Cliffbee.com Shuttle Gunner Toy Review

Individual Review




Name: Shuttle Gunner
Series: Japanese Generation 1
Allegiance: Destron
Alternate Mode: Space Shuttle

Thanks to tha phantom for loaning me Shuttle Gunner for this review



SPACE SHUTTLE MODE
Height: 5cm Length: 10cm Width: 6.5cm

   A creamy white shuttle, Shuttle Gunner is a repaint of Blast Off in a more realistic set of colours. Sure, Shuttles aren't creamy white but it's close. He has black nosecone, black wings, bright purple cockpits window small Destron logos on either side of the vertical stabiliser. There is no rubsign indent - and curiously, no post clipping the two halves of the front together (although he holds together nicely). It's a good looking shuttle and the creamy white helps differentiate him from the later Shuttler.

   He's got three wheels, two just below the wings, one below the cockpit. He can roll freely, but he can't fly. He has two cream guns which can attach on the back (into the jets) and wrap around the sides, to form an attack shuttle mode. There actually are the three jets you see on real shuttles on the back, though they're cylindrical, not conical, and the top one is significantly smaller than the two lower ones. Still, it's a nice touch that they put them in at all. Oh, and they're flat which allows him to stand upright in launch position. Okay, so this is necessitated by his Battle Gaia leg mode, but it still adds to the vehicle mode.

   It's a nice looking shuttle mode, and the cream is attractive in itself. It doesn't really carry the "what's a space shuttle doing in a combat team" of Blast Off, though - because this set isn't really going for realism or a distinct military theme in the same way.

TRANSFORMATION TO ROBOT MODE

   Fold up the wings, extend the rear section. Extend the front section, split it into halves and bring each half down to his sides to form the arms, and twist the nosecone halves to form hands. You can give him his cream handgun, but you can also attach the shuttle guns to the sides of the lower legs, although they look a tad out of place.

ROBOT MODE
Height: 8cm Width: 5.5cm

   The cream and black continues into the robot mode, with a dark green chestplate. He has cream arms with black hands, black lower legs and cream thighs, a cream head with a red eyestrip. Unlike Blast Off, there's no metal chest version.

   Shuttle Gunner has swivel joints at his shoulders, allowing for very poseable arms. He's also got hands that can swivel. Not great by modern standards, but fantastic for a toy of this size in 1986 (when the mould was introduced). The fists are nothing more than the insides of the two nosecone halves, and look a tad strange, but at least he has dedicated hands, which is more than many Scramble City components have. The biggest downfall of this mode is the fact that his lower legs are one solid piece, and it's black, so despite the moulding of two legs on it, it looks like a lump of black. The back half of this piece has the tailfin, which is why I suspect they made it one piece.

   The robot chest has four stickers, distinctly different to those of Blast Off. The top two stickers are to hide the screws that attach the chestplate. There's no visible allegiance symbol here.

   A nice colour scheme that manages to feel different to both Blast Off and the later Shuttler. The cream, green and black all play off each other nicely. His ball jointed shoulders are good by the standards of the era, too.

VARIATIONS

   None as such. He was only sold in the Battle Gaia giftset. He shares the mould with Blast Off & Shuttler, as mentioned.

OVERALL

   A pretty good square-peg style combiner limb, Shuttler is a fun repaint of Blast Off. The robot mode is poseable, albeit the lower legs are somewhat disappointing. I'm very happy with him in person, but it's hard to look over the fact this set is very rare and expensive - so I can't recommend Shuttle Gunner, who would be close to impossible to find separately - 7/10

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