Kit Review

Straight build

Size comparison with a cigarette pack.
It's absolutely massive..

PG 1/72 Millennium Falcon - Various angles (1/5)

PG 1/72 Millennium Falcon - Various angles (2/5)

PG 1/72 Millennium Falcon - Various angles (3/5)

Various angles

Underside view

A large stand is included.

Swappable landing gear and boarding ramp.

The landing gear detail doesn't look all that different from the 1/144 version.

The underside with the landing gear attached.

Swapped out to the boarding ramp.

It actually sits more stably on the ground than on the stand.

PG 1/72 Millennium Falcon - Top detail shots. I dimmed the lighting to get a better look at the molding on the light gray sur

Top detail shots.
I dimmed the lighting to get a better look at the molding on the light gray surfaces.

PG 1/72 Millennium Falcon - Close-up detail shots of the gaps on the upper section. The detail holds up even in the smallest

Close-up detail shots of the gaps on the upper section.
The detail holds up even in the smallest areas.

PG 1/72 Millennium Falcon - The rear cover detail in particular looks like it had a lot of laser machining done — the molding

The rear cover detail in particular looks like it had a lot of laser machining done —
the molding quality is just incredible.

PG 1/72 Millennium Falcon - The insane detail on the side sections. (1/10)

PG 1/72 Millennium Falcon - The insane detail on the side sections. (2/10)

PG 1/72 Millennium Falcon - The insane detail on the side sections. (3/10)

PG 1/72 Millennium Falcon - The insane detail on the side sections. (4/10)

PG 1/72 Millennium Falcon - The insane detail on the side sections. (5/10)

PG 1/72 Millennium Falcon - The insane detail on the side sections. (6/10)

PG 1/72 Millennium Falcon - The insane detail on the side sections. (7/10)

PG 1/72 Millennium Falcon - The insane detail on the side sections. (8/10)

The insane detail on the side sections.

PG 1/72 Millennium Falcon - Details on the inner front section and sides. (1/6)

PG 1/72 Millennium Falcon - Details on the inner front section and sides. (2/6)

PG 1/72 Millennium Falcon - Details on the inner front section and sides. (3/6)

PG 1/72 Millennium Falcon - Details on the inner front section and sides. (4/6)

Details on the inner front section and sides.

PG 1/72 Millennium Falcon - Bottom detail shots. (1/11)

PG 1/72 Millennium Falcon - Bottom detail shots. (2/11)

PG 1/72 Millennium Falcon - Bottom detail shots. (3/11)

PG 1/72 Millennium Falcon - Bottom detail shots. (4/11)

PG 1/72 Millennium Falcon - Bottom detail shots. (5/11)

PG 1/72 Millennium Falcon - Bottom detail shots. (6/11)

PG 1/72 Millennium Falcon - Bottom detail shots. (7/11)

PG 1/72 Millennium Falcon - Bottom detail shots. (8/11)

PG 1/72 Millennium Falcon - Bottom detail shots. (9/11)

Bottom detail shots.

PG 1/72 Millennium Falcon - Close-up detail shots of the gaps on the lower section. (1/6)

PG 1/72 Millennium Falcon - Close-up detail shots of the gaps on the lower section. (2/6)

PG 1/72 Millennium Falcon - Close-up detail shots of the gaps on the lower section. (3/6)

PG 1/72 Millennium Falcon - Close-up detail shots of the gaps on the lower section. (4/6)

Close-up detail shots of the gaps on the lower section.

Even inside the areas with scratches depicted, the internal mechanics are exposed underneath.

The bottom detail is overall just as impressive.

Detail inside the boarding ramp.

The cockpit and the interior of the quad laser turret are nicely detailed too.

PG 1/72 Millennium Falcon - Six crew figures are included in total, and you can pick four of them to seat in the cockpit. I n

Six crew figures are included in total, and you can pick four of them to seat in the cockpit.
I naturally(?) put Han Solo and Chewbacca up front,
and the leftover figures can also be seated in the quad laser turret. (Note: only figures with spread legs can be seated.)

The canopy is also available in a clear version.

Comparison of the cockpit's bar-style parts vs. the clear parts.

Comparison of the quad laser turret's bar-style parts vs. the clear parts.

The Raider dish and quad laser turret on top can rotate in all directions.

The main thrusters are made up of multiple parts, giving them great depth and dimension.

There's only one official leftover part.

The LED unit takes 3 AAA batteries.

PG 1/72 Millennium Falcon - The control unit has 8 LED plugs in total — 5 on top and 3 on the side — but only 6 are actually

The control unit has 8 LED plugs in total — 5 on top and 3 on the side — but only 6 are actually used.
Probably designed to be shared across other kits as well.

In the cockpit, 2 LED light sources are placed behind a clear bulkhead at the rear.

Even with the LEDs on, the lighting effect is a bit underwhelming..

Placement of the front/rear landing gear LEDs.

Placement of the boarding ramp LED.

So in total, 4 LED light sources are placed on the underside.

PG 1/72 Millennium Falcon - Six LEDs are used for the main thrusters, and they're spread out nicely using special clear diffu

Six LEDs are used for the main thrusters,
and they're spread out nicely using special clear diffuser parts.
Unfortunately, I had some bad luck — one of the LEDs was defective and wouldn't light up T_T (second from the left).

The lighting effect from the main thrusters.

PG 1/72 Millennium Falcon - After setting up the LEDs like this, you join the top and bottom halves together — and as you can

After setting up the LEDs like this, you join the top and bottom halves together —
and as you can see, there's absolutely no interior detail reproduced inside...

To turn the LEDs on or off, you remove the rear cover and flip the switch.

The LED lighting effect on the underside with the lights dimmed.

PG 1/72 Millennium Falcon - LED lighting effects from various angles. (1/7)

PG 1/72 Millennium Falcon - LED lighting effects from various angles. (2/7)

PG 1/72 Millennium Falcon - LED lighting effects from various angles. (3/7)

PG 1/72 Millennium Falcon - LED lighting effects from various angles. (4/7)

PG 1/72 Millennium Falcon - LED lighting effects from various angles. (5/7)

LED lighting effects from various angles.

Whether intentional or not, some LED light also bleeds through to the top side.

PG 1/72 Millennium Falcon - You can swap out the joint parts on the dedicated stand to display it at an angle. The connection

You can swap out the joint parts on the dedicated stand to display it at an angle.
The connection feels a little shaky though.

PG 1/72 Millennium Falcon - Display in the tilted position. (1/4)

PG 1/72 Millennium Falcon - Display in the tilted position. (2/4)

Display in the tilted position.

Rear view with the main thrusters lit up and the lights dimmed.

Together with the 1/144 and Vehicle Model Millennium Falcon.

Together with the same-scale 1/72 X-Wing.
The Mil Fal really is huge..

PG 1/72 Millennium Falcon - Finally, the unused photo-etched parts and their mounting parts. I set them aside for whenever I

Finally, the unused photo-etched parts and their mounting parts.
I set them aside for whenever I get around to painting it someday.

After a long dry spell for the PG lineup, a Star Wars model kit showed up out of nowhere. In the summer of 2017, Bandai released the 1/72 Millennium Falcon as a Perfect Grade kit. It initially launched as a Premium Bandai exclusive with online pre-orders only, but was later switched to general retail so anyone could pick it up without a reservation.

It came in at a steep ¥40,000 including the LED unit, though a good chunk of that is probably Disney licensing fees. The box looks a bit small for the price — it's the same size as the PG Banshee box, and the box art is a simple black-and-white design that feels a little plain.

Open the box and PG-style, a huge pile of runners comes tumbling out — the thin pipe-type runners are packed separately in a small box. The Millennium Falcon's signature thin pipe parts are prone to breakage, so not only are they packaged separately, but the plastic itself is molded in a material that allows some flex. (Even so, they're still fragile and snap easily, so be careful..)

The build process feels very similar to assembling the 1/144 Millennium Falcon — and despite being a large kit, it uses an enormous number of tiny parts to bring out the three-dimensional detail. As a result, you'll spend a lot of time squinting and cleaning up gates on parts smaller than 1mm, and you really need to read the manual carefully and keep track of every single piece. Just getting through the whole build without losing or breaking anything is quite the challenge in itself.

In my case, I didn't lose any parts, but a few did break during assembly. With 672 tiny little pieces to deal with, the build time came out to roughly 14–16 hours. There are some tricky sections and a whole lot of tedious repetitive work, so you almost never get that satisfying snap-together feeling you get with PG Gunpla. Instead, you end up in full craftsman mode — carefully tweaking each part one by one with tweezers into the large top and bottom panels.

After all that grueling assembly work, the finished detail is nothing short of breathtaking. Rather than relying on molded detail, they went out of their way to separate individual parts to bring out a real sense of depth, and the sculpt in person is genuinely impressive. It looks like it could go straight into a movie as a practical special effects model with a good paint job — and apparently that level of realism was actually the development goal for this kit.

On top of that, laser-etched detail you'd need a magnifying glass to fully appreciate is scattered all over the kit — something you rarely see in regular Gunpla — so the review photos above really don't do justice to how precise it all is. You can tell Bandai put an absolutely record-breaking amount of effort into the exterior detail, and in that sense the PG title does feel fitting. The problem, though, is that all this detail is applied strictly to the parts you can actually *see* from the outside.

Given the PG title, a lot of people were probably hoping for detailed depictions of the various interior spaces of the Millennium Falcon on top of the exterior precision — but any kind of interior recreation is completely ignored. Bluntly put, it's just a blown-up copy of the 1/144 Millennium Falcon, and it feels like it's a million light-years away from PG Gunpla, which packs in gimmicks and interior detail to the brim. Looking at the completely hollow, empty interior honestly leaves a bit of a bitter taste.

The included LED unit can light up a total of 12 LEDs, applied to the cockpit, landing gear, boarding ramp, and main thrusters. Powering it up with 3 AAA batteries does look pretty cool, but the brightness is a bit weak so it doesn't come across as all that dazzling. Honestly, I think it would've been better to sell the LED unit separately like the Unicorn and knock ¥10,000 off the base price. For what it's worth, one of my LEDs was defective and never lit up from the start — I really wish the quality control had been a bit tighter. T_T

Beyond that, even calling it a PG, there's not much else to look at aside from the detail. The radar and quad laser turrets on top do move, and the landing gear and boarding ramp are provided as swappable parts. A large separate stand is included, but the kit is so big and heavy and the hold isn't great, so it's actually more stable just sitting on the landing gear on a flat surface. You can also swap out the stand joint parts to display it at an angle, but the way it connects to the stand feels a bit iffy structurally, so displaying it tilted feels pretty nerve-wracking.

To sum it up — this kit delivers the finest eye candy in Bandai's history in terms of exterior detail and three-dimensional presence, but that's pretty much where it ends. Interior recreation and separate gimmicks are virtually nonexistent, and to top it off, only wet decals are included, as if they never considered the rest of us from the start. It felt like a waste to leave such an expensive, detailed kit as a straight build or just panel lined, so I decided to review it in straight build form with plans to paint it properly later (someday...).

In a word, this feels like Bandai's gift to "hardcore Star Wars fans who enjoy painting," and it doesn't really seem like a kit that existing Gunpla fans should pick up based on the PG title alone. Above all, the price is just too steep — for this much money you could buy both the PG Unicorn and the Banshee together.

Either way, this is a kit with a split personality — PG-level on the outside, No Grade-level on the inside — and it doesn't seem like the right fit in many respects for Gunpla fans who just enjoy straight builds or panel lining. That said, if you've been a die-hard Star Wars fan for years, I'd say go ahead and grab it regardless of whether you plan to paint it (making a vague promise to yourself someday, like me...). It was originally planned as a limited production run due to licensing, so the chances of a reissue down the line are pretty unclear. :-)

PG Millennium Falcon | 2017.8 | ¥40,000

AIThis page was translated by Claude Sonnet.