Bandai 1/1600 Scale Deathshadow

In the world of anime, there are almost innumerable mecha, battlesuits, spacecraft and other high tech weapons that lend themselves to being reproduced in kit form. In the "old days" (mid 1970s - mid 1980s) this was often the case, with models not only of bipedal weapons we know as mecha but also of many other subjects being produced.

Once such kit is the Bandai 1/1600 Deathshadow, which is a sort of 'sister kit' to the 1/1600 'Green Arcadia.' The Deathshadow is the original mount of the famous Captain Harlock in the famous movie Arcadia of My Youth. In the opening of the movie, the good Captain is on his way back to a defeated Earth, carrying in the belly of his ship a load of refugees. Upon arriving, he makes a purposefully hard landing with the intent of rendering his ship useless to the victorious Illumidas race. In the movie, this is all we ever see of the Deathshadow. Not one shot fired in anger, no warping, no nothing.

That's one of the reasons I was so happy to find this little gem in Dave Guertin's basement! I love models of obscure subjects, and finding a kit of the Deathshadow is something I'd been hoping for since first seeing the movie about 8 years ago.

The Kit:

The 1/1600 Deathshadow comes molded in a sickly grey-green plastic, on two sprues. The total part count is about 35 pieces, and there are no decals or clear parts in the kit. The instructions show two colour views of the finished ship, from front and rear three-quarters, and are typical Bandai black and white for assembly. There is almost no English anywhere on the instructions (this was before export was considered, and before English was trendy), but this never makes a difference anyway.

Construction is fairly simple, with the hull being in two halves. The top deck is a bit of a pain, however, since it is in three pieces, none of which fit all that well. Considerable putty throwing was necessary to get the rearmost deck to match up with the middle deck piece, and the upsweep on the front decking was a bit short as well. This surprised me, since the fit of the bridge and the hull halves was very good considering the age of the design and the number of pressings the molds have been through.

For detail, there are two sets of finned grates that fit on vertical face of the 'cinching' in the waist of the ship. Getting these to fit and then getting them painted correctly and neatly was a pain. The main engine comes as a single piece that fits on the rear of the body, and reminds me a lot of one of those old Cyclone grills from the early 1970s. The engine's fit was very poor, and required heavy sanding to fit.

The molding of Harlock's famous skull and crossbones was amazingly well done. The bridge, while small, was fairly well detailed and the turrets were simple but cleanly molded. All three guns come as one piece, at a fixed elevation. However, the angle is too shallow, and turret #2 runs into the front one! Thus, I had to bend the guns up when I installed them.

Paint:

The kit is painted mainly in two custom mixed colours. The lighter blue-grey is a mixture of Testors Model Master Acrylic flat white, Light Ghost Grey (FS36375) and Intermediate Blue (FS35164). The darker Blue is a mix of black, Gunship Grey and some other custom Dark Blue I had from a long time ago. The blackish colour on the front is Virsago Black, made of Jet Exhaust, Gunship Grey and Black. All the MM acrylics on the kit are the first generation ones.

This means, of course, that the kit had to be hand painted, as those old Testors colours don't shoot worth a toot. All details on the kit were hand painted, including the yellow radar screens on the bridge and the skull and crossbones on the side. The engine was done with Badger Reefer Orange, and I decided not to age it so that it provided more contrast.

Earlier on, I mentioned that the kit is molded in green. The instructions and box art also show the model finished in a light green/dark green vs. my light blue/dark blue. I am not colourblind, but I know for a fact that in the move, the ship is blue. However, as far as I can tell, this kit is NOT of the Deathshadow in the movie. I cannot read Japanese, but the letters SSX appear on the box. I know that one of the Harlock TV series is named "Endless Road SSX," and that his headquarters is called "Base SSX," and I am assuming that the SSX on the box refers to the former.

It would make sense. In the movie, the Deathshadow is blue and the Arcadia is green, and in the TV series the Arcadia is blue, which leads to the logical conclusion that the Deathshadow would be green. I have no idea of the role of the ship in the TV series.

One interesting note, though, is that there appears to be at least one minor detail change between the two ships. The model comes with two little hockey stick aerials that should go midway along the forward underhull bulge. These are not present in the movie version. I was glad of this, since they looked like they'd break off anyway.

There is, of course, no aftermarket on this kit. Once the old MM acrylics were on, the ship was outlined with a black Gundammarker. As is my custom, the entire kit is coated with Future floor polish to give it that nice anime-like shine. The stand came with the ship, and was airbrushed and then Futured by hand.

When completed, the kit is around 6 inches long. The panel lines are all engraved (a nice change from the P.O.S. FROG kits I've been working on lately) and are straight and crisp for the most part. There was no flash to speak of, and even the fiddly bits like the radar masts seemed sturdy.

Conclusion:

Overall, this kit was a fun little build, and didn't take long (only about 3 weeks, and that was in parallel with a plane, my Fi-203). It certainly wasn't suitable for beginners, and isn't a piece that most people would probably want on their desktops. However, while not particularly colourful or imposing, it is a relatively well detailed replica of an important but obscure piece of hardware. If only I could find the 50 previous kits in this series, I'd be a really happy camper!