When pop culture conventions host a variety of vendors selling lightsabers from Star Wars, the caveat is on choosing who to buy from. Some pop up type operations are looking to cash in on the craze, and others are true enthusiasts who deserve the moniker. When I fell deep into this rabbit hole, I made sure I looked around for years rather than impulse buy. There are a lot of things people need to be aware of before buying their first saber.
At its most basic level, what you’re buying at toy stores is a flashlight. Those are the cheapest. The next step up includes a sound board and a motion sensor to activate the various audio effects (known as fonts). Everything else is a modification, with more bells and whistles. The best chipset to use requires some computer programming knowledge.
The same rules apply to the shape of the hilt. Between a basic aluminum stick with some grooves and curves to movie-authentic, the cost will rise. The offerings found at conventions range from starter units to movie replicas. Those enterprises are mostly resellers and do little work to create something new for customers. One search on Alibaba or Temu will reveal who the true manufacturers are. TXQ and LGT/Nexus dominate the market. When a portion of lightsaber businesses make orders from them and do further customizations or come up with different names to make what they sell look like they got exclusive rights, they realistically do not.
The two most problematic figures in Hasbro’s action figure line for the 40th anniversary of the