Carrera Revell TIE Advanced x1 (01214) 1:72

[Mike]

TIE Advanced x1 (01214)

1:72 Carrera Revell & Bandai Namco

 

 

In the Star Wars universe, the TIE Fighter is the standard Imperial single-seater attack ship, and attrition rates during the six films and various off-shoots that it has now starred in must have been horrific!  Named by the Special Effects guys during filming of Episode IV A New Hope (the original Star Wars), after the bow-tie it resembled, a cranked "special" was also designed as the personal mount of arch baddie, Lord Vader, or Darth as he’s known to his pals. They have a menacing angular design in darker colours than Rebel ships, which emphasises their alignment with the Dark Side of the Force, as does the eerie scream of their engines, which as per most Sci-Fi films, can still be heard in the vacuum of space.

 

 

The Kit

Before the launch of the sequel trilogy that started with The Force Awakens (TFA), Revell gained the license to create new kits for the movies in Europe and the US, while Bandai got the license for the Far East and other territories.  Revell have created some kits with wider appeal for the following movies, while Bandai concentrated on sticking to a scale, bringing their Gundam talents to bear on the toolings, making ships, vehicles and some figures that would be hard to beat if you’re happy with 1:72 scale kits on your shelves.  A few were done at different scales to suit the subject’s size, most are 1:72, so it’s easy to pose them side-by-side without any scale clashes.  The kits are intended to be click-together without paint or glue, and some are well-suited to this method, while others such as the space craft will benefit from painting and weathering to obtain a more realistic look, and given that this was all the product of George Lucas’s fever dreams, we’ll insert the phrase “screen accurate” wherever we see “realistic.  That opens up another can of worms because miniatures of differing sizes and levels of detail were used for filming, but that’s a subject left to the online Star Wars fanbois, who can be quite unpleasant if they put their minds to it, as has been witnessed in the past.

 

This kit is a re-release of Bandai’s 1:72 offering of Darth’s personal ship, and even arrives in the same black-themed box as before with the Bandai logo on it, but with a Revell logo and specification sticker placed over the bottom-right corner of the side of the kid, giving their product code and other information in a variety of languages.  After undoing the tape on the top-opening box, you will find three heat-sealed bags of parts, plus a concertina-fold instruction booklet on glossy paper with colour profiles of the model on the rear to assist with painting and decaling or stickering.  Yes, stickers are provided in addition to decals, suitable for the builder who doesn’t want to paint or decal their kit, such as younger modellers that just want to have a physical representation of Darth’s TIE Fighter on their shelves.  Detail is excellent, as anyone that has any of Bandai’s Star Wars models will know, and I’m typing this beneath a shelf stacked with them.  The quality and engineering of the moulds is highly-intelligent, hiding seamlines where possible, and instigating a change in styrene colour with additional parts, some of which are co-moulded on the same sprue as other colours, cutting down on the sprue numbers, and even the part-count in instances such the sprues that contain the ‘solar’ wings, which are co-moulded in black and grey to create the panels, and to cut-down on space usage, the clear sprue is moulded in between the wings.

 

Inside the three bags are two sprues of grey styrene, one sprue of co-moulded black/grey and clear, a small sprue of black, another of clear fluorescent yellow, and another sprue of a different light grey that forms the stand.  The package is rounded out by the decals, stickers, and the instructions, which are printed primarily in Japanese, with the addition of English where necessary, although many of the steps are handled with glyphs and icons that transcend language.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Construction begins with the cockpit, starting with the floor that has Darth’s seat base moulded-in, and has a seat back, control console and steering yoke fixed in, and a seated Darth Vader figure in glossy black to fill the space.  It’s always been a mystery why, but on the sprue with the figure, there is also a silhouette cut-out of a standing Vader on a base that isn’t mentioned on the instructions at all.  There it is.  With the cockpit complete, it is surrounded by two half circular wall sections, with scrap diagrams showing where to place the decals in the faceted sidewalls.  The ball is pressed together around the cockpit and Lord Vader, then the flat bottom is capped off with a small circular section of the outer skin, taking note of the direction of two pins moulded to the interior.  The two fuselage halves are then locked around the cockpit ball from front and back, followed by the access hatch in the top, a small detail insert behind, and the clear porthole with wagon-wheel framing, for which frame decals or stickers are included if you don’t have a set of GreenStrawberry masks, or the skills to make your own.  There is also an unglazed styrene windscreen for those not wanting to place glass in the canopy, as many filming miniatures were un-glazed to cut down on reflections.  Two greeblies are fixed to the sides of the hatch at the root of the arms, and a pair of blaster barrels are inserted under the windscreen, capping off the underside with another circular dome that has a small hole in the centre to attach the model to the stand.  If you intend not to use the stand however, there is a stepped plug to fill the hole instead.

 

The trailing semi-circular cowling that trails the fuselage is built from top and bottom halves, adding two inserts before joining them, two more above and below the central spine, and at the rear of the spine, noting the arrangement of detailing on the visible side of the part.  The cowl then slots into the rear of the fuselage/hull, pushing it securely home to minimise gaps, preparing the two cranked wings by adding the greeblie insert to the inner vertical panel, then plugging the twin blades into the corresponding holes in the fuselage to finish construction.

 

The stand is covered on the last page of the instructions, and is made from a base, which has a curved support plugged into a hole near the centre, and at the top of the support is a two-part pivot that allows you to pose the model at any angle you wish.  There are two additional parts, one that is a plug for the hole left by the support if you do not use it, and the other is a clip that allows the joining together of multiple stands by clipping their edges together.  The bases have a depiction of a small are of the Death Star’s surface moulded into the top, and if using multiple stands to create a larger base, the plug may be useful if fewer supports than bases are required.

 

 

The two translucent yellow lances on the sprue can be inserted into the hollow barrels of the blasters under the canopy, to depict the TIE Fighter firing its weapons.  They can be added and removed at whim, although you’ll have to find somewhere to store them during periods of inactivity.

 

 

Markings

The model has been moulded in colours that broadly match how the ships appeared on-screen, so if you want a clean TIE advanced, you can stop there, apply decals or stickers and call it complete.  If you want to add more detailed painting and some nuance to the finish however, Bandai have included some paint suggestions, and while they don’t mention a particular brand’s codes, the colours could well be from Gunze’s Mr Color range, but they could also be from many other ranges.

 

Bandai’s decals seem to have been a bit ‘leathery’ in the past, and not very responsive to decal softening solutions in my experience, but the decals are well-printed, in good registration, and are densely printed and sharp.

 

 

 

Conclusion

Darth’s TIE is an impressive and iconic spacecraft from one of history’s best-loved movies (certainly my generation) from a time where film-making was still willing and able to take risks.  The kit is stunningly well-detailed, and will build into a more-than creditable replica of a screen legend.

 

Very highly recommended.

 

Carrera Revell model kits are available from all good toy and model retailers. For further information visit

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[FG2Si]

Nice review Mike. I just picked up another copy of this as our cat ate/reenacted the asteroid scene from ESB with the  first one. 

 

As for the Darth Vader stand up, the original release included an actual 1/72 standing figure of Vader. That was replaced by the cut out due to a licencing issue. Revell had the license for North America which included any figures at the time so Bandai made the switch to stay within the rules of the licensing agreement and allow their kits to be imported into North America. 

 

Carl

[Hook]

28 minutes ago, FG2Si said:

Revell had the license for North America which included any figures at the time so Bandai made the switch to stay within the rules of the licensing agreement and allow their kits to be imported into North America. 

But the seated figure was allowed..?

 

Lawyers, man, lawyers...

 

Nice review!, very tempting.

 

Cheers,

 

Andre

[FG2Si]

55 minutes ago, Hook said:

But the seated figure was allowed..?

 

Lawyers, man, lawyers...

 

Nice review!, very tempting.

 

Cheers,

 

Andre

 

Yes, the seated figure was fine but none of the standing ones were. Very much a matter of semantics.