Wednesday 4 November 2009

Cold War Miniatures Zombies 03


It seems such a long time since I reviewed any figures but in truth it's only been about three weeks. I'm going to continue my review of the the Cold War Miniatures 28mm scale zombies from their The Dead Will Walk range, this time concentrating on set 05 Downtown and set 06 Town and Country.
The two photos above show the five figures from the Downtown set and the first thing you'll notice about these are that they are all negroid zeds. I am all for ethnic diversity amongst zombies so this set gets a big thumbs up from me. I'll start off by looking at the figure at the far left. He obviously likes to flash his "bling" with his gold chains, necklace with huge cross, bracelet and watch. This group are dressed in the clothing you would expect to find coloured youths from any city ghetto wearing. This guy wears a bandana, a vest, cropped baggy trousers and the obligatory trainers/running shoes. His wounds consist of small bites to the right shoulder and lower left arm as well as a vertical line of bullet holes in his torso.
Next up is the only female of the group. She wears a sports bra and low-slung tracksuit bottoms that reveal her thong. I notice more and more young women dressed in low-slung pants that reveal a thong nowadays. On some women it looks sexy, on others it's a huge mistake! This young woman has suffered badly at the hands (and mouths) of the undead. She has two big bite wounds to her stomach and left thigh and a smaller bite to her upper right arm.
In the centre of the group is what appears to be a break-dancing zombie, given the way he's waving his left arm and crossing his legs. Perhaps he was one of the backing dancers from Wacko Jacko's Thriller video! His wounds are very minimal - a single gunshot to the kidneys. You must agree that he is very oddly posed.
Next in line is "Mr. Muscles" the body builder who likes to show off his magnificent body to impress the "laydees!" "Just look at my six pack!" "Feel my muscles," he crowed. Yeah, arsehole, and just look at the huge chunk of flesh ripped from your chest so I can see your ribcage. He too wears low-slung baggy trousers and appears to be "going commando." I like the sculpting but I'd have hated this guy in real life.
Finally, at the far right of the group is a shell-suit wearing dude with a hat and a shoulder bag. In addition, he wears a gold necklace. There are a couple of holes in the right leg of his trousers, which I left bloodless. However, he does sport one wound and it is a nasty one. The left side of his chest and stomach has been eaten away. That had to have hurt!

The Town and Country set comprises five figures from opposite ends of the social spectrum. Lower class meets high class. As usual, I'll work through them going from left to right and starting with the business woman. She is neatly dressed in a two piece suit that sports a number of tears, especially in her right arm. I have painted her with blood smearing her lower face and right hand as if she had just enjoyed a bloody meal. Apart from the few rips and tears in her clothing she does not appear too badly wounded.
Standing next to her is a gent in suit and tie, who reminds me of a dodgy dealer - a low life criminal out to make a fast buck. His stance is awkward as if he is struggling to remain upright, due to some unseen broken bones. His right eye has been plucked out and his suit is badly torn in places.
Next up, is a nicely sculpted hard hat worker, possibly from the construction industry. He wears a high visiblity jacket, T-shirt, jeans, boots and heavy leather gloves, which are a nice touch, and of course, his hard hat. His left leg has been twisted at the ankle and a large chunk has been taken out of his lower right leg. There is also a small wound to his left arm and I smeared his jaw and neck in TCR (Tamiya Clear Red).
Another town worker stands to his left. This particular zombie looks to have once been a mechanic, seeing as he is dressed in overalls and carries a wrench in his right hand. Another indeterminate tool is stuffed in his back pocket. Now when I see a zombie mechanic, I immediately think of "Big Daddy" - the intelligent zombie from Romero's Land of the Dead film. However, one look at this zed's face and you can see he clearly isn't "Big Daddy." (Personally, I'm hoping Studio Miniatures make him as one their special named zombies.) This zombie has had the flesh stripped from half of his face and his right eye hangs out of its socket.
At the far right of this group we return to the high society with another female, this time dressed up in equestrian clothing. She might have been one of the fox hunting brigade. I have no idea if that particular "sport" goes on in America or not. If not she'd fit in well in an English setting for a zombie campaign. Alternatively, she might just be a show-jumping rider.There is a large hole in the back of her jacket and a large piece of flesh has been bitten out of her right leg. She still retains her riding crop.
So there we have another two fine sets of figures, both containing useful figures for anyone's zombie horde. I'll just repeat the prices again - each set costs £7.00 or if there are some figures you like/want and others you don't like/want, you can buy them individually for £1.75. I like both sets, in fact I like all of the Cold War zombie figures. What I particularly like about their range is that they fill niches that other companies just don't cover or perhaps cover only sporadically. As far as I am aware, the show jumping female zombie is unique. Other firms make negroid zombies but it is nice to get a set that just features them. More so, if your campaign is set in a large urban area. Some people have commented on how thin these figures are as if that is a bad thing. I totally disagree. For sure, some of them are thin, but look around you. People come in all shapes and sizes. I don't see what the problem is. I'd say that they are more realistically proportioned. Your mileage may vary.

2 comments:

  1. Yep more Cold War loveliness. On a tangent I was wondering what Studio Mini's next special might be too, not got around to hoping.

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  2. I've just sent away for Studio's latest boxed set of zombies (doctors and nurses, by the way) but their website is not revealing who the free figure will be. I'm just going to have to wait and see. As I said, I'm hoping it's Big Daddy.

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