MSiA ZGMF-1001/M Blaze ZAKU Phantom

Height: 9.5 cm to top of head, 12 cm to top of Blaze Wizard.

Articulation: 41 total points of articulation: Ball jointed neck; 8 points in each arm - double jointed shoulder, double-jointed shoulder-shield, pre-elbow swivel, double jointed elbow, ball joint wrist; ball-jointed waist; ball-jointed main thruster on back; 6 hinged skirt plates; 9 points in each leg - ball jointed hip, triple-jointed knee, hinged ankle armor, double-jointed ankle, double-jointed thrusters on rear leg.

Accessories: MMI-M633 Beam Assault Rifle, Extra Ammo Drums x4, MA-M8 Beam Tomahawk, Blaze Wizard, Extra hands x4.

Colors: Molded white, light gray, medium gray, dark gray, black, and clear pink. Painted red, black, white, purple, and pink ("Monoeye" camera)

Release Data: Released January 20, 2005 in Japan at a price of ¥1500. This item is still in production as of this writing (February 12, 2005)

Gallery: 12 images.

Author: RAC

The Figure

The ZAKU Phantom has it doubly tough, as successor to the excellent GINN design from Gundam SEED, and heir to the name Zaku. There have been many cyclopean MS in the Alternate Universes of Gundam, but Gundam SEED Destiny is the first to be brave enough to come out and say it: this is a Zaku, or to be more specific, a ZAKU. As if this poor little guy's burden wasn't enough already, it's going to be released, in various colors and configurations, no less than five times within the first half of this year! This is an awful lot to expect of any toy.

I'm happy to say it is indeed quite a good figure, though it doesn't quite seem as stocky and solid in its proportions as its immediate ancestor, the GINN. I'm reasonably sure this was intentional, as it is supposed to be a much more sophisticated machine. As much has been made of it, I will also say that it is indeed slightly shorter than most MSiA- even the Impulse Gundam, which is not particularly tall itself. However, it is to scale with the rest of the SEED and Destiny figures- it's been suggested that the creators made smaller Mobile Suits to show the advancement of MS technology, as was done with V Gundam. Whatever the reason, this aspect of the ZAKU Phantom really doesn't bother me at all. It's a good figure, and that's the most important part.

The Head

The head is pretty typical of the Zaku/Zeon design style: "Monoeye" camera, conduction cables, and snout. However, the helmet design covers the conduction cables on the sides of the head. Like some of the previous Zaku redesigns, like the Zaku-Fz and Zako Soldier, the cables are covered on the sides of the head, a sensible choice. The ZAKU Phantom also sports a commander's antenna, and there's a sensor/camera on the rear of the helmet, though this hasn't been decorated, at least on this version.

The neck is set into the torso a bit, but has good clearance, and there's a good amount of tilt and swivel. The shape of the rear torso restricts the movement of the head to the front 180 degrees, but there's nothing wrong with that, really. The high collar in the back makes the ZAKU look kind of hunchbacked, and lends a lot of character to the design in my opinion.

The Arms

The ZAKU Phantom's shoulder armor mainly exists to mount the shoulder shields. As opposed to a straight copy of the original Zaku-II's shoulder shield, the ZAKU Phantom has a pair of elegant-looking and nicely-detailed spiked shields mounted on short ball-jointed arms. The shield itself attaches by way of a sort of double ball-joint- it looks kind of like a peanut. It basically acts as a large, very stable hinge, and the shield can easily be shifted forward or back as a pose demands. They look good, they pose well, and they don't get in the figure's way for the most part.

The arms are very flexible- pretty much what we've come to expect from recent MSiA. The shoulder hinge has a pretty nice range of movement, and the arm folds as tightly as it possibly could. To accomplish this, though, some unusual elbow-joints are employed due to the shape of the arms. They're noticeably longer than most elbow-joints, and they make the arm seem a bit too long, to my eye. It's a minor thing, but it can be noticeable if you pose the ZAKU with its arms at its sides.

The Torso

The torso is excellent. The design is most attractive, and I especially like the vertical exhaust vents in the torso, as opposed to the typical Gundam-like horizontal vents. It doesn't really have a fixed backpack, but there is a main thruster just below the connection point for the equipment packs (or Wizards) that is ball-jointed, and nicely flexible.

The waist and skirt armor are the real stars here. Using the raised ball-joint that was also used to great effect on the Saber Gundam, and with no restriction on any side, the ZAKU can lean in any direction with no problem whatsoever. The waist can swivel 360 degrees, unimpeded. The best waist ever, period. The skirt armor is similarly spectacular- a black conduction cable runs around the waist from the center blocks in the front and back, and the hinged skirt plates hang on them. This means they move easily, and there is absolutely no fear of warping. They do fall off sometimes- particularly the front plates, if they're pushed too far inwards. It's a tradeoff, to be sure, but I think the benefits are pretty much worth it. Be warned- the small cylinders on the side skirt plates are glued on, and it's best not to try and remove them.

The Legs and Feet

The legs are pretty similar to those of the GINN, and are every bit as good. The hips have a great range of movement, thanks in large part to the skirt. The knee folds as tightly as the shape of the legs will allow, and the pleasantly blocky lower leg helps balance out the design and give it a sense of weight. The new wrinkle is that the ZAKU has conduction cables and additional thrusters on the sides of the leg where the GINN could mount missile pods. I'm happy to say that the cables have been carefully placed so that they don't hamper the legs in any way. It reinforces one of the things I love about the MSiA line- the engineers learn from their mistakes, and it shows.

The hinged ankle armor is still present, and still obscures the foot almost completely. Still, it doesn't obstruct foot movement, and the double ball-jointed ankles allow for a good amount of lean. Surprisingly, the thruster in the back of the leg is also double-ball jointed! It's a nice touch, though you can't really tell unless you pry the thruster off first. In addition, the back of the foot is notched so these thrusters don't get in the way of the feet much, if at all. Very nice.

Paint and Decoration

The ZAKU is decorated very cleanly, with no sloppiness that I can find. As Rey Za Burrel's ZAKU Phantom is primarily white, black, and light gray, the red of the thrusters and the purple highlights add some much needed color to what could be a drab color scheme. Still, this is one of the few instances where I miss panel lines. The most recent lined figures were all very neatly inked, and did what they were designed to do- brought out the detail of the figure. Rey's ZAKU could benefit from a bit of that, particularly in the legs.

Articulation gets 9/10

Sculpt and Deco get 9/10

Accessories

-MMI-M633 Beam Assault Rifle

A Beam Rifle with some nods to the old Zaku Machinegun, as well as some interesting features of its own. It has the distinctive ammo drums of the old Zaku MG, along with a similarly shaped barrel. The ammo drum here is on a hinged mount, so it can be folded down for storage using the hardpoint on the rear skirt armor. This does have the effect of making the connection for the drum seem rather wobbly. The rifle also has a secondary handgrip, which is on the side of the rifle and is curved slightly, allowing it to fold flat against the weapon or swing out to the side as needed. It's far more effective and less touchy than most of the other such mechanisms I've seen lately. Lastly, the rifle's camera is underneath the barrel, which is an unusal feature. I can't remember any MS other than Zeta Gundam using it, in fact.

The rifle is relatively easy to hold two-handed, and the stock is designed to rest against the shoulder armor rather neatly. It's hard to angle this well with a two-handed grip, though- it probably doesn't help that my rifle's stock is slightly warped. The other thing is that I usually tend to tuck the stock of a rifle under the figure's arm, and this is rather difficult to do without popping the Ammo Drum off.

-Extra Ammo Drums

Four are included, and can be stored on the ZAKU's shoulder shields, two to a shield. They are interchangeable with the drum on the Beam Assault Rifle, but some fit better than others and I'm not really sure why.

-MA-M8 Beam Tomahawk

Inspired the Zeon Zaku's Heat Hawk, though once again redesigned as a Beam weapon. In the show, this weapon is stored in a compartment at the top of the shoulder shield, though to accomplish that at this scale they'd have had to make the Tomahawk dangerously thin or the shield incongruously large, so it's just as well they decided to skip it. The bright pink blade is of the old style of softer plastic, but is also not in much danger of warping due to its length and shape. The point on the back of the axe swings up, though I can't figure out any reason why it should, except to store in the shield- which it can't. I can't complain, though- it's a nice detail to add to the weapon even if it can't be put to its original use.

-Blaze Wizard

The Wizards are the ZAKU equivalent of Striker Packs or Silhouettes- that is, optional equipment an MS can use based on the needs of the current battle. In theory, anyway- to my memory none of the ZAKUs have yet appeared using any Wizard other than the one its MSiA has shipped with. That being said, Rey Za Burrel's equipment of choice is the Blaze Wizard, which is a High Mobility backpack. It's composed of two large boosters mounted on a central body, which itself has a thruster-intensive tail stabilizer similar to the one seen on the Zeta Gundam and Re-GZ, and more recently the Saber Gundam.

The Wizard attaches firmly to the back, and likely won't come off unless you press on it or yank on it with the intent of knocking it off. It does add some weight to the back of the figure, however, so it can make it a bit trickier to balance the ZAKU. The boosters are mounted on ball-joints, and have a good range of movement, all considered. They've been positioned to interfere with the shoulder shields as little as possible, and they do a fairly good job, though they do restrict the arms a bit.

The boosters are nicely detailed, with hinged thruster cowlings which can be swung open to better show the inner thrusters. At the front, there are hatches which open to reveal 14 tiny molded-in "missiles." It's nice to see that the Blaze equipment does add some firepower, though it's still the lightest on weapons of the three Wizards. The hatch is a little loose for my tastes, and it also doesn't open as far as I'd really like it to before it wants to pop off. It's also not quite possible to aim the missiles forward, but that's not as large an issue in my mind as it would be with, say, a cannon of some sort. Still, it's an attractive piece, and a good addition to the basic ZAKU overall.

-Extra Hands

The Standard Three. The Fists are fists- not much to say about them, and I rarely use them on MSiA. The Rifle hands hold the Beam Assault Rifle well, though if you don't arrange the grip just so it tends to want to tilt off to one side or the other. Once it's in place, though, it generally stays. The Open hands hold the Tomahawk securely, and do fine with the secondary handgrip on the Rifle. All the hands attach to the wrists fairly easily and stay once attached. Good hands all around, exactly what I've come to expect.

Accessories get 8/10

Closing Remarks:

The Blaze ZAKU Phantom is a top-notch figure in just about every respect. It does a good job of evoking the image of the classic Zaku-II without being a straight-up copy- you can still easily see the GINN influence, particularly in the legs. The arms are the slightest bit long, but creative joint-arrangement and posing can help this somewhat. However, the waist joint is, as I said, hands-down the best ever, and the hinged skirt armor will probably not be used as often in the future as it should.

I paid roughly $18 for mine, shipped, and I think that's a good price for an imported figure of this quality. If you only intend to get one of the currently-scheduled five, you may wish to go a bit higher for your ZAKU of choice. I doubt you'll be disappointed, at any rate.

The ZAKU Phantom is an all-around great figure, and one that's more than worthy of the amount of re-use it's going to see. It is State of the Art. The Blaze Wizard is Excellent, though not quite as good, in my opinion, as the figure you attach it to.

-RAC 2/12/2005