The UNSC Hornet 96806 was one of the very first vehicles released in the Halo Mega Bloks line back in 2009. To say that I dislike those early sets would be an understatement–I found the construction to be flimsy and I would spend more time putting the sets back together after they crumbled in my hands than it took to build them in the first place. That said, I love me some Halo Wars (and Halo 3), which means I was definitely up for the new and improved 2013 remake of the Halo Mega Bloks Hornet that debuted at this week’s 2013 Toy Fair…

The original UNSC Hornet Mega Bloks set wasn’t totally horrible, but it was highly unstable and very under-detailed by modern MEGA Brands standards. As the UNSC Hornet AV-14 Attack VTOL is a vehicle heavily featured both in the Halo video games and Halo novels, I always thought that it deserved to have an upgrade, but probably wouldn’t get one (as the vehicle has been phased out in the most recent Halo video games).

But MEGA Brands is clearly serious about making their Halo Mega Bloks line one of the best and most comprehensive toy lines ever made, and so they’ve gone back to improve on the earlier Halo Mega Bloks UNSC Hornet which so desperately needed a remake. Both the wings and the pontoons look vastly improved and more detailed this time out, and I think the army green coloration suits the Hornet a little better than the old grey did.

One complaint: I do have to say that the huge Gatling gun on the nose of the UNSC Hornet looks awful. It didn’t look good on the old 2009 set, and it doesn’t look good now. It’s just too big and inaccurate, and I’m desperately hoping that MEGA Brands will tweak the design of it before this vehicle hits production.  This is probably the last UNSC Hornet Mega Bloks set that will ever be made, so it’s important that it be as close to perfect as possible.

The new UNSC Hornet will include two Halo 4 Spartan figures and is one of the Halo Mega Bloks Summer 2013 Sets that should be released in June/July 2013.