Run Kate! Run like a Cheetah!

Yay! Got to do some customizing this weekend. I've been wanting to take a crack at fixing Kate from Lost for awhile. Long story short: She's hot....

The BifBangPow Kate was not my favorite. I've always thought the sculpt was there but the paint job was weird with mint green eyes, brown pupils and the regrettable freckles, and the hair was quite roughly modeled in comparison to the hair on the other Lost females. 

Rose

Okay, so this custom project is a decidedly mixed bag, but it was so interesting to try it and I'm glad to add her to my band of Lost castaways. 

The character is Rose Nadler, a survivor of Oceanic flight 815. She's a beloved figure in the story, a wise lady who was healed of her cancer when she came to the Island and who ended up spending the rest of her life there with her husband Bernard. 

It's a Tropical Island, Get Some Damned Sun!

One of the problems I've had with the BifBangPow Lost figures is the very light skin tone they chose to use. It seems to be a trend across the board with these ReMegos that they are all several shades lighter than their 70s forebearers, but the BBP figures are especially light. I asked about this in our Mego Museum interview with Jason Lenzi and he said it wasn't a conscious choice to make them lighter than old school Megos, this is what they went with. I think for some of the figures its fine. Ben Linus was always a pasty little creep, but John Locke was a fairly well tanned outdoorsman. The BBP head is very pale and a lot of the great facial detail doesn't show up at all. So this week I finally took some time to experiment with fixing it.

Introducing John Locke: Tanned and Ready for Action!

Me Go Back to the Island!

Namaste,

I'm a longtime Mego collector and customizer (I founded the Mego Museum website in 1996 and continue to be involved there to this day) and a huge Lost fan and I'm embarking on a Lost Mego customizing project in anticipation of the Biff Bang Bow! Lost figures coming out summer 2010.

It seems like I may be a bit of a rarity: A Mego fan who is a Lost fan and a Lost fan who loves Mego. There's not a ton of Losties at the Mego Museum (but we did have a good discussion thread going during Season 6) and it seems like some Lost fans are not reacting well to the 70's retro aesthetic, which I can understand. We will see how many of us are out there who are fans of both worlds, I'm hoping there will be enough to keep this new line going.

To me, the new Biff Bang Pow! Lost line brings two of my absolute most favorite things together, a perfect storm of geeky obsession.

I am hoping that there will be enough interest in this line to generate future waves and I'd like to try and create some enthusiasm for Lost Mego customizing. If you are a newcomer to Mego who is attracted to the new Lost figures and would like to make some custom figures to expand your set I'll try and offer a guide to the custom Mego world and point the way toward the heads and boots and clothing you might use to outfit your own Island adventure.

As a first example, here's my first Lost custom, a Dharma Initiative redshirt. This is exactly where Lost and Mego can be such a great marriage. The time travel aspect of Season 5 brought the Losties right back to the heart of the Mego era in 1974-1977. So there are a number of Mego head sculpts that will work quite well for DI custom fodder. Almost every Mego head has long groovey sideburns and shaggy hair, and a great number of them have been reproduced in recent years so they are plentiful and inexpensive. This figure uses the Sir Galahad head which is available in reproduction at Classic TV Toys. The boots and rifle are Planet of the Apes accessories available reproduction from Doctor Mego.

The jumpsuit I made by hand, using an Action Jackson Air Force pilot jumpsuit as a template. I will try to post a pattern when I can, this is the first one I made and it needs some tweaking. But it was very inspiring for me to think of how easily a Lost fan can make some fun action figure toys in the 1/9 scale.