Hey Mr. Spaceman: BoShek and Cantina Dude

Here are a couple of popular Mos Eisley Cantina "Spacemen" that I am surprised Hasbro has not already released (or re-released) in a super-articulated fashion: BoShek and "Cantina Dude" -- I prefer "Yellow Spacer."

First up is everyone's pork-chop-sideburn-wearing spaceman, BoShek! For this custom, I used the VTSC Bossk as the foundation and added the calves from an A-wing pilot. I boiled and popped all the parts and then dyed the yellow parts and A-wing legs black using synthetic dye.

***A word of caution using dyes, at least with red; when dying the parts for my Mosep Binneed and Tawss Khaa figures, the red dye got on my fingers, which then got on my razor knife. I then inadvertently transposed red dye to parts of a Kenner (ketchup & mustard) VC Boba Fett and BoShek's face.***

I cut off the neck and Dremelled a socket into a POTF BoShek head. As per my warning above, I had to paint the flesh areas of BoShek's head sculpt. For a neck post I used the neck from a female Imperial Officer in a red uniform (can't remember her name -- left over fodder). I also trimmed off the collar from the POTJ figure and sanded the collar down to fit the Bossk figure. I trimmed off the silver necklace thing and glued it to the chest piece. I also dyed some MTF gloves red. They came out more purple than red. So, I ended up painting them red with white stripes.

The helmet in the left picture is actually the helmet-head from my Yellow Spacer custom. It has a chopped up Bossk head glued inside. BoShek and the Yellow Spacer wear British Windak high-altitude pressure suits. These costumes first appeared in the 1964 film First Men on the Moon and also the 1966 episode of Dr. Who, "The Tenth Planet."

I tried painting the white lines on the shoulders, but couldn't make them straight enough for my satisfaction. So, I just painted over them. I'd rather not have the lines than to have crooked lines.

The Yellow Spacer custom is a VTSC Bossk body with Ten Numb legs and gloves from the Chicken Fried Cavalry Officer. I painted the gloves red to match character in the movie. The helmet is a resin cast of the POTJ BoShek helmet from Darth Sinister Creations. I spray painted the helmet white, painted in the details black, and then gave the white areas a wash in grey. The helmet is not 100% movie accurate, but it's close enough. In the movie, the tubes do not wrap around the front of the helmet. Instead, they attach to the actor's back.

The background for these pictures is a custom of the Streets of Mos Eisley playset with weathering, a new door, and added accessories. I'll make a future post displaying all the parts soon.

I am the Walrus: Mosep Binneed & Taws Khaa Customs

 As I patiently await any new information on the Haslab Cantina or re-releasing Cantina figures (the recent news of Bom Vimdin has me hopeful), I am steadily working on various action figure and diorama customs.

This post features the original Mos Eisley Cantina "Walrus," no not Ponda Baba aka "Walrus Man," but Mosep Binneed and Taws Khaa! In his original character sketches, John Mollo designated these two character's design as "Walrus."

With current eBay listings pricing out the Black Series Mosep Binneed at $70 to $100, I figured that my most affordable option would be just to customize my own figures.

For both figures, I purchased custom head sculpts from Darth Sinister Creations on eBay. For the bodies, I chose VC337 Grand Admiral Thrawn and the upper body of the ISB Officer from the Imperial Officer 4-pack. I have Mosep the Thrawn upper body with the shoulder accents to add a bit of variety to his costume.

I dyed the body parts used a red synthetic dye. The soft-plastic parts turned more of dark purple-red and the hard-plastic joints red. With both figures, I used B-wing pilot forearms and gloves. I dry-brushed the bodies with red paint and painted the belt buckle and rivet silver. For the head sculpts, I created a custom flesh tone using a mix of flesh tone and khaki paints. Once the head sculpts dried, I then gave them a wash of the same mix but with more khaki paint to darken the wash a bit.

All the articulations work just fine. With the softer plastic tunic-skirt, each figure can sit down. The head sculpts are just pressed down over the neck sculpts with the dumbbell neck joint removed.

I realized after taking these photos that Taws Khaa's whiskers are actually shorter than Mosep's. So, I will probably trim them down. I have also thought about adding the raised collars using G.I. Joe Duke fodder, but for now I am happy with these customs.

If Hasbro re-releases Mosep Binneed, I am sure that I will grab two of them (if possible), but from what I understand, the tunic-skirt on that figure is too stiff to allow the figure to sit. So, who knows? I guess I will cross that bridge if Hasbro ever re-releases that figure.

TESB Boba Fett Custom

This is a custom that I completed a year ago. When the new Target exclusive Boba Fetts were released, I just had to grab some. I prefer TESB Boba Fett's color scheme over ROTJ, plus I love how the flamethrower/laser details are exposed on the left gauntlet. So, I knew I would try my hand at updating a custom TESB Boba Fett!

The base figure is the VC186 ROTJ Boba Fett. I removed the belt and green cape. I also trimmed off the flamethrower/laser cover off the left gauntlet. 

I created the new belt from piecing together the belt from Evolutions Boba Fett, the holster from the Solo-Han Solo 2pk Fett, and pieces from the new G.I. Joe Grunt web gear

I trimmed down a cape from Evolutions Fett and attached it under the shoulder armor. I also sliced off the flamethrower/laser details from the Solo-Han Solo 2pk Fett and glued it to the left gauntlet. I like how this sculpt has the mounting plate sculpted. The left gauntlet was really important to me for this custom. I did not just want to paint the gauntlet and keep the rectangular flamethrower/laser cover. Once the flamethrower/laser detailing was attached, I painted both gauntlets and the jetpack adding weathering to both. Another important detail to this custom for me is to have a moveable range finder. So, I trimmed the sculpted range finder off, Dremelled a whole and attached the range finder from a scrap 300th Boba Fett using hot glue to fill in the socket. I also painted in the two slivers on the left chest piece. Finally, I gave the body a wash in dark grey to dirty the figure up a bit.

The rifle is a kit bash from the VC186 Fett and Evolution Fett rifles.

Here are comparison pictures of my older custom Evolutions TESB Boba Fett and new VC186 TESB Boba Fett. The older Evolutions custom has a 300th Fett head (Dremelled to fit), left gauntlet, and customized jet pack.

Finally, here is a collage of my Boba Fett shelf in my home office. Carded figures in the back, 6" figures, Funkos, and Legos in the middle, and loose figures in the front. I also have this super-cool cloth flag/wall hanger that my daughter got me in Okinawa (not pictured).

My Boba Fett collection has doubled since taking this photo. I will have to post more pictures at a later date, but in the meantime, two figures I am proud to have added to my collection are (1) a custom rocket-firing Boba Fett from Procustomfigures and (2) a vintage 1979 Hong Kong Boba Fett!

Procustomfigures rocket-firing Boba Fett

Vintage 1979 Hong Kong Boba Fett

Custom Jawa Action Figures

This post reflects more of the "custom" side of Cantina Customs with a look at some custom Jawa action figures I made for an extended Streets of Mos Eisley playset/diorama.

Group shot of custom Jawas mixed with stock Jawa action figures.

With the expectation of the Haslab Cantina, I wanted to customize some Jawas with ball-joint knees to see outside of the Cantina. I plan to just use the Black Series Jawas for inside the Cantina.

I had several older Luke Skywalkers based on the VOTC mold with the skinny swivel/bend knees.

I simply cut Luke's legs above and below the knee joint so it did not affect the swivel or bend articulation. Measured the pieces against the existing Jawa legs. Cut the Jawa legs where needed and glued the pieces together. I used the old super glue and baking soda trick to strengthen the bond and fill in any gaps. I plan to paint the legs to match the existing figures later.

These two Jawas are Offworld Jawas that I dyed red. The finished product has a reddish brown look. I boiled and popped the hoods off the heads before dying the pieces. This allowed better access to paint the red eyes yellow. Just to change things up a bit for these Jawas, I gave them alternate bandoliers. The Jawa on the left has one of the bandoliers from the Streets of Mos Eisley Jawa. The Jawa on the right wears the soft-goods vest from VOTC Greedo and the Offworld Jawa bandolier crossed over a G.I. Joe (?) bandolier.

This is a Black Series Jawa with custom ball-joint (swivel/bend) knees and a soft-goods skirt. The legs for the Black Series Jawas are articulated to sit, but the hard plastic skirt renders this useless. Teeka's, Offworld Jawa's, and Streets of Mos Eisley Jawa's legs are the same as the taller Black Series Jawa. The soft-goods skirt is an Ep. 3 Shaak Ti skirt. I switched up the bandoliers just a bit by giving him a Streets of Mos Eisley bandolier over an Offworld Jawa bandolier. The hands are from Grand Admiral Thrawn that I dyed red. The finished product has more of a deep red-brown look. With the articulated hands, the Jawa can hold the ion blaster better.

The Jawa on the left is the figure that came with the LIN droid. That Jawa figure does not have articulated legs under the hard plastic skirt. I gave this Jawa the legs from the taller Black Series Jawa, customized with Luke ball-joint knees. The soft-goods skirt is from some Jedi figure (I think). When I get around to painting the legs, I plan to alter the skirt a bit to make it less flared out.

The Jawa on the right is the Streets of Mos Eisley Jawa with the shorter Black Series Jawa's bandolier. I also trimmed off the tassels from the back of the hood.

I got the idea for this custom from YouTube user Toys Are the Way. The body is a Kuill figure painted brown. I used the hot glue trick to attach the Black Series Jawa head to the body. I painted the hood brown to better match the robe. The soft-goods robe is from an alien (Jedi?) figure. If I remember correctly, it's an alien that looks like Ratts Tyerrel. I glued the front pieces of the robe together. The bandolier is from the taller Black Series Jawa. This guy will stand in as my Jawa Chief.

A Long Time Coming: Part 2 — Fly Me to the Moon

Twenty years ago, when I first created the Cantina Customs Tripod website, I wanted to have a page with a list of every cantina patron I could find. Back then, there was not nearly as much information or pictures available as have come to light over the subsequent twenty years. I mean, back then, J. W. Rinzler, Pablo Hildalgo, and others were barely scratching the surface in their researching and archiving of actual Lucasfilm materials. So, a lot of the characters in the cantina did not have “official” names. I still question some of the so-called official names and have actually diverted back to some of John Mollo’s character names like “Crocker” or “Snaggletooth.” I will admit that it is pretty cool hearing or reading Star Wars fans refer to an obscure background character as Fu-Man-Chu, knowing that my old website was the first published use of this name, but I digress.

Unfortunately, one of the grave mistakes I made in identifying cantina patrons was in assigning the name “Little Aunt Beru” (Gilda Cohen) to Geoff (Jeff) Moon’s “Local Ugly Man” character. Now, in my defense (1) as mentioned, there was limited information on characters and actors twenty years ago and (2) I actually borrowed that identification from another website, which is where I found the black and white costume photo of the character. 

I never thought the character/actor looked female, but since another website identified the character as “Little Aunt Beru,” from John Mollo’s original character sketch notes, I just figured they probably knew more than I did. The problem, though, is that I cannot remember the name of that site. I thought I got it from Red 6’s now defunct page, but looking through the Way Back Time Machine, I could not find any references to Geoff’s character at all. 

Given that my old Tripod site has stood the test of time and is still active today, despite my inability to update and correct information, I may be the main source of this misinformation. Later, after I lost the program to update the Tripod site, I found this image of the Tonnika Sisters with the “Flash Gordon Midget” and unmasked “Bat,” and lo and behold, there is Gilda Cohen in the Kabe costume. 

Gilda was originally listed in Mollo’s character sketch notes as “Little Aunt Beru.” So, I have known for several years (a decade or more) that the moniker “Little Aunt Beru” was ascribed to wrong character, but I had no way of updating that old Tripod site. Other (newer) fan websites and Star Wars convention panels have discussed that the wrongly ascribed “Little Aunt Beru” character was in fact not Gilda Cohen but Geoffrey Moon (a man). 

Geoff also appeared in the 1978 Dudley Moore adaptation-comedy of (Sherlock Holmes) Hound of Baskervilles. Geoff has a speaking part as Perkins the driver (“Drive on Perkins”) that can be seen between 17:00–19:00 minutes. IMDB indicates that Geoff passed away in 1979, just short of his 26th birthday. Hopefully, with the renewed interest in the cantina through Haslab’s Mos Eisley Cantina modular diorama, Hasbro will focus more on cantina patrons, including “Ugly Human” characters like Geoff Moon’s.

Geoff Moon's name (spelled "Jeff") listed in John Mollo's character sketches among other "Local Ugly Men," Fred Wood, Robert Davies, Anthony Lang, and Salo Gardner.

Cantina scene call sheet from April 14, 1976. Geoff Moon's name is third from the bottom.

Geoff Moon mentioned in J. W. Rinzler, The Making of Stat Wars the Definitive Story Behind the Original Film, p. 168.

A Long Time Coming: Part 1

Wow! I have needed to make this blog for quite some time, but first a little background. Over twenty years ago I created a little janky (free) website called Droid Factory Customs to showcase my custom Star Wars action figures. Because of life and losing interest in Star Wars collecting at that time, I sold my entire collection and dropped out of the Star Wars customizing community. A few years later, one of my sons became very interested in Star Wars (around the Revenge of the Sith era) and that got me back into Star Wars customizing. So, almost twenty years ago, I created another, not-quite-as-janky (free) website called Cantina Customs.

With this new website, I also endeavored to create an Ultimate Mos Eisley Cantina Resource Page listing every cantina patron with a floor plan mapping out where each patron appeared in the main left-to-right pan scene of the cantina. Surprisingly, this little website became quite popular! I have seen links to this website on various Star Wars forums including some German and Japanese fan sites. Sadly, though, the computer I used to create that website crashed and burned and I lost all original images and the computer program (Lycos?) that I used to create it. I do not know squat about html, and I have no desire to learn about it. Consequently, Lycos software also became obsolete, and the Tripod host website is not quite as user friendly as I need it to be able to make updates to that site. So, be that as it may, that website has not been updated in a “long, long time.”

Fast forward to social media, especially Facebook, and I have met many Star Wars fans that have utilized information from my old Cantina Customs Tripod site. One of the main highlights from that site is the cantina floorplan that I drew on graph paper. I knew back then that I needed to put my name on at least one of the floorplans so that people would believe me when I said that I drew it 😉. I have actually seen a few custom Cantina dioramas based exclusively on my floorplan. What is funny is that I have actually had online conversations with people that have questioned if I am truly the same person who created that old Tripod website---bonkers! What is also a little weird is that I have also seen an Etsy and WordPress "Cantina Customs" websites that either link to my old Tripod site or just copy and pasted pics and text from my site. Hey, you know what they say about imitation.

Well, in the process of time (sounds like an opening in a novel), life once again took precedent (mostly my college education—I am months away from completing my PhD) and I also lost interest in the hobby, but never in Star Wars. As my brother Kevin used to call me, I will be a “Star Wars Freak” for life. Two things in recent years have, once again, pulled me back into the Star Wars collecting/customizing scene: the Target-exclusive Kenner “ketchup & mustard” Boba Fett (and subsequent Fetts based on that sculpt) and, most importantly, the Hasblab Mos Eisley Cantina! I never, in my life, would have thought that Hasbro would release a movie-accurate (well “from a certain point of view”—more about that in a future post) Mos Eisley Cantina playset or modular diorama, but here we are.

So, with a very renewed interest in the Mos Eisley Cantina and now being in the final stretch of a long college career, I turn back to my absolute favorite Star Wars scene ever—the Mos Eisley Cantina! Please stay tuned for various blog articles that will include behind the scenes information on the cantina scenes, a new floorplan based upon the actual set design blueprints, posts of Star Wars customs, and other random Star Wars ramblings!