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1/400 Quin Mantha
General and Technical Data:
Series: ZZ Gundam
Title: 1/400 Quin Mantha
Release Date: March 2005
Suggested Price: ¥ 2400
No. of Parts: 150
Plastic Colors: Pale Green, Light Green, Yellow, Black, Red, Dark Gray and Blue.
Gimmicks: Miniature ZZ Gundam mounted on display stand.
Introduction:
Have you ever opened up a model kit box and said, "Good God! This is going to be awesome,"? I have, but only once. That single moment was when I first opened up the box to the 1/400 Quin Mantha model to look at the plastic trays. I was impressed. Thoroughly impressed by what I saw. There aren't many models still around from ZZ. Discluding the horrendously expensive master grade ZZ Gundam and its full armor counterpart, there's hardly a thing. You might be able to find a few no-grade models lying around from way back in the day when Tomino's comedic sequel was airing on Japanese television, but they won't be all that nice to look at. Find this Quin Mantha, though, and you'll think you underpaid for it—by about a hundred dollars. Yes, it's that good. I've never built a perfect-grade model, but I can't imagine one looking for feeling any better than this. The plastic is smooth, and tough—just be feeling it I could tell it was a substantially higher grade of plastic than the models I am accustomed to—and it's pre-painted. That's right! Straight out of the box, each part is already painted—and it looks fabulous. Even a novice modeller could put this together and wind up with something that looks professionally made.
Head:
Because of the Quin Mantha's coloration and shape, I'm sorely tempted to think of it as a "queen mantis." The head is very insectoid, almost like a pale-green a yellow gundam head, sans the v-fin. It also has two massive antennae sprouting out the back. Very cool. The head is very flexible and can move in just about any direction. It's pre-painted and looks immaculate.
Torso:
The torso ends up as a solid ball of plastic. There are too many parts inside to count and most of them are very, very small. It was a bit of a pain to put together (a personal issue; I have the hands of a giant) but it looks fantastic once its built. Two mega-particle beam cannons line the upper sides of the torso—the start out as a light green, then the edges of the barrel are painted a pale green, followed by red lining the interior of the cannon and a black circle in the very center. What's more, there are tiny ridges all around, and tiny black cables running from the side of the cannon all the way around the mobile suit's torso to the rear. Everything is unbelievably well detailed—you can hold this model directly in front of your face and still not see all the tiny details there are without straining your eyes. There's a large blocky guard-armor mounted directly behind the head, and just behind it is a large tale that flips up (mounted on the top of the back) that's essentially a more streamlined version of the Qubeley's funnel dispenser. On the back of the funnel-tail is a very small, perfectly formed Neo-Zeon emblem painted on. Stunning.
Arms:
The Quin Mantha's arms are wicked-cool. There's a reason why this design was re-envisioned for the Gundam Unicorn novel—it's amazing, and a big part of that is the arms. The shoulder armor for the Quin Mantha is actually a bit odd—you've got two giant, flat-rectangular pieces that attach the arms to the torso. To the top of these rectangular shoulder blocks attach the giant, bulbous "wing" thrusters. Very well detailed, with lots of color underneath. There are also little mounts under the wings for the Quin Mantha's beam swords to fit into. They look amazingly nice, and everything fits together very snugly. The arms themselves are pretty simple, and look just as nice as everything else. Thought the shoulders have a whopping three joints (more than ANY other model I've seen in my life) the elbows only have the one joint—up or down. There's a large armor guard covering the hands, and beam sabers located just below the palm. The Quin Mantha also comes with several varieties of hands—closed, open, and "grabbing" hands (for the beam swords). The arms can move with a lot more mobility than you would expect, given the model's tiny size and the complexity involved. But this Quin Mantha... it is a model kit that will continuously surprise and impress you.
Legs:
The legs attach to the torso by way of a massive pelvic piece. You have a very large fang-like structure coming down in front, and in back you have a secondary funnel-tail. Like the upper funnel dispenser, this one can move up and down. The only difference between the two is that the lower funnel tail is longer and narrower than the upper one. If there's a downside to this model, it's the legs. They attach to the pelvis by large ball joints and can move at the top in virtually any direction, but the knees have only a single joint, and don't allow the lower leg to move very much. The feet are massive, but are only a single piece when assembled, and can only move up and down a little bit. If you want to pose the Quin Mantha on its feet, you're not going to have a very big library of poses open to you. Fortunately, the Quin Mantha does not want you to bother with that, so a small display-stand is included with it—and, fully, airborne, the limitation of the movements of the lower legs are not an issue at all. Another problem with the legs, depending on your perspective, is that they might be too-detailed. If you look at the sides and back of the legs, or even below the feet and knees, you'll see a lot of painted details. It all looks fantastic, but there's just too much in too many areas that simply are not visible, no matter the pose. It's a shame, that this model is simply too good for its own good.
Weapons and Accessories:
The Quin Mantha does not have very many accessories. There are two small blades that fit into the saber hilts below the palms, and two beam swords that fit below the giant thruster wings. That's all there is for the Quin Mantha, but everything looks so good and moves so well that you really don't need any more than that. The display stand is a nice touch, and holds the model about six centimetres above the surface you have it on. As a bonus, the Quin Mantha also comes with a pre-painted figure (also 1/400 scale) of the Double Zeta Gundam—and it's tiny. You can really see how much Puru's monster dwarfed Judau in the closing battles of the ZZ Gundam. The ZZ has it's own small stand and is very well detailed and colored. The ZZ itself is only two pieces of plastic (the right arm w/ double beam cannon being separate) and looks fantastic. The plastic that the ZZ figure is made out of isn't quite as nice as the plastic the Quin Mantha is constructed of—it's much more flexible. The ZZ is roughly made of the same material (and is the same size) as the figures that came with the collector’s edition Zeta Gundam boxset, when it was first released in North America.
Conclusion:
Have I said that the Quin Mantha is awesome? Have I said that it looks fantastic? Have I said that even a complete novice could build it, and end up with a stunning model that is more-than-fit to be the centerpiece of ANY collection? Well, I'll say it again. And again, and again, and again—as many times as I need to. I don't care what you think of ZZ Gundam or even Gundam in general—if you like building model kits, you absolutely MUST purchase this one. The Quin Mantha may be a bit small, but it looks fantastic. It is the epitome of what modelling is. I'd say my Quin Mantha model was worth over $100 USD—but to buy it for yourself; you'd spending less money than most new HGUC models. Not building a Quin Mantha is a disservice, not just to yourself, but to the model-making industry in Japan as well. Trust me; models simply do not get any better than this. You can try all you might to find one better, but the Quin Mantha is perfect. Utterly perfect.
Rating: 5/5
