Salamander

One more picture: Takatoku VF-1J with reissue Super parts attached:

There's a gap between the lower arm and the arm armor near the hands, but the arm armor simply clips on. Not true fit problems.

Now I don't have a vintage Bandai Valk handy, so I don't know whether it fits on those...

The text says they're still working on the molds so it seems nothing is definite yet. The text also mentions that there are build errors on the test shot model and readers should take note of that.

It just shows off what will be diecast. Also, I'm pretty sure that the test shot lacks certain parts required to make the joints stiff enough (check out the ankle joints and the feet - they sag. Bandai's good at making ball joints that don't sag) and perhaps springs required for the transformation.

So the thing to keep in mind here is :

1st testshot

(Well, since some people apparently managed to get the Chunky reissue thread locked by going off-topic , I'll be posting this in its own topic... )

Since no one has yet posted a review here's one:

Box:

Some people have complained about the box being ugly, but I do quite like it. Of course, it's not a Takatoku or original 1980s Bandai box, but it looks quite fancy with all the black and makes me think of a SoC box. One thing I noticed is that it appears to be thinner and somewhat more compact than those of the last batch of reissues...

Inside is a nice sturdy tray, better than of the reissues from a few years ago:

The bag with the instructions and sticker sheet is taped to the cardboard tray and contains this:

The stickersheet is entirely pre-cut and made from very thin material. There's three numbered stickers that aren't shown in the instructions but that are meant to go on the landing gear doors. The instruction sheet is a bit small and short. The other paper is what looks like a feedback form, with questions on Valks-people-would-like I presume.

A look at the top tray with the Valk and the Super parts:

Super parts are green. The Valk, the missiles, and the heatshield are protected with plastic sheet and plastic baggies.

Super parts and accessories out of the box:

(Some parts have been turned upside down to show the innards)

The Valk itself in Fighter mode:

The landing gear is spring-loaded and works well as usual. I think the springs have been tweaked a bit to be somewhat less strong.

Tail with skulls and fine tampo-print on leg:

Nose with tampo-printed pilot name:

I think these new reissues have some more detail painted on than the last batch of reissues. Also note that Max's VF-1A is light gray and not white. Of course, the gunpod still can't be attached in this mode.

Fighter with Super armor:

The armor fits on quite tightly, except for the leg armor, which tends to fall off at times. One thing I don't like is that the Super-pack equipped fighter mode tends to sag in the middle because the legs don't support the wings/arms anymore like without the Super-pack.

Gerwalk, normal:

Check out the tampo-printed detail on the hands. Nice. Except that this mode still suffers from the usual chunky monkey problems: the poses that are possible are minimal without compromising stability and it looks weird with the legs like that.

Gerwalk with Super parts:

See above for comments.

Now here we get to the best mode of the Chunky: the Battroid:

Doesn't Max look handsome?

Of course, articulation in this mode is excellent for such an old design. Jointed neck, shoulders, upper arms, elbows, hipes, knees, and ankles. The gunpod attaches to the arm with the gunclip, or fits snugly into the right hand. The heatshield is easily swappable with the canopy.

With Super parts we get this:

No stand was used for this picture. Nor for the next one, by the way.

Chunky Monkey Action!

I haven't been able to find any painting errors, nor anything that felt like it might break at any time. Plastic quality seems to be excellent, as well as the molding and fit. Gimmicks work as expected. Bandai managed to add more detail with nice tampo-prints. The sticker sheet was improved, and the packaging is quite nice.

Some things could be done better, like the instructions

9.5/10

1st thought, giving the anniversary and all that, it's going to be Minmay/Minmay's spirit.

2nd thought, some sort of protoculture being.

3rd thought: Kawamori himself.

Now that would be a shock alright.

Fan will rage and SK will be forced to make a compilation movie: The End of Macross........

Which obviously will mean the next series will be called "Macross Returns"

I had a horrible, horrible, horrible thought (that is, if you're an Alto-hater... ):

What if the triangle motif of the opening (and the series) expands beyond a love triangle?

We have Ranka and Sheryl, both singers. I suspect you could call them "actors", too.

We have Alto, who was a Kabuki actor. But beyond use as a vague plot device to explain the chasm between Alto and his father this was never really expanded upon, yet keeps coming back. Could it be that Alto (with Sheryl's earring) gets the last act? Literally?

It would give him the honors and fully redeem him with his father, and might be considered a culture shock...

Although I would not be surprised either if there was a second season coming up, considering how well they have been able to hide the plot from fans...

AFAIK, there's 1 way to circumvent the '1st ordered, 1st served'-thing, and that is to tell them to ship all available items (through the online system) as soon as something new comes in stock for the 1st time.

Okay, just watched the non-subbed version on Youtube and there's something that bugs me about Alto's last flight.

First of all, as noted already, he stays a bit long behind that wrecked cruiser - with the speed he went behind it he should have shown up at the other side before the switch to the Brera/Klan-fight.

But there's something that bugs me about after he got hit badly by Brera: he flies towards the Varja home-planet, then makes a really weird sharp turn before going poof in front of Giant-Ranka. Now just before the weird turn, am I crazy or does something fly off/eject from his plane?

Just to explain the 'weird turn'-thing a bit better: It looks like his VF-171EX stalls, except how the heck do you stall in space? Even if it was the planet's gravity that influenced his Valk, it should have fallen towards the planet, not away from it.

Also, no visuals of him dying except for his fighter exploding. In Gundam this usually means 'not dead'.

I ordered from HLJ as soon as they listed, and now I'm on backorder. What the hell's going on?

They probably got more pre-orders than the number of kits they got from the distributor...

Looks as though Ranka crushed Alto. Wish it were true LOL...

Out of curiosity, the VF-171EX has flares, right?

So perhaps the explosions were just Alto dropping flares and jettisoning/detonating his weapons?

Which would be fitting for an actor faking his death...

(I haven't watched the ep yet, so I don't know whether any wreckage is shown...)

Alto's (paper) plane design is one that soars pretty far without flying fast. I've got a book somewhere that lists it as a soarer, IIRC.

Sheryl's plane is a simpler one that usually flies pretty fast, but when folded out of the right type of paper it may happily recover from a stall and land softly. Crumpled paper will of course impede its flight abilities a bit, but if the paper's light enough it should still fly decently.

Personally I prefer Sheryl's design, because it flies well even when thrown too hard. Soarers tend to plummet to the ground when thrown hard, and don't work too well if there's a lot of wind.

Obviously I've folded and thrown way too many paper airplanes out of windows when I was younger...

I`m really concern if toynami will use less die-cast and low QC plastic like other products.

It has been said that the Toynami versions will be produced by Bandai, since the deal is that Toynami is going to be the US distributor for some of Bandai's collectors' toys.

So, after watching ep 22 again with subs, all I can say is

- Luca = Tool. Couldn't he have been blown up by friendly fire?

- Alto is rather clueless.

- Note to subbers: Virus ≠ Bacteria.

Pfft! 171-kun aint got nothing on me, even he tries to make himself look better by adding EX parts.

171-kun = Micronized Klan & 171-kun EX = Macronized Klan?

I think Michel's VF-25 is going to be jealous. Alto better watch out...

Awwwwww...:

Alto x Ranka:

Alto:

Klan x Michel:

Alto as a girl? (Not that there is much difference... )

a vf-19 with out floppy arms please!

The Bandai VF-19 had floppy arms?

Mine must be defective!

SD VF-25S Armored version:

And...um...Ranka riding a giant carrot:

Why, are the fanboys going to come after you? I've never understood why people are so afraid of the fanbase.

Because some fans are real nutters?!?

Seriously, as someone who has been on the receiving end of crazy fan action, I can tell you that some people will do really f*cked up things just to show they don't like you.

Now because this might be a really big spoiler if I'm right, spoiler tags (also, it's just me rambling, so it might seem a bit disorganised):

Please note that I've not watched Macross Zero.

But try me with a 1A, 1ASuper, 1SMax... blah blah blah and you'd just be wasting petroleum. And paper.

Er, it's 1ASuperMax, which is entirely new.

Besides, it's logical that they bring out the hot sellers first.

I wonder what the chance is that Michel comes back as a Varja-controlled zombie/cyborgised by Macross Galaxy...we didn't actually see him buy it, he just got sucked out of the hole while dying, right?

Somewhere, that would be AWESOME...

I keep getting internet explorer cnnot open this page message. Can someone have a mod post the pics? If it is more pics of the painted Resin Ozma fighter from the first page, I'd like to see it, but it dosn't appear to be transformable which really wont give us an accurate representation of what the toy's fighter will look like.

Chris

You probably need to update your flash player...also, try another browser like Firefox or Opera.

Hmm, there are also side pictures of the Gerwalk and you can look straight into the hollow fuselage

it's no surprise, bandai has always been chunky. look at their ghastly M7 valks.

Yes, because as we all know one specific example from more than 10 years ago means that all products (including current ones) of a manufacturer are like that...

/sarcasm

There's a difference in making a collector's grade toy that will be transformed many times, and a model kit that is made to look nice on the shelf and where the transformation is an additional gimmick.

So it's likely that the TOY will be chunkier than the MODEL.

Then, saying that Bandai doesn't know how to make good-looking and accurate toys is disregarding all of SoC, many transformable Gundam action figures, stuff like Saint Seiya Saint Cloth Myth, and many many other toys.

Frankly, I'm getting sick of the length at which some Yamato-fanboys go to discredit any company that is not their all-time favourite money-sink. What's next? "Bandai is using LIVE BABIES for the production of the Macross Frontier Valks! Boycot them!" or "The paint on the 1/60 Valk is made using extracts from FLUFFY LITTLE BUNNIES! Burn the Bandai factories to the ground!"?

I'm by no means a Bandai fanboi, but some of the statements made on these boards are bordering on the ridiculous.

*wonders how much of the "It's too fat"-whine is caused by the dark space background taking away details and making the Valks seem thinner in most action scenes in the MF anime*

The VF-19 Kia metal coated was a variable model that looked awful in fighter and gerwalk but makes a decent battroid. The normal color that was released is just plain ugly in all incarnations.

They are the same mold.

Bandai's M7 toys awful. The VF-19 model was better than the toy but not by much. The VF-17 toy is built like a tank and looks like one in fighter and gerwalk. The Battroid was decent and makes a better toy with modifications.

Awful for collectors, great for kids. Which, AFAIK, was the primary aim of the M7 series, seeing it was broadcast on TV etc.

The Gundam models range for spectacular to what were they thinking. The performance is still inconsistent. I just got a 1/144 Desert Color Dom and 1/144 Zaku sniper. Great kits that needed no paint and are well designed kits. They are just beautiful to look at even before assembled.

I also got the 1/144 Strike (Normal Colors) and the 1/144 IWSP. No where near as nice a kit. Only a little more effort and a few more parts molded in the correct color, especially the shield gatling gun and shoulders, and it would be a great kit.

and

The VF-2SS, again a variable model but when I first looked at it left it in the box. Parts are molded in the wrong color... other parts poorly engineered. Best described as an almost but not quite. Re-released with no improvements except a glossy finish on the box and a 25th anniversary sticker.

We real modellers PAINT (and often modify) our models, so we don't suffer from that little problem.

The only reason many mecha models come molded in colors is that people who only have paint marker can touch them up and make them look somewhat more like the 'actual' thing...

I really don't know what to expect from Bandai but I do know it will not be on par with a Hasegawa.

We can sit and hope that Hasegawa will get the license in the future but we have yet to see any M7 Hasegawa models.

It really doesn't matter if one person with lots of putty and styrene can make a great looking kit out of a POS.

I just want a model that I look at and think wow this will look great finished.

Bandai can do it but will they?

As far as I can see, it's going to be on par with a HG to MG Gundam. Hasegawa makes really nice models, but they can't transform and are a lot more fragile than most of Bandai's models (differences in the type of styrene used...).

It's not a POS. You obviously have never seen a real POS model. Here's a little list on what they tend to suffer from:

- really bad proportions.

- really crap engineering with parts not fitting others in all senses of the words.

- mold defects like flash, depressions, and gaps.

- shitty plastic that breaks if you look funny at it.

- shitty plastic that doesn't like paint.

- rubber parts that desintegrate when you touch them.

- shitty instruction/decal/sticker sheets (or worse: none at all!).

- shitty boxes.