SD BB Senshi Zetaman 2

Release 1987.5

Price ¥300

SD Zetaman 2 - Box art from the side (1/3)

Box art from the side

Group shot of BB Senshi #1–6 boxes — the kits that kicked off the SD Gundam series

Runners

Parts diagram

Included alongside the assembly manual are a series guide sheet and a character card.

Manual

Straight build + Stickers

Size comparison with a cigarette pack

Front view of straight build before stickers

SD Zetaman 2 - After applying the seals (1/2)

SD Zetaman 2 - After applying the seals (2/2)

After applying stickers

The body without weapons

A bazooka is included as the weapon

28 blue BBs are included — you cock the trigger, then drop a BB into the hole on top of the bazooka to fire

Along with the main kit, a Gelgoog target is included too.

Gelgoog target

When a BB hits the center bullseye, the head and limbs fly apart.

A video I filmed myself showing all 6 early BB Senshi targets in action.

Primitive articulation — the neck and shoulders rotate, and the legs alternate back and forth

Some action poses

Shooting game pose using the target

Together with BB Senshi Gundaman

--- General notes on the first 6 BB Senshi kits -----------------
In 1987, the very first 6 SD Gundam kits were released under the BB Senshi label. They were part of the "BB Senshi Snival Game" lineup, where you fire BBs from a spring-loaded bazooka to hit targets. The kits sport a cute 3-head-tall chibi proportion with a nice rounded, chunky volume to them. Color separation is nonexistent — it's all single-color molding with a few seals thrown in, and the articulation is kept as simple as possible.

The lineup consists of 6 kits in total — Gundaman, Zetaman 2, Dorakun, Zakun, Zetaman, and Don — and while the designs differ, they all share exactly the same package contents and structural features. The BB-firing mechanism has a surprisingly decent kick to it; you can shoot in a straight line for about a meter with a satisfying "ping." On top of that, each kit comes with a target that produces its own unique hit effect, so there's a real fun factor in trying to nail them with BBs. (See thevideo for reference.)

These 6 kits were later reused as the base bodies for the SD Gundam Musha Shichinin-shū arc, and today they've become top-tier rare items commanding prices dozens of times their original value. They're pretty much impossible to track down anyway, so it's perfectly fine to just sit back and appreciate them as a piece of history — "oh wow, something like this existed back then" ^^
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This kit is the SD Zetaman 2, released as BB Senshi #2. It's based on ZZ Gundam, and comes with a Gelgoog as the target — hit the bullseye in the center with a BB and the head and limbs scatter apart.

The target parts were later dropped, and the body was reused for BB Senshi #32, Musha Kage Double Zeta. The single-color molding gives it a pretty bare-bones look, but somehow it's got a chunky volume that feels like it'd look great painted up. Either way, this kit really is like the ancestor of all SD Gundam kits. :-)

AIThis page was translated by Claude Sonnet.