Spelljammer Miniatures

I just received a few interesting pieces from last months release of Spelljammer miniatures in the mail today. These miniatures correspond to creatures found in the 5th edition rules for Spelljammer that were released back in August.

Alternate art edition

The first miniatures are some Chwinga, which I believe were first introduced in Tomb of Annihilation. They are described as shy forest spirits, but for some reason, they exist in space as well.

The origins of the Chwinga are unclear, but I'm pretty sure that they were modeled after the kodama from the Studio Ghibli film Mononoke-hime, which influenced the design of kodama in other franchises as well.

Ghibli kodama

Persona/Shin Megami Tensei kodama

A Chwinga (Adventures in Space #4), and a Chwinga & Space Guppy (Adventures in Space #17).

The Space Guppy is pretty much just another fish-like creature (among many) that seem to populate Wildspace.

Astral Menagerie cover art

The next miniature is a Void Scavver (Adventures in Space #33), which appeared in the original edition of Spelljammer. They are essentially one-eyed space sharks that fill the role of facultative scavengers.

I wish that the eye of the Void Scavver was stalked like on the cover art, but I guess the eye is retractable, since the miniature seems very faithful to the interior art.

The final miniatures are Murder Comets. They are offbeat monsters that I rather like despite the cringy name, which I take to be some sort of riff on "murder hornet" or "murder hobo".

In any event, the Murder Comet is described as a type of paraelemental created by combining the essence of earth elementals with the essence of fire elementals, to which a spellcaster has subsequently bound their spirit. I'm not sure why it wasn't a combination of earth and water, since comets are largely composed of rock and ice.

The Murder Comet has the ability to breathe fire, but I would personally add the ability to release a trail of poisonous gas, as an homage to the 1910 panic promoted by the press and other hucksters when spectroscopic analysis indicated that there were traces of cyanogen in the tail of Halley's Comet.

On the left is a Murder Comet (Adventures in Space #9), while on the right is a Swarm of Murder Comets (Threats from the Cosmos).

The regular Murder Comet is half the size of the ship scale (1:600) Swarm of Murder Comets, so both are undersized (especially if you consider that a really small comet might have a nucleus that is still ~½ mile in diameter).

The swarm looks as if it is made of multiple parts, so maybe it would be possible to separate off a couple of individual comets from the group if you wanted some larger single comets.

I also want to mention that the dragons from this set of miniatures are really nice, but I could not justify buying any of them.

There are two Solar Dragons that are roughly the same size, but I liked the sculpt and pose of the Adult Solar Dragon (right) a lot more than the much cheaper Young Solar Dragon (left). There is also a Young Lunar Dragon (center) that is exclusive to the prohibitively priced Collector's Edition Box.

A much cheaper ship scale Ancient Lunar Dragon comes with the Astral Elf Patrol set, but I think that it is probably too small for my needs despite the nice sculpt.

Zombie Shark

At one time, zombies and sharks stayed comfortably within their own genres.

Then in 1979, Lucio Fulci did the unthinkable, and put zombies and sharks together in the same film.

Zombi 2

Looks better in comic book form.

The next evolutionary step in this theme that I became aware of was in Gyo, from the fevered imagination of Junji Ito.

The monsters in this story are created in part by a virus, but are fully dead. The corpses are propelled by bio-mechanical legs that are powered by the gases released from their rotting bodies.

The mechanical nature of the shark from Gyo reminded me of this picture of Bruce from Jaws.

The first full zombie sharks I know of appeared in the Resident Evil franchise.

Resident Evil 6

And most recently in the Zombie Army franchise.

Zombie Army 4

The collector's edition of Zombie Army 4 came out last month, and included a model of a zombie shark.

Based on the dimensions provided, the model seems to be 1/72 scale, but it is more of a Megalodon than a regular shark.

A very similar looking Zombie Shark model is made by Reaper (Bones Black 44112).

The lower jaw is a separate piece, and needed some putty work since there were huge gaps left between the pieces.

I drilled a hole in the shark so I could mount it on a stand, then I painted it up with whites and grays. A thin brown wash was applied to some organs, and a tan wash was applied to parts of the fins.

I prefer the pale dead look to the blood-soaked look because that is what shark corpses that have been floating around in the ocean look like.

The Wonderful Fish

Decomposed carcasses of large sea animals are often mistaken for the remains of various types of sea monsters. They appear frequently enough, that the term "globster" was coined to describe them.

A walking shark?

The remains of basking sharks are some of the more typical finds that have generated much speculation in the cryptozoology community.

Size estimates for basking sharks place them in the 20 to 26 foot range, but specimens can reach up to 30 or even 40 feet in length. The larger sharks are probably rare at best in modern times due to overfishing and deliberate eradication programs.

The model I own is made by Colorata, and at 5" in length (nose to tip of caudal fin), represents a larger specimen of the basking shark.

The Colorata shark comes from the Sharks of the World Deluxe Set, which includes versions of all three filter feeding shark species (a regular Sharks of the World Set also exists, but it has different models in it).

The other 1/72 scale shark in this set is a whale shark. It is 6" long, which makes it the size of a largish whale shark (36 feet in length).

A couple of other candidates for 1/72 whale sharks (which I do not own) include the whale shark from the regular Colorata Sharks of the World Set, and the 1/40 scale Wild Safari whale shark. The other Colorata shark can be used as a smaller whale shark (25 to 30 feet long), while the Wild Safari model can represent the reputed 60 foot whale shark.

Rounding out my collection of filter feeding sharks is the Kaiyodo megamouth shark (Choco Egg Animals Of Japan Series 4). The megamouth shark was only discovered in 1976, and remains infrequently encountered in the wild.

The Kaiyodo model is 3.5" long (from snout to tip of caudal fin), which is somewhat longer than the 13 to 18 foot size range for megamouth sharks.

The final pictures compare the models of the three different species of filter feeding sharks.

You're gonna need a bigger boat...

Sharks belong to the superorder Selachimorpha, and have a fossil record that goes back to the Carboniferous Period. It is often said that they have gone unchanged in form for over 350 million years, but this statement couldn't be any further from the truth.

The fact is that sharks have evolved over time. One only needs to look at some of the early sharks represented in the Safari Ltd. Prehistoric Sharks Toob to see how different they are compared to modern sharks.

Of the 10 sharks in the set, four can be considered to be approximately 1/72 scale.

Cretoxyrhina

Edestus

Sarcoprion

Helicoprion

Cretoxyrhina, Edestus, and Sarcoprion are all thought to have been around 6.1m in length, while Helicoprion could be as long as 7.5m (although the typical specimen may have only been 3-4m long).

For Sarcoprion and Helicoprion (which I believe have been reclassified as Chimaeriformes), I used a knife to cut notches in the spiral tooth whorl of their lower jaws to make the individual teeth more pronounced.

The most famous of prehistoric sharks is Carcharocles megalodon [or Carcharodon megalodon]. Due to its presumed physical resemblance to the Great White Shark, any >8" Great White could probably be used to represent the Megalodon. Purists however may prefer the Safari Ltd. Megalodon (Wild Safari 303329).

Size estimates for this shark range from 15-30m, but I prefer the more conservative size estimate. While I would certainly be impressed by a 30m shark, I have doubts that every specimen of Megalodon was really that big. That being said, I'd say the model scales out very closely to 1/72 scale if we're talking about a 15m shark.

Luckily for us, Megalodon is now extinct... or is it?

Manō Kanaka

Sharks held a great deal of cultural significance in old Hawai'i. Tools and weapons were fashioned from the teeth of sharks, and drums were made with sharkskin. Man-eating sharks, like the tiger and great white were known as niuhi, and were hunted by nobles. Their flesh, and particularly their eyes, was believed to be imbued with supernatural power.

Some families however had sharks as 'aumakua (a family totem), and considered it bad form to hunt or eat sharks, since there was a possibility that the shark might contain the spirit of one of their ancestors.

The most powerful of such ancestral spirits were the shark gods such as Kua "the Red Shark", Ku-hai-moana who was said to be "thirty fathoms long", or Ka-moho-ali'i the brother of Pele the goddess of fire. These spirits could take on human form, and in some cases ended up producing children with normal humans. The offspring were known as manō kanaka (shark-men), or what we might call were-sharks.

Tales of humans that could change to sharks can be found throughout Polynesia, but probably the most famous one is the tale of Nanaue. Relatively modern stories of manō kanaka also exist, some of which I find particularly chilling.

As far as appearance goes, most modern depictions of were-sharks show them as sharks with human arms and legs. I'm not sure where this concept originated from, but it has been used in both D&D and videogames.

I have mixed feelings about this depiction because the were-shark stories I heard as a child, lead me to imagine them as men with gaping shark maws on their back (hidden under a feather cloak) who could transform into sharks. I suppose the current view of shark-with-legs can be considered as a transitional form between man and shark, and certain Hawaiian chants do have the phrase "..fish with long legs from head to tail...", though it is not clear to me that the reference is to manō kanaka.

Anyway, Reaper makes a whole slew of transitional form were-sharks, but almost all of them are enormous even compared to 28mm figures. The only exception is the dwarf were-shark which is just about right as far as height goes, but the figure is a bit to campy for me.

Other than Rumscratch, the only other suitable figure that I could find for use as a 1/72 were-shark was the Pathfinder Wereshark Pirate (Skull and Shackles #12). I would have preferred if it were less clothed, but it is better than nothing.

Addendum: Center Stage Miniatures also has some Lesser Weresharks (Spawn of Dajobas), but they also look pretty big as well.