Jason Mask Stand

I made this as a surprise gift for a friend who's a big fan of the Friday the 13th franchise. I bought the masks on our last trip to Japan (in 2019) from various shops. There are 10 masks in this keychain series, but I only managed to find these five variations. The total cost for the keychains is around 3500 yen (+ maybe tax) which is about 28€. All of my other materials were "free" as I had them ready at home and didn't have to go buy anything specifically.

First, I gathered some materials. I started with these wooden barbeque skewers and some craft balls and a plastic bead from a kid's jewelry set.

Next, the base. I don't know what type of wood this is, but it was hard. Seriously. As I was drilling the holes for the skewers the drill bit broke off. I couldn't get the broken piece out, so I had to find a new piece of wood. I found a similar piece and got the holes drilled in it without trouble this time. I moved on to the next step, which was to engrave the logo  on the piece. Onward with the next struggle. Again, the wood is so hard, I had a hard time getting the engraver machine bite into it even on the highest setting. And if that was not enough, my hand would start to hurt only after two letters. So, I was making very slow progress.

After I got this far into the project, I realized I didn't like the result at all. That damn block of wood wasn't behaving the way I wanted it, so I then accordingly decided to start over again. 

For my third attempt I chose a different type of wood. The block I found had a nice natural curve on one side. There was a major difference in the hardness of the wood as well. I was able to engrave all the letters in one sitting because the wood was so soft. It didn't even hurt my hand.

The failed base did come in handy though when it came time to do some spray painting om the bases for the masks.

After a mock up fitting of Jason's masks, I had to remove the plastic bead and shorten one of the skewers because the Part 2 Jason's sack mask was towering over the others. After that was taken care of, I spray painted the whole base black. After that was dry, I started adding the red acrylic paint on top ofthe letters. Four layers of red in total.

I then took some black acrylic paint and started carefully painting around the logo. I had a hard time deciding whether or not I should paint black inside the letters as well, which I ended up doing. Still not sure if that was the right decision or not.

Back to the masks. The first step was to remove the chains and the loop for the chains above the masks.

Here's the backside of the masks real quick and the paper that shows all the collectible masks in the series. So the masks I have here for my project are part 2, part 5, part 7 part 9 and part 10. I've triple checked them so I should have them right. But still, the fact that in part 10 Jason wears two masks, the regular one and the über one, throws me off every time.

I cut off the loops with an Xacto knife. Then I mixed tiny amounts of paint, doing my best to match each mask to cover up the areas where the original color of the plastic was shining through after I cut off the loops. After that, I watered down some black acrylic to do some weathering, i.e. making the masks look dirty and worn. It doesn't show well on the silver über mask, but the others look okay.

After that, all I had left to do was gluing the masks on their places. I mixed a two part epoxy glue (which freaking stinks), to do the job. I wasn't working fast enough, so I had to resort to using regular super glue for the last one, but it seems to hold well enough. As a final retouch, if there was some visible glue (when dried) showing from the eye holes or on the back side, I went over it with some black paint to cover it up. I sealed the whole thing with a couple of layers of matt varnish. I let it dry and ventilate for a couple of days to get rid of that fresh varnish smell before shipping it to my friend. It arrived to him in one piece, so I'm happy.

Below some further detail shots

The backside is nothing to cheer about, but this thing is meant to only be viewed from the front, so I don't know what else I could have done. Oh, I also did ad those felt pads to the underside, in hopes it wouldn't get scratched over the years.

Some sketches and doodles during the project.

Stephen King's IT

Spoilers I guess?

Does anybody even read books anymore? Well I do, thank goodness for libraries! I was there to borrow something else when I noticed a creepy clown on the cover of this one book. Awesome, you got me interested! What do we got here?  Well, if it isn't the newest edition of  Stephen King's IT! I've never read this one before, so why not? I've read a few other books by King in the past and I've seen the TV-miniseries (I will refer to it as a movie from this point forward) and I remember liking them somewhat. Let's give it a go!

.... And after reading a few chapters. Oh my god! This book is long! A mammoth with over 1000 pages! I'll never finish this in time! Maybe it's just me, but "It" wasn't a book you can't put down because it's too exciting and you want to know what happens next. No, I found it hard to pick back up after taking a break reading it. The book and the movie suffer from the same problem (the movie to a greater extent), it can be pretty boring at times.

Let's state the obvious thing right from the get go. It should go without saying that the book is superior to the movie in many ways. Despite me having a hard time reading the book. It's far scarier and disturbing than anything they could put on screen.

I didn't care for the constant skipping between the present and the past. I think flashbacks work well in movies, but for whatever reason I don't care for them in books. Or maybe the problem lies in having seven main characters. Once you get through one character and their past the next one is waiting, dragging the overall story. I might have preferred if the book was divided in two parts, one with the childhood and the other with the adults.

It's hard to tell why the parts with the adult actors seem so flat and uninteresting compared to the child actors. To me, the child actors feel much more genuine, like they actually are the characters from the book, while the adults are just acting the role. Sounds stupid trying to explain it, but that's the way I feel.

The real show-stopper whether you look at the book or movie is of course "IT" aka Pennywise the Clown (played by Tim Curry). He is easily the most enjoyable part of either version! Whenever he is around something's happening! I may be scary, disgusting or very disturbing, but he truly breathes some life into this whole thing. The scene in the library (in the movie) is really the only part where they mishandled the character, he was too obnoxious and goofy.

The power of the dark side is strong in Pennywise!

The finale in the book makes more sense (although I'm not a big fan of that either), but the movie, oh boy, is it bad on so many levels!  The movie does a poor job explaining the connection between the true form of IT and Pennywise. Maybe it would have been for the better if the movie scrapped the book's ending and created something original instead? Let's say, a final showdown with Pennywise instead of having him abruptly disappear from the last act without an explanation?

Here IT comes... the disappointment!

Obviously there were parts that had to be changed or left out from the book when they made the movie. I didn't mind most of the minor changes made for the movie or stuff they left out of the book. However, there was one big moment in the book I really would have liked to see make it onto the screen, but it was only briefly mentioned in the movie, probably due to time and budget restriction. Also, I'm glad they left out all the sex-capades from the book....

Essentially the movie feels like a poor man's IT, meant for those who will never get around reading the book. Which is what every movie does, I guess. I think the movie did the bare minimum in order to tell the story right and it trips over right at the finish line. I get it, there certainly were some scenes in the book that are not OK to be shown on TV (or anywhere for that matter....), still I question why bother making something if you can't afford to do it right.

I'm not sure I remember where I was going with this, but nevertheless, even though I have a problem with both versions, the movie and the book, in the end which one would I recommend? Well, if you don't mind reading definitely go for the book. Don't like reading? Watch the movie! Want to check out them both? Then, I'd say watch the movie first and then read the book. The book will fill you in on anything you may have been left wondering about by the movie, to the point that it's too much information. I don't think anybody appreciated that gangbang in the sewers close to the end of the book. Seriously, WTF?

****

IT's not over yet! There is a remake coming out, I don't know when, but soon I hope! I think remake is the wrong word to use here, after all, the first one was a TV-series with just 2 episodes and not an actual movie. As far as I know the new one will be a real motion picture! So exciting! Supposedly the new movie is going to be more faithful to the book, not sure how that's going to happen. How are they going to adapt such a long story for a movie that is what,  2 hours, 3 hours long at tops? (Maybe Netflix should make it to a 12 episode series instead?) Okay, so I'm worried, but still so excited! This is the right way to make a remake! Take films that didn't turn out so good or didn't have the budget to be what it was meant to be. Not remaking classics that were good from the beginning with!

Will we see the twelve year old kids' smoking like they did in the book in the new movie? I don't think so! Some things are just too hardcore for the audience to handle.

From Animecon with love

This is what you get when you have too much free time and for once, enough money in your wallet. ♥

My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic Discord Vinyl Figure by Funko 

I'll admit I don't actually like Discord's mismatched design, but his personality and powers are just awesome. A figure of Discord is such a rare sight for me, I couldn't pass this one up even if it isn't a sight for a sore eyes. Come to think of it, I don't think I've ever seen one Discord toy along all the ponies in any store's toy aisle. Why is that? Girls can't play with villains?Although Discord isn't a villain anymore....

Dragonball Z Beerus & Freeza keyring by Bandai (The Best series )

OMG, this is the first time I'm going to mention Dragonball since I started this blog!? This might come as a surprise, considering the history of my blog, but DBZ is my absolute favorite series of all time (even Star Wars is nothing compared to it). Whew, I'm glad I got that announcement out of the way. I was a little skeptic about Beerus' character at first, but after seeing the movie Battle of Gods, this mix between Anubis and a Sphynx cat has become one of my favorite characters along with Freeza. You can't go wrong with a chibi Freeza, so this one makes a nice addition to my sub-collection of Freezas' and this lil' Beerus has the honor of being currently, the only God of Destruction in my collection. Hopefully, that will change in the future. These two are so small I'd rather consider them as phone charms, but it doesn't really matter, look at how cute they are!! 

Dragonball Z Piccolo by Bandai (Tamashii Buddies series)

Did I mention that I like Dragonball Z? Well, Piccolo is my favorite of the good guys, and to my shame, he is far too often neglected as a part of my collection. I like the idea that these figures are stackable with others figures of the series. It is unfortunate, however, as far as I can tell, you can't remove the figure from the platform it is standing on. Having this "frame" around the figure doesn't really have any purpose as long as you only own one of these. I sure would like to have a Beerus, Freeza, Coola, Cell, Kid Buu, Broly and Janemba in this form! 

Freddy vs. Jason: Jason Vorhees Horror Bishoujo statue by Kotobukiya

The Devil is in the sheer amount of details. I'll admit when I saw the Freddy statue, I thought it was a very bad idea and while I still think that the Freddy one is a little iffy, there is no denying how freaking awesome the this Jason is! The whole idea of gender bending horror icons is strange, but in Jason's case it totally worked out. I demand we get a bishoujo Michael Myers!! A little bit of nitpicking, but on the box art the hockey mask has deep scars going across it as if done by Freddy Krueger's razor glove but on the statue's mask the scars are barely noticeable. Aww. 

Star Wars Real Action Heroes Darth Maul Reissue Ver. by Medicom Toy

A gorgeous amount of details has been put into this, but I still have some issues with it. For the amount of money one has to pay for a RAH figure, I'd expect nothing else but perfection and sadly, this doesn't live up to it. I may have a misinformed image of what the RAH figures are supposed to be like, which probably explains why my overall impression of this action figure would be disappointment. I was under the assumption that these figures were very much customizable, but now when I am facing a problem called a (1) broken shoulder joint, my only two solutions are to A) buy a new replacement body B) send it to Japan to be repaired. Seriously, what the f*ck? How is it possible that one broken piece results into the replacement of the whole thing?? ArRgH!

And then there are little details here and there that are done "wrong" in my eyes, which aren't really crippling to the figure, but bug me out.

• the lightsaber hilt has some strange, little curving at both tips when it's supposed to be straight
• the neon red color of the lightsaber blades
• the belt is on the wrong layer of clothing. It's supposed to be on top of the long sleeved tunic, but for some reason it's under it. I'm guessing it probably would be an easy thing to fix, but I can't do it, because I'm afraid this thing will crumble into little pieces if I touch it. Oh, these problems of my life.....
• the stud earring, where is it?

Besides all that, I simply love it! X3