Gunpla #53 - P-Bandai HGUC Emergency Escape Pod - Primrose Review

Youtube review: https://youtu.be/MQdYu-pd60s

Hi, guys. It’s me again with another gunpla review. This time,  I will talk about the recently released premium bandai exclusive add-on for High Grade Universal Century, Emergency Escape Pod, Primrose, from Advanced of Zeta series. Anyway, I would like to inform you, who have not watched the unboxing video of the kit before, that it has the original price of 1404 Yen, excluding the shipping cost of course. This add-on follows HGUC Hrududu which has been released few months earlier. The remaining questions probably, what could you do with this add-on kit? How many variations could you make from one kit? Does it worth your money? In order to answer those questions, without further ado, let’s review the kit.

Firstly, I will talk about how many kitbash variations you can make from this kit, based on the manual. If you read the manual, it said that we can make five kitbash variations using the primrose, which are: Hazel Owsla, Hazel Next-generation mass production machine, primrose equipped with hrududu, primrose equipped with tri booster unit, and the last is primrose equipped with enhanced shield booster. It also said that you will need at least two primroses to make all those variants. Furthermore, you will need one unassembled pbandai Hazel Custom with expansion parts, two unassembled advanced Hazel with expansion parts, one assembled Hazel II and one assembled Hrududu. You probably think the requirements are too much, anyway, you don’t actually need all of them. I will show you soon how to make those kitbash variants with minimum requirements.

Anyway, this is the original form of primrose. It’s quite simple and you could actually build it less than 10 minutes. Basically, it consists of three parts, the main body, the backpack and mega particle cannon. The mega particle cannon could be deployed by moving certain part to another peg connection. During the assembly process, you will have to choose between Hazel Custom type and Advanced Hazel type backpack. For this review, I will use Hazel Custom type backpack. Anyway, if you want to make a single kitbash kit, I strongly recommended you to choose Advanced Hazel Backpack. Why?? This is the reason.

Here are the backpacks of Primrose on the left, and Hazel Custom on the right. It’s obvious that they are nearly identical. They also have same gimmicks for the booster connection. The main difference is the colors. While Hazel Custom backpack mostly uses different color parts, the primrose use ... well ... stickers, which is quite big messy to put on the kit.

Anyway, the main point is, unless you just want to make primrose in its original form, separately, without kitbashing with other kit, you practically don’t need to make a second Hazel custom backpack. Furthermore, If you simply want to make Hazel Owsla, you won’t need Hazel custom backpack. And that’s why you’d better choose Advanced Hazel backpack type.

Another thing, similar with Hrududu, even if the manual said you need pbandai Hazel Custom and Advanced Hazel, you actually could use the retail or normal versions of those kit, which were previously released in 2005, because they are actually identical with the only difference was the expansion parts for making Gundam TR-6.

Hazel Owsla

Anyway, this is the first kitbash variation of primrose, the Gundam TR-1, Hazel Owsla. To make this mobile suit, you will need : Hazel Custom for the head, arms, legs, feet, beam rifle and shield. Advanced Hazel for the scope, sub-arm, and feet booster, Hazel II for the backpack, Hrududu for the blade rifle extension and finally the primrose for the torso, shoulders, mega particle cannon and special hand to hold the blade rifle.

It looks badass and I personally prefer this Hazel form compared to Hazel-Rah. Hazel Owsla also has pretty good articulation and quite easy to pose.

Hazel Next Generation (Mass Production Machine)

The second kitbash variation using primrose is Hazel Next Generation Mass Production Machine. This mobile suit is basically Hazel Owsla stripped of its armors, beam rifle and shield with Hazel custom backpack. This Hazel variant only uses beam saber as its main weapon. Honestly, it looks so cute compared to other Hazel machines.

The third kitbash variation is primrose equipped with Hrududu. I didn’t make this variation because in order to do that, I have to disassemble the Hazel Owsla torso back to primrose original form. While it’s possible, it will be quite complicated to do that. Anyway, of course, you can make the Hazel Owsla to use Hazel-custom backpack, and connect it to hrududu. And viola ... you will have this.

Hazel Owsla - Rah (?)

The forth kitbash variation is primrose equipped with tri booster unit. It’s almost similar with the third kitbash, except you will need Hazel II backpack and two mega particle cannons. That means, you will need two primrose kits. I also didn’t make this because I only bought one primrose.

The last kitbash variation is primrose equipped with enhanced shield booster. Again, it’s similar with the third variations, except you will need two shoulder armor parts of primrose, two booster shields and advanced-hazel type backpack, another reason why you’d better chose it while building primrose.

In summary, these are the (very) minimum kit requirements to make kitbash variations with primrose:

1. Emergency Escape Pod/Original form --> 1 Primrose
2. Gundam TR-1 Hazel Owsla --> 1 Primrose, 1 Hazel Custom, 1 Advanced Hazel, 1 Hazel II, 1 Hrududu
3. Hazel Next Generation Mass Production Machine --> 1 Primrose, 1 Hazel Custom, 1 Advanced Hazel
4. Primrose equipped with Hrududu --> 1 Primrose, 1 Hrududu
5. Primrose equipped with Tri Booster Unit --> 2 Primroses, 1 Hazel II
6. Primrose equipped with Enhanced Shield Booster --> 2 Primroses, 1 Advanced Hazel (or 2 Advanced Hazels, if you prefer more accurate shields)

Of course, aside from what manuals said, you can actually make other variations since AoZ kits are pretty easy to kitbash. One more thing, this kit also comes with one (very standard) stand base similar with HGUC Hrududu.

Hazel-Rah and Hazel Owsla

And, finally, it’s time for the verdict. Well, I would say that the primrose is a fun add-on because you can make many kitbash variations, of course, if you have the kit requirements. Anyway, Rather than using those ugly stickers for part separation, I think Bandai should give us better backpack for this kit, because they actually have produced it before with the old Hazel Custom. Also, I couldn’t understand why they still keep telling us on the manual of the necessity for pbandai version of Hazel Custom or Advanced Hazel, while we actually could do kitbashing with the retail released kits.

Nevertheless, I think this kit is a must buy for the fans of AoZ series. If you are short of budget, you can just buy one primrose. But if you want for kitbash kits variations, you’d better buy two or even three primroses.

Okay, that’s all for the gunpla review this time. Thank you very much for reading, and ... see you again next time.  

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Emergency Escape Pod - Primrose

Pros:

• Very wide possibilities for kitbashing
• The Hazel Owsla form is quite solid and has more articulation than Hazel-Rah

Cons:

• Extensive use of stickers, even though the (old) original backpack of HGUC Hazel Custom has been already used specific parts for color separation.
• Quite expensive, and you need to buy at least two primroses for making more kitbash variations

Gunpla #52 - RG Nu Gundam Review

Youtube review: https://youtu.be/GmIUivD0h70

Hi guys, it’s me again with another gunpla review, and today, I will talk about the most anticipated real grade kit of 2019, The Real Grade Nu Gundam from mobile suit gundam: Chars Counter Attack. As usual, before reviewing the kit, I would like to inform you that the original price of this kit is 4536 Yen (including the tax). I actually have started working on this kit since last week, but because of Obon Holiday in Japan, I became occupied with other things and got delayed on finishing the kit. By the way, another reason which made me so late making this review is because I spent too much time playing with the kit. Probably, this is the first time I had so much fun playing with an RG kit. I will show you why later. I will review the completed kit with the panel lines and decal stickers applied on it, then the articulation, gimmicks and options you have to play with it, and finally I will show you how to use effect parts for the fin funnels of the gundam.

So, here’s the completed Nu Gundam with panel lines and decal stickers applied on the kit. I think I don’t need to say much, because it’s just simply amazing, so detailed and totally eye candy. Everything looks right, the panel lines, the markings, everything. There are at least two tones of white for this kit. You can see slightly grayish white on the head, shoulders, front skirts, inner arms, and some parts of the legs. Similar with Real Grade Sazabi, this kit is not simply a scale-down MG Nu Gundam Ver Ka, because there are quite many things which differentiate this kit with its Master Grade counterparts. In term of proportion, I personally prefer this RG version compared to MG Nu ver Ka. The head is probably a little bit bigger, but I like better it than the MG version which has longer face. And the most important thing is, there are no psychoframe gimmicks on this kit like MG ver Ka . Some people may love it, and some probably hate it, but if you knew the story, the psychoframe for nu gundam exists around the cockpit only, so this RG version is actually the one which is more anime accurate compared to its MG counterpart.

The construction of this RG kit is a little bit similar with RG Sazabi. One thing I found very interesting about this kit however, is the role of Advanced MS Joint which is not used for the main body of the mobile suit, but rather for the fin funnels. The torso and limbs of Nu Gundam on the other hand, use inner frames quite similar with MG kit. So ... It kinda feels like building a MG kit in 1/144 scale. While building this kit, pay attention to the shoulder-torso joints and waist – leg joints, because they are quite difficult to connect. If you put too much pressure on the joints, it may end up with nasty stress marks on them. Also, be careful with the “v” insignia at the crotch, because it is really small and difficult to put on the place. Other than that, the assembly process of this kit is really enjoyable. Probably one of the best experience of I’ve ever had in gunpla building.

One thing which made many people skeptical when RG Nu Gundam was announced is the fin funnels. I guess everybody know how fragile the fin funnels connection on MG Nu Gundam ver Ka, however, such thing is not gonna happen again this time. While the connection itself looks a little bit similar, the difference in size and mass makes the fin funnels on RG Nu Gundam much more stable than its MG counterpart. So stable, they didn’t even fall apart when I shook the kit. In order to make the posing easier and more enjoyable, this kit introduced a new action base connection. Instead of connected to the crotch as normal RG kits usually do, the action base adapter is now connected to the backpack, and it could be attached to peg connector of action base. Since Nu Gundam has large funnels on its back, this new way of connection proven very useful to avoid them fall apart from the shocks while connecting the kit to the action base.       

Anyway, the thing that makes RG Nu Gundam stands out from another RG kits is the articulation. If you have built RG Sazabi before, you may notice that the kit had outstanding articulation despite its giant body. However, the joints and articulation gimmicks of Sazabi were pretty tight and a little bit difficult to pull out. While still inheriting the amazing articulation of Sazabi, RG Nu Gundam on the other hand, has much smoother and solid joints. It is really easy to move the head, arms, body and legs, without any worry you will break the plastics. The wrists of Nu Gundam also had extension gimmicks like Sazabi, but now, it’s much easier to pull out. The legs in particular, have sliding armor gimmicks, where the armors easily move while the leg bends. You can even lift the legs even further by modifying some joints on the waist section, which in my opinion is the most complicated gimmick of this kit. In order to do this, you need to apply a kind of locking-unlocking mechanism on some parts of the waist. Moving to the main body, the torso of this Nu Gundam incorporates an amazing articulation system which allows you to bend it forward, backward, left or even right so much easier than you can imagine. And the most important thing is, everything is so solid and nothing breaks or falls apart when you move any body parts of this kit.

Another incredible thing this kit inherits from the RG Sazabi is open hatch gimmicks. Some body parts like shoulders, cockpit, chest, front skirts and calves could be opened in certain degrees. Again, all these gimmicks are really simple and easy to pull out. Also, these gimmicks also give hints that Bandai may probably released add-on for Heavy Weapon System for this kit in the near future.

All this things make RG Nu Gundam really fun to play with. You can make so many cool poses without any worries of falling parts or fin funnels. Seriously, in terms of articulation and stability, there is no doubt that Nu Gundam is currently the king of RG line.

Similar with RG Sazabi, this kit comes with three sets of hands and one right trigger hand. It retains the beam rifle, shield, bazooka and two beam sabers with three beam effect parts, and of course there’s also a tiny figurine of Amuro Ray. The bazooka could easily be attached to the backpack with a special peg connector. This kit also comes with backpack parts to make the double fin funnels system, which is will be released as p-bandai next month. This is not covered in the manual, but you could actually make the light version of double fin funnels with the backpack part. And of course, if you have two RG Nu Gundams, you could make the actual double fin funnels without buying the p-bandai kit.

Anyway, despite all its greatness, there’s one downside of this kit: the shield. While the shield itself is beautiful and highly detailed, it has one major flaw. Instead of using peg connector, the shield just simply clips around the arm which is not very secure since a slight shock could make it falls off.

 The last thing I would like to talk is the effect parts for fin funnels. Bandai released figure-rise-jet effect on the same day as RG Nu Gundam, and they are perfectly compatible. These effect parts come in two sets of colors, yellow and blue, and each set could be use for three fin funnels. Remember, only three funnels, so if you want all six funnels flying, you should buy at least 2 sets of effect parts. This effect part has two kinds of connector, the “plus” shaped connectors which could be attached to Nu Gundam fin funnels, and “circle” shaped connectors which could be used for ... guess what ? Yes, for the funnels of RG Sazabi. Using these effect parts, you can recreate the battle scenes of these two iconic mobile suits from the anime. Believe me, it was so satisfying to play with these two kits together.

The verdict is, I have no doubt that the RG Nu Gundam by far, is the best RG kit ever released by Bandai. Certainly it is not a perfect kit, but in term of aesthetics, articulation, gimmicks and stability, this is truly an engineering marvel and one of the best experience I’ve ever had from gundam plastic model kit. No matter if you are a fan of Nu Gundam or not, I recommend you to have this kit, build it, pose it and enjoy the feeling of accomplishment.

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RX-93 Nu Gundam

Pros:

• Man ... Except the shield connection, everything was perfect

Cons:

• Shield connection was very unsecured, really easy to fall off