Saturday, January 5, 2013

MS Gundam Seed Heroines 4 Part 1

Lacus Clyne

A new gashapon review after MS Gundam Seed Destiny Heroines 3 in early October last year, this is MS Gundam Seed Heroines 4. ^^




Released in early 2005, this set contains three characters from "MS Gundam SEED" (Lacus Clyne, Natarle Badgiruel and Aisha) and another two from "MS Gundam SEED Destiny" (Meer Campbell and Meyrin Hawke). Despite being shown on the box cover, Meer and Meyrin aren't the main stars of this particular set in my opinion. ^^; There are other sets from this Gundam gashapon series alone that feature the two characters. For Meer, she can be found in tons of other gashapon sets, on top of various scaled figurine releases. Same goes for Lacus.

Natarle and Aisha are the real charms I think, given how few their merchandises are outside of this gashapon set. There was a resin kit of Natarle released by B-Club and that was it for her I think, and poor Aisha was completed sidelined in all merchandise release despite being the only named female ZAFT MS pilot in "MS Gundam SEED". ^^; Both are really awesome characters in the show in my opinion, especially Natarle who went through tremendous character development from being the XO to Captain Ramius to the commander of her own ship and fought against her former Archangel comrades. The lack of figurines for both of them is quite a pity. ^^;

Design-wise, Meer is the real star in this particular set. Her concert costume is definitely the highlight. Then again, it's the same design as her MS Gundam Seed Destiny EF Collection 3 self, albeit bigger overall. For "merchandising rarity" (XD) and design respectively, I think I'll save Natarle and Meer for last in this review series. ^^


Note the release year. ^^




All five types are shown on the sides and back of the box.


Top and bottom views of the box.


(Left) Box open.
(Right) The usual questionnaire can be spotted behind the front box cover.


No knife is needed to open up the boxes since all of them have easy-to-tear edges.


A aforementioned questionnaire behind the front cover.

That's about the entire set, moving on to introducing one of the figurines in this posting: the n-th version of Lacus Clyne ^^



A little bit of assembly is required, as the figurine is being separated into a few parts.

More images of this gashapon figurine: ^^










Closeups on the details:






[Face]





[Hair]







[Dress]



[Arms]




[Legs]

As with all the other versions of Lacus Clyne, the sculpt work done for her hair is an absolute beauty. ^^ However, I think the "spiraling" folds which made up her dress kind-of steals the limelight from its owner. ^^; It's a stunning-looking dress to me. The design and color used are a lot subtler than some of her other costumes as seen in the anime series, but it's very beautiful nonetheless. While the color scheme is very simple, details like the real fabric-like bottom edges and some wrinkles on the waist area are really.

Also, among all the dresses Lacus has, the folds on this one actually matches the design motif of her headpin. ^^

Besides the hair and her dress, I think the face sculpt of this version is the best yet among all the figurines of Lacus in my collection. ^^ It's chubbier than the MS Gundam Seed Destiny Heroines 7 version, which is more accurate to her depiction in the anime series no doubt. ^^ Her lovely smile is a great finishing touch to this really beautiful gashapon figurine. ^^

A look at this version of Lacus alongside another two featured in past reviews:


On the left is the MS Gundam Seed Destiny Heroines 7 version; on the right is the MS Gundam Seed Destiny EF Collection 3 version.





With the "non-standing" (XD) version from MS Gundam Seed Destiny Heroines 3.



Since she's part of a complete gashapon series that I have, there'll be no individual gallery for Lacus like MS Gundam Seed Destiny EF Collection 5: Lunamaria Hawke or MS Gundam Seed Destiny EF Collection 3: Meer Campbell. Like what I did with MS Gundam Seed Destiny Heroines 3, the reviews for the other four figurines will be spread out in separate postings in the future. ^^

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