GW's 30th Anniversary Space Marine

30th Anniversary Space Marine Figure from GW

So, we'll kick this off with the disclaimers. Yes, it was a rip-off.  Yes, GW still managed to make it a partially bungled experience.  Yes, it was a plastic figure.  Yes, the plastic figure was oriented in such a way as to make any conversion you might want to attempt much harder than necessary. Yes, GW is generally run by a pack of rectally-oriented clowns who give both the hobby and capitalism bad reputations...

This was not encouraging when I first tried to order online...but it all worked out in the end

So with all that fan-boy bile out of the way, I just have to say I still absolutely love the GW 30th Anniversary Space Marine figure. A testament to my enjoyment of the setting. And my stubborn idiocy, perhaps, but I'll focus more on the first part.

Odd arrangements on the sprue...

...but it comes together nicely!

GW never likes to make it easy to like or support them - this exercise was a good example of this tendency.We had been told the figures would be available in-store only.  I dreaded a fanboy mob, but hey, I was keyed up, so a group of us deployed to the local GW retail location, only to find that five minutes late might as well have been hours late. All of the figures in the store were spoken for not even minutes after opening!

But fortunately GW had apparently misled its own staff, and the figure would, in fact, be available online as well (which makes sense because it's a plastic figure, and the idea that you couldn't run enough of them to sell to every fanboy willing to pay $35 for one over a weekend is hilarious, but I digress once again).  So I set my clock to order at the appointed time.  The initial screens were not encouraging (see above), but it all worked out eventually.

Trudging to battle with a funkified combi-weapon of some kind

The sculptors killed it with this figure - great job, I love it

Bottom line is that I was able to order one online, it arrived in due course, and I finally found a break from a recent period of intense time at work to put it together and paint it. And it's a fun little model.  I generally find GW to have an, at best, tepid regard for it's own history, so I was stunned to see GW even bother to acknowledge this anniversary, much less do so with such a nice figure, with a figure that would have all of us (or maybe just a dork like me) running to our copies of Rogue Trader to find these old castings in the photos.  That was a genuine surprise.

Remember these guys from Rogue Trader??? Awesome!!

The plastic is very well done.  The model is a beauty.  I painted him up as a Crimson Fist because it just didn't seem right to paint him any other way (although I do want to do one of these for the Sons of Horus some day).  The only downside? I used the stupid oversize 32mm base (the new standard size for Space Marines).  Looking back, he would have been better on a classic base, to fit in with the rest of the lads I have painted for this Chapter.

But at the same time, this really is not a gaming figure - more of a collector's item for the shelf.  Maybe he'll join a 40k game some day, but really he's just around to guard the gaming shelf and for fun.

Crimson Fist decal sitting awkwardly on the shoulder plate

Nice details on the backpack/power unit, and I love the handy extra-dangerous-looking "utility blade"

Was a lot of fun to paint this fellow up

I know a couple of the other guys scored their own anniversary models, so I look forward to seeing them painted up too.  And who knows? Maybe we'll figure out a way to get this guy involved in game.

I hope everyone else out there has as much fun working on this figure as I did - despite GW's best efforts, you will really enjoy it, and whatever I think of their rollout, here's hoping they continue to explore their own history for other cool figures.

And I hope someone out there mocks up the gun this guy is carrying, because a squad of guys carrying them would be just awesome...