MG Sandrock Gundam EW

Fourth of my Master Grade Wing Gundam EW collection, the Sandrock. This kit’s been finished for like…ever, but I’ve been lagging on Gunpla reviews lately. There’s a rather huge backlog as it is for unbuilt kits too.

Not gonna lie, I’ve never been a fan of Sandrock’s design…like, ever. Even with Katoki’s redesign, I’m not really partial to the Arabian motif. While this EW version certainly is an improvement over the original appearance, it’s not by much.

Straight build; I had considered painting it to match its TV colors more closely, as I did with Deathscythe, but then deemed it unnecessary.

I added some yellow details to areas like the legs, and the entire thing is decked out in decals, mostly water-slide, though a good amount are just straight up stickers.

A really frustrating thing about this kit was that the water slide decal sheet I received from eBay had the wrong decals…probably 80% of the decals on the sheet were just…bull. They were decals that shouldn’t exist; they didn’t go anywhere on the kit. I had no idea why only Sandrock had this problem, since the rest of the decal sheets I bought for the rest of my Wing kits in the same fashion were fine.

I ended up using a lot of the clear stickers that came with the kit originally. Hated them, but no choice.

Articulation and overall stability is actually rather meh. Most of the Wing kits just feel “loose” upon completion; they aren’t particularly stable. A lot of parts are prone to falling off and sometimes just have too much going on (every piece of the skirt armor moves; articulation is great, but only to a point).

Sandrock stands fairly well, though he does have some balance issues. Being that the entire kit just feels loose and somewhat flimsy, the feet don’t have the best leverage on the ground. With the shotels in hand, he can easily tip forwards and face-plant.

So speaking of the shotels…man, the Wing Gundams all get the most unorthodox weapons you can think of for a mobile suit. Deathscythe’s scythe and Shenlong’s trident aren’t too bad or outlandish, but Sandrock’s shotels…I swear no one’s even heard of these before, despite being a real ancient Ethiopian weapon.

Truth to be told, these are very awkward weapons to wield and try to pose with…

Apparently their design is meant to be able to reach around an enemy’s shield and stab them in vital areas like the lungs and kidneys or somesuch.

Did I also mention these weapons are absolutely huge? They’re certainly very exaggerated compared to the regular version.

The shotels can be stored on the backpack with the dedicated racks provided. Makes for rather easy drawing of the weapons.

They also come in red, to represent the blood of Sandrock’s enemies forever dying his weapons crimson as each poor soul’s very life was taken by those blades.

Just kidding, they’re heat shotels. Because giant blades usually aren’t enough, they also require the ability to heat up for ease of cutting.

The massive clear red pieces are certainly a nice touch. A funny little thing about these is that I’m fairly certain Quatre only ever heats ’em up when he’s about to throw them at some poor grunts. In which case, throwing them would usually result in the loss of the weapon itself…like Deathscythe’s shield, a massive waste of resources, no?

For long range combat, Sandrock rocks a rather simple and very conservative Uzi beam machine gun. No need for any of those crazy beam cannons or over-sized whatchama whoozits everyone else sports.

I actually really like this weapon, too bad its so overshadowed by the heat shotels. Very easy to mess around with and a satisfyingly simplistic design.

The shield is themed to be a snake/viper head with a little gimmick that allows the “teeth” to slide forward. Pointless, but overall a nice design. The “eyes” came in clear plastic, to which I painted clear red. I love the effect.

It also sports a hidden function in which you attach the two already massive shotels onto the underside of the shield, stick said shield onto the arm, and create the most unwieldy and cumbersome weapon known to the Gundam metaverse.

Legitimately, there’s like…two poses you can do with this weapon combo. Sure, it looks pretty cool, but the arms can barely support it. There’s also a nice little gear mechanism that allows the shotels to open and close, but beyond that there’s nothing really going for this combo. I’d never put it together like this normally, only for the sake of the review.

To be completely fair, I only picked up this kit to complete my Endless Waltz MG Collection. Had it not been for that, I likely would’ve never touched this kit. Overall I’d say go for it based on how partial you may be to the design.

The kit itself is fairly unremarkable in and of itself; I can only really dock it for its mediocre stability and somewhat lacking articulation (hindered by ornamental armor for the most part). Even without massive wings or an over complicated backpack system, plan to have plenty of space on the shelf for this one; the shotels are absolutely massive.