MegaBox: MB-12 Landbreaker is Something That Exists

So, when I was getting into 52Toys’ BeastBox, something on my radar was the Landbreaker set, a pair of box/construction vehicles that combined. This sort of thing is very much in my area of interest, but I held off due to the price tag, which is the rough equivalent of a leader class Transformers toy. After a while, the price was right, and here we are. And its, well, something. There’s a lot to talk about here, so I’m going to do a paragraph talking about the set as whole, before addressing the vehicles separately, and then combining. If you want the short version: I was predisposed to like this, and while having some preventable flaws, I liked it rather a lot.

 

The two vehicles, Mole on left, Groundbreaker on the right

Aside from the combination thing, which was my main reason for wanting this set, there are a couple of features not found in any of the 52Toys stuff I've previously written about. First off, they have opening and detailed cockpits, reportedly capable of sitting pilots from the modern Diaclone reboot. I don't have the ability have to test this currently, but I suppose that's cool, there is some stylistic overlap there. Then there's the 5mm pegs to connect the limbs to the main body, in a weaponizer- adjacent kinda way, like modern Junkion Transformers. The instructions encourage you to mix & match in ways beyond the two stated combinations, which is fun to do in a sort of "fan mode" way. For example, I did work out that Groundhog can take Mole's limbs and still make a decent box mode, but the reverse does not seem to be the case. Maybe I'm missing something, but I should point out that the other combiner MegaBox are based on the same 5mm port system, so there's options. On the downside, the cutmark problem that Black Getter had is back and still kinda sucks. This is most obvious with the white marks on the blue/grey plastic, which is the sorta thing that should been caught during quality control procedures. Or outright prevented at the test shot stage. The set is a little rough around the edges due to that and a few other minor annoyances. Nothing a bit of touching-up couldn't resolve, and worse things happen at sea, but this ain't a model kit, is it?

Mole, AKA Code 1, is the one I like the best visually, but also the most finicky, and having the worst of the QC issues. As a construction vehicle akin to a high-tech JCB, I adore it. It's hitting all the right industrial notes in safety orange. It's something while not real, has that verisimilitude; it looks like something that could exist, and honestly could be dropped into almost any near future setting without issue. The arms each have 7 major joints, the claw obviously adding more, moving in a very industrial way. It's wheelbase is interesting too. It's the most sci-fi bit of it all, with each pair of wheels being jointed in three places. You can adjust its ground clearance, and the main body is similarly jointed, so the entire thing can rise up like a cobra. The flip-side to that is that the Mole is largely made of joints that feature that blue/grey plastic I mentioned above. Also, I easily get confused putting this into box mode as you can fold it up several ways that feel valid up until the point where it suddenly isn’t.

Groundhog, aka Code 2, isn't as visually pleasing to me, but is more even as an experience. This is because it seems to making the most compromises for the combined form, but is more foolproof and has a lot of character. This vehicle gets around with a single wheel and a set of purely decorative tracks. These tracks are on the small side I feel, fairly disproportionate compared to the arms/legs, but they have these oh-so adorable set of joints so they can be extended and posed. Meanwhile you get a set of limbs with arguably better motion than the above, but topped off with a bigger claw and a chainsaw. And the box mode does not confuse me, and also is achieved in a manner that looks like it could work in real life. As its a simpler design, the limbs just fold up onto the sides, and I can certainly imagine this being delivered on a trailer to building site. So, that's all good stuff, although after messing with for a while, it's quite easy to see that this dude becomes something else. 

 

So, onto to combination. The instructions describe two ways, a combined vehicle form, and the robot form, aka the main event, aka Landbreaker. This is facilitated by another 5mm peg, with the robot mode feeling quite intuitive to achieve. The vehicle mode is less so, it feels more like a happy by-product of the aforementioned modularity, than a distinct form. I'm put in mind of one of those big asphalt laying machines that make motorways though, so it's not without an appeal. The combined robot form is however nice. Possibly greater than the sum of its parts, even. It's not without its weaknesses, a lot ends up on the back, and the leg pilot must hate his job, but the fundamental strengths of both parts come through. I'm going to use that fancy word “verisimilitude” again. It's hard to make a combiner look technically feasible at all, it's very much a super robot genre thing. Landbreaker however looks both unified and almost as sensible as it's individual components. It's got that near-future realism to it, and it's honestly amazing that the designers pulled it off. A big part of that is the "head" which has a webcam-looking sensor on it that moves with a universal joint. It looks like something a construction robot would have, not necessarily humanising it, but thematic and expressive. It also poses like a boss, repurposing all those joints becoming the most unexpectedly agile robot I've handled of late. It's got pretty much everything you'd want or need, even working in the connector as a waist joint and ab crunch. It's still got that serious robotics feel to its movements as its entirely swivels and universal joints but I honestly don't know what more could be added. Mole is largely made of joints, so you can get a lot in the upper body, and Groundhog is far from a slouch too.  It looks great, poses well, and can kick people with a chainsaw. There’s an awful-awful lot to like.

 

In addition to being something that exists, Landbreaker is something that is quite awesome. I don’t know if its the best thing 52Toys has done, I don’t have the experience to make that judgement, and there’s some petty annoyances, but… yeah. This does a lot of stuff right, comparing favourably to Transformers toys, while having that 3^rd party flair, but also very much its own identity. I keep on finding new stuff to like about it. Consider this a recommendation, and if in doubt, there’s a purple and green version.

 

 

BeastBox: BB-48 Desert Assault Squad is Something That Exists

Do I have to explain BeastBox again? Righty, mechanical beasts that compress into boxes? Very collectable? 15+ age bracket? No? Oh, click here then. OK, let’s have a quick chat about a BeastBox I got recently.

 

 

Something which may be a surprise to any international reader is that the people of the UK have an inordinate fondness for Meercats. It's basically a meme, as these adorable creatures aren't native to my wet and foggy home. This is probably down to the "Meercats United" documentary by Sir David Attenborough, and more recently the "Compare the Meerkat" advertising campaign. Please don't ask me to explain that last one, it now includes Wombats. So, with my continuing fixation on BeastBox toys, the Desert Assault Squad was on my radar. Cute and characterful animals are very much something BeastBox does well. And one day, it was on sale.

 

When talking about this set, comparisons to those penguins from my first BeastBox article are unavoidable. The Desert Assault Squad is similarly a team of four mech-animals, differentiated mainly by decals and a single accessory. Like the penguins, they feature magnets to assist with box mode, but unlike the penguins, there's a fair bit in the way of posability and actual transformation. This means that these mecha meerkats have far more going on, but they aren't as foolproof. 

 

Let's talk the individual squad members a bit. Each is a predominantly brown and sand coloured robo-animal, with a gunmetal chestplate and forearm guns. While cute, these aren't necessarily cutesy, almost serious minded. There's little exaggeration here, but each stands on its hind legs in that way people find so charming. These are a quartet of small creatures standing on guard, watching out for trouble, and then shooting it. Posability is an interesting discussion as a result. Each has a very small footprint, so you'll likely be using the tail as a third leg, but it possible to do without it. Articulation generally is mainly a matter if balljoints and swivels, more humanoid than most of my BeastBox, although obviously not as extensive as Black Getter. It's a total of 13 points, with nothing in the waist, but you have enough for a salute. Which is adorable. Transformation into box mode meanwhile is more involved than it looks. The head stows the main body, but the shoulders shift around too, and torso splits in half. It's not strictly speaking difficult, but I will admit to overlooking a mistake, and not realising at first because the magnets held it all together. The resulting box is largely symmetrical, if not totally concealing the nature of its components. I do like the top, which makes use of the breastplates to smooth everything out, and each block has a little letter decal referring to one of the cardinal directions. So you can arrange them like a compass.

All in all? It's a fun little set, with lots of character. It is possibly a bit too finicky for my tastes, but not enough to spoil the experience. Definitely adorable. Definitely something that exists.

Project Tonks: Part 8

Something something magic 8 ball…EDIT: Now with borderline acceptable pictures!

 

 

 

With three satisfactory Tonks completed, and the essentials of a forth underway, the home stretch was now in sight. Tonk 4 would become a refinement of the previous three with respects to the tracks, going smaller, and once more using keyboard keys for the shape of things. The hull and turret design however were a new approach, repurposing a cheap construction toy, the same type/brand as I’ve used for Ork models. This was built up with off-brand lego to make a more interesting shape. Turret rotation here was based on a screwhole, which would have been fine by itself, but added a bit of wire and a touch of hot glue to reinforce the connection. The gun, meanwhile, was built up from a glue lid, a bit of a water pistol, and a bit off an old tank kit. Detailing and painting continued in my usual way, although I’d salvaged a new style of plastic sheeting, which I used for a few panels. As I was out of gold paint, I did the rivets in copper, not that you can tell. Between the hyper-fixation and practice I did this one fairly quickly. I don’t know if I’d necessarily build the turret ring again like this, but its entirely fine, and I like the blue.

 

 

With Tonk 4 done, I moved onto Stage 5: The Tonk Destroyer. Within the rules of Tonks, this in found in the extra section, an alternate playing piece available for games of 3 or more players. The basic concept of a tank destroyer is a fairly self-explanatory one, but to summarise: a tank destroyer is often a vehicle along the same lines as a tank, just removing the turret in exchange for a bigger gun. This was mainly a WW2 thing, often a conversion of a tank proper, but they are still around. On balance, this would be a simpler affair than a turreted tonk, which is why I called it a victory lap. I ended up throwing this together from bits I’d collected for this project, before going all-in on moulded tracks. The tracks where salvaged resin examples by Ramshackle Games, while the gun and blast shield were out of an old robot toy. The body was made from another jenga tile, with one segment cut off, and hot glued on top for a gun mounting. The tracks are smaller than my scratchbuilt ones, which combined with the gun housing makes it look more super-deformed than my other creations, but its fine. It looks very single-minded. I dressed it with bits as I usually do, and added on a crude dozerblade because I was in a 40K sort of mode. It was about this point I realised I could paint this, but I wasn’t sure if I could get it done in time for Tuesday. Then I got snowed-in, OK, decision made. I did it in magenta.

 

Well, its a little ahead of schedule, but Project Tonks seems to have come to a nice conclusion. Time to start thinking seriously about the next project. In the meantime, I’m going to mull over how this all went, and maybe write up a summary. Cheers for now.

 

State of the Blog post December 2023

OK, this is honestly a bit weird. I've been finding myself in a, no qualifiers, good place mentally. I seem to have found some effective coping strategies, and have maybe put to bed some self-destructive habits. As this blog mainly exists as a coping strategy, you might think I'd winding it down, but no. I'm honestly getting good at this modelling business, and found a new interest. This blog is feeling like fun rather than routine. I have a significant buffer of toy articles, and Project Tonks has been refreshing. I am still a work in progress, and likely always will be, but vaguely optimistic equilibrium is not my usual winter mood.

I am however still doing my usual Chrimbo holiday. I may be doing well, but I work in retail. As such the schedule for the Holiday Season looks like this.

Regular posting ends on the December 17^th.

The New Years Special on, umm, new years day?

Regular service resumes on January 7^th.

Project Tonks concludes tomorrow.

Topics in the Pipeline

A new modelling project along the lines of Project Tonks, but that's very much being planned.

More things that turn into boxes.

Many-many Transformers repaints.

 

Until then, have a nice chrimbo!

Resin: The Ramshackle Games Goblin Tank Range (By Fox Box)

 

Wait, wait! This isn't Project Tonks! Tonks adjacent, certainly, but not Tonks. Tonks are about 1:75, these are 28mm scale proxies for 40k. Grot Tanks, basically. So, yes, there's a lot of overlap, the same basic hyper-fixation, but I promise a slightly different experience this time.

OK, so during Orktober, Ramshackle Games, my preferred resin dealership, announced two new vehicle kits, the "Goblin Range Slug Tank" and the "Goblin Range Raider Tank". Notably, these are not sculpted by Ramshackle itself, aka Mr Curtis, but rather Fox Box, a similar sort of enterprise that has a collaboration thing going on. I ordered one of each. Now, I had intended this to be a "pallet cleanser review " sorta project, to fill a weeks worth of holiday, but I had forgotten something in the month or so they took to arrive. Ramshackle Games likes to empty the mould into the box they send you, so I ended up with 4 turrets, 3 hulls, and at least twice the guns you'd reasonably need. Gotta love Ramshackle Games. Its like Five Guys and their fries, regardless of the size of tub you select, you always get a bag of chips. So, as four is the minimum required size for a unit of Grot Tanks, the only reasonable option was to bodge together a forth hull.

I need to make a few comments on the actual models though. The resin seems different from Ramshackle's usual fare, with lots in the way of wafer-thin flash to remove. There's also chunkier bits, as well as bubbles. It's not difficult to clean up, and seemingly less brittle than the usual, but there is stuff to do. The Slug, the unexpectedly duplicated one, also came in two distinct variations, one with the exhausts as a separate piece, and one where it was pre-attached. That was helpful for differentiating them. Otherwise, I kept the trio largely as stock, adding icons and such, before taking a swing at the kitbashed kommander tank. Visually, these are nicely sculpted pieces, with a great selection of weapons. I think I prefer the “Raider” style, but there’s not much it. One observation I would make though is that the models are, like the more recent GW Ork plastics, possibly too unique in their sculpt. I mean imagine three slugs with exactly the same armour patches on them? Its the Squigbuggy all over again. That’s a minor complaint though, and if you’re not trying to customise orkish vehicles when you make ‘em, you’re probably doing it wrong.

With the Kommander Tank, I wanted to get something that fit the look and feel of the resin models. This meant a resin kitbash, and fortunately that's something I have the materials for and have done before. The main body and engine block are Ramshackle Games bits, giving it the same heft as the others, with the turret and one weapon being taken from the spares mentioned above. The tracks where taken off an old Guntank who’d came second in a fight with gravity, and were unchanged. Other detailing like the exhausts were scratchbuilt or kitbashed, as, for some reason, I’ve gotten pretty good at making small tanks. Its the biggest of the four, but given that its got two guns on it and is meant to be in charge, that’s not really an issue. Painting then continued in my usual “Deathskull Rust Bucket” Style, but it was hear I realised that a make-up brush would work on small things as well as big things. This made things ungodly quick.  Although, given the state of my hands, I should have worn gloves.

Overall? I like how these turned out, and these goblin tanks are worth looking into.

Project Tonks: Part 7

Lucky number seven?

 

Mindful of becoming somewhat "tonked-out", I tapped my breaks a bit. I'd laid the foundations for today's Tonk in the week 6 segment, and then promised myself I'd try to do something else for 24 hours. At that point, the Tonk was looking to combine elements from each of the previous weeks'. The track base was similar to last week's, but triangular, with the hull being half a Jenga tile. The turret was looking like the one from week 5, but more towards the front. I soon realised this was gonna be too small, so I revisited the gimmick straws I'd used for week 4's oversized Tonk. Through good luck one of the pieces matched the width of this Tonk all-but-perfectly, with a bit spare for a gun barrel. However, things didn't seem to be sticking well, and I took that as my cue to take a break. 

 

When I came back to it, I found myself making an inverse of a Tonk somewhat, with most of the mass towards the front. The hull was dressed with a keyboard key and a lot of rivets, while I added additional roadwheels in the form of beads atop nanoblocks. While the turret was another small jar, I tried to detail it differently from the week 5 model. I also applied a panel from an old toy car to the top of the hull, as it had duel extractor fans. Painting then continued with my now standard "make-up brush dry brushed rust bucket method". I'm quite happy with how it turned out, although I didn't notice a wonky wheel until it was too late. 

 

Once that was done, I anxiously turned to the next, as I had plans that week and wouldn't be able to model as much. Yep, rushing again. I do learn, I swear, it's just I get very focused on things. Here I used smaller wheels and more beads, before trying a new turret style based on a construction toy. It's obviously not done, so we'll come back to that one again next week. 

 

 

All being well, I should have something to say about stage 4 soonish.

Gaslands: The Return

So, you may have noticed how I suddenly stopped posting about Gaslands. I doubt it, maybe 3 people read this blog regularly, but it's at least possible that the change in content might have registered with you. You might think this was me getting bored of the topic, and you'd be half right. I did get bored with it, but before that, I was involved with a long term Gaslands project I couldn't really talk about. I'd had the idea of doing some friends a car each as novelty gifts, and I couldn't post about them here without theoretically spoiling the surprise. Also, as there were 7 of these friends, I got pretty good with my techniques by the end of it, if in need of a break. They liked 'em, if you are wondering. Advance to the Orktober Stompa and it's aftermath, I decided to do some more, alongside the Tonks Project.

The first, "BeetleBum", was just to get my hand in again. It had been several months since I'd tried to do a Gaslands car, so I threw together some bits in the colours of my Ork/Rutherford team. This car features some bits I've not posted about previously. Pride of place goes to the rocket pod, which comes from North Star Miniatures "Instruments of Carnage" plastic sprue 1. This is an intensely useful set of Gaslands weapons and gubbins, stuff I can’t necessarily kitbash, and if you're new to this, I'd recommend it over the Ramshackle Games resin bits. The Ramshackle stuff isn't without it's charms though, I.e. Ork drivers, and I used a resin panel here too. The base car is a kind of Volkswagon pick-up truck that I got from Poundland. These are/were two for a pound, and honestly aren't that great, but if you're gonna be using 'em for Gaslands, their weaknesses mean little. Happy with the result of a few hours work plus spray painting time, I moved onto another.

The next car was somewhat more involved, and rather obscure. I'd picked it up for a quid at the Brum Toy Fair. The stamp on the underside identifies it as a "Corgi Juniors Whizzwheels Morgan Plus B", so I may be ruining a classic in doing this, but it was pretty banged-up before I got there. The wheels had seen better days, so I'd try adding the ones from the Carnage kit mentioned above. And as it was open-topped, I'd add in some Ork crew. In game terms this would be a repeat of the Dakka Car, but why not? 

 

Oh wait… This is a belated Orktober post!

This was a fairly easy process, but did expose some minor weaknesses with the Carnage kit. For some reason, the gatling guns lack an obvious bit fir the bullets to come out of. an artefact of the scale I think, as this sprue tends towards a more realistic scale than I usually do these in. So I put a bit of tubing on the end of each. The new wheels also required a moments thought, as these are reversible and lack an obvious mounting point. I decided to use some small washers to help things stick. Painting them happened, with the crew painted separately before attachment. I named it "His Lordship's Sunday Dakka". 

 

I did these two up just as I started Project Tonks, before moving onto that more seriously. It was a fun little diversion, although I think may taken Gaslands as far as I can with common toy cars. Creatively speaking, if you get me? I may need to move out of my comfort zone a bit, like a colour scheme that isn’t tetanus in blue, or try a more elaborate entry. Hopefully by the time this goes live, I'll have an idea where to go next. 

 

Project Tonks: Part 6

Six weeks now? I suppose that counts as a routine.

 

As you may recall from last week, I was feeling quite pleased, but had received a delivery of models that were gonna be a distraction. Bloody hell Richard, what were you thinking? You start a long term project involving 1:72 tanks, and as change of pace you order some 28mm mini-tanks for when you are on holiday. That's a really diverse set of projects you got going there. So, of course I put those together alongside today's Tonk work, although the write-up will come in future weeks. On the plus side, it does not appear to have slowed me down by much.

 

Today's Tonk followed on the innovations of last week's where I'd chanced upon a method to easily make road wheels. Here I cut down some 6 by 1 thin not-lego pieces, attached wheels to them, and wrapped the bricks with a strip of EVA foam to provide a foundation. The wheels here were salvaged from toy cars, specifically pull-motors, which also provide good gears. As this was a first attempt, I went for a simple line of road wheels, which ended up needing an additional small wheel as I’d misjudged the distance between them. Not quite what I wanted, but good enough. Attaching these to the hull of the Tonk was a bit of trail & error, as was applying the tracks. I had to faff about a bit so everything sat flat. Otherwise, I went for a slightly more angular look with a smaller turret than the last one. Said turret was achieved by wrapping the business end of a spraypump with EVA foam and bits until I got the shape I wanted. I used a lot of cheapo gap-filler on that turret too, to smooth it out. Painting then continued in the usual manner, making use of a make-up brush to speed things up. A couple rivets didn't want to take paint for some reason, but i think I got it in the end. Sorry about the photos, the light wasn't great.

 

 

 

All in all, I'm quite happy with how it turned out. The tracks aren't quite there, but are certainly good enough. I’ve also found my pace of building and painting has increased. Part of that’s being on holiday, but I seem to approaching Gaslands levels of efficiency where the only thing that’s slowing me is literally the paint drying, or waiting for the putty to set. I’ve made A LOT of track links in the past week, so the remaining two Tonks should go faster. Actually I’ve started on the third, but decided slow down, lest I burn out.

Up next: Another Tonk.

BeastBox: BB-03FJ Flame JoJo is Something That Exists

 

Do I have to explain BeastBox again? Righty, mechanical beasts that compress into boxes? Very collectable? 15+ age bracket? No? Oh, click here then. OK, let’s have a quick chat about my latest BeastBox.

 

My first impression, mainly because I collected this from the post office on my way to work and I couldn't really play with it there, was the packaging design. It was in many ways an inverse of the style I'd seen so far, with a smaller, portrait-oriented affair, with JoJo having pride of place in the upper half, in box mode. It's more minimalist packaging than the others I've seen up close, but still attractive in its way Speaking of boxes, JoJo's box form and general engineering is on the simpler side for a BeastBox, not surprising given its relative age. The cube is dominated by his big three-fingerer fists, with his eyes peering out of a little slot. There is in fairness more going on than you may think, and it does have an interesting conversion scheme. JoJo's transformation is aligned to one of the cube edges, a diamond shape when viewed from the front. I think there's a stand available so you can display him like that, but this chap only has the standard translucent storage case. So, fairly simple on the box front, but that’s not the same as saying its bad.

 

If the box mode seems a bit uncomplicated, JoJo's ape mode screams character by comparison. It's the face, it's grumpy and perfect. I love that head sculpt, and its on a great neck joint. The package art depicts JoJo in a roaring and chest-beating pose, but the actual face is more of a sullen glare. It's also articulated in such a way as to enable him to walk on his knuckles, so the overall vibe is of somebody who is basically not a bad guy, but is a bad day waiting to happen to somebody. I'm also very fond of the colours on this one, putting me in mind of the bayverse Optimus Prime. Is this a deliberate homage? Possibly, 52Toys has form in this area, but it's not a smoking gun. It is an attractive look, regardless, cartoony with simple but effective techno greebling. Articulation isn't bad either, if favouring monkey poses more than humanoid motion. It's possible to get him standing on two legs only, no trivial matter as he is approximately 10% legs and 40% arms by volume. You might almost say its no small feat, on those small feet. Heh. That said, he has no knees, and his arms aren't super posable or anything, the joints there being more for transformation. Nothing to apologise for, mind you, but you hit limitations. 

 

In addition to being something that exists, I really like Flame JoJo. He's about on the same tier as KarmaKuma, doing slightly less, but not using any translucent plastics in his construction. Aside from some minor sprue-marks, he's great. Simple, but great. And very characterful.

 

I wonder if there’s a version of this in Beast Wars colours...

Project Tonks: Part 5

Part 5 then... Here we go.

 

 

While I was being too much of a perfectionist with last week's effort, I wanted to avoid the same imperfections for the next one. I.e. keep the size under control, and do actual track links this time. I started with the track links as I knew this was going to be the most involved and lengthy part of the build, but once I got it right, future builds would be easier. This was because I was going to make some crude, two-part, push moulds which would enable me to mass produce the links with minimal effort. I'm not great at precision cutting, but I don't mind filing a part after the fact to it fits. If you're unfamiliar with such things, I will say it requires a certain amount of preparation and good old trial & error. It's only worth doing if the part you're making is A) rare/annoying to source or B) you're making so many of the things it works out to a time saving. Obviously doing a bunch of track links is a massive B, and if you want to know more about the process, I'm going to include a link here to a video. It probably explains things better than I can. My initial design was to base these around zip ties and paper clips, but these proved to be too slight for this style of mould. Instead, I went for something based on cut down nanoblocks, tubing and scrap plastic. These are perhaps a bit chunky, and aren't interlocking, but I have to work with what I have.

So while I was prepping that and creating a lot of miscasts, I went to work on the actual tonk. This proved to be a series of happy accidents. I'd decided to use a small spraybottle from an airline travel kit for the turret joint. During installation, the top, which I had intended to build up into the turret, pinged off into a corner and presumably Narnia as I have yet to find it. However, a small make-up tub from the same set would work just as well. Actually, better, as it had an indentation on one side the same diameter as the spray mechanism, so it flows better. The track wheels meanwhile were left overs from an old Frame Arms kit, these having been selected as convenient short-cut while I worked out the track links. These are single mould piece with four wheels and a rectangular behind. These looked the part, but there was a lot of empty space that would make adding tracks impractical. So, I wrapped the piece with EVA foam to fill those gaps and make for better connections. Then it hit me, I can do the same thing with lego and disks. That will make the next one so much easier to do! The track links meanwhile, while requiring significant clean-up and gap-filling, went on with almost no issue, when I'd been suspecting a need to mod something to make 'em fit. Word to the wise: if you're trying something like this, do the visible areas first, that way, if you have to bodge something, it's on the underside. I only really needed to add a strip of EVA to bridge a gap. And finally, once I' d added some panels to the side, the tonk proved to be very close to the 7 by 5cm target. I was quite pleased. Painting then continued in my usual way, this time featuring lime green, and some homebrew mud paint to obscure some imperfections.

Generally, I'm a lot happier with how this turned out versus week 4's creation. That was OK, well-liked even, but this is more scale appropriate, and looks a bit better. I'm inclined to do three more like this, and redesignate the bigger green one as a prototype. That puts me a little behind schedule, but I do have some time off this week. I’ll have plenty of time to catch up, assuming nothing happens to distract me…

Uh-oh.

Revisiting Getter Robo: Armageddon

I’m unsure as to how to best write this introduction. So let’s try the basics. Getter Robo is a very influential manga and anime series, one of the original mecha shows. Combining super robots? Yeah, it did that, and wrote the playbook. Getter Robo: Armageddon is a late 90’s anime miniseries, one quite well-regarded for how it captured the tone and spirit of its source material in animated form, which hadn’t really been done before. The Black Getter also appears. As such, Armageddon invites a kind of breathless summarisation as much as commentary. Because, not to put too fine a point on it, its a special kind of insane.

The first response you are likely to have upon watching Armageddon is likely to be something like "What the hell is going on!?“. That's normal, and I'd imagine the target audience had a similar response back in the day. The anime is doing a "not as you know them" meets "DC Elseworlds" thing here, assuming the basic functions of its world are known, only to break them in mere seconds. Here the Getter Team fought a war on the Moon against the metamorphic alien Invaders, won, only for tragedy to strike. Professor Saotome, Getter Ray pioneer and apparent raging nutjob, was murdered by Getter-1 pilot Ryoma Nagare, breaking the team. However, sometime later the Professor is back, alive, and waving around a doomsday weapon, which scares the crap out of everyone. The response of the Japanese government is to go to Ryoma, whom always protested his innocence, uncuff him, and basically say, "Double Jeopardy is in effect, here's a giant robot and some guns, why don't you have a nice chat with the Professor?". Meanwhile, the Invaders are back, and they specialise in kaiju-level threats with a side order of parasitical body horror. What follows is, in an objective sense, awesome. Seeing the assorted Getter Robos let loose, especially Ryoma's roaring rampage of revenge, are undoubtedly genre highlights. The show goes from a standing start to Defcon 2 almost immediately, the pace only slowed by flashbacks which offer piecemeal explanation of how we got here, and what's actually at stake. However, by the time the narrative has uncoiled itself and we get an idea of what is actually going on, its Defcon 1, the bomb is dropped, and none of it really matters any more.

Hmmm. I would not have done things this way.

After 3 episodes, the original director left the project, something that seems to happen with these 90's OVAs a lot, and I've seen conflicting explanations as to how it went down. The current consensus seems to be that he was taking too long, and got replaced, but he took his notes with him. As a result, the new director had to write a new story with no real idea of what the endgame was meant to be. Whatever happened, there's a time skip of thirteen years, which moves the focus onto new characters, with the remaining Getter Team members in a leadership role. There's also a new and much more upbeat opening sequence, and it's almost a different show. At this point, Armageddon does not so much slow down as de-escalate. I mean, there's been a nuclear apocalypse, there's an upper limit on how much worse things can get without disengaging the audience, so things need to settle a bit before ramping up the tension again. This makes the post-apocalyptic majority of the series, oddly lighter than the pre-apocalyptic first act. This is not to suggest the fundamentally hot-blooded characters and mecha sequences have in any way been toned down, though. If anything, with the world broken and an army of fleshy monsters infesting it, this merely allows for the series to mine new veins of melodrama and blood splatter while things explode. Things get rather weird towards the middle too. Let’s just say that the Saotome family clan has issues, and I’d like to know the creative process behind a certain plot twist involving the supporting character Genki Saotome. You’ll know that one when you see it.

 

I suppose the reason I enjoy Armageddon is because it ultimately reminds me of Gurren Lagann, although the smart way to say that would be the other way around. Getter Robo was there first, even if I encountered it later. The debt Gurren Lagann owes to Getter Robo is undeniable, both being peers in the whole "giant robots doing crazy shit" space, but with one clearly influencing the other. With Armageddon’s later episodes, the influence is very obvious too, both in visual elements and plot points. The difference is that Armageddon is a strait-to-video release of 13 episodes, rather than a TV production of 27, which grants it more freedom in some ways, I.e. gore, but it's working as part of a pre-existing franchise. That it is drawing on previous instalments only to subvert them, is both a strength and a weakness. Gurren Lagann is much more complete a story, by comparison. Narratively, Armageddon is a bit disjointed and messy, fond of mythology gags and presuming familiarity with its characters rather than properly establishing them within this work. This doesn’t necessarily count against the anime given how relentless & OTT it is, the series coming into its own in the second half, but it is a problem. I would also make the observation that while the first 3 episodes are valid, Armageddon is at its most enjoyable after the time skip, when the story structure is more conventional, but your mileage may vary on that one. Regardless, its an experience, to say the least.

 

Also, there’s something I find darkly fascinating about this series, and its place in the wider franchise. Its not immediately obvious, but Armageddon is of the Cosmic Horror genre, once you look. Of course, the word Armageddon implies a somewhat biblical aspect, although that’s more an artefact of localisation. The original Japanese is more like “The Last Day of World”, although Armageddon is supposed to be a battlefield as well as the end times, which certainly isn’t a bad fit, but not a perfect one. No, the series is more Lovecraft by way of John Carpenter’s The Thing, which I’m 99% sure is deliberately homaged in one episode. The Invaders are massively alien and terrible, to the point where its not immediately clear what level of individuality and self-awareness applies to them, or as shapeshifters, if they even have an original form. There's several characters whom are essentially Invaders in human form, and have been for a while, but its unclear if this is a case of subversion, symbiosis, or them just being very good mimics. The Invaders consume people from the inside out, corrupting them like a virus, and eventually doing the same to machines. So, just like The Thing then, its not just Gurren Lagann that borrows from a classic. They aren’t the only thing that’s terrifying though. The Getter Robos themselves very much are, and especially Shin Dragon, the Professor’s seemingly alive doomsday weapon. The mecha piloted by the protagonists, are powerful but above all brutal combatants, enabled by the wonder technology of Getter Rays. And something that's being alluded to throughout before being explicitly said towards the end, is that it's the Getter Rays that are the problem. It is not merely a power source and nuclear allegory, its evolution itself, and humanity needs to back away slowly. The Invaders are drawn to Getter Rays, feeding off them, spreading them, which is bad enough on its own, but the series hints towards the true scale of things. This is an aspect of Getter Robo I find to be very compelling; the sheer cosmic horror of the setting bubbling just below the surface. Full discussion of that is however outside the remit of this article, but in this case it feeds into a generational theme, the older characters moving out of the way of the younger generation; another Gurren Lagann parallel. Professor Saotome planned and planned, laying paths for his children and pilots to follow, only for it end badly for everyone. The original Getter Team, his proteges, instead protect the next generation, and choose to step aside as it isn't their world any more. That’s not a bad moral to have. And because it's Getter Robo, they do this by entering a kind of warrior heaven, a mysterious and distant battlefield filled with other Getter Robos and foes. And because its Getter Robo: Armageddon, what the fandom likes to a call a space vagina is involved. You read that correctly.

 

No, I'm not putting a picture of it here, you can look that up on your own time.

Conclusion

Getter Robo: Armageddon is as mad as a spoon. This madness comes from both faithfulness to its source material, its seemingly troubled production, and the fact that its relying a lot on its own cultural context to smooth the bumps. It is however very entertaining, and assuming you don’t go deaf from characters repeatedly shouting “GETTER!”, its worth tracking down.