As the title states, I’m looking for a figure, with a little work, could be a reasonable replication of a CIA Officer during the Vietnam era. I know, the CIA wasn’t there. [:D]
I’ve seen a bunch of figures for Vietnam, but they are all straught-up military, I haven’t seen a one that could be modded to look otherwise. I’m going for someone who would fly under the radar, as every good Spook would do.
Are there any figures on the market that would fit the bill?
Hmm… I guess it depends on what you mean by flying under the radar, I’m not really sure if you mean they’d blend into military-esque units or the population. I’ve seen picture of CIA officers in camo and denim, faces painted black.
Also I don’t know if you wanted a stand alone figure or a group, if you were going the group route you could have a few SEALs or other spec ops types with the officer and then it’s not so much making him blend in but making him stand out- ie instead of full camo maybe give him the standard green uniform without the web belts etc. and instead of a long rifle, maybe have him holding a pistol or something like that.
I think no matter what you’re going to have to do some minor modification and kit swapping. The problem is Dragon’s Vietnam figure line is OOP and somewhat hard to find.
I’d recommend, if you could get your hands on them, these two figure kits
3302 SEALs (Comes with a silenced pistol btw)
3309 Green Berets
What I like about the Dragon kits is they come with a little bit of everything so if you want to mix and match it’s not too difficult, also they’re plastic so cutting/scraping/sanding away unwanted detail is much better. Again, they’re OOP but you can usually find them somewhere around on the internet.
But this is all with my version of a CIA officer in my head and I’m not really sure what you wanted to represent.
I was thinking of a guy in civilian clothes. The picture in my head is a guy wearing blue jeans and a button down shirt. He flew in to give a quick briefing to a meeting of soldiers and then will be flying back out as soon as he’s done.
I’d really love to Hollywood-ize him and have the shirt being a Hawaiian shirt.
That’s the goal, I’m not shooting for realism, just a fun little shelf sitter.
Oh I understand, sounds like a good dio idea. It might not bee all too Hollywood, I think theres some pictures of those Air America pilots in Hawaiian shirts.
I’m not sure how easy it would be to convert a 1/35 torso to include a button down front (as I can’t think of any off the top of my head- hope someone else can chime in) but if you were going to, I think you could either start with any old torso and cut down the detail/add in the button down, or you could go with a bare chested “blank” almost and then sculpt the shirt over that- maybe unbutton a few buttons or something? I don’t know.
Good luck, sounds like a fun piece
It is really easy to modify a soldier into a civilian in jeans and shirt. I have done it a few times. I used Dragon ODS-era US figures w/o PAGST vest body armor. Basically you just shave off the unwanted pockets and web gear. A little scribing on the shirt front for the buttons and you are pretty much done. You may also want to extend the pant legs with some A&B putty so they are untucked, sand down the boots and paint them as tennis shoes, etc. You can leave the cargo pocjets on the pants if you want, or shave them off to represent jeans too. To make him a little more civilian, you could also put a baseball cap on him and add some longer hair using the putty again.
Another option is to get Dragon’s US NAVY SELS II set which has a guy in dungerees (jeans) and sneakers already. You sould still need to rework his shirt though.
Good luck.