The Little Shipping Container That Could

Here's my latest shipping container. It's small, white, and old; it's seen a lot of use, hence its griminess. 
 

Junk Barricade

Here's a barricade made of junk for the Fallout: Wasteland Warfare skirmish game. I'm very happy with the legibility of the "TRASH," "ICE," and "Nuka Cola" signage. I'm getting better at dry brushing! However, I still struggle with ink washes. But I don't mind the dirty look for this application; it suits the setting. 

Here's how the barricade looks from the rear. 

 

The Lesser of Two Evils

Because at least Director Krennic (left) wears a mask. 

Wheels Within Wheels

Target: Earth

Here we have a globe. Sean gave me this for my birthday, among other minis! I should have included a 28mm miniature with the photo, because then you could see that this is supposed to be a very large globe at that scale; I'd estimate it would be three or four metres tall. 

In any event, I painted it black with red crosshairs to suggest this is the sort of globe that might be found in the hidden underground lair of a maniacal supervillain bent on world domination. Alternatively, you might see such a globe on the bridge of an invading starship. 

I wish the crosses were more uniform, but given that I painted them by hand, I think they look okay. 

Scotty Finds The Daily Grind

"Cap'n, do ye know how the doctor takes his coffee?"

Here we have The Daily Grind, a 28mm-scale model from Marvel's Crisis Protocol game. I painted it in tones of brown and green, partly as a knockoff of Starbucks, partly because, well, coffee is brown, and I like mint chocolate chip frappuccinos, hence the green. 
 

It's Green

"Mr. Spock, I ha' found anoother barrel." 
"Analysis, Mr. Scott?" 
"It is...er...it's green." 

 

Scotty's Dumpster Dive

"Scott ta Enterprise. Ensign Bloomey discovered two functionally identical dumpsters 'round the rear o' the tower. They're a wee bit filthy, suggesting this civilization has not yet invented sonic cleaning technology. I shudder ta think of what waste might have been carelessly tossed inta these primitive receptacles. However, whoever painted 'em did a decent enough job." 
 

There Be Barrels Here

"Scott ta Enterprise. I've discovered three cylindrical barrels at the base of the castle, near the main entrance. One be red, one be yellow, one be blue. It canna be a coincidence that these are our department colours, Cap'n." 
 

Strange New Walls

Film 10,000

I knew that this month I`d see my ten thousandth movie, and I`ve been carefully considering which film to watch for that particular milestone. Unfortunately, earlier tonight I got carried away watching some shorts and accidentally went over the line. Argh! But counting backwards, I now retroactively recognize The First Shot (Brandon Hicks, 2021) as Film 10,000. 

Trouble at the Call Box

Oliver's oboe
Notes climb up to the heavens
Robot on the line

Bloody Iron Maiden

One step forward, three steps back--I think this is the worst thing I've painted in quite some time. I was trying to give the impression of old, rotted wood braced by metal strips and topped with a copper icon. Instead, we have a muddy mess. 

The gore-stained interior isn't much better, I'm afraid. I wish I could explain what went wrong here. 

 

Justice Reimagined

To my utter surprise - and maybe it's because my expectations were so low - I did not hate Zack Snyder's Justice League (2021). In fact, I can honestly say that I even enjoyed it, with reservations. This version of the film has more natural humour (though only in sparse doses), Cyborg and Flash are far better developed Batman gets a little more dignity, the action sequences are more effective overall, and the final battle in particular offers genuine jeopardy and suspense--it feels like there are real stakes. The plot actually makes sense now, for the most part. Even Steppenwolf's story is fleshed out, enough to make him an actual villain instead of just CG animation. And we get to see more of Jeremy Irons' Alfred and J.K. Simmons' Commissioner Gordon; both are treats. Amy Adams' Lois Lane doesn't fare quite as well, but she's still more important to the film than she was in the original theatrical release. 

On the downside, the score is terrible except when it includes snippets of Zimmer's themes from past movies. There are still moments that feel out of character for our heroes. There's way too much slow motion. The big new character cameo is welcome to fans, but still feels tacked on. Some sequences could be cut without hurting the film at all. Some of the humanizing moments from the theatrical cut are gone and I miss them, but on the other hand, those cuts make this version more tonally coherent - even if I'm not a fan of Snyder's portentous, somber take on the genre.

As a bonus, comparing this version of Justice League to the theatrical release is a great way to discover the importance of editing.

Doom Buggy

Dune Buggy

Here's a dune buggy I assembled and painted. I'm pretty happy with the metallic parts. I'm not terribly happy with the driver; I should have painted him or her before I put the model together. It's pretty hard painting an inaccessible interior space. 
 

FISK

This sign is part of a New York City construction site kit meant for use with Marvel: Crisis Protocol. I couldn't find any colour references for the wordmark, so I arbitrarily chose yellow on black. I think it looks decent enough. The raised letters really helped keep my lines straight. 
 

Black Suit Superman

Here's Superman in the black suit from the infamous "Death of Superman" story from back in the 1990s. I came so close to getting the symbol right, but alas! Oh well, it looks decent enough. 

The Words Behind the Pictures

I don't know exactly how Letterboxd defines a writing credit for the purposes of their database, but I suspect it's broader than just screenplays, judging by some of the names on my list of most-seen films written by these people. 

Having seen all the films that Charlie Chaplin has directed, I suppose it's no surprise that he's also my most-seen writer, too, given the amount of control and involvement Chaplin had in his films. 

The next three names in the list--Maltese, Foster, and Pierce--all wrote a bunch of Looney Tunes shorts. 

Ben Hecht, next on the list, has a fascinating filmography, writing superb films like Notorious, Spellbound, Scarface, Design for Living, Stagecoach, The Thing, and Strangers on a Train, but also z-grade stuff like Queen of Outer Space, the 1967 version of Casino Royale, and Switching Channels. 

Felix Adler wrote Three Stooges shorts. 

Ian Fleming makes the list thanks to James Bond and Chitty-Chitty-Bang-Bang. 

David Lynch, of course, writes or co-writes most of the material he directs.

Clyde Bruckman is another writer of Three Stooges shorts, but also features from comedy greats such as Buster Keaton and Harold Lloyd. 

Woody Allen, like Chaplin and Lynch, writes much of his own material. 

Stephen King makes the list, I suspect, because of "story by..." credits for the many adaptations of his novels and short stories. 

Laurent Bouzereau produces short documentary "making-of" subjects that appear as special features on many of my discs. 

Orson Welles, again, is another film polymath. 

George Lucas makes the list thanks to Star Wars, Indiana Jones, American Graffiti, etc. 

Sylvester Stallone, I suspect, is here thanks to the Rocky and Rambo franchises. 

Elwood Ullman is another Three Stooges writer. What a fun job that would have been...

Richard Matheson is a well-regarded prose fantasist, SF author, and contributor of teleplays to The Twilight Zone, among other shows. Here for adaptations, much like King, I suspect. 

Ethan Coen is of course one-half of the famous Coen Brothers writing-directing team.

And finally, David Cronenberg is another director who writes much of his own material. 

 

Letterboxd List Progress March 2021

As of tonight, I've now completed two more of Letterboxd's official "Top" lists: AFI's 100 Years, 100 Movies, and the Box Office Mojo All Time 100. The box office list was the hardest to finish off, as there are a lot of terrible films on it, including the three Hobbit movies, which capped the list for me. Looks like the IMDB Top 250 is the one I'll probably finish next. 

If I were to guess which list I'll finish last, it'll probably be 1,001 to See Before You Die. 

Ninjas on Ice

 

Here's a quartet of ninjas, all of them formerly DC Heroclix figures, rebased and repainted by me. I turned these guys into ebon-clad ninjas mostly because of their poses, but also because hey, I might need ninjas for roleplaying games sometime in the post-COVID future. Too bad they wore their black pyjamas to an arctic environment, though. 

Power Ring

Here's Power Ring, Green Lantern's evil Earth-3 counterpart. I'm not terribly happy with this one; my attempts to give the figure definition just make it look kind of muddy, and his chest symbol doesn't have the clarity I was hoping for. The mask looks okay, though; it's the one bright spot. 
 

Garden of the Defending Angel

Here's another scratch-built monument. This time, I glued together several 28mm miniature bases to form the plinth for the statue, glued the HeroClix "sketch version" of Hawkman on top, glued a real rock to the base, added grass and daffodils, painted the plinth with astrogranite technical paint, and then washed the statue, rock, and plinth with black ink. I considered adding a bench, but I can always place one without gluing it down (and therefore removing it from consideration for other uses). 

This monument looks like it's been more recently maintained than that of The Valiant Four. Perhaps it's of a more recent vintage. 
 

There Really Should Be More Than One Day for Women

It's International Women's Day, so I'll just salute the many incredible women I've known over the course of my life--women who have changed the world through their words, actions, and being. Your accomplishments are building the more just world that the women of tomorrow will inhabit. 

If I Were Stupid Rich . . .

. . . I'd buy some robots from Fred Barton Productions. Barton's custom 1:1-scale replicas cost up to tens of thousands of dollars each, and boy howdy would I love to have one (or a few) in my theatre room. 

In order of preference: 

Robby the Robot

Gort

Maria

The robot belonging to the Mysterious Dr. Satan

Mr. Barton also creates other replica props, including a 44" C-57D cruiser model and a 1:1 time machine from The Time Machine. 

Strange New Worlds Wishlist

Strange New Worlds started filming not long ago, so here's my pie-in-the-stars wishlist for the show:

1. Be true to the title. Show us the wonders of the universe, inspired both by Star Trek continuity but also by real-world science. The first episode of For All Mankind season two demonstrated how to do this effectively. Maybe even start with our own solar system, even if it's just the Enterprise picking up some crew from human colonies on Venus or the Moon, Mars, Titan, etc. before the ship embarks on its five-year mission. 

2. Return to the tried-and-true episodic format, the one that gave us classic episodes such as "City on the Edge of Forever," "The Trouble with Tribbles," "The Inner Light," and "Who Watches the Watchers?" If you must include a season arc, make the stakes relatable at a human scale. Let's not save the entire multiverse again, like Star Trek: Discovery, or even just the galaxy, like Star Trek: Picard. How about an arc that saves a work of art, or a relationship, or the soul of just one person? 

3. Hire Bear McCreary to score the show. Failing that, Brian Tyler. 

4. Hire some real SF writers to contribute verisimilitude and a sense of wonder to the stories. 

5. Build an interesting ensemble cast and develop those characters almost as much as the leads.

6. As with the original series, run still frames of previous episodes over the end credits.

7. Have Captain Pike do some variation of the "Space...the final frontier" intro in the opening titles.

8. Let's have an Andorian, a Tellarite, or an Alpha Centauran in the cast. Or all three, better yet.

9. Have the protagonists lose once in a while, and grow from that experience. 

10. When the series ends, let's have a big series penultimate episode followed by a more introspective epilogue episode in which Pike, knowing his destiny, hands over the keys to Kirk. Then do a Kirk: Year One limited series leading into the events of "Where No Man Has Gone Before."

Arctic Explorer

The Valiant Four

 

There's a range of HeroClix characters that come in "sketch" versions; that is, they're meant to look like pencil drawings of superheroes before they're inked or coloured. To me, they look like they're hewn from stone, so I put glued four of them to a plain black base, glued that base to a larger, more ornate base, then added sand and foliage effects. I've tried to create the impression of a work that once stood in a carefully-maintained place of great honour, but as the civilization that built the monument faded away, the statue was left to the ravages of time. 

Seeing More in She and Sea

Anirban Ray's She and Sea is a short film about a relationship gone bad and the despair that can follow a breakup. The film is, I regret to say, somewhat lacking in many departments. Almost every stylistic choice is misguided, the acting is stiff, the dialogue ludicrous, and the music...the music! Oy. 

And yet, I give those involved props for giving this project their all. She and Sea is is sincere in its message about human suffering and what happens when we aren't kind to each other. So even though we may see any given film as "bad," that doesn't necessarily mean that they're without value. In fact, watching this makes me feel a little closer to Oman, a country I knew virtually nothing about before watching this short film. In my heart, I know that people everywhere are pretty much the same, but it's lovely to see that truth illustrated. 

No Helmet Large Enough

Ultraman in Miniature

This afternoon I finished painting Ultraman, Superman's evil counterpart from Earth-3. I'm quite happy with this one, considering the very small size of these figures. The U symbol on Ultraman's chest was the hardest part, but it's legible and, well, not quite symmetrical but close enough, especially from a normal distance on the table and not zoomed in like this photograph. And this time I think I even got the amount of wash right to bring out some definition. The face isn't great, but I just don't have the dexterity or the hand stability to paint tiny pinpricks for eyes and wee lines for the nose and mouth. The wash effects will have to do. 

Considering how pleasant a surprise the pilot of Superman & Lois was, I hope they'll consider Ultraman as a villain. I think these producers might have the chops to pull it off.