Category: Models

DlroSkeleton

August 9, 2026

When I was in Japan I was unable to buy a new model kit since it was sold out everywhere. Luckily I found it on Amazon and here it is:

This ’30 Minute Fantasy’ kit is part of Bandai’s ever-expanding line of fantasy plastic models, and the first in what I expect to be a series of ‘monster’ kits. Here’s the blurb explaining these creatures:

I made the kit today, which was a bit challenging since one of my thumbs is still not fully operational. But even under these circumstances it only took a few hours, and likely would have been faster if I wasn’t getting distracted often.

The box contains two skeletons, and a variety of weapons. As part of the ’30 minute fantasy’ line they are slightly robotic and contain ‘hardpoints’ on which to attach armor pieces from other kits. I wasn’t interested in this; I just wanted the skeletons 🙂

They look great and are very poseable. I equipped one of them with a couple of blades and the other will lurk dramatically on a bookshelf:

An obvious thought that pops into your mind when you look at these is the T-800 endoskeletons of the Terminator series. A quick look online shows many skillful customizations, with this being one of the better ones I found:

This is an easy-to-make, inexpensive (about $12 in Japan) and impressive model kit. I look forward to whatever monster they produce next!

Barad-Dûr

July 30, 2026

In Lord Of The Rings, Barad-dûr is the tower fortress of Sauron. Taller than any structure built by man, it stands in Mordor near Mount Doom and at its peak The Eye Of Sauron endlessly scans Middle Earth looking for The One Ring. It’s the domain of ultimate evil, and it was time for me to build my own:

This is another monstrous set, and since Rivendell is my favourite LEGO build of all time I wanted this one as soon as it released. And bought it I did, although that was two years ago and it has sat on a shelf all this time waiting!

The 5400+ pieces came in exactly 40 bags which I’ve needed to pile two deep to fit them all in the above photo.

The tower is built in three parts with separate instruction books. In total; there are 1003 steps across the collective 620 pages of instructions!

Disappointingly, the set also came with a sticker sheet. No one likes LEGO stickers, and for a $460 set their inclusion is ridiculous. Most of these were placed on curved pieces, and apparently LEGO doesn’t yet have the technology to directly print onto curves.

The first instruction book is the base of the tower and uses about half of the bags of pieces. There’s a lot of detail here both inside and out, with doors that open via a hidden switch, a secret compartment where Gollum hides, and various items to furnish the interior for its wicked inhabitants. The angled walls are achieved using clever building techniques and are strongly reinforced, which is a good thing considering the size of the finished tower.

Most of the included minifigures are in the first few bags, and they’re all great. Frodo has a couple of faces, but I’ll always display the one where he’s almost seduced by The Ring.

A group of orcs with a range of armour and weapons inhabit the lower level of the tower. According to the instructions much of these figures – and their gear – is unique to this set. Yes that one in the middle is grilling a sausage!

Sauron and The Mouth Of Sauron are both suitably creepy. While I’m not showing them here, believe me both are even more disturbing without their helmets on! Until rereleased in a recent set, Sauron was one of the more expensive minifigures available, selling for up to $100 on the secondary market. He has a thrown room in the middle of the tower which has a Palantir hidden being a moving throne:

Here’s the finished set:

It took me over thirty hours to build, which I did in sessions of two or three bags at a time. The last book went very slowly since I could only use one hand (I’ve recently had hand surgery) and needed to be extremely careful since I was dealing with the spire.

The Eye lights up via a light brick, and can also be moved to look in any direction:

Here’s the view from behind showing the interior detail:

I enjoyed building this so much I hardly wanted it to end. Now I need to work out where to put it, a non-trivial problem since it’s 83 cm tall! I’ve got an idea or two, but for now it remains on our dining table since it’s remarkably heavy and I’m certainly not going to move it with only one hand!

‘Poop Pals’

February 22, 2026

I purchased the above in Japan. The name seems to translate to ‘Poop Pals’ and each of the two animals is talking about playing with poop (I think). Obviously their heads resembles the poop emoji.

What the heck is this?

It’s a model kit! The above photo shows the entire contents, and you’ll notice instructions and runners common to other plastic model kits. There’s also two bags of what the kit calls ‘clay’:

This is weird stuff. It’s very lightweight, and feels more like foam than any clay I’ve ever known. It’s also a little oily. For the Australians reading, it has the texture of those old banana lollies, albeit fluffier.

Assembly of the animal bodies is trivial, so I’ll focus on the heads. The ~~poop~~ clay is softened by kneading it, and then stuffed into a mold. A lid is then put on and rotated to flatten the base, and then the final poop-shaped head is complete. It’s easy and works surprisingly well. I imagine kids would love this step.

Then you put stickers on the facial features and your animal is complete. Don’t you agree my cat look wonderful…? Here’s the bear:

The clay/foam apparently dries solid after exposed to the air, so I imagine these things would last a while. But as a model kit it’s quite poor, with ill-fitting pieces (which is very unusual for Bandai) and clay that isn’t adhesive enough for the ears and eyes to stay on.

You get enough clay to make three heads though, which of course I had to try:

I think the above is a ‘twisted bear-cat’. It’s my masterpiece!

This was fun, and were I a drooling child I imagine it would have been lots of fun. But it’s also weird and imperfect, and therefore not surprising that it cost me only ¥99 (about $0.65). We saw it for as much as ¥2000 during our recent trip, and at that price it’s not even close to worth it.

So it was fun while it lasted, which was less than the time it took me to write this post 🙂

Robot Claw