July/August is Bond-month on STARZ, and while I have Little Nellie on the bench, and a DB-5 on the shelf, I don't have any Bond figures! It is high-time to remedy that situation!!
As one might imagine, pickings are somewhat slim: the only mainstream manufacturer to venture into this territory is Andrea Miniatures, with three offerings: "Underwater Struggle" (based on the poster from Thunderball); "Secret Agent"; and "License to Kill", the star of this project.
I absolutely love "Underwater Struggle"! But, regrettably, I have yet to see a casting that I have been satisfied with. And while it would have been a more feasible undertaking a decade ago, a white-metal, interactive vignette is now "off the radar". "Secret Agent" is a classic James Bond pose ca. From Russia with Love, but the face is horrendous! [note: see below]
Which brings us to the centrepiece of this project. . . Goldfinger is my favourite 007 film, and the figure is based on Bond's evening suit in the pre-title sequence. While License to Kill is the name of the 16th Bond film with Timothy Dalton in the lead, I believe Andrea derived the name of the piece from the Italian title of Dr. No.
I feel this is the best overall Bond offering from Andrea. While I felt that none of the Andrea offer- ings captured Connery's likeness acceptably, I thought that "LtK" at least got me in the ballpark. WRONG!!! When I received the kit today, I immediately checked the face--and there before me was Sean Connery! The likeness is EXCELLENT, and while I might decide to tweak it ever so slightly, it is good-to-go OOB! My question now is: how are the likenesses of the rest of the Bond figures?
The casting quality of the 4-piece kit (+ plinth) is SUPERB: as with most of my sojourns with Andrea products of late, it takes me back to the halcyon days of the late 20th c. when figure modelling was at its peak!
I am very pleased to own this kit--and VERY glad I decided to get it. Stay tuned!
“When the cost of a hobby exceeds the fun and doesn't attract new people, the game is over.” -
Oscar Koveleski, August 2003
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