LEGO Star Wars 75388 Jedi Bob’s Starfighter review

LEGO Star Wars gets meta for Rebuild the Galaxy by reaching back into its own canon to bring back a cult character – but is that enough to hang an entire set on? 

Perhaps the best way to kick off a review of 75388 Jedi Bob’s Starfighter is to point out how incredulous the community was when rumours of this set first dropped. Surely the LEGO Group wasn’t really about to bring Jedi Bob back from the annals of LEGO Star Wars history? Why would it do that? Why now? And – perhaps the most important question of all – who is this set for?

Release: August 1, 2024 Price: £34.99 / $39.99 / €39.99 Pieces: 305 Minifigures: 3 LEGO: Order now

Jedi who?

To understand the significance behind 75388 Jedi Bob’s Starfighter, you first need to understand the significance behind the main man himself. The anonymous yellow-skinned Jedi first popped up in 2002’s 7163 Republic Gunship, released alongside Attack of the Clones in a time before the LEGO Star Wars theme had fully embraced the saga’s zany cast of background characters – and instead decided to come up with its own.

This grinning warrior would go unidentified for seven long years, until someone at DK Books decided he needed a name and crowned him ‘Jedi Bob’ in the LEGO Star Wars Visual Dictionary. He’s since gone down in legend, and in 2020 was at the centre of a fan campaign to choose the minifigures in 75309 Republic Gunship – but when he failed to materialise in that UCS set, any hopes of Bob returning to the LEGO Star Wars line-up effectively dried up.

That was until the LEGO Group and Lucasfilm announced LEGO Star Wars: Rebuild the Galaxy, an upcoming Disney+ animated special that reimagines a galaxy far, far away. The Millennium Falcon’s gone evil, TIE Fighters and X-wings are getting mashed together, Darth Jar Jar is on the loose, and seemingly at the centre of it all is Jedi Bob. It’s a surprising gambit if only because this character is still pretty niche in the wider world of LEGO Star Wars – he is 22 years old – but the LEGO Group is giving it a go anyway.

He's now coming back to the physical LEGO Star Wars line-up in 75388 Jedi Bob’s Starfighter, a 305-piece set that takes advantage of what’s effectively a blank canvas to give us a new and original Jedi Starfighter.

A Jedi Starfighter, but not as you know it

With zero source material to work from, the LEGO Star Wars team could really have gone in any direction with 75388 Jedi Bob’s Starfighter. It’s slightly disappointing then that we’re getting another red and white Delta-7B, given 75333 Obi-Wan Kenobi’s Jedi Starfighter only arrived on shelves two years ago, but this one does just enough differently to carve out its own space in the portfolio nonetheless.

It’s red rather than dark red for starters, and there’s some nice colour blocking with smart use of pointed 2x4 wedge plates. Hints of dark grey towards the back of the ship throw a third colour into the mix without compromising the ship’s relatively clean aesthetic, while the bulbous cockpit is integrated a little better here than on previous Delta-7Bs. Everything still sits a little higher than in the movies, sure. But this is definitely the best take on this starfighter we’ve seen in LEGO to date.

That’s helped too by the plates with door rails that fill in the gaps previously present on 75333 Obi-Wan Kenobi’s Jedi Starfighter, and of course by the creative liberties the designers have otherwise taken with 75388 Jedi Bob’s Starfighter: the three engines at the back of the ship are meaty and mighty, while the additional two engines at the front call back to Anakin Skywalker’s custom Jedi Starfighter from the 2003 Clone Wars TV series. It all makes for a formidable and fun ship to swoosh around your LEGO room.

It's not all good: the cannons on either side of the ship feel a little tacked on, though they’re easily removable (same for the spring-loaded shooters underneath), while there are still some obvious gaps underneath the cockpit (sorry Bob, this one’s not airtight – best not leave the atmosphere). The rear landing gear is also not really tall enough to have any effect on the starfighter when it’s sitting on a table, so you might want to consider a display stand for this one.

The storage compartment for Bob’s accessories – a sadly-unprinted blue milk carton and a banana – is cleverly hidden too, and while you need to remove a piece to access it (rather than opening a hinged compartment, for example), it does mean avoiding unnecessary bulk in what should be a nimble and streamlined starfighter. The stickers are also few and effective: you won’t want to leave them off, but adding them isn’t too taxing either. A happy middle ground.

They call me mellow yellow

‘A happy middle ground’ also feels like a suitable way to describe the minifigure line-up in 75388 Jedi Bob’s Starfighter, which does its very best not to take attention away from its star with even better secondary characters. We don’t really have context for any of these minifigures yet (not that we really need it for Bob), but the Ackbar Trooper feels a bit disappointing given we could have made one of these at any point using existing pieces. There’s no room in Bob’s ride for an astromech droid either, so here we have a pretty funky spin on a Gonk Droid instead. And that’s really all there is to say about Servo (SR-V0).

Which brings us to Jedi Bob, who’s just as yellow as the day we put him away with the rest of our Attack of the Clones toys, and even more worn than we remember (isn’t that always the case with your childhood minifigures, though?). That clear design differentiation on his torso will be music to the ears of collectors worried about the value of their original Jedi Bob, a demographic the LEGO Star Wars team always seems to be conscious of when releasing new minifigures, but everything else about this character is as nostalgic as you’d expect.

That’s right down to the yellow skin, which in hindsight makes sense: yellow minifigures are supposed to be a blank canvas for any ethnicity, so giving Bob a specific skin tone would sort of defeat the purpose. It means he stands out in the LEGO Star Wars line-up in 2024 for sure, but there’s no harm in calling even more attention to what’s clearly intended to be a cute call-back for those of us who have been at this longer than we care to admit.

So, who is 75388 Jedi Bob’s Starfighter for? Well, in a way, it’s for everyone. For those who owned Bob as a kid, it’s like injecting nostalgia straight into your bloodstream; and for those with zero attachment to this weird yellow Jedi, it’s just a really good Jedi Starfighter (probably the best yet). The price is a little hard to contend with, but then what LEGO Star Wars set isn’t worth waiting for a discount on?

The LEGO Group has been pretty sneaky about finding new ways to repackage tried and tested ships with Rebuild the Galaxy, but between 75388 Jedi Bob’s Starfighter, 75393 TIE Fighter & X-wing Mash-up and 75389 The Dark Falcon, it’s hard to hold a grudge.

This set was provided for review by the LEGO Group.

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Our honest opinion: It could have been even bolder, but Jedi Bob’s long-awaited return to the LEGO Star Wars line-up does just enough to make this a Jedi Starfighter worth picking up. Again.