Gecco’s
Tales from the Apocalypse kit series fits together to tell a story of a fight for survival as zombies roam around a city. The first three-kit series, called
Day 1, 11:50 am on the freeway, includes a heroine, a truck driver, and a traffic guard. The packaging looks like the vintage VHS boxes seen in video stores, complete with labels, wear, and fading. The atmospheric design continues on the instructions, which are printed like a newspaper and tell part of the story. Unfortunately, they don’t give step-by-step directions, but photos of the completed figure and an exploded view of the parts help.
Each kit contains parts individually packaged in sealed pouches. The beautifully molded parts have no flash or ejector-pin marks, and the mold seams are nearly invisible. I spent just five minutes on each kit cleaning up the parts to prepare for assembly.
Dry-fitting showed the figures could be built and painted in subassemblies. Starting with the legs, I glued the body parts together. A little acrylic putty and a damp brush took care of seams. Gecco molded the legs solid, as opposed to the hollow arms and torso. That lowers the center of gravity and keeps the dramatically posed figures upright.
On the heroine, I glued the face to the upper part of the torso and filled a small seam under the chin. But I might not have needed to, because the kit is engineered so you don’t really see the join.
I dry-fitted the woman’s head and torso to get the hair aligned. This was the only tricky part of any of the kits. I glued two of the three hair parts together, painting the inside of the hair pieces black before attaching them to the body as they would be hard to reach after assembly.
I filled tiny gaps on the truck driver’s wrists. He comes with an optional cap and some intestines if you want extra gore; the part snaps on so you can take it on and off.
Building the traffic guard was straightforward, and the kit includes optional left arms and a hardhat. I wanted to leave the head off for painting, but it locks into the torso halves. So, I just trimmed the front part of the mounting tab and was able to snap it into the torso afterward. I wish the kit included decals for the stop sign; I used dry transfers from a craft store.
Final assembly was a breeze, with tight fits that required little glue and minimized the risk of damage to the paint. The kits were a blast to build, and they provide plenty of scope for finishing and display.
Note: A version of this review appeared in the September 2017 issue.