'Super' Miniatures from Reaper/Pathfinder

As a comics fan long before I was a wargamer, and a wargamer now most of my life, I am an irredeemably dedicated fan of the SuperSystem superhero/supervillain miniatures skirmish game, and of the game-specific line of Superfigs miniatures which accompanies it (the dedicated SuperSystem website seems to be down presently; information--as well as a tremendous variety of play-aids--can be had at the SuperSystem Annex and award-winning miniatures painter Agis Neugebauer has a showcase of his Superfigs work.

Great as Superfigs are, one can never have too many four-colour hero and villain models. Reaper Miniatures has some dedicated candidates in their wonderful--and wonderfully diverse--Chronoscope line (how I would love a shot at developing a coherent miniatures skirmish game out of *this* collection of models!), but it is their more recent Pathfinder Fantasy series which has my current attention: ostensibly Paizo's 'D&D 3.5+' fantasy system, the Pathfinder world must have a great deal more than traditional dungeon-delving going on, if these epic good guys and bad guys are wandering around in it! I have used links to Paizo's site as I have used them often through the years (and they offer a discounted price on most of the miniatures in question); if you want to see more and/or order directly from the source, Reaper has a great reputation for customer service, as well, and you can start at http://www.reapermini.com.

Grey Maiden

Grey Gardener (a pulp masked hero if ever one walked down a shadowy alley)

Red Mantis Assassins (male and female)

Hellknight

Pactmaster

Plague Doctor (especially suitable for a pulp campaign)

Skinsaw Man

Skinspawn (a perfect henchman for the above)

Stag Lord

Scarecrow

The Scribbler

Whispering Tyrant (the figure which of them all just radiates 'master villain')

I hope some of this piques curiousity about SuperSystem--I know I could use more opponents, and more Friendly Local Game Stores (FLGS) willing to carry the line!
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Butcher Bird Flies Again

An authentic WWII Focke Wulf Fw 190 has flown again--in Arizona and Washington.

A JG54 Fw 190A-5, crashed outside Leningrad in 1943, has been resurrected by billionaire Paul Allen's Flying Heritage Collection; the frame is original, the engine rebuilt from remaining BMW 801 salvage. Much of the reconstruction was overseen by JME Aviation in the UK before completion at Casa Grande, Arizona, where the Fw 190 was test-flown in December 2010--the first genuine 'Butcher Bird' to get airborne in over half a century.

The Fw 190 will homebase at Everett, Washington, where efforts to reskin it in it's original JG54 paint scheme are underway.

Restored Butcher Bird first flight

Fw 190A-5

Pigs Fly No More

Though it would be difficult to find an aircraft with a past more fraught with political interference, the General Dynamics F-111 overcame all to render decades of service to NATO air forces, from Cold War stand-off strike capability to surgical missions into the modern era of asymmetrical conflict, the F-111's unique combination of near-fighter speed and maneuver capability, bomber payload delivery, and nose-to-the-earth terrain-hugging radar effectiveness providing a mission effectiveness and flexibility that remains difficult to equal.

Some combination of aircraft will have to, however...for with the formal retirement of the Royal Australian Air Force's strike fleet, all F-111s are retired.

Known to it's US crews (fondly) as the Aardvark (reportedly for it's pronounced snout), to the RAAF it was a contraction of aardvark's literal translation, 'earth pig'--simply, the Pig.

An RAAF pilot with the second-most flight hours in type, squadron leader Steve Clarke with some 3400, was a pilot for the Pigs' final sortie. The type leader, Captain Brad Insley (United States Air Force, retired) was present for the final flight and got one last Pig ride, as well: in the cockpit of an F-111 he had flown to Vietnam in 1972, as it was towed to permanent static display.

With it's distinctive cockpit pod and variable-geometry 'swing wings,' the F-11, like the Navy's F-14, was an obvious artifact of it's era...and it may be that era has passed. Not without challenge, however, or trial. All of us still alive and free owe some measure of gratitude for the fact to Pigs that flew--and the men who made that so.

Despatch: Hail Caesar!

Warlord Games follows up their Black Powder ruleset with a hardcover set of Ancients rules, now available for pre-order from the Warlord website with an incentive of an exclusive, otherwise unavailable pewter miniature of a quintessentially Roman legionnaire adorning the rulebook's cover:

Of particular interest, 'Hail Caesar's' authors: Rick Priestley, abetted by Alessio Cavatore...
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RIP Adrienne Roy

DC Comics colorist Adrienne Roy passed away Dec 14, apparently after a lengthy battle with ovarian cancer.

In an era when 'four color comics' did not define a type of traditional superheroic comic book action so much as the literal limitations the medium placed on adding color to the illustrated action, Roy was a master; she brought flash, vibrancy and style to George Perez' inspired work on New Teen Titans...but for me it was the sense of mood and atmosphere she added--with an extremely limited palette, and for a variety of different artists--to literally hundreds of Batman family comics I will remember most.

The Batman then did not need deconstructionist writers variously breaking his back, destroying his city, killing him, zombifying him and/or painting him as hopelessly psychotic to make his world seem dark and shadowy. He had Adrienne Roy.

Thank you for your work, and rest in peace.

Christopher Allen
Dallas, TX

Enter--the Helicarrier!

Sometimes something gets made that one just must have. That thing for our household this holiday season is a toy I never expected anyone to make, despite it's unalloyed coolness: the S.H.I.E.L.D. Helicarrier! A fixture in the Marvel Universe from it's first appearance in Stan Lee and Jack Kirby's uniquely-Marvel answer to the sixties spy craze, Nick Fury, Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D.*, the Helicarrier rose to greatest prominence in the late-seventies 24-issue Marvel Godzilla comic book, as it and various of Nick's supporting agents pursued the great Toho monster across the Marvel universe:

Like so many supporting elements of that comic book universe, however--the Warriors Three, Zabu the sabertooth from the prehistoric Savage Land, Stegron the Dinosaur Man, the Prowler--it's charms always seemed appreciated by too small an audience to ever expect to see it brought to any kind of three-dimensional life. The success of the 'deformed' Super Hero Squad mini action figures line, however, has led to an animated TV series starring same...and a centerpiece therein is their 'flying headquarters,' which has been incarnated as a centerpiece toy for the Christmas season. And though it's name may have changed, and it's design been 'kiddified' consistent with the source--make no mistake that under the garish colours and superdeformed proportions is...the greatness of the S.H.I.E.L.D. Helicarrier!

Fortunately, this household happens to have an eight-year-old boy who loves his superdeformed superheroes, who will be profiting from his father's decades-long Helicarrier mania this Christmas.

*--and S.H.I.E.L.D. stands for Supreme Headquarters International Espionage Law Enforcement Division, no matter what irremediably more idiotic and less memorable moniker current deconstructionist Marvel talent insists on rebranding upon it; Stan Lee said that's what S.H.I.E.L.D. means, and that's the end of the conversation, for me.
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