Gundam

Gunpla Build - High Grade Gundam Maxter (Build) 2024-04-18

You know the drill. Let’s look at the runners:

One of my most common reactions is to say something like “There aren’t as many colored parts as I thought there’d be”, but not this time. There’s plenty of red and blue plastic in this spread. And of course, we get the Action Base just like we did for the Gundam Rose.

Gunpla Build - High Grade Gundam Maxter 2024-04-15

We interrupt our streak of old builds in order to do a fresh, new, just-arrived-in-the-mail one. I’ve been eagerly awaiting this kit for months, and now it’s finally here:

That’s right, it’s the High Grade Gundam Maxter from Mobile Fighter G Gundam, by far the most American mobile suit ever created (yes, even more American than the one dressed like the American flag).

Playing Catch Up 2024-04-10

You may have noticed a pattern over the course of the last two builds. I started building both of these kits months ago, then put them on ice for one reason or another, then finally got back to finishing them now.

And these aren’t even the first times this has happened this year! For example, I’m pretty sure the Razor Crest sat unfinished for at least a year. And looking at my workbench, I count approximately seven - seven! - kits that I started and then stopped.

Gunpla Build - High Grade Byarlant Custom 2024-03-21

Picture it - Holiday Season, 2022.

I’m taking my kids to shop for gifts while mom is out of town. We go to a store that just so happens to sell model kits. I’m hoping to score a Real Grade God Gundam, or maybe a High Grade X Divider. I come up short on both counts, but in the meantime I find something else. Something that I never expected to come across at a brick and mortar store.

Then I sat on it for a year, until one day I got tired of its giant box taunting me and finally decided to build it.

That day was December 16th 2023. And that kit was the High Grade Byarlant Custom, from the Gundam Unicorn OVA:

Of course, like so many other kits over the last six months, I got tired of it mid-build and put it back on the shelf, which is why I’m writing about it here in March, instead of December.

Whatever! Let’s get to it.