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| Sketch as done by Jes Goodwin, used without owner's permission. |
Observe. Jagged holes, bolted on plates, tubes, chips and cracks. A clear contrast of white paper to dull-grey graphite or ink. A helm characterized by a skull-like lower area, bolts, an almost starwars-esque visor-slit, and a Pickelhaube spike. Many circles are utilized as symbols; the metal plate adorned with Nurgle's Emblem, the stomach, the knees and the black circle that contains three skulls on the Marine's shoulder.
A clear aesthetic, marked by surprisngly many clear and straight lines. Observe how almost all rough surfaces and blemishes, such as ribbed tubes and cracks, are contained within those clear lines. Consider, how no pockmark, hole, or tear disturbs the mostly straight lines that make up the shins or arms.
This image, so it follows, creates a very clear image of what a Plague Marine/Chaos Renegade of Nurgle is supposed to look like in the 41st millenium, according to Jes Goodwin. I tend to agree with this vision, and it is this vision that I hoped Games Workshop would return to eventually. Did they though?
Well, yes and no. Observe again.
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| Picture taken from Games Workshop^s website without their permission. |
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Horns, tattered cloth, mutations, maws, tentacles and spikes. Much has changed, and yet many of Jes Goodwin's primordial design-aspects can be discerned. A very brutal, heavy aspect exemplified by the violence encapsulated in Mark II&III armour, the return of those archetypical retro-helms and their eclectic mix of sci-fi and historical influences, as well as wear and tear that evoke an image of disrepair and natural degradation induced by millenia of warfare.
However, those new elements, especially horns and plague-bearer faces, seem to be very prominent. The formerly clean, well-contained design seems to be disrupted, disjointed, and, well, almost abandoned for a lack of better words. Does this make it a bad design? Not really, no. There are many things to like about it, if this aesthetic is to your taste. However, Jes' sketchwork is what got me into Warhammer 40k, and his Plague Marine is one of his greatest pieces in my opinion. Surely then, I must see the kit as a failure? Not at all! Most of my gripes with the kit come from the way the lay-out is done, and how limiting and at times frustrating it is to convert and generally build. Aesthetically, it is varied in detail work, crisp in casting and the mold-lines are well-placed and easy to remove. It is also very accepting of other parts; heads, arms and fists can be swapped easily. If you wish to swap the backpacks, you'll have to remove the small nub on the torsos back, as otherwise the backpack won't sit flush.
Let us return to the initial question: Did they return to Jes' aesthetic? I posit that they did and did not at the same time. The aesthetic, to me, clearly isn't visible anymore due to all the visual disturbances and the confusing colouring that now introduces vibrant violets and blues into a usually more sombre, and dark palette. However, Jes' aesthetic can be carved out of the kit and be brought back to the light of day. If you observe the kit carefully, then you'll notice that Jes' sketchwork is the basis for the kit, all the clutter has just been added on-top of it.
So I set out to de-clutter my Plague Marines.
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As you can see, the huge potato-masher grenades have been removed from this pair of legs. Nothing is wrong with them per se, but I hate how they broke up the silhouette when viewed from the front. The horn-outgrowths have been removed from the left shoulder-pad. I've used a regular phobos-pattern bolter and a plastic Mark III helm as well as shoulderpad. The left arm is a FW Mark III resin arm and is armed with a plastic gladius. There is also a half-cloak behind the left arm.
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Again, a horn outgrowth has been removed from the fly-shoulderpad (right). The plague-bearer face has been removed from the right shin, and roughed up a bit to appear more pitted (A lucky coincidence of the removal process, really). Here, perhaps, puzzling, there are more overt mutations on the bolter, but consider that they are still "contained" within the silhouette of the bolter and body. The head comes from the Blightlords' kit (more on that one in the future), and I picked it because I liked the weird mix of blindness and grim grin. The head is also very smooth and clear in terms of silhouette.
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Again, a smoothed down shooulderpad, the tentacle holding the axe has been cut down and the axe-head has been replaced. The backpack and helm come from the plastic Mark III kit. I've removed the chest-spikes, not because I dislike them, but because I want to put a nice crossed-scythe transfer on his chest. I've left the spikes on the left leg because I like this Horus Heresy element it carries (GW, we need more bits with pyramidical spikes, like right now).
Now, you might say that there are astonishingly few Pickelhaube heads here, and that there are quite some pitted pieces and flesh-growths, especially on the first Plague Marine. I think that is fine. Aesthetics evolve, get replaced and reformed. Thesis and anti-thesis come together, fuse and create a solution together (A horrid over-simplification of Hegelian Dialectics in a shitpost, based on me playing Fallout New Vegas for the past few weeks). Astartes have become bigger these days, their arsenals have expanded, and we have more plastic kits to chose from than at any point ever.
I have not expirienced the Rogue Trader days, as I was born in the middle of the 90s. I have not actively partaken in the days of 2nd edition. But during my early years, a friend in Croatia introduced me to a duo of money-consuming hobbies, Magic the Gathering and Warhammer 40k, both of which are still an elemental part of my life. I can still vividly remember the day he showed me the Plague Marine sketch done by Jes Goodwin. Funny, I do not remember the medium it was one; was it a print? Within a magazine? Or a book? I don't know, but I vividly remember the artwork itself, and it has been etched into my sci-fi image corpus since then.
Do I think that the new Plague Marine kit is perfect? No, but one can do great things with it. One is not served the full Jes Goodwin aesthetic on a silver platter, and some might lament that. I say it is good. By applying oneself to the figure, being brave by picking up a knife and carving away at the figure gently, one can reach something very close. Two aesthetics in one, if you will, and choise is always good in my book. You can do many things with the Plague Marine kits. Mutated Nurgle Renegades. Bloated bellies en masse. Regular Mark III chests. Retro-Helmets or new gas mask style helmets. Bone growths or smooth, almost insectile armors. Mind you, all these choices are only contained within one kit. You just have to apply yourself to the kit, carve out the piece of grim-dark future that you like. That's what's beautiful about the hobby though, isn't it? Applying yourself to it. Creating something unique.
I'll leave you with another Plague Marine. Thank you for the time you took out of your day to read this.
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