| MSiA RX-78GP01 Gundam "Zephyranthes"
Series: Mobile Suit in Action!! (MSiA)
Contributor: Jones Kingsu Date: January 3, 2006 The mecha from Gundam 0083: Stardust Memory are by far the most loved Gundams in the Universal Century timeline. They’re fast. They’re powerful. They can be classified as super robots. They come from one of the best written Gundam spinoffs ever.
The GP01’s head resembles much of the one in the series but it seems like it’s a bit smaller with the figure. It’s complete with the green eyes, V-Fin and additional antenna on top. The attachment is your typical ball-and-socket. This allows the head to rotate it’s head about 90° left and right. The head tilts down to 45° but tilts up to only 15°. Yep, we still can’t give them the charging/flying forward pose.
The GP01's torso is very much like its MG kit. Same thing can also be said about it with the original animation. The molding is nothing spectacular but it’s not awful either. Torso twists more than 70° left and right and no more than that. The lower torso sports these nicely molded skirt armors. They’re nicely spread out so that the legs have great articulation. We’ll get to the legs later. The backpack is molded nicely as well. It has the standard RX-78 beam saber holders on opposite sides on top which can be adjusted a bit via ball-and-socket. The vernier nozzles are also adjustable. Funny thing about the backpack is that it can be rotated 360° sideways. The backpack’s connected via ball-and-socket and I welcome all bonus articulations but this is weird.
The arms are of standard fare. Since this MSiA is what I would call a version 1.5, it doesn’t have that swing forward and back shoulder attachment. But it does have the double-jointed elbows which gives it better poseability. The arms may be nice and provide adequate articulation but the hands are awful. The molds are done substandard with the closed fists and saber hands but the trigger hands are just plain awful! They can’t hold anything securely! Making Zephyranthes hold a gun requires some patience if not ingenuity. (I made it hold the beam rifle by tucking the stock of the gun under the shoulder.) One thing I like about this set of arms is the marking of 01 on the left shoulder.
GP01’s legs are still faithful in design and has a pretty solid mold. Articulation’s still standard albeit limited that the knees aren’t double jointed. The feet’s wide enough to make the figure stand in a variety of poses.
Machine gun
Shield
Long-range cannon
GP01’s accessories are comprised of a beam rifle, machine gun, long-range cannon, foldable shield, and a couple spare e-pacs. Most of its accessories are okay with the mold and everything except for the foldable shield. The shield absolutely sucks. The folding action isn’t really a “folding action” but rather you detach the lower part of the shield and then mount it up to the upper peg hole to “fold” it. What’s worse about it is that the shield is better off folded since it falls off when it’s “unfolded” mounting is plain awful on this one. What’s even worse is that it can mount the spare e-pacs at the back of the shield loosely. They fall off at the slightest vibration. I think it’s better off without the shield.
Funny thing is that I loved GP01 more than GP02 in the anime but it went the other way around with the MSiAs. GP01’s MSiA suffered a lot from accessory problems and the accessories count as 50% of the figure. I don’t suggest getting GP01 unless you’re just after the completion of a 0083 set. Overall Rating: 2 out of 5 stars <<back to Gundam |
