O Gundam + Exia R2

I think this may be my most image loaded post yet and as such I wish blogger would let me upload more than 5 pics at a time. The reason for that is because I ordered two very impressive kits and because of that, I had almost 60 pics to upload this time. And because of how some the pictures turned out I got me wondering if shrinking the pics from a bigger size (7.86 Megapixels) to a smaller size (0.48 Megapixels) actually gives a better quality pic over a one taken at that size in the first place. If anyone can give me tips on how to get better quality pics for 800x600 sizes please feel free to share. I know that .JPG will give smudges on the pic but a .PNG will be too big for me to use here.

Boxarts

They go together

So do the manuals

Now onto the kits themselves. Both are very impressive HG 1/144 kits but in my opinion the O Gundam is a much better buy. While the O Gundam comes with fewer weapons, its articulation is vastly superior to the Exia R2 even with the new parts they gave it. In terms of looks, I’d have to say that Exia R2 is clearly the more dynamic one and would give even mecha n00bs the impression of it being badass but Gundam fans would probably prefer the look the O Gundam has since it’s got a bit of the ruggedness that came with the suits from the U.C. Series mixed in with the modern look of the 00 Series making it more like a real robot type than Exia. It really does depends on your taste since it is appearance we’re talking about here although I myself am torn between the two if it’s just down to the appearance. It’d be easier to make a decision if they had given the O Gundam and option hand like Exia’s but unfortunately Bandai didn’t seem to think that we’d want one for it. The boxarts themselves are made of awesome since the style and scene they decided to use are just plain epic. If you look below you can see that the boxarts were made to be placed right next to each other to complete the scene. It’s an obvious but effective tactic that Bandai used to make people buy both at the same time. Although, the O Gundam Kits sold out faster than Exia R2 did at Hobbysearch. Normally I don't use the flash to take pictures because I don't like how it leaves a shadow around the objects but they do give better detail of whatever's not shadowed.



The O Gundam comes with a short rifle, a beam saber, a shield, a backpack and a GN drive. Although it does come with a single beam saber Bandai gave it two 00 Gundam-type saber beam parts. It also has a sliding gimmick at the back of the waist to insert stands into. I understand that the O Gundam was made by celestial being so that may have been a technical decision but the ending clearly showed that it was the normal rounded beam being used. But I guess that had taken that into consideration and made the slot for the beam saber to be able to fit the rounded and sharp-type beams, another marketing ploy I suppose. I wished they had made a new mold for it so the O Gundam would have a normal beam part and also a strengthened beam part like the Robot Damashii version.

It’s interesting how much the O Gundam was supposed to pay respect to the original RX-78-2 since they even molded the entire hand in dark grey including the backhand part which is usually white for most gundams. The articulation in the neck is also excellent since I can make it look up a down like the HGUC kits. Unfortunately I couldn’t get it to look all the way up to reenact that famous upward shot from the series. It would have been great if they had done that in Gundam 00 too but there weren’t any Chars to do it to in there. But do you know what was the best part about the kit? It only had two stickers, one for the chest core and one for the eyes.

Thank god for it having only two stickers...

GN Drive + Backpack

Comparison shot of the back

Display stand gimmick. Also one on the bottom.

I was always reminded of a boxer everytime I see it in the anime

It is normally impossible to get a gundam to do this. Guess what that means for the articulation

Now onto Exia R2. It comes with a GN sword III with parts for GN sword I, four beam saber handles, one white molded beam saber, one GN shortsword, one GN longsword, one GN Shield, an extra open left palm, one Normal GN Drive and one Burst Mode GN Drive. Keep in mind that I mentioned that it comes with a white molded beam saber because the kit doesn’t come with any saber beam parts. It’s a good thing that there was an extra with O Gundam, another Bandai marketing ploy no doubt. Don’t get high hopes just because you get to have all of Exia’s original weapons as they weren’t very well made since they need a lot of detailing to make them look good. You have stick on a very large sticker on the shield since its been entirely molded in blue and the sticker obviously doesn’t work very well. The real reason people will get it is because of the GN Sword III and it obviously does not disappoint as the clear green color of the heat blade is beautiful. Despite being a HG 1/144 scale kit the GN Sword is a lot less clumsy than the 1/100 version and stays in position better than it.

The new articulation in the legs and the saber holsters at the side are very nice add-ons as well. The lack of GN cables also make it much easier to build and move around though the external armor between the shoulders and torso are annoyingly loose until you attach the arms onto the torso. The saber holsters can be spun to adjust the position of the beam saber and they don’t fall off unless you push too hard. They also move with the legs and make the entire suit look even more dynamic. All of the joints fit very well and are just as tight as they need to be. The 1/100 Exia had loose joints like the legs that really should have been tighter and joints that were so tight like the elbow that felt like they’d snap if you push too hard. I find no such problems in the R2 and I’d have to say despite the need for extra detailing, the Exia R2 is better than all the previous versions of Exia.

All of the new parts here

Different sizes for the GN Swords

Components of GN Sword III

Extra parts for the old one

The only Exia (or Astrea) to have done this pose perfectly

O Gundam's Shield is way better

Holster spins right round right round

Comparison shot for the back

I wonder what owners of the previous version thought when they saw this

Best I could do at the moment. Wait till my di:stages come...

Kono Sekai ni, Kami Nante Inai!

Edited it to have a green sky.

This wasn't edited. To limit the flash I covered it with my finger, this is the result

Also I have to take back what I said about Gundam weapons not fitting into Figma hands. At the time I got them, it didn’t occur to me to that I only tried to fit the beam saber into Miku’s hands and not Kagami’s hands. It only occurred to me last night when I tried to fit O Gundam’s shield in Kagami’s hands because both the handle and Kagami’s hand grip were both round and of the same size. So as it turns out, Lucky star characters are perfectly capable of holding gundam weapons but trying get them to fit in Miku’s is not worth the trouble. That doesn’t mean I can’t get Miku to hold weapons though since I can switch their hands to do it. I’ve also heard that it’s possible to make a Miku Raiser so I’ll probably get an HG 1/144 O Raiser to try it.

Exia, Slicing the Onions

Kagami is now armed

Exia really needed a gun

Kagami, eliminating the distortion

Dynames did this with Kyrios

Watch out Exia

What would Kagami do with these if she had them?

Looking for Creativity

With my exams coming to a close in 5 more days, I am looking forward to all the free time I'll get back. Unfortunately for me though, I am running out of interesting manga to read since my ridiculously fast reading ability and manga reading software let me burn through chapters at almost unbelievable speeds. Want to know how unbelievably fast? I downloaded psyren last sunday because I say it had a high chapter count and interesting summary. I downloaded the first 48 chapters at mangatraders in 3 hours. I finished it all in one and a half. It was quite interesting too. Finished it up to 72 yesterday, in less than an hour I might add, and am now looking forward to next chapter. You should see how fast I go when I skim through stuff. I don't actually have an experience where I had to skim all that manga at once but I do remember opening 30+ tabs from the top manga list at manga updates and when I got around to reading them, I found 6 that were interesting based on their summary alone in a minute or two.

They say that 90% of any form of entertainment is crap. I wholeheartedly agree with that. What I basically did was that I've burned through so much manga that I have 100+ series waiting to be updated with new chapters and probably went through twice as many completed or oneshot stories which probably makes up 4% of the manga out there. There's still the 6% but it's going to be harder to find interesting ones now since my standards for good entertainment rise with time. I have found that quite a good portion of the new series coming out are interesting enough to satisfy my standards. Unfortunately though, they are NEW series so they just ADDED to my waiting list. What I need are series with a good number of chapters out and interesting ideas. I'd love it if there was an actual series like Otter 11 from Bakuman. It sounds like a very interesting read.

Just in case you're wondering what are the new manga I've went through in the past week, here's a list:
- Psyren
- Medaka Box
- Mel Kano
- Beelzebub
- Prunus Girl
- Manabiya
- Kampfer
- Kyoukai no Rinne
- Frogman
- Cage of Eden

I really like Medaka Box, Psyren, Prunus Girl and Kyoukai no Rinne. The great points about these manga are their characters and the set up behind their stories. Well not so much the set-up for medaka since I've gone through a bunch like it but the characters are very interesting. I particularly like that standing behind people gag that Medaka uses on people. It's been done in each chapter so far so hopefully there's going to be more the author can use that joke with.

So what am I going to do with my 2 week holiday? A number of things I can think of are building my Exia r2, 0 Gundam and their diorama during that time, watching the anime I've been meaning to get around to and quite possibly start a light novel-like series to post up on the internet. I already have a very interesting and suitable idea to use for the story and hopefully I'll either figure out how to draw or find an illustrator to help me with it. Look forward to that.

And to end this post I'll put up trailers for all three 20th century boys movies along with two great miku vids. I've been told by Rif that Chong Hock has the first movie so I'll most likely pick it up to watch during the holidays. I must say that they really did a good job with casting since all the actors look their part in there. I didn't think they'd be able to get people that look so much like Otcho, Fukubei and Sadakiyo from the manga.

Movie I -Descent


Movie II - Last Hope


Movie III - Last Chapter


Hidamari no Uta


10 no Yakusoku