Here's a look at Special Hobby's new 1/48 scale kit of the Bristol Mercury-powered Fokker D.XXI in Finnish markings.

Link to Item

If you have comments or questions please post them here.

Thanks!

Nice review Rowan.
That's a cracking little plane, espeicially with the skis on.
Andy

Nice!
And I was about to ask if people had just forgotten or ignored this release. What's best about this release is:
1) It's accurate, and it's a dedicated Finnish version. No cutting up the fuselage to fit the extra clear panel found on Finnish machines (like with MPM's 1:72 version)
2) It's 1:48, meaning we can ditch the decade-old CA kit! Let it be the first of the company, it's still "interesting". (although it has a few slight advantages over this new one, I'll have to admit, it just looks like the folks who did the masters just neglected their references)

To answer your speculation in the review, yes indeed, a wasp-engined variant is supposedly coming. A picture of the longer canopy was posted here some time ago:
http://www.modelforum.cz/web/view.php?cisloclanku=2008020001

A comparison with the old CA kit?
I've done some too as I got both kits. Classic airframes' offering is quite appalling to be honest. For example, differences in the fuselages is amazing. Dimension are widely off the map all around on CA's fuselage, with the front section being the worst. While it should be rounded, it's almost rectangular when viewed from the side. The cowling lenght is several millimeters off, featuring inaccurate shapes and separate resin bumps, which look like a pain in the rear to attach accurately.
To put it short, there's not much to comparing to do. The only aspect where CA seems to be better (and saying this without having building experience of either kit) is the PE & film instrument panel, the inclusion of the 20mm wing cannons (which were used on as many as one Finnish plane IIRC), and the PE fret including landing flaps. Too bad it looks like the PE instruments in CA's kit are of a wrong version for a Finnish plane.

Judging from a quick comparison of the basic components of Special Hobby's kit against scale drawings in Keskinen / Stenman's Fokker D.XXI (Mercury) book (enlarged 150% from the original 1:72 scale), it looks accurate. Extremely accurate if compared to the CA kit, but it isn't flawless.
The wings look a bit too long in span, and the cowling appears to be millimeter (give or take) too long. Nothing serious.

I've haven't got much to add to the review, just a few things.
-Though engine indeed looks gorgeous, it leaves things to be scratch-built:
1) the two prominent air-intake tubes for the oil cooler
2) exhaust pipes (2 per cylinder) are missing and not even mentioned in the instructions
3) support struts connecting to the exhaust collector ring are omitted
4) the oil line (at least that's what I suspect it is) going to the crankcase isn't there
-The inclusion of a Revi3 reflector gunsight used in some planes would have been a nice addition. ( some photos here)
-Decal options are exactly the same as in the (first) 1:72 MPM kit.
-Wings are moulded without the anti-stall slots introduced later and installed on most planes. While they could be made by the modeler, this limits the potential of the kit somewhat. Such slots are much easier to fill and sand than make yourself if missing. (and the wing doesn't really have much details to worry about ruining)
I'll be they'll release a slotted-wing machine later as happened in 1:72, but it really wouldn't have hurted to throw them in right away. I mean, there's the smooth engine cowlings included already, which will go straight to the parts box with this Finnish version.

With the longish griping section, don't get me wrong, I've been waiting for this kit for a quite a while and now that i't here, it look sweet.
With that Aces High campaign would be a nice opportunity to get crackin' on it.