HGUniversal Century

RX-80PR-4 Pale Rider DII

A deep-cut Titans suit that gives you three weapons for the price of one and asks you to overlook a mold that remembers 2015.

MechaGrade Score

3.4/5

Pale Rider DII · 1/144 · 2021

GradeHG

Scale1/144

Released2021

Runnersn/a

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The verdict

This is a kit for people who already know they want a Pale Rider on the shelf, not a kit that converts newcomers.

The Shekinah composite weapon (gatling, mega beam launcher, and micro missile launcher in one chunky piece) is genuinely the reason to own this, and the leg and ankle engineering holds a wide stable stance better than a lot of HG kits twice its age would suggest. But the frame under all of it traces back to an older Pale Rider tooling, and that shows up in sticker reliance and a couple of soft joints.

Best for: UC deep-cut collectors and Titans-suit completionists who want the Shekinah weapon on their shelf, not first-time builders

The full review

What it is

The Pale Rider DII is Anaheim Laboratory Log's modernized rebuild of the old Pale Rider Dullahan, reusing GM Sniper II production stock under a new Titans-spec shell, and Bandai's HG kit leans into that identity. You get a boxy, utilitarian ground-combat frame with goggled camera eyes instead of the classic Gundam-face look, plus the real draw: the Shekinah, a composite weapon that reconfigures between a giant gatling, a mega beam launcher, and a micro missile launcher. Building it, the newly molded Shekinah parts feel like the newest thing in the box, crisp and clearly the part Bandai cared about most, while beam saber, beam javelin, beam rifle, and shield round out a loadout that's unusually generous for an HG at this price point.

The catch

The base frame is where the kit shows its age. This is built on the older Pale Rider tooling, and that means real reliance on color-separation stickers to get the Titans dark blue and black scheme looking right out of the box, plus cheek vents that need paint or stickers to read correctly since they mold in white. The wrist ball joints are the other known weak point, they loosen over time and can struggle to keep a firm grip on the heavier Shekinah configurations once you've swapped it around a few times. It's also a P-Bandai exclusive, so expect to pay import markup and shipping on top of the roughly 2,420 yen retail rather than finding it on a store shelf.

Who it's for

Buy this if you already love the Pale Rider silhouette, want the Shekinah's three-in-one gimmick in hand, or you're chasing a complete Anaheim Laboratory Log lineup. The engineering underneath, especially the double-jointed hips and that wide, stable ankle spread, rewards someone who wants to pose a ground-combat suit in a proper stance. Skip it if you want a first kit that snaps together clean with no stickers, or if loose wrists holding a big gatling for years is a dealbreaker for you. This is a suit-specific pickup, not a generalist's HG.

The build story

What the build is actually like, and the engineering worth knowing about.

The build itself is straightforward HG-tier snapping with no major surprises in gate placement, though the parts that show the kit's age (the torso and limb shell pieces) need more cleanup attention than the newly tooled Shekinah runners, which come off cleaner and fit tighter. Expect to reach for a paint pen or the sticker sheet more than once to get the cheek vents and panel accents looking finished.

Where the engineering earns its keep is the lower body: double joints at the hips and a double ball-joint ankle setup give this ground-combat suit a genuinely wide, stable stance that most HG kits at this scale don't bother with. The Shekinah's reconfiguration between its three weapon modes is satisfying to fiddle with, and the accessory spread (javelin, saber, rifle, shield) gives you real posing variety for the price. The wrist joints are the one place the engineering doesn't keep up with the ambition of the loadout.

Lore & trivia

01The Pale Rider DII was built by the Titans in U.C. 0084 using production stock from the RGM-79SP GM Sniper II, sharing its basic structure with the earlier RX-80PR-3 Pale Rider Dullahan.
02Unlike the classic V-fin Gundam-face look, the DII drops the V-shaped antenna and uses goggle-style camera eyes, echoing the look of the original RX-80PR Pale Rider.
03The suit's signature Shekinah weapon combines a giant gatling, a mega beam launcher, and a micro missile launcher into a single reconfigurable armament, giving it both close-range and long-range roles.
04The kit was a Premium Bandai (P-Bandai) exclusive release in the Anaheim Laboratory Log sub-line, tied to the novel series rather than a mainline anime.