LEGO Star Wars designer talks priorities going into 2026's BB-8

LEGO Star Wars launched a fresh take on the sequels' star droid, 75452 BB-8, but with a whole new raft of priorities.

With many reviews, including our own, labelling 75452 BB-8 a downgrade on the now-retired 75187 BB-8, the foremost question around the LEGO Star Wars set is: why now, and why in this style? When Brick Fanatics' Matthew had the chance to sit down with the set's designer, Henrik Andersen, the LEGO designer explained that there were some clear priorities and goals that went into the design of the set.

"We know that he shows up as one of the most lovable characters, especially among the droids," explained Henrik. "He's loved by almost all of our audience, from small children to adults. He hasn't been available for some years, so now was a good time."

Henrik went on to note that, with all the other buildable droids that have been released, such as 75379 R2-D2 and 75398 C-3PO, now was as good a time as any for BB-8 to get the same treatment (although not quite at an accurate scale to the others as we see in the movies).

"To make it different from the previous one, which is a round sphere on a base, this is more of a playable display model," Henrik continued. "I wanted to add the functions, so we very quickly moved away from the idea of a stand and him being completely round. We would rather have the function of the head [turning as the droid moves].

"In this model, the most important thing is to have that function. It's a nice display piece, but you can also actually play with him, especially since it's a 10+ model, so geared a little bit more towards the younger audience."

Henrik did note that he played with including the thumbs-up light feature as part of the droid's moving function, but it ended up taking away from the turning head. That said, you can still stick out the blue flame, like the previous LEGO set and in the movie, but manually rather than as part of an interactive function.

"It's always about weighing what's more important and what will be the new feature in this set," concluded Henrik.

75452 BB-8 is available to buy right now from LEGO.com, in stores, and from select third-party retailers for £79.99 / $89.99 / €89.99.

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