My Seamless Collection Part 1: Kimono Troop. Striker Blue Squadroon.

Background

My 1/6th scale collection consists entirely of TBLeague female figures at this time, and represents various factions in a fractured, Mad Maxian- sort of world following a third world war, global economic collapse and a 2nd American Civil War.  The heroes of this universe are a loose alliance of the defenders of civilization attempting not only to preserve what's left of civilization, but to restore and rebuild the world.  One of these units is Striker Blue Squadron, an independently raised(volunteer) military unit headquartered in New Mexico and operating mostly in the southwestern United states. It's mainly a mechanized unit unit responsible for keeping the highways open and free of road bandits and other ne'er-do-wells, but it maintains a special ops detachment known formally as "K Troop" and informally as "Kimono Troop."

Kamiko Takahara (TB League S22A body, TB League modified Tomoe Gozen head sculpt)

Kimono Troop is composed entirely of women and under the command of Lieutenant Kamiko Takahara, a somewhat mysterious American woman of Japanese ancestry around 30 years of age. Born in San Francisco and educated in both the US and Japan. She is known to have served in the JSDF during the failed Chinese invasion of Japan, and hints to have served in a covert ops and or military intelligence capacity, though she is very coy about this when asked directly.

Kamiko Takahara: My Inner Samurai 5 by Gary  Menten, on Flickr  

Kamiko with PPK by Gary  Menten, on Flickr

TB League /  Phicen by Gary  Menten, on Flickr

TB League /  Phicen by Gary  Menten, on Flickr

20190817_The Squad_0013 by Gary  Menten, on Flickr


Kamiko is noted for always wearing a red silk bow in her hair, even in combat and considerable speculation exists as to why. Her enemies and detractors claim it's a matter of her personal vanity, while others who know her, claim it's a sign of complete contempt for both danger and her enemies.  Kamiko herself claims it's a lucky charm and that it was given to her by her mother.  She's also hinted that her danger awareness is greatly heightened when wearing it and this is where the mystery of Kamiko Takahara begins. The name Kamiko in Japanese, literally translates into "Little God or Little Goddess." It'd said that the name conferred to her by her mother at the insistence of a Shinto Priest who believed the infant Kamiko to have a close connection to the Kami or gods or spirits and that she would grow to have some sort of divine protection from them.  Though Kamiko dismisses all this as religious nonsense without foundation, she does believe that wearing her red bow enhances her danger awareness and the warnings often come in the form of hearing her mother's voice in the back of her head, warning her of danger.  Whether this real or just her imagination is unknown, even to Kamiko. She just accepts what is, and uses it to advantage.



Miyori Sakamoto (TBLeague S24 body with YM Toys Xiu B head sculpt.

TB League / Phicen by Gary  Menten, on Flickr

Miyori, (Pinky) Sakamoto is Kamiko's best friend and a squad leader in Kimono Troop.  She and Kamiko became friends when Kamiko was attending high school in Japan at the insistence of her family. She is fiercely loyal to Kamiko and often acts as a bodyguard to her.  She also severely dislikes Erika von Stroheim and frequently asks Kamiko for permission to kill her during parlays, though she does so in Japanese, which Erika does not understand.  

6 by Gary  Menten, on Flickr

She is known to have served with Kamiko in the JSDF during the Chinese invasion, and volunteered to return to America with Kamiko and help search for her missing family once the invasion was repelled.  Even after it was established that all  of Kamiko's family (excepting niece Michiko) had died during the Great Anarchy, Pinky remained in America with Kamiko and joined Striker Blue force with her.  

The firefight06 by Gary  Menten, on Flickr

(Note) because of the smaller size of this figure compared to the others, I arm her with a Sterling submachinegun which fits her hands nicely,


Jitsuko (Gogo) Yamaguchi  (TBLeague S28A body with Super Duck SDA 002A Head)

The firefight03 by Gary  Menten, on Flickr

Gogo is another of Kamiko's friends from Japan, though at the moment not represented in my collection as the pale skinned S28A body has been "commandeered" for another figure (Capt Glynnis Penny-Farthing). She will reappear later with a tan skinned S29A body that more closely matches her head sculpt colour.

The Squad by Gary  Menten, on Flickr

20190817_The Squad_0006 by Gary  Menten, on Flickr


Laura Neville  (TBLeague S32 body with Super Duck SDH 018B head sculpt)


_DSC0050_0093 by Gary  Menten, on Flickr

Tall, slender and long-legged, Laura is a typical California girl in every respect save one: she holds a P.Eng deg and was a spacecraft design engineer at JPL in Pasadena before the world went to hell. At first she survived on her own in Pasadena which suffered very little destruction physical destruction but was immediately plagued by hordes of mutants.  Later she fled the city only to be captured by Erika von Stroheim and eventually rescued personally by Kamiko Takahara

Kamiko To the Rescue05 by Gary  Menten, on Flickr

Kamiko To the Rescue09 by Gary  Menten, on Flickr

SB32-2_0003 by Gary  Menten, on Flickr

Alexis Nihon Park Shoot 2_0133 by Gary  Menten, on Flickr

Alexis Nihon Park Shoot 2_0193 by Gary  Menten, on Flickr

Laura Neville 3 by Gary  Menten, on Flickr

Because of her science and engineering knowledge, Laura provides Kimono Troop with a much-needed technical and scientific know-how and she is often involved in many of the more specialized black ops because of her special skills. She is very close to Kamiko and is the cousin of retired British Army Captain Glynnis Penny-Farthing.   (Their mothers were sisters)

Cynthia Luna (AKA Bazoukers, Luna Kabooma)

Luna Kabooma 3 by Gary  Menten, on Flickr

Cynthia originally hails from Santiago, Chile with prior service in the Chilean Army. She is the troop's heavy weapons specialist and is frequently seen carrying an old 3.5 inch rocket launcher (M20A1 Super Bazooka.) While her barracks mates often refer to her as "Luna Kabooma," Kamiko's pet name for her seems to be "Bazookers," though it's uncertain if this is a reference to her weapon of choice or a sexual reference.  As all of Kimono Troop's members are handpicked by Kamiko, she maintains warm and affectionate personal relations with all of them and has nicknames for many of them.  


Luna Kabooma 5 by Gary  Menten, on Flickr

Luna Kabooma 4 by Gary  Menten, on Flickr

Katanga Lost Diamonds034 by Gary  Menten, on Flickr


Luna Kabooma 2 by Gary  Menten, on Flickr



Well, that's all for now. I'll post updates as they come along and shortly post something about other members of my collection who are not part of Kimono Troop.

most impressive! The background to their universe is very interesting too! I shall look forward to the continuing adventures of K Troop!

Blondeactionman wrote:

most impressive! The background to their universe is very interesting too! I shall look forward to the continuing adventures of K Troop!

There is more to follow on my collection, particularly the non-Kimono Troop members like Erika von Stroheim and Glynnis Penny-Farthing.

Kimono Troop Command wrote:

Blondeactionman wrote:

most impressive! The background to their universe is very interesting too! I shall look forward to the continuing adventures of K Troop!

There is more to follow on my collection, particularly the non-Kimono Troop members like Erika von Stroheim and Glynnis Penny-Farthing.

Fantastic!

great work love all the ladies

JohnnyE4 wrote:

great work  love all the ladies

Arigato!

Nicely posed figs!

somekindajoe wrote:

Nicely posed figs!

Thank-you

Your very creative of each one of your characters biography. I’m really liking each one is uniquely kitbashed.

Prof Gangrene Fan wrote:

Your very creative of each one of your characters biography. I’m really liking each one is uniquely kitbashed.

I'm not much into collecting standard stock figures to be honest, although I would probably like to have some Star Trek (TOS) figures and may yet break down and buy some of the Quantum Mechanix figures. This being said, kitbashing allows me to create the look I'm looking for and I have several different influences. These include the 1968 film Dark of The Sun, the 60's TV show Rat Patrol, the early Sean Connery James Bond films Dr. No through You Only Live Twice, and the Japanese anime series Girls und Panzer.

Miyori definitely exhibits a Rat Patrol influence!

Cool backstories, and I appreciate that you provide details on the body-head sculpt combinations you're using for these figs.

Do you come up with the characters first and then seek out figures to "shell" them (as folks say in the doll world), or do you start out with a figure and let the character evolve from there? Or is it a combination approach?

SCU_HQ wrote:

Do you come up with the characters first and then seek out figures to "shell" them (as folks say in the doll world), or do you start out with a figure and let the character evolve from there? Or is it a combination approach?

Now that’s a really good question to ask Dave. I’m very much looking forward to reading Kimono Troop Command answer myself.

SCU_HQ wrote:

Miyori definitely exhibits a Rat Patrol influence!

Cool backstories, and I appreciate that you provide details on the body-head sculpt combinations you're using for these figs.

Do you come up with the characters first and then seek out figures to "shell" them (as folks say in the doll world), or do you start out with a figure and let the character evolve from there? Or is it a combination approach?

It' a combination approach. In the case of Kamiko, I knew i wanted to create a 1/6th version of my favorite DAZ 3D creation. Kamiko is mostly made up, but has elements of my own history built into the character. Like me, she was born in North America, but has strong ancestral links to another country. She is intelligent, and intellectually curious, tries to treat people fairly, is sarcastic, irreverent and snarky at times. Unlike me, she can also be quite revenge-driven, insolent and just very nasty to people she doesn't like.

Since my DAZ 3D Kamiko had friends Miyori (Pinky) and Jitsuko (Gogo), I naturally included them also, but made much less effort to make them look like my DAZ creations that with Kamiko.  In the case of Erika, I just had to have a figure with that uniform and find a way to work it into the universe.  This wasn't easy. My first instinct was to base her on Hans Gudegast's (AKA Eric Braeden's) honorable German officer in Rat Patrol, Captain Dietrich, but found it made more sense and was more entertaining to use her as a Colonel Klink on steroids sort of character.  

A bit of explanation here:

1. I'm old enough to have watched Hogan's Heroes during it's original run in the 60's, though I was quite young and watched it because my parents watched it.
2. My parents watched it because they both lived through the Nazi occupation of Belgium during WWII and this show made fun of the Nazis, which is something they understood, because making fun of them was the only recourse they had during this terrible time.  
3. I'm a big fan of Mel Brook's "The Producers," and Brooks would tell you that the only way to deal with dictators is through ridicule.
4. According to Allied POW's the depiction of German prison camp guards in Hogans Heroes was only a bit of a stretch.  They were far from the best the Wehrmacht hat to offer, as anyone who was competent was sent to the front.
5. I'm of a generation that's old enough to have known Germans who were much to young to have had anything to do with the war as well as some who fought in it but used the old excuse, "Orders were orders. What could we do?"

So eventually I came up with a new profile for Erika. In this one she is a modern German, without Nazi sympathies and was once a very promising, honorable officer in the Bundeswehr until she suffered a traumatic brain injury in Afghanistan and started to replace the gaps in her memory with her great grandfather's memories, which clearly go beyond WWII.  In this way, she can be seen as a villain, a victim as well a comic relief.


I hope that answers your question.

SCU_HQ wrote:

Miyori definitely exhibits a Rat Patrol influence!

Cool backstories, and I appreciate that you provide details on the body-head sculpt combinations you're using for these figs.

Do you come up with the characters first and then seek out figures to "shell" them (as folks say in the doll world), or do you start out with a figure and let the character evolve from there? Or is it a combination approach?

I would say that Miyori is part "Rat Patrol" and part "Dark of The Sun."

SCU_HQ wrote:

Miyori definitely exhibits a Rat Patrol influence!

Cool backstories, and I appreciate that you provide details on the body-head sculpt combinations you're using for these figs.

Do you come up with the characters first and then seek out figures to "shell" them (as folks say in the doll world), or do you start out with a figure and let the character evolve from there? Or is it a combination approach?

To expand on my previous answer a bit, the character of Laura was made up after I had gotten both the figure and head sculpt. In fact the head sculpt came first and I experimented with it on Erika's body S22Abefore getting the S32A body. See Photos.

Red Undies and PPK by Gary Menten, on Flickr

Red Undies and MP40 by Gary Menten, on Flickr

Ultimately, when I got the S32A body, I named her Dr. Laura Neville after Charlton Heston's character Dr. Robert Neville in "The Omega Man." I gave her a parallel sort of back story except that she's an engineer rather than an MD and immunologist, and she eventually flees the mutant infested city, convinced that her sister is alive after believing she heard her voice in a short wave radio broadcast. She is captured by Erika and rescued by Kamiko. She and Kamiko take a great liking to one another and she becomes a trusted member of Kamiko's troop. To go a little a further, in this world without to many men it it, most women seeking physical intimacy of some sort have to seek it with other women and so this is commonly accepted in within Stryker Blue Squadron in general were there are at least a few men, and very accepted within Kamiko's troop which has no men at all and is headquartered at some distance from Atlas HQ where most of Stryker Blue Squadron is based. This is not something that I've emphasized in the photo essays, but is a part of my back story that behind the scenes, many of the characters have intimate relations with one another including Kamiko and Laura.

Great to see all these characters with all the info.

You really do show the posing ability of these figures and how well they photograph.

Beatlefan wrote:

Great to see all these characters with all the info.

You really do show the posing ability of these figures and how well they photograph.

The key to posing these figures is patience. For what it's worth, I find they can be posed much more realistically than the old GI Joe / Action man figures.

Yeah totally agree, you can get some very realistic poses.