The next… fair few posts will be a bit out of paint sequence as I try to sort out as best I can all of the stuff that’s been painted over my most recent period of blog-inactivity. As such, we might also have daily posts in certain stretches. So today we’ll start with a pair of models painted months ago and months apart. Both from the Marvel Zombies games by CMON, we have Mariko Yashida, who is a character who was at one point Logan/Wolverine’s fiancée but died, got resurrected and a bunch of other ridiculous stuff because superhero comic writers seem obsessed with just bringing dead characters back to life in alternative forms. (waves at Jean Grey, Gwenpool, Spider-Gwen ad infinitum)
I hate to see Mariko go, but I love to watch her leave!
With this in mind, it’s just easier to paint the models, be like “oh yeah, that’s Mariko at some indeterminite point in time” and not worry about the rest. I really do like the sense of motion that the sculptor has captured here as well. Our second character today is Cosmo the Spacedog. Seen in the Guardians’ corner of the MCU, Cosmo was created by Dan Abnett – yes, the very same Dan Abnett of Gaunt’s Ghosts. Cosmo is a a psychic dog of Soviet origin, based on the historical Soviet Space Dogs. Cosmo is apparently also a member of something called the “Pet Avengers”. John of Justneedsvarnish spotted Cosmo’s cameo in March’s Round-Up, but I was waiting for an appropriate figure to post alongside him.
Both of these figures are counted as “bystanders” in Marvel Zombies – so not all that much more than tokens – but I guess you can say the same about any board game model if we’re being realistic. At some stage I’ll attempt to make character cards for them so we can use them in Zombicide proper, as with most of my other bystanders.
Azazel's Bitz Box. 
Great work on both mate, Mariko’s skintone is perfect for Asian, and the emotion on Cosmo’s face is sublime, I can almost hear her calling out, “he called me a bad Dog !” These two are worthy of having their own data card, as have all the bystanders you’ve shown.
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Thanks Dave! I actually found a program that takes all the hgard work out of it, apparently. Unfortunately, it’s an .exe, so I might need to find someone even more technically apt than myself to check it for safety…
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Very nice! 🙂 Of course Cosmo would be a star regardless of whether there’s another character there!
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Haha, I do have several more canines in the painting pipeline as it so happens…
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Welcome back! I love Cosmo and didn’t know there was a mini out there. My daughter would probably go crazy over it. The glassy part of Cosmo’s helmet turned out really nice. There’s not a lot to Mariko, but your painted clothing turned out quite nice once again. Is Cosmo about the same scale as the MCP minis? Would be interesting to have her in both games.
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Cosmo would be a bit small compared top the MCP minis as they’re oversized and the Marvel Zombies ones are pretty normal-human-sized. I’ll do a comparison later on. I’m sure there are some STLs and fanmade stat cards floating around somewhere…
So is Cosmo a he or a she? I assumed a she originally because Soviet Space Dogs, but then the Wikipedia referred to Cosmo as a he, even mentioning a gender-swapped alternate reality version (because of course there is).. I painted in some specular highlights and then the lighting on the gloss finish gave me some more, so on complaints there! 🙂
Mariko’s dress was actually trickier than it looks, wanting to get a nice highlight and shade blend without too much desaturation. I ended up glazing it with my old Khorne Red to bring the colour back after highlighting.
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Actually, I don’t know Cosmo’s gender…I thought in the movie Cosmo was a “she”. “Maria Bakalova” voiced her. The first ‘space animals’ that I can recall in the Marvel Universe were the trio of “Super-Apes” that run around with the old communist super-villain, Red Ghost.
Oh, I was commenting more about the basic design than the painting of her dress. I have no doubt it was harder to pull off than it looks. Especially whenever you give us the details on these things. And sometimes it’s just how the process goes. I’ve been stalled out on a stupid mini for weeks, because it’s not looking like I wanted and it doesn’t help that I went in the wrong direction to begin with. C’est la vie!
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Great work mate. I am not even going to pretend I understand the resurrection trope.
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Thanks mate – I put it down to lazy writers myself – much like most of the old Star Wars EU where every split-second-seen-minor character in any film turned out to actually be something like Han Solo’s Aunt’s second cousin and was actually integral to the Battle of Endor, though off-camera.
Or a million other lazy tropes.
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Mariko is certainly a classic character in the Wolverine corner of Marvel. I didn’t realize they killed her and brought her back several times. That cheapens her death a bit, but as you said, its pretty common in superhero comics. With that said, I really like how both of these turned out. Cosmo is a really fun sculpt and you painted him or her very nicely indeed!
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Yeah, with Superhero comics (and even things like the MCU and even Star Wars these days) it might be better (and more mentally healthy) to just ignore the majority of the canon of full continuity and go with individual stores based around our own.
Similar to the way that the Highlander franchise was limited to them only ever making one movie and no TV series.
Cosmo actually makes for a great companion character in-game, and we’re always keen to see them turn up!
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Sadly, I completely agree with your sentiment on MCU and Star Wars. I was watching nearly everything Star Wars a few years ago and now I watch next to nothing because I got burned by Book of Boba Fett (and The Last Jedi before that). We’re officially in an era of content overload and you have to be picky because there’s too much out there to experience it all.
I’m glad to hear Cosmo is fun to use in-game too!
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