35 years ago, the military miniature hobby had a strange attitude toward soft plastic figures.  Soldiers such as Marx and MPC were considered “toys.”  Soldiers by Britains were considered to be something better.  Back then, Britains figures were PVC plastic.  One has to wonder.  Of course, there was the hardcore contingent that felt that only metal figures could be serious miniatures, while others might accept hard plastic figures such as Historex.  Most had little regard for plastic figures by Monogram or Tamiya.

                Most soft plastic figures were made as toys.  Marx was a toymaker.  Though the sculpting on Marx figures can be exquisite, the details are not always historical.   For instance, too many of the World War II 54mm soldiers are armed with carbines. The Marx World War II Germans lack suspenders, and many carry a rifle that looks more like an Enfield carbine than any Mauser.   Anomalies can be found in most ranges of toy figures.  Accuracy was not as important as play value.

                The first plastic kit figures were pretty good, but limited.  Adams (Later Renwal, later Revell) produced a set of 1/40 scale American figures that has good poses, detail and animation.  Their main weakness was their size: 45mm.  Monogram also made a set of plastic kit soldier, but these were 1/35, or 50mm scale.  Size and time worked against Monogram.  Though figures in correct World War II uniforms were included with some kits, the boxed set of troops were late 1950s types.  Monogram also had a problem of some troops being a bit off, insofar as detail or proportion.

                Tamiya came out with some of the finest tank models of the time.  Despite their being 1/35 instead of the accepted 1/32 scale, they had good detail and were accurate.  Their initial sets of soldiers were less accommodating.  Their “German Infantry” was toyish, and their tank crews were robotically stiff.  Metal still ruled the roost, insofar as realism. 

                I have often wondered why hard plastic figures come up short, even when the sculpting is extraordinary.  The main problems are in the arms and hands. 

                Arms often do not fit properly to bodies, leaving gaps.  Also, many modelers place arms slightly off, without doing any corrective work to the place where they join the shoulder.  Corrective work ,such as filing, smoothing, putty and adding creases to clothes are essential for  realism.  Granted, some figures are so obtuse that they make corrections too difficult, if not impossible.

                The hands of plastic figures are often shaped to accommodate whatever thing the modeler wishes to insert.  The result is an open hand with protruding thumb.  Items are “clamped” by the hand, rather than gripped.  A modeler has to rework the hand so that it is fused around the object it is holding.  Using putty to fill the gap between the hand and the object is fruitless.  The modeler has to cut, file, notch ,and otherwise rework the hand and fingers.

                A side issue is the one of individual pieces of equipment.  Tamiya was famous for packing canteens and other “add-ons.”  The problem was that extra equipment was molded as if it were on the shelf, not on the soldier’s back!  All field gear tends to fold or press into the soldier.  Backpacks flatten on the back; canteens press against the side, rather than resting atop the uniform.  Tamiya did not take into account that soldiers and uniforms are pliable.  The modeler needs to create impressions on the soldier into which equipment melds.  (If you ever wore real field gear, you know what I mean!

                The sculptors of the better metal figures were making very specific pieces, right down to weapons and equipment.  They were able to sculpt all details precisely, and they knew how to account for field gear, hands and weapons.  The plastic sculptors in Japan were not as cautious, as they were obviously using an “assembly-line” approach.

                Plastic figure quality changed in the 1980s, as more makers entered the field.  Tamiya began offering more realistic kit figures. Makers like Dragon, Airfix and Italeri produced kits of hard plastic figures that could almost match the best metals.  A combination of better sculpting and better plastic technology has given us a broad range of plastic kit figures.  These can be made “as is”, or converted with a few easy tricks.