The 0080 kit rush continues — this time it's the Guncannon Mass Production. This is a unit that got blown to pieces so early in the anime that most people barely even remember it, yet Bandai boldly went ahead and made it — and made it quite cleanly at that.
A mass production type is supposed to be... well, a unit refined from the Prototype's testing into something easier to produce in large numbers. But this thing ended up more elaborate, larger, more complex, and better-looking than the Prototype. I work as a product development engineer myself so I have a rough idea, but mass production items are almost always supposed to be simpler and cleaner than experimental prototypes — that's what makes them productive to manufacture. Somehow this one went the opposite direction. -.-; Well, it's an anime, so whatever.
First off, the Guncannon Mass Production shows off some really nice detail, as you'd expect from a newer kit. Everything has just the right amount of detail without feeling flat or bland. The cannon design on the backpack in particular is quite clever — the cannons are stowed in the backpack and then extend outward, increasing their length when deployed.
That said, articulation is actually worse than the older original Guncannon. The knee joints are double-jointed, yet they still can't bend past 90 degrees — which is pretty disappointing compared to HGUC kit #1, the Guncannon, which shocked everyone with its incredible range of motion. And whether it's due to the original design specs or not, the prone firing pose simply isn't doable here. There are no dedicated prone-position hand parts like on the Guncannon, and the neck can't tilt upward, so you just can't replicate that same pose.
And the most frustrating thing is... the recently released 0080 Cold Districts GM got a nice clear green part for its camera eye, but the Guncannon Mass Production just gets a sticker. I can understand the older Guncannon using a sticker instead of a clear part for its head camera, but the Guncannon Mass Production is a brand-new kit — if one unit gets a clear eye and another gets a sticker, the one stuck with the sticker is going to feel pretty hard done by, don't you think? ^^;;
Compared to the Guncannon, it's bigger, more detailed, and more refined-looking — but you should know going in that the articulation and overall sense of dynamism take a step back. It came out five years after the older Guncannon as a similar product, so expecting it to also have better articulation is going to lead to disappointment. That said, it's not terrible by any means — it just looks relatively worse compared to the Guncannon, which had freakishly exceptional articulation to begin with. (The Guncannon's knees bend all the way to about 170 degrees, and it's not even a PG. -.-; See the Guncannon review.) On the flip side, the Guncannon Mass Production has a unique feature where the knees can rotate sideways, which does help compensate somewhat for the limited knee bend.
Anyway, the kit itself is top-notch quality, as you'd expect from a newer release. Clean, well-detailed...
I'd say the value for money is excellent. ^^
HGUC Guncannon Mass Production
2004.2
¥1,200
AIThis page was translated by Claude Sonnet.
