MG Figurise Wild Tiger

I wasn't going to. I really wasn't. I'm not a "model kit person". Too many parts to put together and instructions to follow and... why not just buy pre-assembled action figures? So many parts. Too many parts. Hundreds of freaking parts. And stickers.

And then something happened. I mean, who could resist this box? Particularly when it was for a fraction of the price it was initially released at? *cough* I was kind of curious and I'd seen that other people who'd never accomplished model kits had managed this one so... why not?

This is why not, by the way. This plastic carnage left behind after I was done. All of this contained parts. Hundreds of often unimaginably tiny plastic bits that I refuse to count because that would be horrible and I don't want to know. So I must ask, why?

Well, this turned out to be a pretty good answer, I think. This is the extent of the entire kit: one fully articulated 1/8 scale Wild Tiger figure, complete with one adjustable stand, 8 interchangeable hands, the "helmet open" face (with bangs!), additional helmet parts, two Wild Shots with interchangeable open or closed tips, and one enormous Good Luck Mode arm.

Another angle on the extras, because I worked damn hard. I also painted all of the hand detail myself, because I wasn't about to try and apply the rest of those damn stickers. And water transfers? HA HA HA no.

Heya, Kotetsu! Now even in this picture you can see one of the major drawbacks of a model kit: those damn tabs that keep them connected to the plastic carnage I showed off earlier. What I ultimately did was cut them with scissors, then go back and remove as much of the remaining tab as possible with cuticle scissors. Yes, I bought cuticle scissors for this bastard. And still it wasn't perfect, sometimes due to angle and sometimes due to the color of the plastic. Still, he looks pretty damn good considering. Technically I could sand the rest and paint, but... But. So much but.
All in all, though, this kit is impressive as hell. I imagine all Bandai Master Grade kits are of this quality, and if so... I never want to touch another one ever again. The parts are well-made and sturdy, incredibly intricate, and overall the quality is very good even though the snap-together nature of the parts means things will get loose and fall off. My suggestion: glue. Not the joints or the parts that are supposed to come off, obviously. This guy has a problem right shoulder that I'll be very carefully gluing for sure.
The instructions themselves actually require no ability to read Japanese, though this translation does help if you need it. I'm just glad everything was well-illustrated.

Ahem, yeah, so I used paint for the eye area of th helmet. Obviously. Kinda forgot to smooth the edges, but it's not something you can normally see when it's not up-close photography. The stickers just... did not look right. So I did better, ha and so on. Though now that I'm looking at it up close, the interior bits need more black too... Well I'll get to that.
Sadly that upper left corner of the SoftBank sticker needs to be pressed down and re-sealed as well. I'm an artist so I cheated on getting the stickers all smooth and stuff, see. ...Except for this one, apparently. Bastard. The kitty beard looks damn near perfect by some miracle, though.
Anyway, about that face. On the box cover, it just looks blank, bored and boring. Same with every other shot I've seen of this figure. Mine, though? Looks devastatingly sad and concerned. I couldn't get a decent enough shot with the light working for me to show the whole thing, but there is just such a look of heartbreak. What the hell. What happened? Don't do this to me, Bandai. It's not the placement of the eyes or mask, either. Believe me, they've been changed up several times. He's just sad. So I won't be using that face anymore. Tiger gets enough shit from you, Sunrise.

I did just want to illustrate how fucking tiny some of these pieces are. This piece is Kotetsu's bangs. A separate piece. Which you barely even see. This is not even the smallest piece on this figure. Now do you know why I opened the box and didn't actually get to building it until weeks later?

And just because it amuses me, Wild Tiger without a face.

Insert late for school joke here. He's really astonishingly flexible, and can hold a vast number of poses. Even if you over-extend a joint, the worst that will happen is that you'll be popping it back in place. And that does happen a lot, but it's better than accidental breakage.

And here's one Wild Shot in action! These are pretty neat, I have to say. And detailed as all hell; he had a "folded version" under his arm piece. You just switch that out for the real deal that actually moves when you want to use it. There's also finally a better look at the hand detail I'm all unnecessarily proud of and stuff.
Since you can definitely see it here, the green plastic is pretty impressively glowy under the right lighting conditions. Which I kept getting by accident. Ah well, it still looks cool.

The Good Luck Mode hand is stunning in it's impracticality, which is surely why I love it. And yeah, you really do need the stand for his thing; it's bulky and heavy despite being impressive.

Impressive. And kind of seriously scary, too. It's a hell of a lot of fun to have around, though. You have to admit that you would not go after a guy that had one of these aimed at you. Must resist... so bad bad jokes... too many jokes... overwhelming...

So let's get to that ass shot, shall we? Wild Tiger certainly approves. Point of amusement: there is that so very obvious removeable tab dead center that allows the stand to plug in and... that was totally on purpose and cannot be denied. Thank you, Bandai.

Anyway, yes. See? When I try for glowy, I get too much flash. Ah well. I'm very happy with how he turned out, actually. Even if he's obviously still a bit of a work in progress. I don't think I'd ever want to do this again, but I have surprised myself with going against that thought before.