The D’Deridex-class Romulan Warbird is the first Romulan ship to join the XL-sized line of The Official Starships Collection, Star Trek Starships XL Collection. Designed by veteran Star Trek concept artist Andy Probert, the D’Deridex-class Romulan Warbird first appeared in the Star Trek: The Next Generation first-season finale “The Neutral Zone,” and then on many subsequent occasions throughout the remainder of the franchise.
Alongside the Klingon Bird of Prey, the Romulan Warbird has probably become one of the most iconic Star Trek alien starship designs, and so any model needs to it absolute justice. Andy Probert originally designed the ship to be vertically-oriented — which the Eaglemoss team have said they are exploring making a concept ship model for — but that the horizontal ship design was developed out of the creative process.
The iconic design has been rendered as a nicely detailed model for the Eaglemoss Star Trek XL line, and it’s an impressively-detailed one. It comprises a metal forward section and plastic secondary hull and nacelles. Along the forward section — or, the head of the bird, to interpret the ship’s shape literally — there are lots of nice details including many small windows that depict the gargantuan size of the Romulan Warbird.
The model appears to match the second studio model (two Romulan Warbirds were built and used for production), as well as the CG model created by Foundation Imaging later in Trek: the nacelles have extra greebles that were not present on the first studio model built for “The Neutral Zone.”
The coloring of the model and its vibrant green is a close match to the model as seen on screen, though in real-life the studio model’s paint scheme uses a duller shade of green. But that very strong green is how we know the ship best from the vessel’s on-screen look, and so Eaglemoss has replicated that well. Like a lot of Eaglemoss models, this too suffers slightly from the problem of the window paint not quite matching up with the window notches on the model’s body, but given their tiny size, this is not as noticeable as it has been on some of the larger Starfleet model ship.
The main body of the Warbird also has a number of raised details and panel lines that add a lot of visual interest to the model. This really is an impressively-detailed model.
But it’s also one that feels a bit small. Though it measures nearly nine inches in length from bow to stern, when lined up against some of the other Star Trek XL releases, it is one of the stockiest of the bunch. That’s a shame, given the Romulan Warbird is one of the most impressive ships in the fleet, but standing next to some of its bigger brother models, it is a little dwarfed.
In addition, the ship’s stand is not the greatest: it grips the lower shelf of the secondary hull, but it does not feel secure and the model is prone to slipping from the stand if you are not careful with it. In addition, because the ship is long — and the metal parts are all the way at the front — the novel is very close to being forward heavy and dragging the ship over.
This is definitely one of those models that you want to be very comfortable is secure in its intended display position before you walk away from it… or you might be in for a nasty surprise.
Overall, the D’Deridex-class Romulan Warbird is a great addition to your Eaglemoss Star Trek XL starships collection, especially if you love the franchise’s alien ship designs. Though it may not have the size of some of the other XL models, it more than makes up for that in the intricate details and that cover the entire model and make it a lot of fun to examine.
If you’re interesting in adding the Romulan Warbird to your fleet of Star Trek starship models, you can pick it up now in the United States for $74.99. While as of this writing the model is on backorder in the UK, but keep an eye for its availability for £49.99 here if you’re in that region.