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In a previous review, I looked at an exclusive Star Wars LEGO set from Target, the Hailfire Droid 75085. This time I thought I would look at the one remaining exclusive set from Walmart, Anakin's Custom Jedi Starfighter. This is the ship that Anakin flew in Star Wars: Clone Wars. For those of you who don't know or don't remember, in 2003 between Attack of the Clones and Revenge of the Sith, there was a short lived animated series called Clone Wars. This series was loved by some, hated by others and largely forgotten until used as trivia. None of the events are considered canonical anymore since the CGI The Clone Wars series was launched. All of that to say thatafter about 2005, there was not a single product released in conjunction with the first Clone Wars cartoon series until someone at LEGO decided to greenlight 75087 Anakin's Custom Jedi Starfighter. Let's take a look at this unicorn, this beautiful anomaly. REVIEW: SET DETAILS Set #: 75087 Name: Anakin's Custom Jedi Starfighter Theme: Star Wars Parts: 370 Price: $39.99 Before we get to the build, let’s talk value. At 39.99 the price per piece works out to almost $.11 each. This is on the high/middle side of pricing for a licensed set. There are 3 minifigures. The minifigures are Episode 2 Anakin Skywalker (also available in 75021 Republic Gunship), a unique Asajj Ventress, and a red astromech droid (unnamed) that also appears in 75039 V-Wing Starfighter. BOX CONTENTS Some people may wind up picking up a set that is open box or, want to verify the box contents before beginning a build. For this set, there are 3 numbered baggies, a sticker sheet, and an instruction book. THE BUILD AND EXECUTION BAG 1: I honestly can't remember the construction on the last Clone Wars Jedi Starfighter that I built, so I'll be going into this without a comparison in mind. The first thing that I noticed was the place where the Astromech would eventually sit. If I remember one thing, it's that LEGO puts an ejection system into the deeply seated Astromech ports, a slot that an axle will fit in. Obviously the attachment points for the wings, but what about that Technic pin with towball? Ys, this is a separate chunk from the first one. I was kind of surprised at how long this was. I guess for $39.99 I should have expected a longer/bigger ship, but I was thinking of how short every other Jedi Fighter in my collection is. (OK, maybe I was comparing things more than I originally thought.) There's 3 stickers applied to that 16x4 wedge. Too bad that they didn't print it, hopefully I got the stickers on straight. Now, flip it over and add some details and a landing gear. The details consist of a pair of pearl gold binoculars on each side. You also build Asajj Ventress with her dead white eyes, just like the 2003 Clone Wars character model. It would be nice if she had arm printing, but that's asking for a lot for a Walmart exclusive set, I think. BAG 2: You keep building up the structure of the ship. You're surrounding the Astromech port to protect it in battle, or from just randomly falling out. Instead of another landing gear or 2, they built a foot, and additionally some weird flap things. I wasn't really thinking ahead of the build, so I was wondering what these decorative flaps might be for. Ag, attachment points for the engine pods. It's weird because I thought for sure that they were bigger in front. Oh, there it is. Also 2 more stickers. I may have attached the stickers angling the wrong way. I didn't really feel like taking it apart to shift the stickered pieces around. Now, you build a wing. Thankfully, the striped pattern is brick built instead of stickers. I probably would have stopped if these wings used ugly stickers. Each wing has 2 guns and 2 spring missile launchers. But that wing looks short, right? So you build a smaller wing and attach it to the tow ball. This creates the more fluid wing shape that appears on this version of Anakin's fighter. It's not super easy to pin the smaller wing to the bigger wing. I kept fidgeting with it. Why is there a Red R2? Where's R2-D2? I don't remember the cartoon series, but back in 2003-04 Hasbro also had a red R2 dome. Maybe it's because in Episode 2, the Jedi Starfighter didn't have a full droid, just a red dome. Bag 3: I see where we're going here, time to build the other wing. For some reason, I was thinking that the cockpit was in front of the Astrodroid at this point. Guess I was tired or not thinking clearly. Rest assured that even though I did not picture it, the wing builds are similar. Looks like we're making the cockpit, look a sticker control panel. Don't fly in space with a giant hole in your cockpit. Ooo, another fin, and the last sticker. Here it is, the final product with young Anakin. This is pre-mullet Anakin. He's still got that ridiculous braid too. I guess that's why he's so angry. REACTION The set looks good, but to me it just doesn't fit in. There's really no other sets from this era of Star Wars. It's an anomaly that it appeared so long after the cartoon that spawned it. Asajj was never my favorite villain, even though I was reading the comics and watching the cartoon that featured her. I think I set up my lighting wrong, so you can't really see the details on her head. Both minifigures have dual sided printing on their torsos and printing on the backs of their heads. They did a good job matching the unique shape of this ship to the original cartoon image. It's not perfect, but then what is? FINAL THOUGHTS I looked at my thoughts on the Hailfire Droid, and I find that my thoughts for this set echo that one, only moreso. In this world of the Sequel trilogy and the anthology films, Clone Wars is becoming increasingly marginalized. The fans of 2003's Clone Wars are rarer than fans of The Clone Wars (2008) or Rebels. The only thing going for this set long term is that it is an exclusive. Its' exclusivity has not helped it terribly during its retail lifetime. I have never not seen this set on shelves somewhere. Walmart and the LEGO store stock it, and if it went out of stock, no one really noticed or cared. What would have helped this set the most is if it had been retired at the beginning of 2016 along with the raft of other Star Wars sets from 2015. It seems that LEGo had no new exclusives for The Force Awakens to take its place though. Target, Walmart and Toys R Us seem to require an exclusive to be available at all times. Because of this, this set is sticking around, and won't get a discount until the week it finally retires. By then, consumers will be so sick of seeing it on shelves, it will quietly disappear into the stockrooms of the few who buy everything on clearance. I expect minimal gains long term. I just don't see a lot of people who were kids in 2003 to be clamoring for it later on when so many other, better sets are available. EXTRA PIECES As with most Star Wars sets, you wind up with some extra lightsaber hilts. You've got the metallic silver and the light blue gray Asajj ones in this set. Plus a gold pair of binoculars that is not very common.

With so many total sets available and #chaos in full effect as predicted by J-Mack, I thought it would be useful for new(er) members to the site and to Lego investing on the whole to take a look at how a short or shorter than expected run can greatly impact the value of a set. Without further adieu... The Mine 4204 June 1st, 2012 – Nov. 29th 2014 CAGR: 0.05% I loved 4204 The Mine. It had a lot going for it (at least in my eyes) – cool subtheme, unlikely to be remade, and lots of potential buyers seem to like construction vehicles and sets in non-technic sets. I'm sure they like them in Technic, too, but based on sets released, traditional sets seem more popular and sell more. I got a great deal on a whole bunch of them about one and a half years in, and hoped to see it retire around the two year mark. Sadly, either more sets were produced or not enough folks were buying at MSRP because it lingered for about two and a half years. Unfortunately, the brickset.com dates also only indicate the date at which it became unavailable from Shop at Home, but I can assure you that Toys R Us in Canada still had stock into early 2015. I like a varied portfolio, I'm a big believer in the right CITY sets, but the shelf life hurt 4204 in my opinion. Currently Brickpicker lists its US value at essentially MSRP. Granted, it was a CITY set, so if you didn't get it at a good discount you can only blame yourself, but profit potential seems to have been crimped by availability from 2012 into 2015. City Cargo Terminal 60022 Aug. 1st, 2013 – Dec. 12th, 2014 CAGR: 15.97% In comparison, another large CITY set, 60022 Cargo Terminal, was available from Shop at Home for under eighteen months, total. Massive difference for another subtheme I liked and thought was cool. With a current BP value of around $155 USD, plenty of extra room to visit profit land and frolic in piles of solid returns. With CITY sets, I'm not really looking for a set to hit the stratosphere, but I find they can be steady workhorses that reliably net returns – great for mixing it up. That being said, a couple of other sets I want to focus on had even shorter runs than 60022 and have exceeded likely every investors' expectations. (I call BS if investors claim they knew The Zombies was going to break through $200 USD on launch day or even as it started to become a little hard to find) Logging Truck 60059 Dec 2013 (Jan 1st 2014 wide release) to Dec 15th 2014 CAGR: 67.27% Cool vehicle from a sometimes overlooked theme. Add approximately one year of availability, stir, and watch the money come in. Enormous ROI%, even at MSRP, but pure gravy for those with the foresight to get some of these at 20% off or more. The size of the set really helps the CAGR percentage, which is great for new investors who are looking for solid short to medium term sets that can really help a small time investor scale up. Arctic Supply Plane 60064 Aug. 1st, 2014 to Dec 28th 2014 CAGR: 43.63% Crazy short run from a theme most probably though had at least another twelve if not eighteen months. Just now the last Arctic sets have moved to Sold Out at Shop at Home, so quite a big difference. Even though the plane looks a lot like other planes (at least to me) in other City subthemes – like the plane in the Deep Sea subtheme (another Toys R Us exclusive, at least in Canada), it certainly hasn't caused collectors to NOT want to buy this set, even while its brothers and sisters were widely available. With great scarcity seems to come nice gains, even if the set doesn't seem all that amazing. Ant-Man Final Battle Jun 1st, 2015 – Oct 15th, 2015 CAGR: 25.66% Seems to be in a nice initial growth phase. Even with some chatter about this set and investors jumping on the bandwagon, the lack of new supply will likely only keep prices in relative check for a short time. Great minifigs and a very short run, plus upcoming screen time in new movies means a lot of potential. Despite knock off Superhero minifigs being an issue – and many superhero set builds being underwhelming – there is still money to be made on the right sets. Also spoiler alert the 2016 summer Superhero sets look a lot more desirable overall, so perhaps this is a good time to try out this theme (or revisit it, if you've been avoiding it in the post 6866 world). Plus, this is a crazy short shelf life for a set, even if it had issues at launch. Snowplough & Excavator and Others... The whole Demolition line seemed available on sale over the holidays, at least around me, but the Excavator seems to be the exception. Brickset lists it being available from Dec. 2nd, 2014, but general release (I believe) was Jan. 1st, 2015. A retail life under a year and from a cool subtheme, I think this might surprise in the next six to twelve months. Toys R Us Canada has them on sale right now, 33% off (Jan 29, 2016) and I tend to think this could be an easy double at this reduction with pending official retirement. The Snowplough is even cooler (at least in my opinion) and I think will be a huge draw next winter in places that get snow. Just around a year of availability and well-reviewed on other Lego sites all point to a nice potential profit in the next twelve months and beyond until it hits a plateau There are plenty of other sets from other lines, but I have to leave some work for readers to do themselves. I tried to highlight a few I find interesting, but rest assured this isn't a complete list and there are other short-run gems out there to be found. Right now, Hydra Fortresses, Pirates sets and Raptor Escapes are being sought out at retailers. The beauty of the short run sets (or themes...think Castle before and Pirates now...Scooby Doo is my prediction for 2016) is that often online stock dries up quickly and getting more than one or two requires some leg work, stock checking and dragging the kids (or self) to physical stores to mop up the remnants. For me, it is one of the most enjoyable parts of this hobby/business, although I am a self diagnosed masochist who likes the awfulness that retail environments sometimes foster. Final Thoughts Older investors are probably familiar with a lot of these sets, and earlier ones; the lore of the Zombies and Wolverine's Chopper Showdown are the stuff of investing legend, whispered about whenever two or more investors gather. Keeping a watchful eye on the forums here on Brickpicker as well as Shop at Home should give you enough lead time to go on a buying spree when you see a short run hit sold out. Currently, there are so many lines/themes and waves out there that short run sets seem to be happening with more regularity – or I'm just noticing it more – but they present opportunities that a savvy investor can jump on. If you live in a regional area with a lot of competition (from “normals” buying sets from their kids or, worse, rival Pickers) the chances of short run sets surviving long after moving to 'sold out' are slim, so stay sharp out there! Veegs