Mazinkaiser Chogokin Z Color Ver.

Review by Gazbot

Sample provided by HobbyLink Japan

This review is specifically for the Chogokin Z color version, the original version has already been reviewed by SentaiSeiya here.
The main difference is just that the silver parts are a shiny chrome color instead of the more anime accurate flat grey. So, lets take a look at the Box:

The figure and and some accessories are in one tray, the Kaiser Scrander parts and second Kaiser Blade in another, it also comes with an instruction sheet.

Once out of the box I gave him a quick turnaround, he is heavier than he looks and stands very easily.

I switched to a blue background from this point on because I thought the grey made it difficult to see the edges of his chrome parts.

His legs had plastic protector bibs on them to prevent scratching I suppose.

The face sculpt and paint are really nice.

The metal content on this is limited to the lower legs, the chest and upper back armor, and the hip and shoulder joints. This however, results in a very well balanced figure.

So he looks pretty great overall, even if he is a bit on the slim side and not quite anime accurate. Lets examine his articulation. Starting with the head.

Surprisingly the Kaiser Pilder cannot be removed. Personally I prefer this, but I understand many do not, and it would have been nice if it came with a separate Kaiser Pilder accessory. The side horns can be rotated, I am guessing this is to help avoid breakage (editor's note: this is for the "Reito Beam" freezing attack).

The neck joint allows a 360 degree turn of the head

He can tilt his head downward quite far, but the helmet sculpt prevents looking up very much.

Next up the arms. The arms are the source of every complaint I have about this figure.

This is as far as they can go up normally.

But, by manipulating the joints and chest fins you can get them up this high.

The shoulder joint comes out from the body to allow more forward movement of the arms across the chest.

The metal shoulder joint is SUPER tight. I popped the arm off the first time I moved it, by not supporting it properly. Fortunately it seems designed that way, so no harm done.

The arms are restricted from going as far back as they can come forward, this is as far back as they could go.

The elbow joints are a bit odd as well. There is a gold peg into the arm which bends but also rotates and there is a flap/hinge on the forearm to allow further bending. Sometimes they become unaligned however, and you need to rotate the arm before you bend it.

It does allow for some extremely close arm bends.

But, the top connection is not extremely tight. I have since learned that the reason for this is that you can swap out arms with some other SRCs as a feature. But I would rather have a simpler and sturdier joint.

The hands are on ball joints and swap-able. Every time I pulled one off, the peg stayed in the hand instead of on the wrist, the cuff fell out as well. It was annoying and I resorted to using my teeth to remove the peg from the hands. I though the pegs were maybe assembled backwards as one side was smaller, so I reversed them. That fixed the problem, but then the hands we floppy and loose, so I switched it back. The lesser of two evils.

On to the torso. Like the head it can spin at the waist in a full circle. It can also lean back reasonably far.

The chest joint can be pulled up for a longer body and more extension, but the joint will be more visible when you do this.

The legs have really sturdy metal ball joints attaching to the hips that also rotate.

The knee joint can move more than 90 degrees inward and is a double jointed. I also has a great detail fill so there is no gap, the knee pad prevents much reverse movement though.

The feet are on ball joints, and have the same pull down joint extension that the torso has.
They can also split in the middle for more movement, but I did not realize this until I later looked at SentaiSeya's review.

There is an open socket in the butt plate for inserting a Tamashii Stage adapter (included).
I wish it came with a cover plate, bu it's not so bad on a robot as it would have been on another character. Also the adapter without the stand looks like a waste disposal pipe :p

Mazinkaiser comes with 3 sets of hands; the closed fists, the open hands...

...And some sword holding hands. The Kaiser blade must be split into two parts then reassembled to be held.

He comes with the standard version Kaiser blade, and a bigger "forced perspective" version.

While they are supposed to come apart to fit into the hands, for some reason the bottom jewels come off as well.

Here are some poses with the normal blade, and then one with the giant blade

Next up, let's check out his flight apparatus, the Kaiser Scrander! He has another exposed port, this time on his back to allow it to be mounted there.

The Scrander comes in 5 pieces.

The four wing parts rotate where they are plugged in, and also have individual hinge joints making them quite pose-able.

So lets do some Scrander posing!

Now for dual wielding mode!

My best attempt at matching the box pose.

He stands between 7 and 8 inches depending on how you measure it.

Here he is with his brothers Mazinger Z (on the right SOC shin version) and Great Mazinger, (on the left SRC version).

And a more complete size comparison line up.

And here he is living on my shelf.

Overall it's a solid figure. I have some gripes mostly about the arms and hands, but the pros outweigh the cons for me. I am not as much of a fan of this Mazinger as I am the earlier versions, but the chrome finish really sells it for me, and while he is not especially fun to pose, he looks AWESOME on my shelf. So I am happy with him.

Pros:
Tight joints
Good balance
Nice detailing
Chrome finish looks great
Articulated Scrander allows for some great effect

Cons:
Arms joints are odd
Removable elbow joint sometimes comes off when you don't want it too
Changing hands is a pain.
Some joints are too tight
Not as pose-able as some other figures in this line

Also notable, the chrome effect is what made this version more desirable to me, however is is susceptible to finger print smears.