Release Date: Mid-September 2008

Retail Price: MYR 182.00*(USD $42.90*)

*The price is subject to change, depending on the situation.

Finally, back to full health.

Hello and a very good day to all of our awesome readers here on our blog. I’m back with another Unboxing and First Impressions, and today we will be Unboxing and give you guys my first impressions of the MS-06-R-2 Zaku II Johnny Ridden Custom Unit (MG) Ver.2.0. Before we start I do want to first make an apology of the lateness of the Review of the Gundam Astray Gold Frame Amatsu Mina (RG), due to unforeseen circumstances and sickness, I do have to postpone the review to the next coming Sunday as I just got out from a very bad sickness recently. Again, I am sorry for the lateness, as I have not foreseen that I would be sick for this long nor I have not foreseen that the sickness would really hamper my ability to work on the kit.

Regardless I have made a pledge a long time ago that I will always have a new post up on Sunday and I intend to not miss a Sunday as long I am here. 😊

With that out of the way, lets us get into the Unboxing and give you guys my first impressions of this awesome looking kit. Let’s first go through the Box art of this MG kit, I do like how the illustrator just paints on the overall action scene for this unit. Unlike the MS-06S Zaku II Char Aznable Custom unit, this box art does make this unit look like a battle harden front-line commander unit. With the Zaku Closely clutching its 360mm bazooka and with the desperation of battle that can be seen in the back-ground Tenjin Hidetaka (the box art illustrator) really manage to capture the desperation of the Zeon forces during the battle of A Baoa Qu. Despite the desperation that you can feel in the illustration, the illustrator still manages to make the MS-06-R-2 Looked badass.

In many ways, this boxart does take me back to the old Tamiya Plamo boxarts. As a kid, I loved the Tamiya boxarts as it really captures the scenes of the battles well, the same with this one too.

You can see more of the awesome boxart on the front cover of the manual, that is if the boxart in front of the Box it’s not enough. The manual is a more standard affair. The manual mostly looks like the MS-06S manual with a few exceptions mainly on the MS Development section and the middle section. There are changes in some build instructions as well, the changes are on the leg section and the back-pack section. The weapons section has mostly remained the same (that means more of them damn nubs) but for this version, they do include the parts and the instructions to build the 360mm Bazooka. I am looking forward to building this one.

The manual though familiar it is interesting.

Going through the runner parts are the one that I look forward to for this kit and by god, it looks awesome. Unlike the MS-06S Char Aznable version, this kit it’s just one shade of red and black (and a hint of yellow) and honestly the red here looks a lot better than the one on the Char’s Version (sorry dude, but its true). The quality of the runners is on par with the MS-06S so on that I can already expect this to look awesomely unpainted. Honestly though, since I had lots of fun with painting the Amatsu Mina, I do expect myself to have more fun painting this kit and now I can’t see myself not doing so for my next future build as well. The decals and the sticker here as well look better than the ones I get on the MS-06S, I am looking forward to applying them on the kit this time, maybe I should get the mark setter for this lovely kit and try it out.

Overall the Runner parts and the decals do, look awesome. Though honestly, I am not looking forward to building the Zaku Machine Gun and the Bazooka because of them damn nubs. Oh well maybe this time, hopefully, I would do better than before. Hopefully.

My final thoughts on this kit, so far as I was going through it all I do feel like this is going to be more Zaku II but I do have concerns of the kit as like how does the kit would perform in real life, how is the changes affected the articulation of the Zaku II or does the extra stuff on this would add in to the weight and balance of the whole kit and most importantly, is this kit going to be as good as the other Zaku II kits. The Zaku II (Ver.2.0) that I have built over the years always has been a fun kit to go and It has never disappointed me so far. Though by the looks of it this kit does have some major changes to the looks (legs mostly) it does look to be still more Zaku II and as I have always said in this blog, you can never go wrong with more zakus in your life.

With that said ends this edition of Unboxing and my first Impressions of the MS-06-R-2 Zaku II Johnny Ridden Custom Unit (MG) Ver.2.0. Before I close this, I do want to give a shout out to a few of my former Yamaha colleagues, namely Jason Wong, Regina Hui and Ricky loh for getting me this kit. Your form of support over my own battles over my health, wellbeing and what I set out to do for a change does bring me hope that there is always light at the end of the tunnel that I am on and your support means everything to me. For that I thank you, this kit will always be a kit that will have a special place in my heart.

You guys may as well notice that the quality of the photos taken for this Unboxing looked a lot better than it was before (though my photography skills still sucks ass, I will learn in time), this is made possible by one of my closest friends and one that I consider both of them like my own family. The couple Adrianna and Mun Hong, gave me their unused camera for me to make use for my future projects and as well for me to create and plan additional content for this small blog of ours. To the both of them, Thanks a lot, guys, your support is invaluable to me and having this camera in my arsenal is really a blessing. Thanks so much the both of you from the bottom of my heart.

Finally, thank you to all the readers of my blog here and to all of you that reads and those take time to voice out your opinions here, Reddit, FB or on my Instagram. Your voices and your words in some way is a form of support and really, I couldn’t have made over 50 posts here without you all here, So as well Thank you all for your support.

With that ends this edition of my heartfelt Unboxing and First impressions, we are your thoughts on this kit? Have you guys yourself built this awesome kit before? We do look forward to reading your thoughts and opinions on both this kit and to this post! I do appreciate reading through and replying to all of you here! So type away! 😀

We will be back this Wednesday with a new Let’s Talk Gunpla segment and as well hopefully I will be able to release the review for the Amatsu Mina! Do look forward to that! As ever I hope that all of you have an awesome weekend ahead and may you all have an awesome gunpla time too! Till the next time!

Ciao!