Painted Verena Talos, MHD-19 and Loku Kanoloa: Return to Hoth (Part 2)

Here's the second installment of my painted miniatures for Return to Hoth, the new expansion for Star Wars Imperial Assault. These are the three Rebel Heroes, Verena Talos ("the cunning operative"); MHD-19 ("the loyal medic"); and Loku Kanoloa ("the deadly marksman").

These are three excellent miniatures: dynamic poses, detailed sculpting, and lots of personality. 

I was particularly pleased with Verena Talos. Although a she's a pure invention of Fantasy Flight Games, she has an authentic "Star War-sy" feel. Perhaps it's the dramatic braid of hair -- that's a trick that always worked for Princess Leia. In any case, I like the way that FFG has populated Imperial Assault with a number of bad-ass women, including Verena, Jyn Odan and Diala Passil. With the advent of The Force Awakens, strong women are certainly the new face of Star Wars.

And here's the infelicitously named Loku Kanoloa, a deadly sniper named after a cooking oil. I would have thought that squids would be sensitive to anything reminiscent of a deep-fryer. Perhaps it's time for FFG to splurge on a new Star Wars name generator. 

At least I now have someone to lead my Mon Calamari Rebel Saboteurs. 

My favourite new miniatures is the medical droid MHD-19. It pleases me that Fantasy Flight Games has given us this hero because Star Wars droids have always fascinated me. What is it like to be a droid? On the one hand, they are bought, sold and chopped up for spare parts. Some ("the Gonk Droid") are essentially walking toasters. In one of the first scenes of A New Hope, we Jawas pedaling droids to the dirt farmers of Tatooine as if they were copper pots. 

Servio ergo sum

On the other hand, many droids are sentient, sensitive and self-willed. They feel pain. C-3PO is downright emotional. And indeed, after watching The Force Awakens, I began to wonder whether R2-D2 is force-aware. 

Does this make droids like human slaves? Maybe. They are frequently shackled with restraining bolts (like the ones that Luke puts on R2 and 3PO on Tatooine). Yet droids all seem content with a life of service (with the exception of aberrations like IG-88 and 4-LOM). We never see a droid asking for wages or emancipation. So perhaps droids are a category unto themselves -- sentient beings without any personal aspirations or ambitions. That is something truly alien to us. I suppose that's what I like about droids; since the movies don't tell us what to think, their true nature is left to our own imagination. That's the way Star Wars should be... strange and mysterious.

Thanks for looking!