GW are releasing even more Middle Earth models – filling in entries in army lists that didn’t previously have models, or providing updated plastic versions. In this article we review Beechbone the Ent. Before we dive in, we’d like to thank Games Workshop for sending us a preview copy of the Beechbone the Ent for review purposes.
This model had a bit of a long journey getting to me, which is why it isn’t painted in this review, and I wasn’t able to take pics to show alongside much more talented painters. That did save me a panic attack from thinking I’d be putting my painting up against Richard Gray though, so swings and roundabouts.
Tools Used
I would rate this kit as moderate complexity. For assembly and preparation I used clippers, a craft knife, plastic gap filler, super glue and gorilla glue in the build. I did not require a rotary tool (though if you work with metal miniatures or larger/more complex resin builds, rotary tools are great for drilling and sanding with appropriate safety gear). If you are a younger player or don’t have steady hands, you should get some help with the more delicate knife work in removing the resin vents.
The Casting Quality
Out of the box there are 18 resin components and the base. Casting is crisp and the level we’ve come to expect from the modern Forgeworld sculpts, and there are no obvious miscasts or misalignments. There are small resin vents as I mentioned in the Snow Troll review that you will need to remove and these are found at the end of many of the fingers, branches and leaves. These are annoying and require some deft knife work to get them all, in particular the vents at the end of very thin branches, but these are a necessary part of moulding for detail that small. There is only one shim to remove, as the sculptor sensibly doesn’t have voids between leaves on the branches that you have to punch out, which would have been incredibly fiddly.
Assembly
As I did with the Snow Troll I used sub-assemblies, and the instructions almost point you towards doing this, where you assemble the head and face first, then the body and stick the head on, then the arms, then stick the arms and the last of the branches on the body.
As with Birchseed there are a number of very similar looking branches that are numbered in the instructions but you have to work out what they are. Fortunately they’re a little more different than the branches on Birchseed and have different points of contact with the larger model, rather than a series of ball and socket joints. This should make it pretty hard to mess them up, but you will still spend a couple of minutes starting at the instructions trying to work out which is part 1 or 2 and which is part 5 or 6. It wouldn’t kill Forgeworld to put part numbers on the resin blocks which would resolve this (NB – for further research check if this would kill them, don’t be afraid of asking the big questions).
I assembled the legs & base and found a small misalignment, where the rear leg isn’t completely flat and doesn’t snugly fit the scenic base piece. I don’t know if this is a sculpting issue, or an issue that can be solved with a heat gun/very hot water and adjusting the leg at the knee by about 5 degrees (it is fairly thick though so I’m not sure if this would be possible). I spotted this after I was assembling the legs already, and dealt with it by using filler to cover the gap and avoid a void between the rear foot and the base.
The head branches are the fiddliest bit, and where I think the order of assembly is just flat wrong. Piece 3 attaches to piece 2 (the forehead branch) at the back. In the instructions you stick this on after you’ve already glued 3 branches to the head so you are trying to attach it from the back with two other branches in the way. Don’t do this to yourself, glue piece 3 to piece 2 before you start gluing branches to the head, and then glue piece 2 to the forehead, and it makes the whole thing simpler.
I’ve taken a picture of the fully assembled head below so you can see it clearly and how the branches go together. The instructions don’t zoom in enough in my opinion, and you end up a little uncertain as to the exact positioning of some pieces without dry fitting.
In general the thing that will annoy you most in the build is the little resin vents at the end of nearly every branch and cluster of leaves, very thin mould lines that you need to differentiate from bark lines, and possibly very slight mould misalignments that you have to remove with a sharp knife.
I sub-assembled the head, body and arms before final assembly. As you can see in the picture below, there isn’t a lot of base space left over for additional things (dead orcs etc) so I’ll be going with a little rock and basing paste to finish off.
I left the arm that crosses the body separate before undercoating, as gluing this in makes it hard to reach the leg and waist where it crosses, and leaving it off makes painting easier.
Conclusion
The finished model is scaled to the later Games Workshop Ents (from the plastic Ent kit onwards), and the tallest of them. The sculpting is a little better than the Birchseed Ent, and gets rid of the ball and socket joints on that model. The miniature is dynamic, and captures the Ent in the films well. It adds another centrepiece model to the Fangorn list, an army composed almost entirely of big impressive models.
It’s good to see GW add another model to the Ent range, good to see a continuing commitment to Middle Earth and good to see even obscure characters with six seconds of screen time getting models. The kit can be a little fiddly, but it’s nothing patience, a modelling knife and a little bit of filler can’t handle.
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