November 14, 2001 CURRENT RUMBLE Eat Me Yappy 11.14.01 Uncle. I'm putting the blame on H-man's mad arm-twisting skills. But here I am, wrenched from the comforts of cushy retirement-- from the afternoon croquet games and the finger sandwich luncheons. Just to bring you another dose of quickly glossed-over and forgotten ranting. Anyways, here it is: Victora's Star Crow. VA-12. From the show Starzinger. An example of the Popy sub-company's foray into the weird world of Pura-Dera. That means "cheap-and-plastic," for those unfamiliar with inane elitist jargon. A quick run-down of the toy's features: Zenmai (pull-back motor) action in the front half of the ship The detachable rear serves as a "launch" mechanism. Spring loaded missiles at the wingtips. Unsurprising. A spring loaded platform at the top of the ship allows you to launch the included Jan Cooga figure at unsuspecting housepets. Which is great, of course, if you are an undiscerning five year old. Just look at it! Didn't we retire the primitive aesthetics of Jetsons-eque bubbleships three decades ago? And those puny little chrome thrusters? The fragile little "laser" cannons? What idiot thought this thing up?! When I first removed this Fisher-Price-wannabe from its styrofoam tray, I immediately knew that it needed that special Yappy touch. Unfortunately, my initial experiments with my trusty Gundam Markers proved disappointing, since Victora was too damn knucklebrained to mold a single bit of panel detail onto the toy. After a quick dip in paint stripper and a quick rolling up of the sleeves... It was time to pull out the Dremel. First, the bulbous canopy and the silly thrusters had to go. A quick pass of the circular mini-saw, and I had spare styrene for the modifications I was about to undertake. The detaching gimmick? Infantile! I would never PLAY with Star Crow; after all, it was going straight into my sealed trophy case. A combination of solder and two-part epoxy made sure Star Crow would remain a solid, unified whole. And with some spare sheet styrene I built up a more respectable thruster array. Any self-respecting designer would've provided a believable propulsion unit, let me tell you. It's simple physics, people! Next, I decided the Star Crow's armaments needed work. A lot of it. Off came the pitiful lasers and the missile firing wings. Wings on a spacecraft-- ridiculous. Star Crow needed something... bigger. A 12" long brass rod, more sheet styrene, and some left over Gundam kit parts became a much more intimidating particle weapon. But Starcrow needed some defense-- a yang to its yin. I took the leftover thruster bells, epoxied them together, and built them up with putty. I christened the result the "Y-Field Generator," a device that would use bi-polar asymmetric gravitons to deflect beam and conventional weaponry. Cool, huh?! As I waited for the epoxy on the new weapons to set, I turned my attention to the scrawny, hydrocephalic Jan Cooga figure. His would-be-Microman physique no longer matched the fierce new lines of Star Crow. More sheet styrene and epoxy putty beefed up Cooga's limbs considerably. I carved a new chest out of resin with perfect 90° angles and 45° bevels-- à la Hajime Katoki, WHO IS MY LORD AND MASTER! I sanded everything down with wet 300 grit sand paper to get rid of all the mold lines first. Then repeated the buffing process with incrementally finer papers, until I polished every surface with 1000 grit paper soaked in Pine-sol. Thanks, BBS guys, for the great sanding advice. Two coats of primer, six coats of acrylic paint, a coat of sealant, another three coats of enamel, two coats of dull coat, and one coat of semi-gloss later... here it is... Star Crow as it was meant to be. Next up, I'll cover how to make your Chokinzoku fully poseable. Keep the faith, true believers!  RUMBLE INDEX  |  CURRENT RUMBLE