Month: January 2019

Scorpion Alien – Aliens Retro Collection

Today’s xeno is an alien crossed with a scorpion:

This one shares a similar colour scheme to the Revoltech Big Chap I got some time ago. I do like the contrast of the copper against the black. With him having a slight profile, not too much of the detail is visible front-on.

Left:

Here we can see much more of his pose, and I think he’s posed well. What I’m less fond of is how the gold highlights have been used – I think it would’ve looked better if the highlighting on the head was more like the silver on the Mantis. Again, the arms are half-copper, half black in a way that isn’t hugely appealing. 

Right:

I like the way the tail curls, but again, the odd colouration. Only place the half-colouring is working for me is the “pipes”, which are more like spikes on this one, to fit in more with the scorpion theme. 

Head close-up:

Sculpting is nice here, The copper almost fades away here, making it look less sudden than the other side. He’s also got his teeth painted in silver. Spine painting is mediocre close up. 

Back:

Back looks better as it has better copper coverage. For the tail, I’d like it more if the gold was over the top side and not on the bottom – I think that contrast works well. 

Back close-up:

I like the distribution of the copper paint on his back, though the sculpt feels “muddy” and confused. I feel the details got a bit lost here. Back spines are still cool though :P.

Overall, I think the sculpt is strong enough, and the colours work. Just would prefer the colours to be better distributed so it doesn’t look so odd. 

Snake Alien – Retro Aliens Collection

This one came with the mantis alien, and was the other figure to break in transit:

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Yeah, it has a really thin body, so getting this one through the postal service is a risky business. It also has a LOT of spines, so these may also snap off. Even on my replacement, I had one of the tiny bits snap off near the base of its tail, but fortunately it isn’t really visible unless you know it is supposed to be there. 

So let’s get onto the less broken one:

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HISS! He’s posed well, and the design is pretty decent. What’s there is sculpted and painted well. 

Left:

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He arches up nicely, and I like the spines on his head. The colour contrast between the green and the brown is nice. If you see the triangular bits sticking out of its lower back, one of those is missing, but can’t remember exactly where. 

Right:

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From the back, I’m not sure if the spines are painted as the sculptor intended, suspect they were going for a blend, but is a bit messy here. Head is nicely done though.

Back:

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I like the detailing on the back of webbing. Not too much to say about the back. 

Base:

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I like the way he’s curled up, to support his body. The base looks decent too. 

Overall, I like the look of this figure. However, I would’ve liked to see more meat on the body of it – not just for stability reasons. Whilst snakes don’t have too much to them, this snake seems to not exist in the middle, and is only bone and webbing in the middle. I think it would’ve helped the stability and design if this figure was given a snake’s body all  the way down. 

Mantis Alien – Aliens Retro Collection

Next up, the mantis alien:

This was the one I was most excited about… so let’s see how he fares. From the front he looks good – we have a couple of shades of green going on, and some silver. I’m glad they’ve used a couple of shades of green to paint him, as it does add a lot to the figure. I like the pose of the figure too. 

Left:

I like the pose of the arms and the body. The circular parts are nicely highlighted in the lighter green, and the sculpt o the head is lovely. What I like less is the webbing on his arm. The paint looks very sloppy on it, and it looks more like metal sheeting than skin. 

Close-up of the side of his head:

Couple of sloppy paint bits – the green on his shoulder and a little on the ribbing on the lower part of his head, but I do love this head design. The silver highlights on it work well too. 

Right:

And the webbing on this side… ergh. Awful. Looks like he’s got some metal in the crook of his arm. It’s like the sculptor didn’t even try to get the webbed effect the original had. If they did something similar to the shoulder sculpt, that may’ve worked. Anything but this… weird attempt. Nothing would’ve been better, but could’ve made the figure dangerously fragile. I’ll just stare at his lower arm instead… yes, that looks better. 

Back:

Weirdly, he has no tail. With the webbing and the lack of tail, I do wonder if the sculptor was trying to do this from memory instead of with source material… The back is OK, but not a strong point of the figure. 

Top of the head:

Pattern looks good on the top of his head :). 

Overall, he looks decent enough from the front, but the “webbing” on his arms really brings this figure down. I still like him, but there’s definitely some weird design decisions going on here, which I don’t fully understand. Yes, the arms probably needed more support material, but why no extra raised bits to look like webbing? Is this actually some kind of statue of the mantis alien, instead of a specimen? Yeah. Gonna go with that. 

Gorilla Alien – Aliens Retro Collection

With the bull alien came the gorilla alien:

This is one burly dude of an alien! I do love the “growling” pose, and we also get to see his inner mouth due to it. The blue dry brushing effect does help to accentuate parts of the figure, and I think this mostly works. 

Left:

That’s some big claws he has there on his legs! Love the colour scheme. What I love less is some of the line painting at the top of his head is a bit messy. The sculpting is nice, with plenty of details to look at. 

Right:

Here the lines are neater, but one pesky bit at the front of his head there. We have a lot fo the same details as the left side, and I do like how he’s posed. He also seems he’s got his hands curled, ready to pound the floor. 

Back:

Big butt! I think his body looks a bit awkward from this angle, and maybe needed a little more shape to it to make it less square. However, it is detailed nicely, and I do like the design of his tail, which has an interestingly sculpted end part that I like. 

Top:

He has a nice, shiny head, a little bit marred by stray paint. I like the way they’ve gone for a different finish here, and the effect it gives it. 

Overall, I’m a fan of this one. The colours are nice, and the posing is good. Feel they’ve done a good job of capturing the gorilla alien’s appearance.

Bull Alien – Aliens Retro Collection

This is the first of six blogs for the three Aliens Retro twin-packs. Bought all three packs when they were on sale on the Eaglemoss shop. Partly glad I got them there, as I was able to get replacements, as two arrived broken. However, they could’ve done a better packing job… 

These alien designs are based on the never-aired Alien cartoon designs. 

Anyways, enough ramble, let’s have a look at the Bull alien:

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Starting off with a side pic, as front-on doesn’t have as much to see. The head design is really nice, but I’m not too fond of the body – the stripes feel too flat, making the body feel too flat in general. The front arm and feet look good, but his back leg feels a little awkwardly shaped. Not a fan of the tail – feel as if this should be beefed up, and look more like the original Kenner version. Another advantage of doing this would be to make it less fragile – my first one the tail was snapped off in the box, and getting him out, I can see why. I don’t think they had to go this thin to achieve a bull tail effect. 

Head:

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The purple stripe is nicely painted, and faithful to the original design. The horns look good too, and I think they did a really good job here.

‘Face’:

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Nice set of grinning, silver teeth here. Got a seam line going on, which isn’t too much of a big deal, as you don’t usually see this angle – here I’m holding the figure to get this shot. The bottom of his body doesn’t look particularly well-sculpted from here, however, again, it’s not particularly visible on display. The ‘arm’ poses do work well at this angle though, and does make him look menacing. 

Left:

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Man… if only they gave the exoskeleton parts a bit more shape… The limbs look a lot nicer on this side imo, and the back leg doesn’t look oddly stretched. 

Back:

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I feel his back pipes are a bit short and stumpy. I think it’d be more aesthetically pleasing if they were bigger/more dominating on his back. I like the way the exoskeleton ribs end with spine parts, but still feel they could do with more shape in general. 

Back:

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His back looks OK, nothing special. I know bull tails are thin, but I feel as if they could add more weight to the tail, possibly remove the spine parts (maybe do ridges like the body?) to make the figure more robust. If you’re moving this figure around, be careful not to clip the tail on anything, as it will easily snap. 

Top:

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The plates at the top of his limb joints work well, and the body shape is nice and bulky. 

Overall, I think he’s a decent figure, but does have a fragility problem in the tail. Thankfully Eaglemoss is happy to provide replacements if they have them, though resin is fairly easy to fix with superglue if you break it yourself or can’t get a replacement. If I were to change anything, it’d either be the tail or to add a more rounded shape to the flat surface of the back parts. though I feel these complaints are relatively minor. 

Chestburster Victim & Facehugger Keyring – Aliens

Now for a bit of an interesting figure… one that’s part of the scenery…

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This wasn’t a figure I was planning on getting, but saw it for a reasonable price, and decided to go for it. Thinking of posing this with one the xenomorphs in the same Eaglemoss series. 

The sculpt is surprisingly detailed, and the paint is mostly good, which is a surprise for an Eaglemoss figure. There are some parts where the clothing paint does go onto the fines, but most strands are OK. The clothes are well done, and are shaded well, and the blood isn’t half-bad. My biggest complaint with the figure is the skin colour feels a little too ashen, and could’ve possibly done with a splash of skin-coloured paint. 

Chestburster close-up:

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A chestburster’s head… in full, gruesome detail. I think this has been done well, and we have the t-shirt pushing back from the wound. I feel there’s some inaccuracy in how this would look irl, but I think the artistic liberty does help the chestburster stand out. I feel a little more detail in texture could’ve gone into the hair, but I don’t think this is a big thing, and the paint is nice on the hair, with the strands on the victim’s forehead. 

Sides:

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The sides of the figure look nice, with the alien wall texture continuing around the figure. 

Back:

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Was quite impressed with this – they’ve actually textured the back, so if you have this at an angle where the back shows, it will still look “the part”. The paint here is also nicely and subtly shaded. 

Due to the subject, I don’t think this figure will be especially popular, but it is nicely done, and would look nice in a diorama. 

As a small added bonus, here’s a keyring by Tsudaka Hobby that I picked up in a Suruga-ya order:

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It did come with the key loop, but I removed this to more easily place it in an ita bag (featuring all my favourite things). The legs and tail are very flexible, so they’ll bend if caught on anything. The black wash is OK, but I wish they left a little more on to soften the effect. The bottom of the facehugger is also sculpted decently well. I like this keyring, and glad I got it. 

Captain Alexi – Virus

This figure I was going to write a blog for about a week ago… but then I decided to watch the film before writing about this figure. This blog will include spoilers for the movie (beyond the figure itself…), so skip this if you want to watch Virus first. 

So, uh, here we are and here’s Captain Alexi:

The turncoat himself :P. Part of me wonders if this figure should’ve come in obscured packaging, because it’s kind of spoilery in of itself. Though, to be fair, it’s fairly obvious this is gonna happen to him, one way or another. 

This is based on his final appearance, so loses some of the iconic features of the original Captain Alexi. Would’ve been nice to keep some evidence of his tattoo or something. 

Left:

Here we can see the gun that’s just been grafted to what’s left of his arm. The gun is nicely sculpted and painted. 

Right:

Here he is… face almost holding on. His arm is nicely sculpted though, and here he is holding his pistol, which also looks the part. Legs are definitely reminiscent of the Strogg figures I have, which are by the same manufacturer. 

Back:

Gruesome! Infection waiting to happen, if you ask me. However, there’s a lot of detail here, and decent paintwork. I think the fleshy parts back here do a good job of looking organic. 

*peel*:

Here we have some very regular-shaped lungs The skull’s decent, as is the electronics, but the lungs look really odd in colour and shape. Also the heart could do with being a shade or two darker to fit in more. 

Skin innard:

This is a thin, almost rubbery bit of plastic. Here we have the inverse of his organs, which helps hold this piece to him… but as you can see from the above shots, the head part doesn’t really stay on properly. I think this is a cool idea, but poorly executed. I don’t think the material it is made out of did much for his looks either. 

Wat?:

Hey! Where did his head go?!

Ah, here:

He does escape and run off as a head in the film, which they’ve replicated here. His spine is flexible, but doesn’t really hold position. Probably so it doesn’t get so deformed as to not fit into his back properly… So it’s not particularly poseable if you want him running around, but you could probably flex it to be able to cling to something. Blood effects lower down look a bit eh, but the rest is OK. 

Mini-virus:

You can use this to terrorise other figures in your collection :P. This thing looks cool, but not like anything much. It’s OK, but with no articulation, there’s not much you can really do with it. 

He also came with a torch, like the ones in the film, but I forgot to photograph it. It looks decent, and has a weathered effect, so it’s a nice accessory…. but I want him to hold his gun. 

Overall, he’s a decent enough figure for a mediocre film. It definitely wasn’t a great film, but I liked it more than the 10% rating on Rotten Tomatoes would suggest. Though I do have a soft spot for this kind of film, and it did look older than its 1999 release date. So overall, the toy line is OK, and you can safely skip the film, unless you want to watch a predictable romp involving cyborgs. 

Aliens x M.U.S.C.L.E – Series 2 – Part 3

Now for the rest of the figures in this wave.

First up, Burke:

I like the texture on the guy’s shirt – how to do a plaid shirt when you don’t have colours to use. I like the sculpting on this one – detail has been put into the clothes, with the wrinkles, pattern and his shoes. Another hairline to report on the back though. He does have a watch sculpted too, which is nice to see. Overall, I think this is a decent figure.

Hicks:

Hicks, giving off a strong Duke Nukem vibe. I think they’ve gone overly Nukem with the hair, which is what does it. Still, not a bad little sculpt, but probably not going to please someone who needs their figures character-accurate. 

Hudson:

Erm… and now I’m getting Frakenstein’s Monster vibes from this one. For me, this doesn’t really feel like Hudson, and looking at pics on Google Image Search… I’m still feeling that. The hair doesn’t look right, and his face looks derp. If we ignore it’s supposed to be Hudson, he looks OK for a generic army dude… though I think his face needs changing so it doesn’t look like he’s going “uhhhhhh”. 

Lastly, Vasquez

(she better not get my blog flagged again!):

That. Face. That…. face. They went for annoyed Vasquez, but ended up with pissed off granny. The mouth is too long, and I think the facial features are too squat, leading her to look older and angrier. They did give her dog tags though…. Her gun looks OK as far as sculpt goes – can’t blame the for filling in the smaller holes, for structural integrity. Also mine is a bit bent, but I could ix this, so I don’t regard this as a negative of the figure. 

If it wasn’t for the weapon and the headband though, I think it’d be a bit confusing who this is supposed to be… Again, OK for generic army dude, but kinda fails at being Vasquez.

Again, a mixed bag as regards figures. I think they’ve tried to add more to these figures, which has mostly worked, but have ended up with some odd faces, which doesn’t help with recognising them. This set has some highlights and some lowlights, so I’d recommend just getting the set(s) with figures in that appeal to you. And maybe not look too closely at the faces. 

Aliens x M.U.S.C.L.E – Series 2 – Part 2

Now for some alien warriors and their main nemesis…

First up, this dude:

Why, hello there! This one, um, has a normal hair. That’s mine. Sorry. Overall, he looks OK, pretty similar to the ones in the other set. Only this one is waving. 

Top of his head:

I do like the sculpting on the top of these alien warrior’s heads. That part did come out well, though here we can see the arm joint is a bit “eh”. 

Xeno number 2:

This guy… likes to lounge around. This guy I’d say is the weakest of the three warriors in this set – his pose isn’t overly exciting, and he doesn’t stand up on his own either… 

Lastly for the xenos:

With his arms up, this feels more like a xeno pose, crossed with a M.U.S.C.L.E one. He’s also in attack mode, with his inner mouth poking out. He also isn’t super at balancing, but his tail does more to support him, so he doesn’t look like he’s lazing out. 

Now for their natural enemy… the Ripley!

The sculpting feels more detailed than series 1, and she has something that almost passes as an expression. 

Ripley with Newt:

Another iconic “pose”. However, I’m not too much of a fan of the sculpt on this one, no matter how hard I try to not see it. From the front, Newt looks like she’s melting into Ripley a bit, and the faces look odd. From the back, Newt’s leg looks like it has been flattened, which doesn’t look good. The hair sculpts look good, if a little merged. Rifle looks the part though. 

Again, a mixed bag. The sculpts seem to have more detail in this set, but there’s more balance issues with this set, or other moulding weirdnesses. 

Aliens x M.U.S.C.L.E – Series 2 – Part 1

Series 2! For this series, I got the “normal” edition, which is in a flesh colour. I think there was a limited run of these in different colours, but in blind bags, but those aren’t ones easily available. However, I was happy to get these in a non-translucent plastic. 

First up, the Alien Queen herself:

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She has her cute li’l arms sculpted, and her large head plate. At a glance, I don’t mind the head plate, but looking close, the spider-web effect is a bit odd to me. The front part of her head I like the texture of though. Here, you can see better the odd ring bits than the translucent set – here I can tell they look odd to me as the rest of the arm lacks texture, which makes them stand out. 

Her back and spine look good – lots of sculpting and texture here, giving a detailed appearance. No detail under her head plate, though. Overall, I like this one.

Powerloader, featuring Ripley:

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Here we can see Ripley piloting the powerloader – her clothes are nicely sculpted, and her face is fine for the size. I think they did a good job with this, given the size. One of the aerials is a bit bent on mine, but I could fix this. 

Sides:

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Lots of small mechanical details here, which are nice. Claws look nice, but a little bent – I suspect if I do try to sort these, there is a good chance they’ll bend a bit over time. The join between the front cage and the powerloader itself is a bit rough, but it doesn’t really bother me. 

Back:

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Looks good from the back – we have a decent amount of hydraulic parts modelled here. Just need to sort out that derpy aerial… 

Half a figure, Bishop:

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Unfortunately mine has a hairline from when it was moulded. Ignoring that, he’s been well-sculpted, and I love this iconic choice of character and “pose”. 

Apone:

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First thing that stands out to me is the flatness of the top of his hat – not sure why his hat is so flat. However, he does look ready to kick butt with that cigar and his fists. Sculpting is OK on this one, but again, another one of those hair marks. 

Bit of a mixed bag here – I think the sculpts are better thus far than the first series, but there’s more of those hairlines. Also the Alien Queen isn’t very well balanced, so she’ll need some tack to keep upright. 

Aliens x M.U.S.C.L.E – Series 1 – Red ver. – Part 3

Now for the last four figures in this set. 

So, let’s continue on with Kane…

Nom! Here we have Kane being facehugged. The facehugger is nicely sculpted, but his body is a bit lacking – the way they’ve done the joins on his arms doesn’t work well – instead of looking like the edges of his shirt, it very much looks like his arms are stuck on. His shorts/legs is a better bit of moulding. 

Kane, unfortunate ver.:

Due to the material used, I don’t think the chestburster shows up too well on this one. But it’s certainly an iconic thing to include, I can see why they did this one. Even though it’s a bit indistinct, I’m glad they included this.

Lambert:

I don’t find the likeness on this one too good, and her expression certainly looks odd in my photo. Her clothes are nicely sculpted, but her body feels an over-distorted shape – looks like they tried to give her boobs, but didn’t sculpt the shirt shape correctly, so her entire top is puffed out. 

Lastly, Parker:

Again, a mould hairline on the back. I think this decently looks like Parker, and the sculpting is good – his iconic headband is there, and his clothes look decent. And he also looks ready to do some punchin’ M.U.S.C.L.E-style. 

Overall, these ones were a bit of a mixed bag, but I don’t think any of them are terrible. I like the red colouring, but it does make the sculpting look less distinct, so I feel this is a bit of a trade-off. 

I’m glad I got this set, and I like the mash-up between the two franchises…. enough to buy series 2! Stay tuned for series 2 😉