I own multiples of both. I like both. Neither are perfect.
Bandai's does have the dubious honor of being the only valk I've wanted to hurl at the wall.
If you dislike the show, the best way to voice your disapproval is with your wallet, which means not buying any of the merchandise, including any of the VF toys. How many of us are going to do that? Not I.
LOL!
For comparison, here's the "good" one I received from HLJ. To be fair, it was damaged by incompetent USPS handling, though the thinner box and minimal tetris packaging did not help.
The Super Dimension Cinderella Ranka and blue (or red) concert uniform Sheryl are probably the best renditions of those characters, IMO. Both were produced by Megahouse.
You can still get them on Mandarake for 4 or 5k yen.
Turpenoid works really well. It won't damage plastic but will strip paint and printing really easily.
I use it to remove things like those pesky 1994 BIG WEST markings. Just take care not to get any on painted surfaces you don't want to strip (better to just put some masking tape around those areas).
Yup! Price + shipping was less than the HLJ price, so it forced my hand early. Was originally going to just get one with my VF-4 orders next month from them.
So I happened to click on the AmiAmi SDF-1 link and saw some newer pics (new to me at least) and wow it looks lame. Every single pic has stands holding up the arms and even cruiser mode is saggy in the middle.
What is this, the Macross Quarter?
http://www.amiami.com/top/detail/detail?scode=FIGURE-014860&page=rt_02
HLJ still hasn't shipped my 0S kits either and it's been a few days since I ordered them. I imagine they have a huge backlog after their holiday break.