So we’re still waiting for those plans to build a full-scale, working U.S.S. Enterprise to come to fruition, but wildly-ambitious projects to make some of science-fiction’s most beloved spacecraft doesn’t end there.

Coming to our attention just hours apart, just as an Internet petition is raised on the White House ‘We The People’ platform urging the U.S. government to “secure resources and funding, and begin construction of a Death Star by 2016” in order to “focus defense resources into a space-superiority platform” and “strengthen national defense”; another team based in Nashville, Tennessee is pouring its attention into building a full-size, correctly-scaled Millennium Falcon.

Introduced by the Obama Administration, ‘We The People’ promises official responses to all petitions that exceed 25,000 signatures. With 3,543 signatures gathered so far and a December 14^th deadline day looming, there’s still a way to go before the U.S. government even considers plans to build the moon-sized spacestation/superweapon (the Death Star) that, lest we forget, would have the power to destroy entire planets with a single destructive laser beam...

More concrete are plans to construct the “fastest hunk of junk in the galaxy” with the build of a real-world Millennium Falcon. Conceived by Star Wars enthusiast Chris Lee (who also happens to be an original member of the 501^st Legion of Imperial Stormtroopers), he intends to use the finished Falcon as a place to hold workshops for kids, and has already gone and bought an 88-acre plot of land in his native Tennessee where the tremendously ambitious build will take place.

With power, water and foundations soon to be in place, Lee and the rest of the project’s contributors are now asking for donations and help via their official website to get things moving. No end date set as of yet – Lee says they “really don’t know” how long it’ll take, and jokes, “the journey is the reward, as they say” - the project does however have a complete, intricately-detailed 3D model of the Falcon in place to work from, created by college student Stinson Lenz. So the final thing won't actually fly, but it's a fascinating project that deserves recognition, if not only for the passion and determination of those behind it.

Visit FullScaleFalcon.com for more on the project. Sign the petition for the Death Star here.

Richard Birkett