Now in my book this has got to be one of the best announcements in a while because French figure sets are few and far between unless you go resin, and tank crews even rarer. Miniart’s kit number 35105 will give us five French tank crew which suddenly makes building that Tamiya B1 bis even more appealing.
Also, all but the officer would fit in nicely as Spanish Republican tankers (and the two in khaki could work well as Nationalist tankers too).
These are the best sets, where theres a whole range of possibilities (as opposed to say US Marines).
Stuff like that is always handy to know, I’d like to do something Spanish civil war sometime.
There’s such massive complexity between Republican/Nationalist and regular/irregular/International Brigades/Morrocan/Civil Guard/early/late uniforms that you can pretty much put anything in depending on what (or who) you want to depict.
George Orwell sums it up in Homage to Catalonia: “I have spoken of the militia ‘uniform’, which probably gives a wrong impression. It was not exactly a uniform. Perhaps a ‘multiform’ would be the proper name for it. Everyone’s clothes followed the same general plan, but they were never quite the same in any two cases. Practically everyone in the army wore corduroy knee-breeches, but there the uniformity ended. Some wore puttees, others corduroy gaiters, others leather leggings or high boots. Everyone wore a zipper jacket, but some of the jackets were of leather, others of wool and of every conceivable colour. The kinds of cap were about as numerous as their wearers. It was usual to adorn the front of your cap with a party badge, and in addition nearly every man wore a red or red and black handkerchief round his throat. A militia column at that time was an extraordinary-looking rabble.”
Well that would definitely make for an interesting scene, particularly as many of the vehicles seem to have been equally cobbled together from whatever was at hand.
Magnifique!
Hopefully they keep the scarves and the more flamboyant aire of the crew – the plain uniform is pretty bland. Plus there’s that fairly recent Tamiya French infantry set and a UE tankette… hmmm
superb – and even free french forces in my beloved Shermans…!!