Soul of Chogokin Gx-77 Pacific Rim Gipsy Danger

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Soul of Chogokin Gx-77 Pacific Rim Gipsy Danger

Note how the Plasmacasters are oriented on the trays (red stripes pattern on top).

The pick, along with the “wings” for the backpack are located underneath the battery tray.

Most importantly, note how this plastic insert goes into Gipsy’s “collar”. When returning Gipsy to the box, put this on him first, don’t leave it in the tray and force Gipsy to go into it, it may warp the collar.

Not really a big fan of vertical box layouts. I still prefer the old “landscape”-style SOC boxes of old, but that’s just me.

Wow, it’s been 5 years since the Pacific Rim movie came out and I never would have imagined we’d get a SOC Gipsy Danger.

The design and tooling are good, but it’s hard to tell how much metal is underneath the plastic panels.

Plasmacasters (called Plasma Cannons in the movie)

The Plasmacasters require swapping the alternate forearms in place. The connection for the forearms isn’t that well thought out. You will likely pull out the forearms while lifting arms up. I’m not a fan of this concept.

Rocket Elbow

To get the Rocket Elbows pose right, you have to open up the panels on the forearms and reset them to cover the wrist joint.

Wish they put in some effects parts here to make the thrusters more visually obvious.

If you want to make his Rocket Elbow pose more dynamic, remember there’s a secret hinge underneath the shoulder pads that allows for added range of motion.

Chain swords.

Both modes of the sword are included. Part of me wishes the unformed sword was more like a chain whip, instead of a single plastic piece, but I guess that would’ve added more to the costs.

Attaching the swords into the wrist guards is a cinch.

Heh, maybe next time they should always start with the swords, eh?

Last but not least.. the “tanker-used-as-a-melee-weapon” accessory. It’s pretty big, but all plastic. It can only be gripped on the bow end of the ship, where the ridges are.

One of my favorite scenes in the movie.

Lights Department

To equip the batteries, you have to remove this panel from his back first.

The main panel is a bit hard to dig out, thankfully, the pick works excellently for this task.

Gipsy Danger’s Electronics run on LR41 button batteries. These are included (Vinnie’s brand again) with the toy and packed on a separate tray. Gipsy requires 3 batteries for the light up chest and eyes, plus another 2 on each Plasma Caster.

To get to the battery compartment, you have to remove these 2 panels.

To activate the lights in the torso and head, you just press the Nuclear Vortex Turbine chest panel and it will “boot up” the Nuclear Vortex Turbine, just like in the movie. It will cycle through various colors before staying on. From blue, to dark orange, to finally, “stable” orange. Pretty amazing.

The head actually doesn’t sport any LED bulbs, it’s all done with light piping from the torso LED.

To paraphrase the text on the front of the box, “This giant is mankind’s last hope”.

Although not indicated in the manual, the Nuclear Vortex Reactor in the toy stays active for 3 minutes before going into auto-off mode.

Each Plasmacaster runs on 2x LR41 button batteries.

To activate the Casters, you have to tug the Elbow Rocket nozzles to turn on the switch.

Visually, it looks great, Bandai went with strong LEDs for lights here and the lighting effect does not disappoint.

Display base

Note the peg in the hole for orientation of the support arm for the base.

Huh, I guess Bandai dropped the classic look of the SOC gold chrome nameplate here? Odd.

You can lock in Gipsy Danger to the support arm via the crotch connector, making him quake-proof.

The Good
-Figure weighs 648 Grams and stands roughly 9.5 inches tall

-Diecast parts are pretty much spread around.
–soles of the feet,
–“Backpack”/ battery cover
–Sections of the thighs
–Parts of the torso (I think)
–Shoulder, thigh and knee joints
–Back part of the lower legs

-Clever design work in making the panels and pistons move when you rotate the shoulders and raise the legs.

-The pick (for electronics) is back and I gotta say this design is better than the previous pick that came with DX Combattler.

-Articulated feet and toes.

-LEDs are bright and it really adds a big bonus to the toy.

-Great “polish” on the finish of the figure, they took something that could’ve been dull to look at due to all the gray tones and plastic material and made it look amazing. That is something.

-Gotta love the secret hinge on the shoulder pads, I missed it my first time around the toy.

The Bad

-ZERO ratchet joints. Makes it feel like this toy was originally meant for the Metal Build line?

-Forearm connections aren’t as solid as I would’ve liked, you can pull them out with just using your pinky finger (or maybe I’ve just got strong pinkies?)

-Head is just posted on a simple peg, not a ball joint. This, along with the collar design, limits Gipsy’s head poses. To be fair though , I don’t really recall Gipsy looking up and down much in the movie… soooo.. it’s accurate? Yay?

-The need to manually attach the “wings” seems kind of odd, since the pieces are small, I would’ve preferred the whole thing come fully assembled (unless Bandai was trying to avoid another Mazinkaiser Chest panel incident?).

-The manual is a simple, black and white print out on a single piece of paper. WTH? Unimpressive.. very unimpressive.

The Ugly

-The cover panels for the Plasmacaster forearms fall of with the slightest touch, it got to the point that it was ridiculously annoying. I cannot emphasize this enough. What the deuce, Bandai??

Overall, It’s generally … okay. It’s big and decently heavy (think Aoshima Mazinkaiser, without the Scrander wings) and everything is sculpted and painted beautifully, the finish makes it stand out.

But the lack of ratchets really turns it off for me in a big way (maybe it’s just me), plus the forearms tend to slip out way to easily (NEVER hold the toy by his forearms). It’s not a bad toy but I was honestly expecting something… more? From an engineering standpoint, it doesn’t feel like something made by the designers of the SOC Voltron. Personally I don’t see this fella making my top 20 SOC list, and I really loved the Pacific Rim movie. But I guess your mileage may vary.

Funfact: According to the writer of Pacific Rim, Travis Beacham, he named Gipsy Danger after the Pre-World War II British aircraft engine, the de Havilland Gipsy aircraft engine, designed by Frank Halford.

Gold



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