Miniart has certainly raised the bar when it comes to the quality of 1/35 scale plastic figure kits, and this set gives you some very nice figures indeed. The animation of the figures in this set isn’t as exciting as some of their other sets with the ubiquitous ”standing around doing nothing” look, but they re very well done and the detail is very good.
The sculpting is excellent with good folds to the uniforms, very nicely detailed faces and hands, extremely good uniform fittings, including moulded on rank and unit patches, and good poses inspite of the lack of movement. The mouldings are very good with minimal cleanup, the fit as on most figures using seperate legs requires a little filler in and cleanup to completely eliminate the joins once assembled but nothing major. Assembly is of course childsplay with only the base figures to put together without any accoutrements.
Intended for use with Miniart’s Bantam jeep, but usable elswhere also, one figure is intended to be the driver, another sitting in the rear of the jeep, a third standing on the passenger side of the jeep while the fourth and fifth are intended to be MPs standing outside the vehicle. All wear bare M1 helmets ( despite the artwork none include netting ), M1943 field trousers and M1938 leggings. Three wear the M1941 field jacket, the driver an M1943 Field Jacket and the fifth a Tanker Jacket.
Not much is provided in the way of personal equipment with the MPs getting the most with a canteen each, a set of M1 Garand ammo pouches, a holstered M1911A1 pistol, a pistol mag pouch, and a very nicely done M1 Garand that includes all three sling swivels delicately moulded to the gun. The driver gets no equipment, the standing figure a holstered M1911A1 pistol and a pistol mag pouch, while the sitting figure gets a canteen, a pistol mag pouch and an M1A1 Thompson sub-machine gun, but no mag pouches for the Thompson.
As is the norm with Miniart figure kits the assembly instructions and painting guide are included on the reverse of the box and you may want to pay attention to this colour chart as it correctly gives the colour for the M1941 jackets as Olive Green, not the buff colour that everyone usually thinks they are.
Once again Miniart have shown that the well sculpted faces and uniforms normally associated with resin figures are possible in plastic kits and this set is another very good one. Although touted as a Jeep crew and designed with the intention of being used in Miniart’s Bantam Jeep, these figures can easily be adapted to pretty much any U.S. vehicle in the ETO so if you have a truck, jeep, halftrack or similar that needs a crew then these are definitely worth considering.
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