OLD Gundam W 1/144 Wing Gundam

Release 1995.4

Price ¥500

BANDAI BANDAI Japan product info

Box side view

Runners

Parts diagram

Manual

Straight build + Stickers

Size comparison with a cigarette pack

Weapons loadout

Limb articulation is actually pretty good.

Buster Rifle pose

Beam saber pose

OLD 1/144 Wing Gundam - To transform, rotate the lower body 180°, pull out the hands, fold the shoulders, and arrange the arm

To transform, rotate the lower body 180°, pull out the hands, fold the shoulders, and arrange the arms to look like chicken feet.

Fold the legs as shown above, then raise the side skirts.

Spread the wings and attach the shield and Buster Rifle to complete the transformation.

Bird Mode

Underside

Together with the 1/144 First Gundam.

Together with the 1/144 V Gundam and G Gundam from the previous series.

Together with the HGAC Wing Gundam released in 2013.

1/144 Wing Gundam - WF Repackage Version

WF series box art with pilot character image added

A color guide for painting the figure has been added.

Figure runner added in the WF series

OLD 1/144 Wing Gundam - Heero Yuy figure (1/3)

Heero Yuy figure

OLD 1/144 Wing Gundam - Assembly manual slightly revised to include the figure (1/3)

Assembly manual slightly revised to include the figure

Newly added color guide for the figure

This is the 1/144 Wing Gundam released as part of the old Gundam W series. System injection and stickers give it a decent level of color separation, so the straight build looks pretty reasonable, but seam lines are pretty blatantly visible all over. The leg seam lines in particular tend to gap open due to poor part fitment.

Limb articulation is surprisingly decent, but the joints are loose — especially the lower body, which is so flimsy that even a straight standing pose is hard to pull off. The feet don't grip the ground well either, making posing a pain. The Bird Mode transformation itself is reproduced reasonably well, but the locking after transformation is also weak, so overall this kit ends up feeling pretty unstable.

For the lead kit of the series, it's got quite a few shortcomings — the overall looseness is probably the biggest letdown. It seems like the early backlash got through to Bandai, because the joint strength did improve in the kits that followed.

That said, it still carries a lot of significance as the hero kit that kicked off the series, and it's worth noting that the transformation gimmick was pulled off even at 1/144 scale. :-)
[ Updated at 2018.2.15 ]

The 1/144 Gundam W series was repackaged and released as the WF series in July 2000. The kit itself is the same as before, but a small character figure was added, bumping the price up by ¥100. The box art and manual were also slightly revised, and a color guide for painting the figure was added. Since both the regular 1/144 W series and the WF series are still mixed together on the secondhand market, please refer to the WF version review below for details on the figure and included contents.

AIThis page was translated by Claude Sonnet.