Contemporary Witches 01

As a complete change of pace I thought I'd show you three contemporary witches, two of which were recent purchases and one, which I've had for quite  awhile now. They are all made by different companies to varying standards.

First up is my favourite figure out of this trio - the limited edition version of Jill Lucas by Silver Fox Productions for the RAFM Miniatures range of USX Modern Day Heroes. Jill is available in two versions - normal and limited edition. The limited edition versions differs from the normal version in that it comes with the spell effect rising from the pages of her spell book. Only 300 of these figures have been produced and mine is number 117. They all come with a small certificate. Jill is obviously a Goth Girl. The sculpting of her is just exquisite. I love her coffin shaped backpack and her red plastic horned tiara. The spell effect of the ghostly skeletal head is such a cool touch. Limited edition Jill Lucas is RAF09001 priced at $10.95. If you want the normal version, she is RAF02838 priced at $5.95.
In the centre is Witch Hazel, sculpted by Kevin White as part of the Hasslefree Miniatures range of Modern Day Adventurers. She is obviously based on the character of Willow Rosenberg from the Buffy the Vampire Slayer TV series, specifically series 6, when Willow turned bad and almost destroyed the world. I'm using her as an evil Goth Girl rather than bad Willow, and keeping the name Witch Hazel. I should mention that Buffy the Vampire Slayer and its spin-off series, Angel, still remain two of my all-time favourite TV series and I would love for someone to do a full range of figures from both series. Witch Hazel has cast a levitate spell on herself. Once again, the sculpting of her is sublime. She is listed as HFA041 Witch Hazel on the Hasslefree webstore and she costs £4.00.

Third in line is Anastasia Tenebris, sculpted by Dave Stone of Wargames Terrain Workshop. She is actually described as a female necromancer but that just makes her an evil witch in my book. I must admit to having mixed feelings about this figure. On the plus side, I like the concept of her raising the dead so spectacularly. What is cool is that her base, with the two rising skeletons has been cast in transparent green resin. Most of this has been obscured by my painting but the ghostly flame effects do show some of the green resin beneath my dry-brushing. The necromancer is a separate casting and could, if you wanted, be glued to a different base. She'd fit well on any 25mm diameter base. What lets this figure down is the sculpting of the necromancer. Compared to the other two on display here, she looks rather crude. Now don't get me wrong, Dave is a very talented sculptor. His scenery pieces and monsters are just superb. However, when it comes to sculpting humans, he still has a long way to go to match the work done by the likes of Kevin White and B. Van Schaik, who sculpted Jill Lucas. The female necromancer is not named, so I gave her the name of Anastasia Tenebris. She does not appear in the WTW webstore's online sales section, but you can see her in the News and New Releases section as part of the September 2017 new stuff. I'm sure if you sent Dave an e-mail he'd be able to give you a quote for her price. I can't remember what I paid for mine.
I bought the figure of Jill very recently, and Anastasia a couple of months ago. Witch Hazel was bought a few years ago as soon as she was released. I could have called this post, The Good, The Bad And The Ugly, but decided not to. I do like all three of these figures but I haven't decided how to use them yet. My thoughts at the moment are to wait for the release of N.O.W. by EN Publishing to use them in that contemporary setting RPG. Oddly enough, Anastasia is the one who has the most gaming potential. She is such a generic sculpt that she would fit in well in almost any genre from fantasy to sci-fi. I am pondering about whether to make her an ally of Malexica in my JDMG campaign. Does Malexica need an ally? We'll see. And no, I haven't forgotten about that campaign. A new batrep will be coming soon.