Okay, now we get to the mobile suit. The instructions have you build it from the bottom up, so let’s just do exactly that.
Feet
I just want to take this time to say that I love this dark tone of red:
It’s just so rich and deep.
But yeah, there’s not much else to say here. It’s got an inner frame and a toe bend, and everything you’d expect from a foot.
Legs
See those little orange vents? You have to make sure not to put those upside down, otherwise the knee armor won’t fit on. It’s an easy mistake to make, but it’s also easy to reverse.
Oh, and if we look around the back of the leg, we’ll see there’s a nice big hole where we can plug in the white handle of the heat knife:
So now you know where it goes!
Lower Torso
We’ve kinda sorta been here already when we looked at the accessories. But to recap, the Crossbone’s Scissor Anchors are made out of the front skirt armor. You just flip outer framing outward, and you’ve got a little claw:
Upper Torso
This is where we find the second Advanced MS Joint:
So we have the shoulder joints and the neck joints built into what is a very literal rectangular frame. Of course, the big hole in the center is to allow the Core Fighter to plug in.
A few notes:
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There are two tiny little white parts that clip onto the sides of the chest. I ended up super gluing one of them on after it popped of twice (resulting in at least twenty minutes of trying to track it down):
I suggest you glue it right off the bat. You'll thank yourself later (just don't use too much glue, as it's a very small space, and you could accidentally glue the cockpit shut)
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The kit comes with two different stickers of the Crossbone Vanguard logo that you can place in the front of the chest. I've seen Bandai make these kind of "logo stickers" in such a way that there is little to no transparent border surrounding them, but that's not the case here.
There's a rather thick outline of clear sticker material, and I highly suggest that you trim off as much of it as you can. It looks better, and it makes the decal lie flat more easily on the curved surface of the plastic.
Arms
There’s a lot of inner framing in the arms. Part of it is to accommodate the beam shield emitter (which is on its own special hinge), but part of it is because the Crossbone Gundam has an extra joint near the shoulder that allows the forearm to twist.
I’ve checked all my other Real Grades, and none of them have such a joint. I’m not sure if it’s here to support some gimmick, or if it’s there simply because the engineers wanted to flex a little.
Head
This is by far the hardest part of the build. Not only does it sport some of the tiniest parts, but you have to cram them all into a very tiny space. My only advice - aside from taking it slow and steady, of course- is that there’s an opportunity to glue some of the parts that make up the face.
Doing so will make it much easier when you eventually have to the whole face apparatus into the head armor. Just be careful not to use too much glue. A little goes a long way here.
Anyway, when building the head we have to make a choice. You can either with the standard pair of Gundam eyes, or you can give it a pirate eye patch. I have no idea if this is something that happens in the manga, or if it’s just something they included here because it looks cool. Either way, I went with the eyepatch because how could I not? It’s a pirate after all!
Fair warning though - the eyepatch is harder to assemble. I tried taking a picture, but the parts are just so small that it’s hard to make anything out. Instead, you’ll have to settle for this snippet from the instructions:
Normally, there’s be a clear part with two eyes (upon which you’d place the eye stickers). But when you’re using the eyepatch, you first place down an even smaller clear part with just one eye (that’s part A2 in the instructions). Then you place the grey eyepatch (part E11 in the manual) in such a way that it both next to and on top of the clear part. It’s a little weird, but it works (this is also where I advise the use of some glue).
Interestingly, when using the eyepatch, there’s no black backing sticker to place behind the green eye sticker (which is how you’d usually do it). My guess is that the grey part creates a shadow behind the clear part, such that the backing sticker isn’t necessary. Or maybe it’s just so tiny that no one would notice.
There’s another challenge to tackle here. Like the F91 before it, the Crossbone Gundam can open up its face in order to vent heat. That means the lower part of the face is a separate construction that sits on a hinge. And you have to cram that into the head armor, alongside the rest of the mouth. It’s not easy, plain and simple. I only got it work by gently laying the components into one side of the head (as straightly as possible), attaching the second half of the head, and applying pressure until it all lined up and fit. It may not have been the best approach, but it worked.
A few more things of note. I want to talk about the skull on the top of the head:
Yes, it’s tiny, and it you want it to look really good, you’ll need to do your best to panel line it (or at least fill in the eye sockets). But once you see it all marked up, the effect is definitely worth it.
Also, you surely notice the red scars running along the eyes. The kit comes with decals for those, though I can’t for the life of me imagine how that’d work. I just used a bit of red paint instead.
Finished!
And with that, the Crossbone Gundam is finished. With the way things have gone so far, I expect I’ll do multiple posts for photos. I’ve got so many different poses to take with different accessories, in different combinations, with and without the cloak, etc. Stay tuned.