Revell's Star Wars™ The Force Awakens Millennium Falcon

I bought the Revell Star Wars: The Force Awakens Millennium Falcon from Amazon a couple of weeks ago while online shopping. This is cheaper and slightly smaller than the Bandai's 1/144 scale Millennium Falcon. From what I gather online, this Revell kit is around 1/160 something scale.

The kit comes in a nicely printed cardboard box with a picture of the Millennium Falcon with the new rectangular radar sensor, indicating that it is the new Millennium Falcon from The Force Awakens movie. It says that it is suitable for Ages 6+ (yes, I qualify!), Skill Level 1, and takes 30 minutes to built (verified to be about right). It also indicates that it has action, sound and lights! You don't get that on the Bandai kit.

The back of the box shows what Skill Level 1 means, the parts list and the features of the completed kit. No glue, no paint and no tools are deemed necessary to complete this kit! It also shows some other kits of the series that you can collect.

Here are the parts out of the box. The pieces are all nicely cut out by Revell - there are no sprues/runners to cut these parts from, like most model kits. The 2 main halves of the ship are nicely held in place within the box with 2 clear plastic inserts (seen on the left side of the picture). These prevent the painted halves from moving about and getting scratches on the paintjob. The plastic insert also holds the blue tinted transparent Hyper Drive of the Falcon (blue strip on the right). A single sheet of instruction is included. The smaller pieces of kit are wrapped in a plastic bag. The electronic piece responsible for the light and sound is separate from these parts.

Building the kit was pretty straightforward - add parts to bottom half, add the 2 side hatches, add light and sound module, add parts to top half and finally put the 2 halves together.

The side hatches both have some holes on one side. From what I gather, these help to transmit sound from the electronic module. However, the instructions did not indicate should these 2 holes oriented to the top or bottom of the craft. I decided to place them at the top.

After about 30 minutes (or less actually), the kit is done. It is pre-painted and it does look good! Panel lines are detailed and if you want, a nice weathering wash would bring out more details. As it is, it already looks good.

The cockpit is painted black so there isn't any details at all. The gun turrets rotate but do not pivot up/down. The rectangular radar sensor rotates. The landing gears can retract and extend.

The light and sound module is activated by one of the exhaust vents at the back (centre bottom one). The light effect is a nice blue glow simulating the Hyper Drive! You get the movie effect sound too.

The landing gears extend and retract with a nice click. There are 5 landing gears to hold the Falcon up. You can see the nicely detailed bottom of the Falcon in these shots.

Overall, I had great fun putting this kit together. There is very little you can go wrong with this kit. Perhaps some care should be taken when pushing in the landing gears in case you break them. The parts are sturdy and seem to be able to hold up to a bit of play. I think it is great value compared to the Bandai kit (I may still get it to try out and if I do, will compare it to this kit). The finished kit looks nice and is already painted so it is really hassle free to build. Hope you enjoy this little write up on this kit. I am a Star Wars fan and this is really one of the easiest kit I have completed.