around long enough, and don’t really run the risk of selling out. I’ve seen dewbacks and Enfys Nests at Targets on clearance, a shame in both instances that no one appears to be buying them. We’ll talk about those toys later on, but the landspeeder has OT appeal and everything. Something else that it really has going for it is that it’s not too large. If collectors were appalled or turned off by the massive size of the TIE Fighter, a vehicle of this size should probably be more acceptable to them.

"Hey kid, cool ride. Why don't you go kiss your sister?"

Again, not flashy or loud, the landspeeder is a good add to a Black Series collection, one that is low key enough that it may never be on that mental list of Top 10 or 15 Black Series pieces in your collection, but will usually be more than enough to make you happy when you see it or remember you own it. For the right price this is a super quality add to your shelf.