Musings of $5 (formerly $8) surplus weapons

Each of the crappy Soldiers of the World figures tends to come with a handgun. I've managed to accumulate two Beretta M92's and five 1911's, all with holsters. What do you do with seven handguns when neither of your modded figures will ever use these? Do a Meryl Strife from Trigun and go to town.For added effect, I threw in the ammo links from the M60E4 machine gun. I actually have hip holsters for the Berettas, but those didn't look too well with a skirt. Also today's a good time to experiment with a backdrop cloth for photos. Fake wood and Magic: the Gathering boxes makes for bad contrast.

Not quite "Derringer Meryl", more of The Duke from Boondock Saints, I'd say.

One of the more welcome surprises was this M1 Garand rifle with the not shown grenade launching attachment. I forgot to mention that the build quality of the Soldiers of the World weapons tends to be quite surprising for what I paid. If I actually paid the retail $25, I'd be really disappointed with the lackluster figure and somewhat happy with the included gun. Some features of note include the shoulder strap clasps, despite not having said straps. Still a nice detail.

This piece took the cake for the rifle. Actual well molded separable clips. Not also that, but the rifle has moving parts to insert these into.

The loading port closes. Separate motion from the cocking lever, but still a nice touch.

For $5, you'd expect a solid molded piece of plastic with no features, poor paint job and poor details. Comparatively, Ultimate Soldier's line of 1:6 scale weapons suffer a bit from paint jobs (I have a badly painted SMLE rifle from their British Commonwealth set) and also have an obtrusive copyright stamp on the weapons. Luckily, Capt. Generic's Army Surplus needed to mass produce these things cheaply to the point where they couldn't be bothered to mold that on the weapons. Although, these things have solid barrels (can't stick a toothpick down the barrels) which is ok considering the level of detail they have.

I should probably change the girls' outfits soon. Getting bored of the same old thing and I've been overshadowing them lately. Maybe after the demoman gets made.

This is how we do things in the south side!

Hotaru's been neglected lately. Haven't had any fun things to showcase with her. Today, I tried to pick up some $8 crappy mod-fodder to discover they're on clearance for $5! These things retail for $25, so I don't know how that works out for KB Toys. I haven't really reviewed these pieces of crap (oh boy, they are crap), but I'll give some highlights.

After you get them out of the box, they have really horrible expressions on their faces. The following pic shows a likely scenario where you would best make use of their expressions.

"WARRRRGH! I am the headless jogger! Beware, soldier guy! I have kung fu grip!"

"Noooooo! I can't change my expression!"

Headless jogger wins! FATALITY!

This is a good time to highlight the good and bad parts of the dolls. Their heads are rubber and easy to pop off, as demonstrated. Great for modding, since they have a solid stump for attaching another head. Their rubber hands make holding stuff easy, but are a pain to customize. Not to mention, they only come in white, which is a problem when I need to make the demoman. I should also mention their molded bodies have severe flaws. Their arms are floppy on different points and each one's right knee is loose. Always the right knee, and wobbly for 30 degrees of motion, then stiff. Doll stands are a must for these buggers, since their boots/shoes are terrible for maintaining balance, despite being rubber and grippy.

Now, you might wonder what happens to all the heads from all these victims. Well, wonder no more!

I have a dedicated wine glass from sophomore year of college that now holds the heads of former soldiers. Fits about 5 heads neatly so far. Might hold 6 easily.

Headless jumpsuit jogger :5
Soldiers: 0