Wednesday 1 February 2012

Vampifan's Views 19 My Monthly Musings part 6

Vampirella by Joe Jusko. Note his name on the gravestone.
Seeing as I normally post my monthly musings at the end of the month I should have posted this yesterday but, hey, I'm a day late. So what? January was a very busy month for me. On the figure painting front, I have finished 12 Black Cat Bases 28mm scale African-American gangstas (5 males, 5 females and 2 mascot dogs), 4 Recreational Conflict 28mm scale survivors and 2 Battle Bunker 28mm scale zombies. On my desk at the moment are the following 20 figures - 4 West Wind bikers, 4 West Wind vampire rock stars, 4 West Wind zombie rockers, 4 Studio Minis Left 4 Dead zombies, 1 Studio Minis Hogan the Santa survivor, 2 more Battle Bunker zombies and 1 Eureka Victorian schoolboy.
Good news for those of you wanting to see my WWG Mayhem City Police Station - the end is in sight. All being well I hope to finish it this month. Yeehaa! I've been making a lot of office furniture for it and I have just five rooms to decorate - four detectives' offices and the large squad room. I only have a bunch of book shelves to make and then I'll be able to complete all four detectives' offices. The squad room will be the last to get made but fortunately, I already have a lot of the furniture for it already constructed. This has been a mammoth project, by far the largest card building I've ever made. I can't wait to finish it and then move on to something else. Don't ask what just yet. I have loads of options available.
I finished reading one vampire novel and two zombie novels in January. The vampire novel was Breaking Dawn by Stephenie Meyer - the final part of her Twilight series. It was easily the best book in the series. The one character who has annoyed me the most in this series has been the petulant Bella Swann, the heroine of the novels. However, my opinion of her changed once her new husband, the vampire Edward Cullen, transformed her into a vampire. Vampire Bella is awesome!
The first of the zombie novels I read was As The World Dies: The Untold Stories by Rhiannon Frater. This was a short anthology featuring three of the peripheral characters from her As The World Dies series. If you're a fan of the series you'll probably like this one but it's not an essential purchase. Once again, we have a book that is badly let down by poor proofreading. Five times the word "soldier" is spelt "solider" including twice in one sentence. Unforgivable!
The second zombie novel was one that I bought after reading Zombie Ad's interview with the author, Iain McKinnon, on his Zombie Shop blog site. http://zombieshop.blogspot.com/2012/01/20-questions-with-iain-mckinnon.html The novel in question was Domain of the Dead. It's not a very long novel at 184 pages and I'm afraid I wasn't very impressed with it. Most of the action takes place on a research ship, which gets overrun with zombies, far too quickly and far too easily in my view. I really couldn't empathise with any of the characters, which is a major failing for any novel. Yet again, the book was let down by too many proofreading mistakes. My friend, Joe/Zabadak, states that this a curse of zombie books and I must agree with him.
I'm currently reading Remains of the Dead by Iain McKinnon, which ties in with Domain. At the start of Domain, a small group of survivors are found by a helicopter crew from the research ship. However, the helicopter only has a limited passenger capacity, so some of the group are whisked away and Domain tells their story. Remains concentrates on the group left behind.
As I mentioned in previous monthly musings, the last three months of 2011 saw me making no trips to the cinema. Here in January 2012, I've been three times. First up was to see Twilight: Breaking Dawn part 1. This follows the first part of the novel I mentioned earlier and ends with Bella's transformation to a vampire. Not very exciting but it serves its purpose in setting up part 2, due out later this year. The novel runs to 700 pages, so I wasn't at all surprised that the producers split the film into two parts.
Secondly, was the excellent Underworld Awakening in 3D, which I have already reviewed on my blog. The third film I saw was Haywire, which has nothing to do with the undead. It tells the tale of a female black ops agent who is double crossed on a mission in Dublin. She survives the assassination attempt and goes after those who set her up. Gina Carano plays the betrayed agent and she is very good in this film. As a champion mixed martial artist, she is excellent in her fight scenes. The film drags in places but overall I thoroughly enjoyed it. There's just something about hard-ass females kicking butt that I like.
That's almost all for now, but I would like to make a special mention to Johnny/Lord Siwoc for his wonderful survivor's house he made, dedicated to Vampifan. See it on his blogsite, Brains and Guts! here - http://lordsiwoc.blogspot.com/2012/01/house-of-desurvivor.html if you haven't done so already. Johnny, you really made my day with that. Thanks once again, mate!

21 comments:

  1. First off, I think the picture you've used to head this month's musing is my favourite one yet ! Its very striking

    Grest news on the Police Station; probably like most of your followers I can't wait to see the finished article.

    How you put so much into a month still leaves me in awe.

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    1. Many thanks, Joe. You can see with this picture of Vampirella just why Joe Jusko is my favourite Vampi artist. i love this picture as well.

      I knew that the news about the police station would thrill a lot of my followers. It's great to have the end in sight at last.

      As for my workload, if you can call it work, I'm very disciplined and I hate time-wasting.

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  2. Looking forward to seeing your Police Station. Is it worth purchasing? Thanks for the reviews, I do enjoy them even if some of them aren't my genre. Good stuff.

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    1. Is the WWG police station worth buying? Unquestionably yes! I'd advise buying it soon before WWG converts it to their TLX system. As well as the police station, which you can make as big or as small as you like and can configure to your heart's content, you also get a load of police vehicles with this set, which are very useful - patrol cars, motorbikes, a SWAT riot vehicle and a police helicopter. It is also a great set for office furniture to use in other buildings.

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  3. A good month my friend, lots of figures and movies, that police station must be something else...looking forward to that and another good month in February!

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    1. Fran, if I do nothing else but finish making the police station this month I'll be a very happy bunny! Anything after that will be a bonus!

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  4. Sounds like a very productive month. I am looking forward to seeing your reviews on the newly painted minis, and really looking forward to seeing the Police Station in all its glory.

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    1. Joe, I know from previous comments just how long you've been waiting for me to complete my police station. Well, the waiting is almost over. Believe me, I want to get it finished as soon as possible.

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  5. Glad to see the Police station is nearly finished can't wait to view it. Thanks for the reviews on the books I'll add them to my to borrow from the library list rather than to purchase.

    Its been nearly a whole year since I went to the cinema the last film i saw was Disneys 'Tangled' with my then 3 yr old daughter who is 4 next week OMG where did it go!

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    1. Borrowing books from the library - I can't honestly remember the last time I set foot in a library. It might be as far back as my student days, many years ago!

      Thumbs up for "Tangled" - a very good film!

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  6. Well you never do seem to have a "lazy" month. You do remember to just sit down and charge those batteries?

    Zombie rockers? I need to take a look at those....

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    1. Johnny, I just can't do "lazy!" As for recharging my batteries, I can do that when I go to bed.

      The pic of the zombie rock fans on the West Wind website is not a good one - it just shows one of them! Ditto with the vampire rock stars. You'll find them and the bikers I mentioned above in the Gothic Horror range listed under Bad Moon Over Memphis.

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    2. I forgot to say thank you for the blogdropping. Cheers mate. Now I just need to get hold of the miniature as well to represent you there!

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  7. Just discovered this awesome blog and am now following you! Huge fan of what I've seen so far and am going to read more as soon as I publish this!

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    1. Hi and welcome to my blog. Many thanks for introducing yourself and leaving a comment. I wish more followers would. Anyway, feel free to leave a comment or ask a question at any time. Enjoy your reading!

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  8. Sounds like a very busy productive month, long may it continue!!

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  9. LOL ....outstanding level of output mate, your like a hobby terminator, you don't stop, you just keep going!

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    1. Ha, ha, I like your description, TE. Very good!

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  10. A busy month sir, well done. I am soooooo looking forward to seeing the police station.

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    1. Thanks, Adam. I can now see the light at the end of the tunnel and there really isn't that much to do to finish the police station. Soon the waiting will be over, my friend.

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