Ginga custom pt.5

I sure took my sweet time, but I finally got it done!

Who's the most obvious choice among the German Shepherds in the Ginga universe?! It's the Main-man John of course!! Although it could have been Jerome Anyway... there was a difficult decision to be made. Which John would be my reference? The good old GNG version of John or the newer GDW version, which is more faithful to his original manga appearance? Well, since I apparently learnt nothing from my previous Wilson experience, I chose to do them both! And later I got to regret that decision.

While I was looking for some reference pictures, I had to come to the conclusion that the Weed version (sounds so wrong) of John was far more inconsistent with his markings, but  then again, it's no secret that the animation and drawing-style in GDW can be a little funky sometimes. So, it was really hard to find a reference picture in those few episodes where John appears in where, A) it isn't snowing B) John doesn't look like he just escaped from a loony town.

Yes, I'll admit that I was lazy and used the same tan color on both dogs. In the model images you can see that the GNG version is darker than the GDW version, but I thought that the difference was so subtle that I didn't bother mixing more paint. I'm not really happy with the color inside their mouths either, but I just had to move on. No matter which version, those markings around the eyes were killing me. I already got the smallest brush I could find, but I still need a smaller one and perhaps a magnifying glass too. Oh! and a new set of less unstable hands! that would be great too :D

Please right click and open in a new tab for a larger view!

I apologize for the terrible lightning in the "after" images. It has been rainy and cloudy all day so I didn't have enough natural light. If I forgot to mention earlier, I bought these (new! in a box!) for 2,50 € a piece from a flea market. There were other breeds as well, but none of them have yet appeared in any Yoshihiro Takahashi's manga as far as I know (for example Afghan Hound, Cocker Spaniel, Rottweiler). So the big question is, which John do I like better? Well, I will have to go with the retro-John aka the GNG anime version just because that is the first John I ever laid my eyes on. There!

Next up on the customizing list is Jerome! and a secret character...

Not suitable for anyone under the age of 14

Funko Pop! Movies super-stylized Alien vinyl figure and Star Wars Clone Wars Darth Maul bust bank!

I got these two lovelies in February and do you know what's special about 5th of February?  Well, it's the birthday of the Swiss artist and creator of the Alien (aka Xenomorph) monster H.R. Giger (d. 12 May 2014), coincidentally, this date also happens to be my birthday. So, I'm more than happy to add this chibi Xeno into my still very scarce Alien collection.

I'm not gonna lie. I did think twice before I bought this, but my mind was weak and so here we are. Initially I thought that there was something very disturbing about this bust, mainly the fact that Maul is actually smiling or alternatively *le evil grin* but I have gotten used to it now. I love the details put in the gauntlets on his forearms. However..... <entering nitpicking mode> ..... there are some spots of white paint on the lower lip and the tattoos aren't that well painted on if you look closely.

It just so happened that I bought these two from the same place, so they were shipped in the same box. However, the way these things were packed left something to be desired for. The Maul bust was loose and didn't come with any original packaging (or any kind of protection for that matter). So the bust was basically shoved down on top of the Alien figure's box, slightly damaging it. So its original box got a bit crumbled, but the Alien figure itself is fine, no big deal. Same thing can't unfortunately be said of our red, horn headed friend here. I can only imagine that the horn's have been rubbing against the box for the whole postal trip, resulting some paint being scraped off of a few horns. Which is a little disappointing to say the least. I mean for Pete's sake, all you needed to prevent this was a small piece of bubble wrap if you didn't have enough to cover the whole damn thing! Ò ‸ Ó

And what's up with this post's title? Well, that was just something that was written on the bottom of the Alien's box. It sounds absurd and a little over exaggerated in my opinion. Oh, and the Darth Maul bank? Age recommendation is only 8+!  ＼（＾▽＾）／