Hi Figure Realm! Long time, no see. No major disaster or severe injury this time, just life getting in the way, lost track of time, got busy, that's all. Anyway, my recovery has gone reasonably well, and even though I'm still not perfect (typing is still a chore, so I'm going to keep this description brief-ish for now, 'til someone else can type a more comprehensive write-up for me later), I haven't stopped working on figures. Still doing NECA-style TMNT '87 cartoon figures, and today's is pretty epic. Check out the massive Chrome Dome!!

In the old cartoon, Shredder created Chrome Dome to be a massive robotic terror, 12-15 feet tall! Of course, the actual scale varied wildly from shot to shot, but there was no question I'd need a 1:6 figure to build this bad boy. I got me a cheap rotocast Black Spider-Man figure (NOT the ToyBiz ML Icons or Hasbro ML Series Max or whatever they were called), and set to work. Had to shorten him a bit, he was too tall and lanky. Also had to modify the shoulders 'cuz the rotocast shoulders didn't have much range of motion. Replaced the hands with a pair from a Sigma 6 Snake Eyes, sculpted over to make them larger.

From there, it was just sculpt, sculpt, sculpt! Used TWO full tubes of Loctite Epoxy Repair Putty for this guy. The fins on his back are made from popsicle sticks. His odd retro-future ray gun is made from an old Cerebro Blaster from a classic ToyBiz Gen-X Banshee, and a few parts from some random GI Joe missile. Check out screenshots from the cartoon, it looks almost identical!

I was expecting this guy to be a more complicated build, but his design turned out to be really simple. I LOVE how massive and imposing he looks on the shelf with my NECA turtles (check out that last photo . . . no tricks, no stands, no wire work, no Photoshop trickery, he can hold a turtle in one hand, he can stand in an off balance pose, his joints are SOLID, he can literally hold a turtle up in the air, I could NOT stop giggling with glee as I was getting that photo!), and he's one of my favorite new additions to my collection!

TURTLE POWER!!