Everyone who knows model kits knows that Bandai Hobby produces some of the best kits in the business. And now, Bluefin is bringing the new Bandai Star Wars line of model kits to the US!
Check out this amazing video to get a feel for the commitment to excellence Bandai has put into this new line of kits.
The first kit in the series is the Star Wars: Rogue One Red Squadron X-Wing set. The set includes both 1/72 and 1/144 scale X-Wings so you can do a perspective display, or, like in my case, so you can have matching daddy and son X-Wings. It’s currently available for pre-order on Amazon and will be released later this week to coincide with the release of the Rogue One film. An A-Wing, a TIE Interceptor, and Poe’s X-Wing, all in 1/72 scale, will be following shortly in January. The rest of the kits being released in 2017 have not yet been announced with dates, but if you watch the above video, you can get an idea of what’s coming.
I was lucky enough to get my hands on an advanced copy of the X-Wing set, and while I haven’t gotten a chance to put it together yet, just looking through the box has me super excited! I love that the set comes with two X-Wings so that my son and I can both do one. The larger one has more pieces and details than the smaller one, and comes with water slide decals, while the smaller one has regular stickers. This is the perfect father and kid model kit (though if you want to build them both yourself, I won’t hold it against you).
Like with all modern Bandai kits, the X-Wing kit takes advantage of Bandai’s color injection molding technique to get multiple colors onto a single tree of parts. This allows for fewer runners and a variety of pre-colored pieces. There are seven runners in total between both X-Wings.
The instructions are, as with all Bandai kits, in both English and Japanese. They are very easy to follow and walk you through building the sub-assemblies that build the full kit. There is also a detailed, full color color and decal guide. None of this will come as a surprise to anyone familiar with recent Bandai Hobby model kits, but I wanted to highlight them for those new to the kits. This level of detail helps immensely if you’re trying to get as screen accurate as possible.
If you order now, you should be able to get it delivered in time for Christmas!
In the coming weeks I plan to work on building and painting my X-Wings. I may even do a live stream or some videos after the fact, but I will definitely follow-up with a detailed review of the kit.
