U.S. WWII Relaxing Tanker #1
Modeling the U.S. Army in WWII

Mustang Productions
35008

I like this dough-faced guy with the swatch of hair hanging out from under his helmet. Unlike most of the angular, battle-worn faces that are typically seen on scale figures, one can read a little more into this guy's look. I see him as a Midwestern farm kid, not a naive rube but a confident and competent soldier who is up to the job at hand. Credit sculptor Anders Heintz with capturing that can-do spirit of the citizen soldiers of WWII.

Heintz's sculpting is well-executed and the figure is presented as one piece, no separate head. On the backside, the figure has a bad case of "droopy drawers," which underscores the fact that soldiers didn't always get the best-fitting uniforms (in fact, when GIs did have the opportunity to have their clothes washed by the Quartermaster Corps, there was no guarantee that the uniform that came back to them would be their own!).

There are only a couple blemishes in the casting, perhaps due to torn molds, with the space filled on the right side of the neck between the helmet and collar, and a bump along the zippered fly (no, it's not what you might think!). Neither of these errors appear in the box art figure, also painted by Heintz. And as another nice change of pace, this tanker wears the cotton poplin field jacket rather than the winter combat jacket usually seen on armored crews. It will be nice to see what other figures Heintz will have to offer.

Product sample provided by Mustang Productions.

-tss-

 

 

Modeling the U.S. Army in WWII © 2002—2007 Timothy S. Streeter