[Mordiganne]

The Universe is expanding.... (pics to follow in next post)


While talking about the alterations I made to the Baghead Spider-Man figure, I also started thinking about the Fantastic Four itself. They've never been among my favorite Marvel heroes in any capacity. They were just always very boring in the comics I read of theirs as a kid. It wasn't until seeing them in A:EMH that I developed even a passing interest in the FF. So, I don't/won't have much to say about the characters. I really just made these real quick to fill a rather glaring hole in the collection. All that said, when I mentioned making a FF She-Hulk last batch, that idea blossomed into creating my ideal FF team since none of the Hasbro figures were passable for my collection. Their design aspects vary too wildly from figure to figure. I wanted uniformity, so that meant creating an all new version of Marvel's first superhero team. This entire batch is FF team related. To that end I went a little overboard but now I have a very nice FF team with plenty of display options. I bumped the batch I was going to be making for these slots to the next one assuming I don't decide to change the lineup along the way. In comic news I've been too busy of late to even read anything. And an unplanned vehicle repair is keeping my extra pennies in my pocket so haven't picked up anything extra either. So, anyway, onto the rest...


She-Hulk - I think She-Hulk's tenure on the FF was pretty brief, but I never read any comics that had She-Hulk in the FF so I can't really say. However, while looking up FF art, I ran across an art panel of her in an FF suit that looked really nice and I wanted to make one. I thought about giving her a full body paint, but decided that I liked her skin tone as done by Hasbro, so I only painted the suit. I think it looks really sharp and glad to add this version of the character to the collection. I'll probably keep her out since she's going to be in the cosmic section along with the rest of the FF.

Mister Fantastic - Pretty simple custom but I wanted to make him different than just using the cyke buck again, so I used a Dr. Strange body with cyke type arms. I had to give him a belt to cover the odd gap that the Strange torso has without the sash - I realize now that I should have put the buckle in back, but not going to take it off and risk the paint. Maybe in the future when I won't care about having to fix a perfectly good paint job. I made the stretch arms with some bits taken from the Figure Factory figure and a bit of creativity. I wanted to keep some articulation so I made the stretch begin after the elbow with swivels in what should be the forearm. I added a little sculpt to his hair to go with the EMH look and other than painting that's about it. I've given a passing thought to long legs and torso, but I don't see a real need.

Human Torch (depowered/half power/Flame On!) - For simplicity's sake I'm putting all the Torch's in one go. As soon as I decided to do this FF project I immediately knew I was going to be making at least 2 figures for this character: depowered Johnny Storm and full flame Human Torch. I wanted to try something different with this figure so I sculpted the flames in a different way and tried a couple of different paint techniques. I like the way it came out. The regular Johnny is a reaper body, I think, with a swapped right arm and a Hyperion head (with just a bit of sculpt on the hair). I was halfway through the flamed up Torch and waiting on sculpt to cure when I decided to make a third half-flame version. I think it's a DD base on this one with another Hyperion head - only with more sculpt on it. Not much to say here; he's a mix of the other two.

Thing - Unfortunately there was no way I was going to get a suitable Thing for my collection without making one. Very laboriously making one. Everything including the waist belt and up was sculpted by me, including both of the heads. I didn't sculpt the hands as there was no need. I took these from a Hasbro Thing. Since I was sculpting anyway, I decided to make two portraits: open mouth and closed mouth (w/ removable stogie). By sculpting each section individually I was able to make the design accurate without losing any articulation. It just took a long time. After a few additional tweaks I'm beyond pleased with how this one turned out. Which is awesome since there is an absolute zero chance I'll ever sculpt up another one of these. This guy is firmly in the 'one-and-never-again!' category. Although I might make him a pair of bootless legs to swap. Maybe.

Invisible Woman (depowered) - Standard Aurora body with some Emma hands. I gave her two portraits. One inspired by her look in EMH which was shoulder length and slightly unruly. The second is an older look which I equate to after she had the two kids. Since she just turns invisible there's not much to do with the character custom wise. If I get another "invisible" boxset figure I might make a "fading" version. And if I can find any scale kid figures that have articulation I'll add the kids to the bunch.

Thundra - Thundra is another character that I was never exposed to pre-internet. I had to Google her to find out what her story is. I went to the official Marvel database and went from there. It's a little confusing to say the least. Basically I learned that, outside of her being an Amazon, she's primarily a Fantastic Four supporting character, so I'll add her in to their section on the random heroes shelf. I really enjoyed making her as I had the opportunity to try some things that I either haven't done yet or don't do all that often. She's always depicted as a bustier character, so I had to enlarge her chest from what the valkyrie figure was molded with. To go along with the art piece I chose, I added a DD belt since it's one of the thinner belts that Hasbro made and when rotated it matched the art's belt almost exactly. I did have to sculpt her belt loops and the belt buckle. Lastly the head required a lot of work. Sculpting galore, fashioning her...actually I'm not sure what that thing on her head is. A tiara maybe? Anyway, as with Red Sonja the left hand broke off and had to be fixed. I couldn't tell you where the ball end of her weapon came from. I added the chain onto it, but the origin of it I have no idea.