Okay, I admit it, I like the animated Teen Titans show, even though it's aimed primarily at kids. One of the best things, however, is that the 3.5 inch figures are both inexpensive and readily available at Target, thus allowing me to make custom figures! For my first three, I chose to make Starfire's sister Blackfire, Robin as Red X, and Cyborg with a blaster cannon arm.
In his mad quest to stop the villain Slade, Robin dressed up as a costumed villain named the Red X. Unfortunately, he didn't tell his teammates his plan, which they took as a betrayal of their trust.
This was the hardest of the three customs to make. I took the body of a standard Robin and
shaved off the details on his chest and belt, using both a razor knife and a heavy file, followed
by fine sandpaper to make the surface smooth. Then I took the head of a 'motorcycle helmet' Robin
and popped it right off the figure. Alas, the roll of film in which I took the 'progress' photos
was destroyed, so I only have the end results to show you. Anyway, a good deal of cutting and shaving,
followed by sanding, was needed on the helmet as well, to make it look like a smooth, face-covering
mask. Again, I wish I had progress pics. Finally, a bit of the cape from the Zipline Batman I used
to make the Thomas Wayne figure was glued to Robin's plastic cape, then painted gray on the inside.
The figure was then reassembled and painted as best as I could manage with my VCR on pause, and I'm
rather pleased with the final result.
The next figure was simpler. Starfire has an older sister named Blackfire, and aside from
their hair and eye color, they look almost identical. Even their costumes are pretty similar.
So really, all this entailed was popping off the head of a Starfire figure (after dipping it in
near-boiling water to soften the plastic) and repainting the figure and head. Starfire has more
exposed skin than her sister, who wears grayish armor on her arms, legs, and midsection. These gray
areas should have very thin horizontal lines as well, but when I tried painting these, it turned out
just terrible, so I went with unlined.
Finally, the simplest figure of all was Cyborg.
Cyborg's left arm can transform into a sonic cannon. Now the 5-inch figure actually comes with an arm you can pop off and replace with a cannon, which is pretty cool. The 3.5-inch figure comes with a hand-held cannon accessory, which I've never seen him use in the show (in fact, I've never seen any of the characters use any of the accessories they come with, with the exception of Triton, who comes with his trident weapon). So using a fine-toothed hacksaw, I chopped off Cyborg's arm just below the elbow, then sliced off the 'grip' of the cannon. I snipped a short length of a safety pin (which turned out to be a bit hardier than a straight pin) and stuck half of it into Cyborg's arm-stump, then twisted the cannon onto the other end. Very simple, really, and best of all, his arm can be reattached with the same method (though I have another Cyborg figure with his arm intact already, though I noticed afterward that the one I'd modified turned out to be the one with the 'motorcycle riding' hands).
First Robin, then Terra became Apprentices to Slade. I really liked Robin's costume, though Terra's was...meh. So I put her in a costume similar to Robin's. Robin was made by simply switching Robin's head onto Slade's body. Well, not so simple, since Robin's head has a hole in which his neck-post fit. Slade's body had a hole in which his head-post fit. Not exactly compatible. So I had to find a screw about the size of Slade's neck-hole, actually just a touch larger. Sawed off the non-pointy end and screwed it into the body, then screwed Robin's head onto the pointy part. I could have simply glued the head on, but then there'd be no articulation. Plus I know from experience that gluing heads back on rarely works for long.
Terra was simpler -- I just removed her head, added the yoke part of Robin's cape, then re-attached.
A paint job later, and she matched Robin. Again, it's not the costume Slade made her wear (with
which he was able to control her powers), but I like it. Maybe someday, Bendai will actually make
a figure of Apprentice Terra!
Frankly, making Teen Titans customs is a blast. Though small
and sometimes hard to work with, they're dirt-cheap and quite available right now. Someday soon,
I hope to show you customs of my animated versions of both Superboy and Impulse!
