Meet our mech. He's real, and we're going to show you how the wizards at Legacy Effects put him together.

This is no static display piece. Everything about this mech actually works, and it is stomping around Comic-Con right now. It all has to fit together perfectly when you're building a mech, so all the pieces are carefully trimmed and finished for a precise fit.

Legacy's Rob Ramsdell fits a piece of armor above the mech's pecs.

Stilts? Pfft. An exoskeleton is so much more WIRED. Bruce Mitchell gets a little help becoming 9.5 feet tall.

Jim Kundig spots Bruce Mitchel as he dons the pads and linkages that control the mech's arms -- one of which sports a sweet chain gun.

Suiting up is a four-man job that requires Peter Weir Clark, Alan Scott, and Jim Kundig to help Bruce Mitchell into the massive mech.

WIRED's mech is only slightly less menacing without its armor.

It's just another day at the office for Bruce Mitchell, suited up in the mech's cockpit. The larger arms mimic the motion of the smaller arms, which Mitchell controls via a series of linkages.

Reach for the sky, mech! Peter Weir Clark provides a little physical therapy to WIRED's mech.

It isn't as if you can buy mech armor at the hardware store, so Legacy Effects made custom molds to create our mech's skin.

Bruce Mitchell tries his mighty legs on for size while David Vocarrubias and Alan Scott wire him up.

Comic-Con or bust (your head).

Check out the discrepancy in shoe sizes between our mech and the guy inside. Form follows function -- it's no small feat (See what we did there?) to keep a 9.5-foot-tall mech from toppling over.

The molded fiberglass skin is painted and polished before being fitted over the metal skeleton beneath.

When your mech is more than 9 feet tall, it's a good idea to wear a helmet.

At more than 9 feet tall and 400 pounds, the fiberglass-over-metal mech was terrifying even before it was finished.

WIRED's massive mech hanging out at Comic-Con, towering over Adam Savage.