Bandai Galaxy Express 999

Galaxy Express 999 (TV version)

Maker: Bandai

Year: 1976 (it's as old as me!)

Scale: unknown

Type: Injection-moulded styrene

Aftermarket: a bit of sheet styrene from a printer cartridge box

Price: $5.75 CDN at Broughdale Hobbies

In the realm of anime, there are many artists, animators, directors and creators who toil all their lives and yet their names remain unknown to most. However, there are also those so famous that their work, if not even their names, are commonly known even on this side of the ocean. One example of the latter is Leiji Matsumoto. His legendary body of work includes designs for Space Cruiser Yamato, as well as creating the worlds and characters of Captain Harlock (Albator, le Corsair de l'Espace to you French speakers) and Galaxy Express 999.

The Matsumoto era dawned in the mid 1970's and has seen several revivals. There have been numerous manga (comics), movies and TV series based on his famous creations, including Galaxy Express 999. This is an adventure story about a young boy who boards a train and travels all over the place, learning about life and himself in the process. Of course, since this is a Matsumoto anime we're talking about, the train is really a spaceship SHAPED like an old coal locomotive (a D65, to be exact), and by 'all over the place' I really mean 'through the sea of stars.'

Unfortunately, GE 999 is not all that well known over here, despite Animerica serializing it for a while back in the late 1990s. However, in Japan, GE 999 is quite famous, and it's no surprise that there are several different models of this spacefaring steam engine. There's even a lavishly detailed pre-built replica offered by Aoshima now. Of course, 'lavishly detailed' and 'pre-built' are two phrases that are anathema to me.

Thankfully there's this little gem that harkens back to the early days of GE 999, when the original TV series was still current and the modern trend towards nigh infinite bells and whistles on kits was a long way off.

The Kit:

There's not a lot to say about this kit. It is very simply constructed, and being a train, most of the parts are half-boxes. All of the train cars come in halves, including the engine, and are split along the long axis of the car. The kit is all injection moulded, but my copy is fairly new (1995 - 19 years after the moulds were made!), so some of the detail is a bit soft, and the seams don't always line up.

The GE 999 comes moulded in three colours: black, brown and white. For the most part, the colours are basically correct in how they're split up part-wise, although you're mad to build this kit without painting. The styrene is typical of Bandai's older kits: it is brittle, very hard and somewhat resistant to gluing. I am always surprised that the older Bandai kits always seem to use an 'old' grade of plastic when compared to the new ones. The older the kit is, the more brittle the plastic seems to be. I can't understand this: a 1995 pressing of the GE 999 seems to be far more brittle than a 1995 Gundam Wing kit. It's weird, but it ads to the "charm" (frustration) of these older kits.

There is no provision for snap fitting of any kind, and there are next to no guide pins to assist in aligning the halves of the train cars. Those that are there are far too small and loose to make a difference anyway, so dry fitting the parts on this thing is a real chore. I took to taping the thing together, and that seemed to work fine.

The nice thing is that the wheel trucks can be assembled separately and inserted into their respective cars once they're done. I was really surprised that a kit this old had something like that all worked out. The only thing to remember is this: put the front wheels of the engine on BEFORE you slide in the 'chassis.' If you (like me) don't, you'll have to mangle the truck to get it in place!

Building/Painting the GE 999

As I mentioned before, building this kit doesn't take much but patience and elbow grease. There's a lot of sanding/filling to be done on this kit, and with the plastic's resistance to glue, you're going to want some CA on hand to fill the gaps. CA is about the only filler that's as hard as the plastic the 999 is moulded in!

The halves of the train cars can be assembled first. The coal car and coach car have 'lids' that go on at the end, and the wheel trucks should be installed before putting the roofs on. The trucks are held in place by a white plastic washer that works amazingly well, all things considered. The trucks can all turn once they're installed, but they don't rotate overly freely, either, so they won't just flail all over the place.

The coach was painted using a reddish brown that I mixed up for my old Starfix Spitfire (no review of that one - it didn't turn out as well as my Mustang). It was actually almost a dead ringer for the colour I needed, a happy coincidence since the paint was over 8 years old! It was based on long-ago-forgotten Model Master browns and reds, all of the first generation acrylic type.

The roof for the coach, the coal car and the engine were all done in Virsago Black, and the gun car was done in Gundam White. The turrets were altered so they could be installed once the car itself was finished. All cars received multiple coats of thinned Future, applied by hand. Of course, being a train, most of the cars are just big, flat plates. Hand brushed Future doesn't like flat surfaces, so 6000, 8000 and 12000 grit polishing cloths were used to buff the finish smooth. Two thin coats of Future were then applied to this, and the results were very nice. I tell you: those polishing cloths are expensive, but worth every cent!

The passenger coach came with two black strips for 'windows.' The box shows these painted a dark blue, to simulate glass, I suppose. However, in the movie versions of GE 999, the windows are often seen as yellow, indicating lights being on in the train. Thus, I painted the windows with the modified Badger Reefer Yellow I used on my Zaku HB. Unfortunately, the engine didn't have any panels for the windows, and thus they would have been left as open holes, looking in on an unfinished, undetailed 'cockpit.'

I couldn't stomach that thought, so I made my second ever use of sheet styrene on a model kit (the first was the door on my Trimotor). I
found some thin styrene that had been used as packing material for a printer cartridge or some such thing, and cut pieces to fit in as windows for the engine. I painted all around the windows first, so I wouldn't slop, and glued the windows in just before I glued the halves of the engine together. Again, the result was that the engine looked just like it does in the anime!

Once I was done painting the trucks and engine, I drybrushed some silver on them to try and make the details stand out. Given the age of the kit, there was quite a bit of detail on the engine especially, and the drybrushing served to bring it out. A Gundammarker was used to outline all the cars, but it was used sparingly on the engine: I didn't use it to outline all of the drybrushed features, since I felt this would be overkill.

The coal in the coal car was painted Virsago Black, then with Testors Model Master Black Anthracite Metallic. After this, a black wash was applied. This gave the coal a flattish black colour, but with dark metallic sparkle to it. More than any of the other cars, the coal car needed the most sanding with the polishing cloths, given that it is both flat AND darkly painted.

The kit comes with a variety of rather colourful, toy-like, gaudy foil decals. There are some loud "Galaxy Express" labels for the side of the coal car, and GE999 scripts for the sides of the engine. However, in the movie versions of the train, there are no such labels. I didn't use them, since it really does make the kit look like a toy, although I don't doubt kid appeal was a major selling point of this kit back in the day.

Conclusion:

The GE 999 kit is not one that you see built very often. There's apparently a longer version with more coaches, but to be honest, I'd get sick of them if I had to build more than one of them.

Despite its age, the model is fairly well detailed, and can be made into a convincing replica of one of anime's long-established icons. The D65 engine is something of a legend in Japan, and I believe it is their most powerful steam train ever. As a result, the engine is something of a fetish object, and is as much a symbol of Japan's old rail power as the bullet trains of the 1960's are a symbol of more modern Japan. Because of this cult status, I wouldn't be surprised if there were newer, better fitting and better moulded replicas of the D65 around.

However, you're not going to find another replica like this: a train with three triple turrets on it! That alone is cool, even if the construction is simple and the kit is a bit toy-like. If you like the weird and wonderful, or are a Matsumoto fan, you really should at least try to build one of these. It's a fun little diversion from Perfect Grades and 1/32 Trumpeters.

All Aboard!