Gunpla Review: HGBF Denial Gundam

Here's a review on the High Grade 1/144 Denial Gundam from Gundam Build Fighters Try.

Wow... where's Menasor :/

Aesthetics

The Denial Gundam is, in my opinion, one of the best looking gundam out of Build Fighters. It's looks like a mix of Legend Gundam (upper torso) and Kowloon Gundam (single front skirt armor). There are a few visible seam lines (shoulders and forearms). Also he has quite a number of visible nub marks. I recommend being extremely careful on the blue and very light blue parts. The light blue parts has some large gates connecting it to the runner.

Color-wise, it's a straight up Legend Gundam, with the gray being slightly lighter. Stickers includes a single red head camera. eyes (which I ruined), the grey bit's in the should flap (which I left out), the large grey parts in the calves (which I painted), black for the leg vents (which I panel lined) and the white for the forearm and ankle armors. Overall, very good color separation, specially the chest.

He's incredibly lean, with a supermodel waist, large thighs, tiny feet. It all comes together into a very nice looking Gundam. Reminds me of a Katoki design, specially the legs. The design, however, comes at a price (see Articulation).

He's on permanent burst mode since the clear parts are molded in clear purple instead of the sparkly space black in the anime. Also, unlike the Build Burning, you cannot swap to the normal mode, again due to the lack of clear black parts. The clear parts, in reality slightly color-shifts from purple to a pinker shade of purple. The camera can only capture one color though.

Articulation

He has pretty much the articulation of a modern High Grade. Unlike most HGUC kit's though, the neck is unique (maybe the same as build burning).The neck is on a hinge on the base of the chest, while the head connects to the neck via a ball joint, with a tiny peg that prevents the head from tilting side to side. His head can rotate side to side (if you cut off the tiny peg), do the chicken, but looking down is limited since, as mentioned earlier, the helmet design (cheek parts), hits the collar area.

Why did you not get a picture of the neck joint peg or the limited downwards movement?

It uses a new shoulder mechanism, where the chest bit moves forward in place of the polycap hinge for the shoulder movement. Due to the chest design though, he can't quite do a cross arm pose.

Better than the 1st articulation pic...

 The arms are on a double hinge joint, granting him an almost 180 bend.

*gasp! An accurate description of the mentioned articulation point!

The shoulder armor itself is connected via a plastic on plastic ball joint which can be pulled out slightly to give better range, and has a hinge so it can swing up. The tiny shoulder flap can move up independently, but limits the outward motion of the arm itself. It has a bicep swivel and a ball hinge wrist. The torso is connected via 2 large polycap ball joints: Chest to torso, and torso to waist. The super model waist gives it very good range, and the fact that the middle bit is circular, makes it visually appealing as it does not present any awkward angular gaps.

Back to form with inaccurate pictures

The legs are connected via a T-bar to the crotch, so you can swing the hip like a Sailor Moon pose. As in the pic above, the hip plates are on ball joints, which are connected the thighs via a hinge. It also has universal hip joints (forward and back, side to side), and double jointed knees. The shins connect to the thighs via a small polycap (plastic knee connects to polycap inside upper shins), so you need to pose carefully or it'll come of.

How does this pic describe everything you said above???

The front skirt is a single solid piece and it just hinges up. The back skirt has a grey "inner frame" and hinges out as well. Problem is the front skirt impedes the leg's front motion as it cannot swivel out of the way. It cannot kneel due to this. It also gets caught on the blue stomach piece, so if you are planning on painting the kit, sand off the upper area to prevent rubbing.

ugh.. I give up!

 Also, unlike the Build Burning, which has a ball joint and a swivel in the ankle (at least from what I have seen), the Denial denies you that range as it only has a ball joint. The ankle armor itself is connected via a separate joint... which is connected the same way as the knee (same polycaps) but it only hinges very slightly up at the upper ankle. Add that to the narrow feet design makes it difficult to pose in extremely wide legged poses. I had to pull the ball joint out to give it more range... at the cost of stability.

I'll kill you for that pun

Weapons and Extras

Junya, the "pilot" is an expert of a lot of forms of hand-to-hand fighting style (including the signature Jigen Haō-Ryū Kenpo). As such, he lacks any ranged weapons, nor a shield (but the exclusive Cathedral Gundam if you want this design with standard armaments).  Instead, he gets a variety of action hands: Splayed open hands for slapping opponents. Karate chop hands to Unicorn chop a Neo-Zeong (still no idea how a delicate manipulator pierce though inches of armor plating), fists for punching fools, a clear fist for the show's signature punch, and holding things hands... for no apparent reason. Everything, save the clear fists and holding things hands have a hinge to allow the wrist to swivel up and down.

Brought to you by Alienware

He can perform (to a certain extent) most of the stuff he does in the TV show, such as:

Seiken Zukiiiii!!! (Interchangeable with Shippu Zuki, or any of the punch attacks)

Ugh...guess what, he did not do the other Jigen Hao Ryu poses...

He can also perform the other fighting styles in the show such as:

Boxing

lol! Mayweather style

Ba Ji Quan

you have no idea how excited he is on the possibility of posing stuff like this... that's still show accurate

Vale Tudo

Ronda Rousey?

And other potential fighting styles such as: Muay Thai

His TekkenxGunpla fanstasy came true

Karate

See?

Taekwondo

You can stop now...

Snake Style Kung -Fu

You forgot Judo.. which he actually used in the show -_-

As for other weapons, he has 2 short blades that can come out of the forearm. It's made of the same clear purple part as the hair extension effect parts.

Guess what video game he's currently playing

In the show, it can lengthen to become long swords, but you don't get those. Just short blades for shanking fools... or templars.

Templars don't have bazookas

The rest of his accessories are effect parts. It comes with 2 clear hair pieces. One pony tail that has 3 joints (hence poseable).

FABULOUS! Too bad half of it is off shot!

Or a Sailor Venus hair. It was a lot more substantial in the show vs the one given to you, but hey, it's better than nothing.

On top of the hair, he comes with burst mode effect parts... which makes posing him a PITA. Butterfly flame which plugs to the holes at the back, flames for the shoulders and flames for the wrist, which connects via the sword connection

All clear purple parts have glitters or "plavsky particles". All of these reminds me of Valefor from SRW.

And Build Burning's Ialdabaoth right? Red vs Blue?

As an added bonus, you get the flames from the Build Burning.

But the pegs that suppose to connect to make it look like thrusters are very loose on mine. They just flop down, like a flaccid pen.

Annndd we're censored

You also get Build Burning's effect parts. 2 fist effect parts for the Ryusei Rasen ken. Flame trails of various sizes.

And a single kick effect for Sei-so Giri.

He actually broke the mouth piece on the RG Zaku :))

Quite a nice number of stuff for the price... not quite on the same level as the G-gyagya though (basing it on sheer size of the suit).

Size Comparison

Denial is slightly taller than your average 18 meter suit. Not quite Nu Gundam though. Here he is next to a Zaku.

His favorite suit design is that Zaku.

And next to MP Prowl

Because everyone has an MP Prowl

Summary

The kit has some drawbacks, specially on the articulation. If it was a normal beam rifle, shield toting suit, it would have scored much much higher. But since it's a martial arts melee suit, the articulation sort of disappoints. If only the ankles had a swivel, or a front skirt can get out of the way, or that tiny shoulder flaps moved higher. The tiny feet makes balancing him a chore and mine for some reason, the lower legs keeps popping out of the pegs. But most of these are caused by the design. On the plus side, it looks great, has decent articulation, comes with a bunch of hands, 2 swords and a bunch of effect parts on top of the Build Burning effect parts. Would recommend him? Yes! He just looks too good to pass up, especially if you're a fan of Build Fighters. I believe he would have worked much better as a Robot Damashi  release. Will there be one? No clue. I'm waiting for the Dom R35, so I might just post some existing kit that I have.

Lens flare overload