Underrated, Yet Badass Mecha Reborn in Awesome Plastic

You ever see Gunhed? James Cameron is a fan. And as far as late 1980s sci-fi films go, it’s aged surprisingly well.

The movie might be familiar to gamers as Gunhed went on to serve as the basis of a TurboGrafx-16 game, which was known as Blazing Lazers in the West.

And there couldn’t be a better time to rewatch it! This October, Japanese figure maker Kotobukiya is releasing a 1/35 scale Gunhed plastic model kit for ¥10,290 (US$131). I’ve always thought the Gunhed mecha design—done by Shoji Kawamori—was wonderful. In the above gallery, there are images of a completed sample on display in Tokyo’s Akihabara.

Gunhed has an interesting backstory: The 1989 Japanese flick was born out of a contest to figure out the next Godzilla storyline. It eventually morphed into this mecha movie. Filmmaker Masato Harada, however, found the film’s production “frustrating”—though, he was still able to do the things he wanted to do. What’s more, Harada, who speaks fluent English, hated the dub so much that he took his name off the English version. (More here in this interview.) Backstory troubles aside, Gunhed is worth checking out.

WF2012夏でした [Approaching Target]

超緻密造形 コトブキヤのプラスチックモデルキット「ガンヘッド」のサンプル展示 [Moeyo.com]

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