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Disney’s Millennium Falcon Drone Goes on Sale

Posted: 05 Sep 2015 12:45 PM PDT

Disney Star Wars The Force Awakens Millennium Falcon Drone

Even though a new trilogy would have sounded impossible a few years ago, there still are a lot of fans thinking that the new Star Wars: The Force Awakens movie is the best gift Santa could bring them this year. For their kids, there’s a new range of merchandise that includes, among many other things, a Millennium Falcon drone.

Now that Mickey Mouse is officially Darth Vader’s daddy, we’ll get to see action figures of menacing Sith Lords and cute Ewoks sitting right next to Princess Elsa and her likes. To promote the upcoming Star Wars movie, the entertainment giant has teamed up with American RC vehicle maker Air Hogs to create a series of toys that are more relevant to our times. As such, there is an X-Wing drone, but more importantly, kids of all ages will get to pilot Han Solo’s light freighter, the Millennium Falcon, which has also been turned into an UAV.

USA Today claimed that the Millennium Falcon drone would cost $120, but Walmart sells it for $88, while Toys R’Us offers it for $109.99. Star Wars merchandise can get pretty expensive, with some older Clone Troopers costing way more than that, so the price tag of the drones shouldn’t shock anyone. It’s a real pity that more original space sagas, that even served as inspiration for Lucas when writing Star Wars (I’m thinking about Frank Herbert’s Dune here) don’t get to have such merchandise, not to mention that they get nowhere as much promotion as Star Wars. Truth be told, Lucas’ brainchild is far more commercially successful, and most people nowadays ditch originality for pretty designs and special effects, anyway.

Disney also thinks we should take a break from our obsession with R2-D2 and C-3PO. To help us do that, it introduced the BB-8 app-enabled droid, which was developed in partnership with Sphero. Touted by some as the most innovative piece of Star Wars merchandise, the BB-8 droid might not be the huge commercial success Disney hoped, as it costs $149.99. Sure, crazy Star Wars fans will probably turn a blind eye while opening their wallets with a huge grin on their faces.