Hi guys, Sharp-O back on the model kit BS with a return to the LBX line of 1/1 scale buildable robot kits from Bandai Spirits! We’re taking a look at Ban Yamano’s prototype LBX; AX-00!

Hi guys, Sharp-O back once again with another Mint in Box and today we’re looking at the S.H. Figuarts release of Takeru Tenkuji, the man whose life shines bright: Kamen Rider Ghost Ore Damashii!

Ghost continues the Figuarts line’s shift to a more stream-line package format and as I’ve said previously, I love this as it’s more ergonomic and saves space for collectors who keep the packaging like me.

Inside the packaging you find the figure itself, an extra hood piece, three pairs of interchangeable hands and the Gan Gun Saber.

Also included within this release is Yurusen, the Ankh-like ghostly assistant to Takeru but without the charming anger issues and floofy hair. He comes in one piece, features a head-swivel and has a stand to help him float around Takeru.

Ore Damashii form, translates to ‘My Soul’ and basically means Takeru’s wearing a jacket made of HIS OWN SOUL and it looks fantastic! The slick black with orange highlights is totally my jam and his short sleeved hooded soul-jacket makes him look like a right brawler.

The spirit-hoodie, while looking amazing, is made of a hard rubber that severely hinders the poseability of the upper torso and, to a lesser extent, the shoulders and upper arms which is pretty disappointing.

I’m digging the inverse helmet design that has the compound element all over the face while the eyes are a glossy jet black, a big departure from the norm which lends to Ghost’s unique look. To change out the hood pieces, you just have to scalp poor Takeru by taking a chunk out of his skull, removing the down hood and slipping the up hood over his head and pegging it in.

The Ghost Driver is realised very nice though the handle doesn’t move but it does include a removable faceplate so you can see that monstrous cyclops face that the real Driver has so that’s a nice touch.

The interchangeable hands are swapped out as easily as most other Figuarts, but unfortunately the range of movement is pretty hindered by the silver cuffs, somewhat limiting the range of movement and, by extension, the overall poseability.

The Gan Gun Saber, or Eye Gun Saber, is a nicely rendered version of Ghost’s primary weapon and, in a break from the Figuarts standard of bundling two weapons for different modes and this actually transforms. It comes packed in blade mode but by splitting the blade, and pegging it back in reverse then tilting the hilt to put the weapon in gun mode. It’s a nice solution to a problem that people have hated about Figuarts for a long time.

I’m a little disappointed in Ghost Ore Damashii because while it’s a great looking figure, it’s mired by the same adherence to the suit design that makes it look great but, regardless of that fact, I do kinda recommend picking this guy up because the unpopularity of the Ghost series itself (and it’s baaaad) means that the Figuarts are pretty cheap and I’d say this guy is worth 24 quid of any Kamen Rider fans money just because of how he looks next to his compatriots.

As always, I’ve been Sharp-O, this has been the SH Figuarts Kamen Rider Ghost Ore Damashii and my life will burn bright on the next Mint in Box!

Please enjoy the review!

This year marks the first time that I (and The Website of Doom) has had a presence at London Toy Fair so here’s my thoughts on the event!

Kamen Rider Wizard is an odd series for me. In concept, a magical Kamen Rider who saves people from falling into a deadly depressive despair caused by Phantoms should be my cup of tea but I just never got on with the series, despite a cool premise and awesome looking Rider design.

So why am I not reviewing the base form? Because, according to trusted review sources (aka Josh over at CDX), that Figuart is garbage and I will not have garbage on my Rider shelf. Trash, yes — garbage, no. Let’s cut to the chase then and take a look at this mage!

Wizard’s Flame Dragon style passes over to his box, with a dull silver and red dragon sigil surrounding the window. The reverse sees full colour images of Flame Dragon form with Wizard’s summoning circle in the background.

Pulling Wizard out of the packaging reveals a very literal box of tricks. He includes six pairs of interchangeable hands, a reversed WizarDriver, the WizarSwordGun in both sword and gun forms and the Drago Skull. It’s a robust selection of accessories but I feel he may have too many hands? Blasphemy, I know, but some are only slight variations on others plus those bulky Wizard Rings on each hand makes swapping them out almost as painful as handling Bravo. He also includes a pretty ugly Tamashii stage but I’m not going to grumble at more stage arms.

It’s Showtime! Flame, Dragon! Haruto’s first elemental Dragon upgrade looks fantastic; taking the long flowing coat of the base form and adding more draconic elements to the design. The figure is well constructed and the joints are nice and tight but is it just me or are his feet a little big?

One thing I love about the Wizard design is that the helmet reflects the jewelled ring aesthetic and the translucent red ‘gem’ of a faceplate is executed amazingly well. Add to that the tandem gems and runes on his pauldrons and the jewelled elements on the torso, and you’ve got one stylish looking mage!

True to S.H.Figuarts’ regular high standard, the WizarDriver is beautifully detailed; shimmering silver with the Hand Author picked out in an intense gold and dark translucent plastic with a detailed rune behind it. Attached to his hip, Wizard carries the Wizard Rings which give him access to his various forms and the various spells he can utilise.

Both forms of the WizarSwordGun are highly detailed and have the Shake Hands opening gimmick to activate the various Final Strikes. I’m not sure which I prefer overall but I feel the Flame Dragon upgrade should have a unique weapon to add to Wizard’s arsenal. Oh, wait…

Each of the elemental Dragon forms includes a specialised dragon weapon and Flame’s is the Drago Skull which is by far the goofiest one and I say that knowing that Water Dragon includes the Drago Tail. The dragon skull, which is a swappable chest piece that sticks out of Wizard’s chest, has a decent amount of articulation — the neck moves, his ears waggle and the mouth opens.

Stacked up to both his predecessors and his successor, Flame Dragon looks pretty cool but I do lament that this isn’t a good version of the base form because that would look so much cooler.

Overall, if you need a Wizard for your Rider shelf, you can’t really go wrong with Flame Dragon as he looks great and is a functional figure, even if his colour palette is a shabadoobie touch too red. Have any thoughts on Wizard or the Figuarts line? Let your voice be heard in the comments and I’ll catch you guys next time on Mint in Box!

Hello, Heroes! Welcome to a review that was a long time coming. Way back in the halcyon days of February 2014, I was beginning what would eventually become known as my Anime Renaissance and the first step back into that deep, spiralling pit was a little show called Tiger & Bunny.

Set in a world where corporate sponsored superheroes compete in a heroic reality TV show. The series see a low-ranking veteran hero, Kotetsu T. Kaburagi aka Wild Tiger, teamed with the rookie Barnaby Brooks Jr. Together, they embark on a buddy-cop adventure of justice, revenge and what it truly means to be partners in crime-fighting.

It’s a fantastic show and I highly recommend it but one of the cool things about the show is the sponsors; most (if not all) are real brands and corporations. Naturally, Bandai produced figures of all the character in the show under their S.H. Figuarts line and we’ll be looking at the titular heroes today!

Barnaby Brooks Jr, or ‘Bunny’ as Kotetsu affectionately teases him, is the young upstart who doesn’t have a codename and has a Bruce Wayne complex like you wouldn’t believe! His toy offering is… Not good. It’s barely Marvel Legends tier and that’s a pretty low bar for a Figuarts to stoop to. The entire package includes Barnaby, a custom Tamashii stage (every T&B character gets one, which is neat) an extra forearm guard, his Good Luck Mode leg and a whopping TWO pairs of interchangeable hands.

Barnaby himself looks rather dashing in his armour, his reds, whites and translucent pink all pop vibrantly. He looks like he stepped right out of the anime on those heavy die-cast legs of his. Naturally, the extra weight has made his hips rather droopy which is a pain but this is one of the older style Figuarts so you take the rough with the smooth. If there’s one downside, it’s the collar of the armour severely restring the ball-jointed head’s movement.

Out of the box, Bunny is sporting two Crusade branded gauntlets but you can swap one of those out for an Amazon.co.jp branded one. Across his chest is a giant Bandai logo and there’s even a cute little Bunny logo that matches Tiger’s.

The Good Luck Mode special attack is one of the first times Kotetsu and Barnaby truly sync up as a duo and it’s amazing. Granted, the armour add-ons are purely cosmetic, they still look bad-ass. The plastic counterpart is a solid representation, swapping out the whole leg assembly in a rather frightening way, and even has a little bit of articulation.

Overall, Barnaby is a poor outing for the S.H. Figuarts line. That’s not to say there aren’t good points but really, he feels more like an accessory than a figure in his own right.

Kotetsu T. Kaburagi. Veteran hero. Widowed father. Goofball DILF (by Blue Rose’s reckoning) and one of my all-time favourite superheroes. Wild Tiger is a true believer and a trouble magnet, as well as a well-dressed underdog. This particular release (one of four for this particular mold) is for later in the show when Kotetsu’s powers begin to deplete to the point he can only activate them for one minute at a time. Despite the severe downgrade, he still fights one as Wild Tiger 1 Minute! His accessory count is what drew me to him, including a custome Tamashii stage, twin Wild Shoot grappling hooks and SEVEN pairs of hands, all of which are signature poses from the show and omitted from every other release.

I love the Wild Tiger armour, it couldn’t be cooler if the green parts were orange. As opposed to the lithe form of Bunny, Tiger looks like a brawler and is more built for strength than speed. His logos are for S.H. Figuarts and SoftBank and the nape of his neck boasts the exclusive title he sports toward the end of the story. Much like Bunny, Tiger is super heavy thanks to the die-cast legs.

Kotetsu’s Wild Shoot allow him to swing around Sternbild City like Spidey and to grapple enemies, rendered here in clear orange wire which refuse to straighten.

His hands are amazing and I love them all. They give the figure so much character and expressive ability, whether giving people a cheeky double thumbs-up or a Wild Roar or making fun of Barnaby and his ears.

Overall, Wild Tiger 1 Minute is a fantastic release and I’m super thankful to Josh from CollectionDX for buying this me for Christmas and all but forcing me to buy Bunny to go along with him. More than any other dynamic duo, you need both Wild Tiger and Barnaby Brooks Jr together if you’re a fan of the show and I recommend getting them, even if one half is letting the team down.

Shinnosuke Tomari is a former elite police officer in the Metropolitan Police, who, after an event that traumatized one of his colleagues, has been “demoted” into the Special Investigations Division. This division looks into the stranger happenings in the city, particularly the recent “Heavy Acceleration” events. These events, termed “Slowdown” by the public, leave people unable to move. When he is chosen by the Drive Driver and Tridoron, Shinnosuke transforms into Kamen Rider Drive and is tasked with battling the Roidmudes who plan to rise against humanity and take over the world.

While the main Type Speed release is a little lacking in accessories, the First Run Bonus parts more than make up for this deficit.

We’re back with another Kamen Rider Gaim figure from the Arms Change line; this time is the man who will make the world strong, Kaito Kumon aka Kamen Rider Baron! The second protagonist of the show, Baron utilises the power of the Banana lockseed and, yes, that makes him my favourite Rider just for aesthetic alone!

Just like Kachidoki Arms, AC02 comes in a similar packaging but in delicious red and yellow hues and, again, highlights the core gimmick of the show and this toy line. It also features a cross-promotion with Kamen Rider Ryugen (who’s up for a third helping of fruit-themed warriors?). The inner tray is also very similar to other releases and includes everything you’d expect Baron to come with.

The Pre-Arms form shows a lot of differences to Gaim, apart from his legs. His under-armour is more like chain mail, which is befitting since he’s designed more like a European knight rather than a Japanese samurai (Gaim) or Chinese warrior (Ryugen). While paint is minimal, I do like the ornate detailing on the silver plate armour. It’s a nice touch that could have easily been left out.

The Banana armour in it’s fruit mode looks like a rather stunted banana but otherwise looks great. Most of the surface is coated with this lavish gold but stops just short of the full design, but you’ll never see the unpainted grey plastic when you switch to armour mode but enough stalling, Kaito is about to show you his true power! BANANA!

The core AC gimmick is as easy as you see in the pictures and damn if it’s not a ton of fun! I even made the henshin sounds because the utter ludicrousness of this transformation sequence makes me smile.

Baron can pull off some fairly decent posing options despite not being as poseable as a Figuart, and staying upright isn’t as much of a problem as you’d think because of the top heavy armour. His Banaspear (which is more of a lance…) is replicate very well, looking like the peeled-banana lance that it should be. It even features an extending tip!

Now that I have two of these AC figures, I can now show you how compatible to the figures are with each other. I can easily swap the Banana and Kachidoki armours between Baron and Gaim and both wear them with no problem at all. It’s a real testament to this line that this core feature of the show has so much cross-play in the actual toyline.

Kamen Rider Baron is one of my all time favourite Riders, both in character and design and I have to give a massive thank you to my reviewing comrade-in-arms-change, Josh Reed, the handsome toy reviewer of Collection DX. I’m impressed with this figure’s playability and super happy to have in my collection! I highly recommend picking up any AC figures you can get your mitts on because they are an absolute blast!

Hey guys, Sharp-O back once again with more toys from glorious Nippon and today we’re looking at my first figure from Kamen Rider Gaim! Kamen Rider Gaim is the 24^th entry into the franchise and features humanity coming face to face with the reality of an infestation from another dimension called Helheim. A chosen few use lockseeds to transform into Armoured Riders and defend–Actually, they spend most of the series stabbing each other in the back and trying to save their own skin because this is a series written by Gen “The Butcher” Urobuchi, a man who takes great delight in putting his characters (and the audience) through the ringer.

Today, the spotlight is on Arms Change 011: Kachidoki Arms. The beauty of the Arms Change toy line is that, much like the show, the various lockseed armours are interchangeable between Riders, meaning you can mix-and-match your figures! Gaim’s Triumphant Arms debuts about half way through the show and despite getting another upgrade after this one, I consider this to be the orange samurai’s true final form.

AC011 comes in a lovely window box, showing the figure and accessories while having a half image of the figure in full regalia. The box is uniquely designed for this figure, with all the images relating to Kachidoki Arms. The reverse of the packaging shows the figure in some dynamic poses as well as showcasing the Arms Change gimmick.

This set consists of a Gaim figure, his armour in fruit form and helmet, two variations of the DJ Gun, a Musou Saber and two sashimono.

The base figure is a variant of the standard Gaim Pre-Arms for, with the Kachidoki lockseed affixed to his Sengoku Driver and this Arms’ unique head crest already in place. Paint is used sparingly but to good effect, picking out important features. Articulation-wise, this is a huge step down from the S.H. Figuarts I’ve reviewed before, mainly sticking with swivel or universal joints rather than an abundance of ball joints, the only ball joint being on the neck and feet. It may be less articulated but you can still get plenty of posing out of this base form but let’s get to the main event: LOCK ON!

Another fun feature of this line is the intricate transformation of the lockseeds from Fruit to Armour forms. They unfold and lock into place exactly as you’d expect them to. That said, Kachidoki is especially hard to return to Fruit form once unfolded, the various tabs have to be in EXACTLY the right position and even then need a healthy amount of force to tab them. Running through the process a number of times can help but it can still be a bear.

Once donned in his zesty shogun attire, Gaim truly does look every bit the valiant defender of Zawame City. The helmet’s orange shows through the magnifying visor but not nearly as much as I like, leaving the visor to look rather drab in comparison to the other vibrant colours that make up Gaim’s triumphant form. Again, paint apps are used sparingly and there’s some really nice metallic silver and gold paint in amongst the reds and oranges. Unfortunately, this bulky armour does hinder his articulation somewhat, it’s mostly confined to his legs.

Gaim’s arsenal of triumphant, Invess-destroying armaments starts with the DJ Gun. I can’t stand this thing. As a weapon for a shogun, it could work (Shogun with a Shotgun is a movie I’d watch!) but adding the turntable and sound gimmicks makes this easily the most annoying weapon in the show for me and, unfortunately, this really only compounds that. Now, it’s not the fault of the sculpt, it’s perfectly adequate (if missing a lot of paint) but the problem comes from the hands. They have hinged fingers, unlike the various sculpted hands of S.H. Figuarts, and they’re too weak to hold the front heavy DJ Gun. The somewhat limited arm articulation also leads to a somewhat unnatural pose when holding the weapon with two hands. The Musou Saber (a default sword/gun sidearm to some Riders) is a fantastic little sculpt but is sadly lacking the paint apps present on previous releases. Finally, we come to the sashimono banners that can detach from his back and become dual-wielded melee weapons. They have the Gaim emblem printed on one side and are the weapons I think suit Triumphant Arms the best. Though they are smaller than I’d like, I can live with their size.

The Arms Change line is definitely a cheaper and more toyetic alternative to the more collector oriented S.H. Figuarts but you can’t discount their inherent charm because while they’re not as shiny or articulated as their Figuart counterparts, the AC line is embracing the gimmick of the show and incorporating it into a vast number of figures. This is the 11^th release of this line and it’s fantastic and I will definitely be picking more up soon!

The Super Review Wars DX has begun and CollectionDX shall rain death upon you! Or reviews. Or just this one.

So yeah, here we have S.H. Figuarts Kamen Rider Black RX! For those of you who are more familiar with Saban’s 1990’s offerings, this was the Masked RiDER, the heroic prince Dex from the planet Edenoi!

Praise Ferbus, this packaging is fantastic. I love all the nice details here.

Out of the package, you can see that there is a WHOLE lot of great detail here, from the paint to the sculpt. There are also some gorgeous compound eyes on the head.

I also love how the toy has details the suit did, like wrinkles and zippers. It just makes it feel way more intense.

Speaking of intense, check out the articulation on this little fella.

He has double ball-jointed everything forever. If it should be possible to put a human into a pose, then this figure can do it. It’s just spectacular.

The Masked Rider also comes with all the accessories he could ever need, including six pairs of hands! He has fists, holding-things hands, posing hands, utility hands, splayed hands, and KARATE CHOP hands. He also comes with 2 versions of his Revolcane (or Electro Sabre, praise Ferbus). One version is metal-colored and the other is an opaque blue. That way you can mix and match the hilt and blades to create every possible scenario for slicing fools.

He also comes with an extra belt that the blue hilt attaches to so you can replicate whipping it out in public.

Just look at this, man.

I love this figure. If you’re a huge Kamen Rider or Saban’s Masked Rider fan (praise Ferbus), then you owe it to yourself to pick one of these up!

Also, please check out www.collectiondx.com and see where I normally post my reviews!

Until next time, mortals.

PRAISE FERBUS