Thursday, December 25, 2014
Review: S.H.Figuarts Kamen Rider Bravo -Durian Arms-
| Figure Information | |
| Manufacturer: | Bandai |
| Origin Series: | Kamen Rider Gaim |
| Scale: | Non-scale |
| Height: | Approximately 15cm tall |
| Original Price: | 4,860 Yen |
| Packaging: |
If you're a regular review reader here, this is probably the 4th time you've seen a Gaim Figuarts packaging here; if you did (even just one of the Gaim SHF reviews), you'd notice that Bravo's box designs seems different, special like Today's occasion, Bravo is one of the Tamashii Web exclusives for Gaim Figuarts series. Thus, as a trend of the more recent Web Exclusives, you lose your typical window to inspect your figure (which sucks btw) for a more "premium" look and thus, Bravo gets this accurate and gay product shot pose instead.
Losing the side windows as well gives Tamashii Nations to slip in a standing product shot on one side which wasn't really present on the regular releases. The other side gets a bigger nameplate which is, again, thanks to the windowless packaging.
The backside, however, remains the same featuring some detail highlights and the figure's gimmicks along with Bravo's emblem as the background.
| Details: |
Starting off with Bravo's head, it looks great IMO, I'm not the best judge when it comes to accuracy but it looks dead solid if you ask me; the metallic dark green paint also makes it very good and accurate in terms of color and also makes it blend perfectly with the silver color used on the finished product.
As Bravo resembles Roman soldiers or Gladiators, the brush is also present and also finished in a really vibrant metallic red paint that perfectly pops out together with the rest of Bravo's colors. Another thing worth mentioning is how much attention had been given to those spikes, I could've wished for a pointer finish but that would make it fragile and a hassle to handle so I guess the finished product is the perfect presentation for them spikes.
What surprised me the most is that even after a whole year of an awesome ride with Gaim (the series), I never noticed that there was a "crack" on the helm's design and it can be found on Bravo's left eye.
The Durian Armor in general sense is neatly done as it shares all the goods with that of his head in both the spiky details and the paint finish while the backside remains your generic "peeled" or "opened" fruit. The amount of spikes really amazes me and they all look and feel pretty sturdy.
If you think it doesn't get spikier than that, well, it does! The spikes doesn't end at the Durian armor as it extends to Bravo's pre-arms suit by being present in the gauntlets and leg armor.
The inner suit of Bravo is actually retooled from Baron's inner suit and you can really see a heavy amount of similarities if you check out both.
The belt like other riders features a movable slicer along with a neatly detailed and removable lockseed and rider plate despite the scale.
But like Baron and Zangetsu, Bravo's belt doesn't have any lockseed carrier like the one that Gaim had.
| Accessories: |
Tamashii Nations had done a great job with providing us the much needed accessories such as his weapon the twin Duri Noko, the obligatory closed Durian lockseed which you can cling on Gaim's belt AND as a very fun filled accessory, they even included a wine glass! An item often seen in his Zawame broadcasts in the early parts of the show.
As for the hands, he comes with 3 pairs of alternate handsets in the form of two open hand variants and a pair of gripping hands; additionally, he comes with a special right hand which can hold the glass wine.
For a fun bonus, Tamashii Nations provided people to download a pdf template of Oren's signature speech bubbles; unfortunately, my printer doesn't have any ink so you won't be seeing these in action but if you own Bravo or just want to print the template, you can download it here. Below is a general look on the template provided.
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| Articulation Points: |
Much like his fellow Armored Riders, Bravo possesses a great array of neat articulation points which I'll speed up on since it's pretty much generic for a lot of figuarts but I'll focus on the special mentions though. :D
Bravo's head is almost the same as the other riders such that he can freely rotate his head sideways, tilt his head and look up to a very decent extent.
What's different is that despite the usual articulation points, the Durian armor seems a bit too big so Bravo can barely look down thanks to that.
A special point I'd like to discuss is with Bravo's shoulder pads; unlike the first 3 Armored Riders that I've reviewed, Baron's shoulder pads aren't just hinged, they're actually using a joint similar to most figuarts wrists and that they are only clipped to his shoulders.
And with such, you can pull down the shoulder pads or even rotate it to an extent.
With his unique shoulder pad articulation, you make use of the shoulder joints to almost its full extent by having access to a full 360 rotation and an almost 90 degree sideways raise. Additionally, Bravo retains your usual bicep swivel, double jointed elbows and hinge + ball jointed wrists.
Now, I'm not sure if this is another unique feature or something I missed out on the first 3 armored riders but you can actually see Bravo's actual Torso joint and this actually surprised me as it gives you a very very satisfying ab crunch.
The unique joint also allows you to rotate his body a bit and further rotate it via his waist joint.
Bravo retains all the sweet leg articulation such as the hinge + swivel hip joints, the thigh swivel and the double jointed knees; since Bravo uses the same inner suit as Bravo, this also slightly limit his sideways split due to the mass of the thigh guards on the suit.
The ankle joints remain as your typical newer rider figuarts ankles that allows you to tilt them, pull them down or rotate them sideways; and the obligatory toe hinge which lets you bend the toes upwards.
| Poseability: |
Oren had been a fun character through the entire series and his Figuarts version can really do all of his fun factor for his casual poses but of course, I keep them low since I'm more into action-y shots.
Put on his Duri Nokos and this is where the fun gets!
With a pair of em, you can only leave it to your imagination on how you'll pose the ex-soldier and he certainly can do neat action poses thanks to his wonderful frame.
One thing that I'd like to mention though is that switching out arms are practically a pain since there's no real room to hold Bravo as pretty much around 80% of where you can hold has spikes and even though they're not that sharp, it's still a pain to have the spikes impale your skin as you try to switch out his hands or even just adjust his body as a whole.
Despite my minor complaint, I definitely love the figuarts' finish as it can definitely bring out Oren's character very well!
Pose him around with fellow Armored Riders and you got yourself a totally worth it figure and with that said, below are some shots with other Riders.
| Final Thoughts: |
Despite being tagged as an exclusive, I totally loved the figure as much as I love the character back in the show. The addition of the wine glass wasn't really needed but they still did and to give the figure even more life, they even provided a free speech bubble printable. The figure definitely gives justice to the character and that, for me, makes his higher price tag a minor thing. Definitely a great Armored Rider to add to any Gaim collection so, you definitely must get it if you love Oren or even just love the suit.
Again, Bravo is another figure that I got from the awesome people at Onegai Onii-chan!
I give the great patisserie a glorious 5 out of 5.
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