SOUCHAKU-HENSHIN KAMEN RIDER SERIES

SH Classic Masked Riders Series - GD-36 Masked Rider V3 (c.2001)

  

RIDER V3

MASKED RIDER

KUUGA

 

MASKED RIDER

AGITO

 

CLASSIC

MASKED RIDERS

 

MASKED RIDER

RYUKI

 

MASKED RIDER

FAIZ

 

MASKED RIDER

BLADE

MASKED RIDER V3

Kamen Rider V3 was released as part of Bandai Souchaku Henshin Classic Riders series in 2001-02. V3 was one of the original Riders and the creations of the late Mr. Shotaro Ishinomori (who is credited with many of the tokusatsu hero designs in the 70's)  Masked Rider V3 was probably one of the most successful and one of the most popular of all the original Riders (rival only by Rider 1). V3 was a cyborg constructed by Rider 1 and 2 from the severely injured Kazami Shiro who earlier saved the two Riders from the Leader of Destron. Being the direct successor to the original two Riders (who were nearly identical looking), V3 shared many of the classic design features of Rider 1 and 2 such as the bulb eyes, chest armor, bug antennae (V3 is a grasshopper like his predecessors), and the turbine henshin belt. Being mostly green and white (with red trims), V3 was certainly a lot brighter looking than the first two Riders.

Masked Rider V3 was one of the better looking of the Souchaku Henshin Classic Riders. The old Riders design do not go well with the cloth "armor" format that were better suit for the modern Riders. The two main problems were the bulky chest armor and the die-cast wrist armor that made the figure appeared a little out of proportion. However, the bulky look certainly gave these figures the "retro" feel of the old vintage Chogokin toy.

SH Series Masked Rider V3

Classic Masked Rider V3 was released as Chogokin SH Series GD-36. The toy came package in small green window box. Note how the package show the "split" human and transform "armor" version.

Naked Mode

The core body was similar style body used since the original Saint Seiya Cloth line which made it a little dated by today standard. However, this was one of the aspect that drawn me to this line. The ability to "henshin" into the Rider by adding "cloth" armor made these SH figures a lot like small scale Henshin Cyborg and RAH costume hero. The head, as usual was too small in human form (especially the Classic Rider for some reason).

Weapon Accessories

 Masked Rider V3 came without any weapon accessories since he didn't have any in the TV show. (The first Rider to use weapon was Rider-X)