White Elephants

Sometimes when an impressively large model catches my eye, I have to take a reality check and think about whether there is any point in owning the thing.

Here are a few items that gave me a moment of pause before I decided not to buy them.

1. Kyoshinhei by Good Smile Company

This figure represents a God Warrior from the Studio Ghibli short film produced for a 2012 exhibit at the Museum of Contemporary Art Tokyo.


Giant God Warrior Appears in Tokyo posted by f711513007
At 50cm in height, the figure is impressive, but I have to say that it would be well under it's actual 1/72 height as represented in the short.

The figure is still probably very undersized compared to the original God Warrior as presented in Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind.

Scale issues aside, the final price with shipping would have been very high, and there was the very real possibility that the model could have sustainded damaged during shipping (polystone resin is not the most durable of materials).

2. Colossal Titan Coin Bank by Bandai

This PVC figure represents the aberrant type 60m Titan from Attack on Titan.

The Colossal Titan at 60cm, is even taller than the God Warrior. It is actually 1/100 scale, but that's something I would have been willing to overlook with regard to a fictional flayed giant.

3. Flower-class Corvette by Revell

Even now, I often contemplate buying this kit, but at 85cm in length I wonder where I would store it. The pool might be an option, but I couldn't keep it docked there all the time.

4. U-Boat Type VIIC by Revell

I would seriously consider a waterline U-boat since they could be used for gaming every now and then, but at 93.3cm long, the type VIIC and the even larger type IXC submarine (106.3cm) are just really big.

I suppose that the kit could be converted easily enough to a waterline model, but that seems almost like throwing away half the kit.

5. Skipjack-class Submarine by Moebius Models

As with the U-boats, I would definitely consider a waterline model of the Skipjack for an Ice Station Zebra scenario, but at 106.7cm, the full hulled kit is a monster. I believe that this model is also sold in Revell packaging.

6. Gato-class Submarine by Revell

Yet another submarine. This time the 132cm long Gato-class sub. If I were to have bought this model, I would have been tempted to get two. One built up in the standard way, and one built up as the USS Sea Tiger from the 1959 film Operation Petticoat.

Balao-class submarine

However, I probably would have been bothered by the fact that the subs used in filming were actually Balao-class submarines, while the USS Seadragon which reputedly operated in red primer color for a time was a Sargo-class submarine.

7. C3-type Cargo Submarine by Lindberg

Lindberg went out of business, but the kits are still being produced by Round 2 LLC under the Lindberg brand name. The model is 148.6cm long, and comes with four Kaiten manned torpedoes.

8. Saturn V Rocket by Dragon

There was a time when I was really interested in getting the 1/96 scale Revell Saturn V, but by the time the Dragon version came around, that desire was a distant memory. At 153.7cm tall, I'm not sure if there is a commercially produced 1/72 kit that is larger than this one.

In closing, I'll have to admit that at times I look at my existing piles of lead and plastic and wonder what the point of it all is. However, finishing a project no matter how small, or getting to play a game with newly painted miniatures always brings a sense of satisfaction, and puts me back to the proper hobbyist perspective.

Aragami

The Aragami (荒神, アラガミ; violent gods) are giant chimeric monsters from the game God Eater. I have not played the game, but it takes place in a post-apocalyptic world overrun by various species of Aragami whom the players kill and harvest for resources.

The game franchise expanded into an animated version of the story which started airing last year. The anime version of God Eater belongs to the action-oriented seinen genre, with violence, gore, and underboob.

The story is pretty standard fare, but one thing that really stood out for me was the primary antagonist Aragami known as Dyaus Pita.

I found the creature to be terrifying, particularly because it had a human face which seemed to be completely devoid of human intelligence.

Anyway, I liked the monster so much, I went ahead and bought some of the Bandai trading figures (超造形魂; Chouzoukei Damashii) that were made for the game.

The Vajra Aragami is the base type of its species. For some reason, it is always shown with a broken fang.

Dyaus Pita, a sub-type of the Vajra. There is also another version in the game known as Dyaus Pita (Resurrection) with skeletal dragon-like wings.

Prithvi Mata, is another sub-type of the Vajra. It has not appeared in the anime.

All three of the figures have the same basic body, but vary with respect to paint scheme, face/head, and neck frills. They also come with their own 80mm bases.

As far as size goes, I think they work well with 1/72 scale humans when compared to the 1:1 scale Vajra display used at events ^[1],[2] and how they are portrayed in the games.

The anime versions of the creatures on the other hand, are a lot bigger (although the size will vary a bit within the game as well). This being the case, I see the option for some to use the figures for 10mm or 15mm gaming as well.

The final monster from the set that looked interesting was Sariel.

It is a chimeric creature that seems to be part siren and part butterfly, with maybe a bit of fish mixed in. I don't know anything else about it, and I don't think it has appeared in the anime at all.

Nurikabe

Nurikabe (ぬりかべ or 塗壁) is a yōkai whose origins are from the coastal region of Fukuoka. In folktales, it typically manifests itself as an invisible wall that impedes the movement of its victim. Like many yōkai, it is not particularly dangerous, and seems to be satisfied with causing fear and confusion until its victim gives up trying to move.

The most popular representation of Nurikabe, created by Shigeru Mizuki, takes on the appearance of an animate plaster wall.

I like the earlier one-eyed version, but the iconic Nurikabe from GeGeGe no Kitaro is what most people who are familiar with the creature will recognize.

I suspect that Mizuki was influenced by various pictures of haunted walls from Japanese paintings when creating Nurikabe.

However, in 2007, a painting that showed a different vision of Nurikabe surfaced from a private collection in Utah. I'm guessing that prior to this discovery, there were no actual paintings that definitively showed what Nurikabe looked like.

Author/illustrator Matthew Meyer created a version that blends the two types at Yokai.com. I also like the version of Nurikabe from the PS2 game Ōkami, which takes on the appearance of a much more elaborate wall.

Regardless, the only miniatures of Nurikabe represent the version from GeGeGe no Kitaro. The large Nurikabe is from the GeGeGe no Shigeru Yokai Emaki Series (ゲゲゲのしげる妖怪絵巻) produced by Kabaya, while the Nurikabe performing the leg drop is a glow-in-the-dark GeGeGe no Kitaro Attack Swing keychain mascot from Bandai.

There are a couple of other Nurikabe toys I'm trying to find, but overall, I'm not terribly fond of the typical Kitaro version of Nurikabe. It just looks too much like a giant piece of gray toast.

As far as size goes, I'd estimate Nurikabe is portrayed to be about 10' tall in the Kitaro manga. However, it can make itself as large or wide as necessary to impede its victims, so pretty much any size works.

I also decided to have a go at making my own Nurikabe out of clay. After all, it's just a rectangle with arms and legs... I think I'm going to use it as a master so I can create various versions of the creature.