The Empire’s Death Star returns as a huge kilogram dimensional silver coin for Niue

It’s fair to say that in the realms of the media franchise coin, the New Zealand Mint’s ‘Star Wars’ range is about as extensive as it gets. Most, however, have been standard format coins of one sort or another. A recent sojourn into Chibi land and a range of ‘helmet’ shaped coins have been the main detours from the norm, but now we have something a little more ambitious.

The ultra-iconic Death Star has appeared on a few coins before, arguably some of the weaker designs, as they kept a border instead of going rimless, but never headed in the obvious direction of dimensional coins – until now. If you’re going to try something, go big, and the mint has decided a Death Star needs a kilo of silver to do it justice.

Coming in at 58 mm in diameter and with an antique finish, this new coin does a good job of replicating Emperor Palpatines vehicle of choice (he’s definitely over-compensating for something…). It’s a Niue issue, so the head of Darth Elizabeth (who was probably around ‘a long time ago..’) sits on the underside. The signature superlaser dish, and the equatorial trench are both present.

Packaging is neat and effective, showing off the fact you can afford almost €3,000 for a Star Wars shaped ball of metal, with ease. To be honest, if you’re a coin collector and a fan of the movies, this one is hugely appealing, especially with its 299 mintage. Exclusive to German dealer EMK, it’s available to order now with shipping from mid-January, assuming nobody blows it up in the meantime…

THE DEATH STAR

Death Star is the name of a number of fictional mobile space stations and galactic superweapons featured in the Star Wars space opera franchise. The first Death Star is stated to be more than 100 km to 160 km in diameter, depending on source. It is crewed by an estimated 1.7 million military personnel and 400,000 droids. One blast of its superweapon delivers energy comparable to that released by the Sun in an entire week. The second Death Star is significantly larger, between 160 km to 900 km in diameter depending on source, and technologically more advanced than its predecessor. Both versions of these moon-sized fortresses are designed for massive power projection capabilities, capable of destroying multiple naval fleets or entire planets with one blast from their superlasers.

The first Death Star is depicted in various sources of having a crew of 265,675, as well as 52,276 gunners, 607,360 troops, 30,984 stormtroopers, 42,782 ship support staff, and 180,216 pilots and support crew. Its hangars contain assault shuttles, blastboats, Strike cruisers, land vehicles, support ships, and 7,293 TIE fighters. It is also protected by 10,000 turbolaser batteries, 2,600 ion cannons, and at least 768 tractor beam projectors. Despite all that, they blow up quite easy

SPECIFICATION
DENOMINATION $100 NZD (Niue)
COMPOSITION 0.999 silver
WEIGHT 1000 grams
DIMENSIONS 58.0 mm
FINISH Antique
MODIFICATIONS Dimensional
MINTAGE 299
BOX / C.O.A. Yes / Yes