Gunpla Build - Real Grade Shining Gundam (Build)

Let’s crack open the box and look at what we have:

I have a couple things to point out here:

• One of the beam saber blades is shorter than the other. This was also the case for the Gundam Universe figure.

  It's also a thing that real samurai did, which I was vaguely aware of thanks to watching too much anime, but I only recently decided to look up.

• We've got a lot of gold plated parts for use with Super Mode, and I'm not sure if I'm going to paint them.

  On one hand, they look quite a bit nicer than the usual "gold" plastic that Bandai uses. On the other hand, the color is still kind of off (someone on a Discord I frequent described it as "piss gold")

• This uses the exact same "Advanced MS Joint" parts as the God Gundam, that being the joints for the wrists.

  Surprisingly, though, most of the rest of the inner frame is brand new. There are a couple of parts reused from the God Gundam, but not as many as you might think. As a result, when you're finished you'll have almost an entire large runner's worth of leftover parts.

• The decal sheet is surprisingly small for a Real Grade:

Speaking of decals, there’s another problem with the decals that I’d like to drill down on …

Lack of Decal Directions

Normally Bandai’s instructions are very clear and explicit when it comes to decals. Most of the time they’ll tell you exactly where to put every single decal. In other cases they might give you a variety of markings for you to choose from, and the manual will give suggestions on where to put them.

But that’s not the case with this kit. There are numerous decals that aren’t referred to at all in the manual. Like this one here:

There is nothing - not a guide, nor a single photograph - to suggest where some of these markings are supposed to go.

Now, I know that there are a lot of builders out there for whom this isn’t a problem. They love - it not downright prefer - the freedom to place markings wherever they please.

But then there are people like me, who are dumb as a box of rocks and want to be told what to do. And I can’t help but feel both baffled and disappointed at the fact that Bandai’s left us high and dry.

The good news is that in this case there is help. If you go to Delphi Decal’s product page for their replacement waterslides, you’ll see that they’ve used all these unreferenced decals in their product photos. And while I don’t know if the placements they chose are what Banadi had in mind, they all seemed logical to me.

Extra Decals?

Apparently the folks at Delphi felt the same way I do about this kit lacking in decals, because they added a bunch of their own original markings to fill in some of the "empty" spaces (for example, on the shoulders): Will this make it look better? Yes. Am I shocked that Bandai didn't think to do this themselves? Also yes.

Okay, enough is enough. It’s time to get to the build.

Core Lander

Just like on the RG God Gundam, there’s a level of detail and color separation here that blows away the Core Landers on the High Grade G Gundam models. It also unsurprisingly has better color separation than the Gundam Universe figure (which makes you paint the white vents).

It may not have fancy wings like God Gundam’s, but I think this may be my favorite looking Core Lander. It’s cool and futuristic while still largely looking like a car:

Feet and Legs

For the overwhelming majority of Gunpla, you build the feet separate from the legs and then plug them together. Which means that later, if you really want/need to, you can just as easily detach them.

That’s not really the case here. The feet plug into the ankle joint like so:

Which then plugs into another bit of ankle joint:

Which then plug into a ball joint on the leg:

Once it’s all done and the armor is all attached, it’s locked pretty tight. I’m not saying that you can’t detach the foot, but I am saying that I pulled so hard trying to do so that I was afraid I was going to break something (and I never did get it off in the end)

Later on during this part of the build, I had my one and only accident. When assembling the thrusters that are embedded in the legs, you have bend and contort all of the parts in order to get them to fit properly. The photo below shows some of the steps from the manual:

When building the right leg I put one of the parts on backwards, and put so much pressure on it trying to put it in position that it broke. The end result is that I cannot attach it to the inner frame of the leg. If I open up the leg armor, there’s a chance for the whole thruster assembly to fall out of the model, buuuuut if I’m careful I can also position it exactly the way it needs to be:

See? You can’t even tell that something is wrong with it.

Still, this is a great example of one of the dangers of Real Grades. The engineering on these kits is beyond impressive, but there is an argument to be made that sometimes they try to do too much for a ¹⁄₁₄₄ scale kit, with parts that are ultimately too small and fragile.

I certainly think that’s the case with these thrusters; ironically, from the standpoint of sturdiness and stability, they would have been better off with a High Grade-esque partsformation, but since Real Grades refuse to go that route we end up with something like this that is really cool in theory, but in practice is much more likely to break.

I’m not in love with some of the decals on the sides of the legs. They look too small, and stylistically I don’t think they really fit the vibe of Shining Gundam.

Lower Torso

The original Shining Gundam design has big yellow triangle on its side skirts. On the Real Grade, however, we instead get two very small triangles that aren’t even supposed to be colored (though as you can see below, I still painted them)

I understand that Real Grade designs are not supposed to be TV show accurate, but they don’t tend to make changes that are quite this drastic. I just don’t see the purpose of it.

Here’s another weird thing - the rear skirt and the side skirts are connected to each other. Move one of them back or forth, and you move both:

If there’s a practical purpose for doing this, I can’t think of what it is. It’s just one of several unusual things about this model.

Let’s look at the final assembly:

If you look closely, you’ll notice the see two King of Hearts logos on the front skirts:

I don’t understand why both of them are so small. Or why neither of them is in color. They’re not exactly invisible, but they certainly don’t stand out. I struggle to think what anyone at Bandai were thinking here.

Upper Torso

This is just classic Real Grade. Lots of interlocking sections and layers upon layers of parts:

Even the neck has multiple joints:

But while it is technically impressive, I don’t like the look of it.

If you look at the Gundam Universe figure, there is a lot of space between the blue torso and the yellow chest vents, and the green gem in the chest is vertically centered:

This gives off the impression that it has a big, broad chest.

On the opposite side, we have the Real Grade where the chest vents are (relatively) smaller and more cramped, and where the chest gem is not only (relatively) smaller, but also set higher up on the chest:

(Side note - I know I’ve said in the past how I hate the chest gems on mobiles suits like Wing Gundam and Wing Zero, but I actually think it looks good on Shining, and I don’t like that it was made smaller here)

These changes make Real Grade chest look smaller and more slight, which is not the kind of image you want your martial arts mobile suit to project.

Head

Building this made me really reflect on just how weird Shining Gundam’s head is.

Most Gundam heads are made to look like a samurai helmet, but I don’t think that’s the case with Shining. Instead it looks more like just a head (complete with slicked back hair and a ponytail) wearing a face mask.

But it would be weird if it were shaped like an actual human head, so instead it does this weird thing where the area right behind the face is really flat and wide.

I like the way the Gundam Universe figure handles this. The head is wide and vaguely pyramid shaped:

There’s something about this that works for me. I think it’s because it looks sufficiently exaggerated; it clearly evokes a human head and face, but it is also clearly not human.

On the Real Grade model, the face itself looks more cramped, and the area right behind the face is more curved and … egg shaped I guess:

I find it very offputting, not to mention the whole ensemble feels so uncohesive. The face looks very distinct and separate from the area behind it, as if they bolted eyes and a mouth to the front of a table.

The only nice thing I’ll say is that it looks a lot better with the face mask open:

Speaking of which, this head clearly has a lot going on. Between the face mask and the hair, you’ve got seven tiny parts that are all on hinges.

You might be wondering how well this works out in practice. Is it tricky to assemble? Do the parts feel fragile? Do they flop around instead of staying in place?

Amazingly, the answer to all of these questions is “no”. This is one area where the engineering feels both impressive and reliable. When you flip all the bits out, they stay in the open position until you push them back in. And when they’re pushed in, they don’t tend to flip open on their own (except the ponytail on the top, which is a little bit floppy, but it’s not too much of a problem)

Arms

I realized after the fact that I forgot to take many Work in Progress photos. Suffice to say that it’s pretty similar to how the arms (and shoulders) on God Gundam are assembled, so go read about that if you want a better idea.

Still, there are a few things I want to point out. First, I did decide to use a gold marker on the on the shoulder armor:

The idea was to create a two-toned look between the flat front area and the recessed grill area.

Second, I think that if it weren’t for the extra Delphi decals, the shoulders would look much plain and sparse and … flat:

To be fair, this is largely accurate to the original design, but I think the Gundam Universe figure had the right idea by adding some extra panel lining to the shoulders. It gives them some much needed texture.

I do like the blue gauntlets though. They look pretty cool, especially with all the decals.

Hands

Like God Gundam, this kit comes with a lot of hands:

However, unlike God Gundamm, it does not come with a Shining Finger form for the left hand. You get one for the right hand, and that’s it.

That means that not only does it come up short compared to RG God Gundam, but it also comes up short compared to High Grade Shining Gundam, which not only comes with a left Shining Finger hand, but also comes with a giant Shining Finger hand that I’m pretty sure only appears once in the entire show (but which they still included for the sake of completeness):

This is such a bizarre (and possibly cheapskate?) omission. How does it fall short to both of these comparable models?

Beam Sabers

These make me feel both really disappointed and pleasantly surprised.

First, the good. This model kit does that I never in a million years expected to see, something that very nearly comes close to singlehandedly cancelling out all other flaws.

It’s this sticker right here:

Which lets you recreate this:

The madlads actually did it. I can’t believe it.

Now for the bad - the kit does not come with the Shining Finger Sword. But you know what does include it? That’s right, the High Grade kit:

I know that Real Grades aren’t intended to be definitive versions of any given mobile suit, but historically they’ve been treated with a certain level of prestige. But omissions like these undermine that line of thought. They make this model feel unnecessarily cheap and underwhelming.

Shining Gundam Expansion Set?

Shortly after the release of RG God Gundam, Bandai put out an Expansion Set: In addition to including Fuunsaiki the horse and an Action Base, it also has the parts needed to recreate its Sekiha Tenkyoken special attack.

As of this writing, the RG Shining doesn't have an equivalent accessory pack - but it easily could. I can envision one containing:

• Extra Shining Finger Hands
• The Shining Finger Sword
• The Bud Carrier

And it's entirely possible that this is the reason we didn't get some of these things in the box with this model, so that they could be sold as a future add-on. If that does happen I'm going to be pissed.

The thing with the God Gundam Expansion Set is that, while all the included items are cool, they're not strictly necessary. Fuunsaiki and the Sekiha Tenkyoken only show up very briefly, and only near the end of the show. You don't need either of them to recreate most of God Gundam's iconic scenes.

But the Shining Finger Sword is used multiple times in multiple fights. It's the genesis of one of Domon's most iconic lines:

So iconic, in fact, that it's immortalized in a meme:

It absolutely should have been included with this kit, and I won't be pleased if it turns out that it was kept out for the sake of nickel and diming.

Conclusion

There’s a lot about this model that feels wrong.

The stickers are lacking and uninspired. The visual tweaks - which usually make Real Grades look better - somehow make it look worse. And the accessories are both weirdly specific (in the case of that “G. GUNDAM” sticker for the beam saber) but also lacking. And of course it continues the trend of Real Grade models no longer including a pilot figurine.

If I were looking at it in isolation, I might not think much about these problems. But I can’t do that, because I have the RG God Gundam right here to compare it to.

I know, I know - at the time of this writing I still haven’t taken photos of it. But I have played around with it, and I’ve also spent a lot of time looking at it as it sat in my lightbox for days on end, taunting me as I continued to not do even a half-assed photoshoot.

And what I can tell you is that RG God Gundam is a damn good model. It looks stunning, it’s sturdy, and it is packed with gimmicks and accessories. It exemplifies what the Real Grade line is about.

So it is extra disappointing, then, when its counterpart falls short in comparison. I don’t understand how that could possibly happen.

It’s also hard to view this in isolation when this is not the first time I’ve felt this way about a Real Grade. The RG Wing Gundam had similar issues; while I still love the way it looks, it also has limited decals, and what I consider a general lack of parts separation and, um, “mechanically-ness” that you expect from a Real Grade (not to mention that I think it was the first one to omit the pilot figure).

What I’m getting at is that not only is the Real Grade line getting inconsistent in quality, but it’s doing so by sometimes feeling half-assed and lazy. It’s one thing if a kit is fragile because they, say, tried to replicate the full Zeta Gundam transformation process at ¹⁄₁₄₄ scale. That’s ambition.

It’s another thing entirely when it looks like they’ll go hard for one model (like God Gundam), and laze out with another (like Shining). I’ve long considered Real Grades to be a special event of sorts, but I think it’s finally time to start looking at them with a closer eye and a greater degree of scrutiny.