Page 86 - Star Wars Insider #181

“THE HARDEST PART WAS MAKING SURE THAT along the way. First the legs are
painted, then the head piece is
THE CLICKING MECHANISM WORKED, SO THAT vac-metalized, and fi nally the body
YOU COULD TURN THE HEAD ON A FIGURE THIS sticker is applied.
LARGE AND STILL GET THAT SATISFYING, Presumably, though, the whole
NOSTALGIC EXPERIENCE—ONLY LOUDER!” process is a lot easier than
making a screen-accurate R2-D2?
Well, it’s true that there is a lot less
surface detail on this piece than on
process that will break some fans’ Choosing the correct materials, a screen-actuate R2-D2, but that
and collectors’ hearts—especially and making sure that the quality doesn’t mean we’ve let down our
when they learn we did the exact and standards of the fi nished guard when it comes to attention
same thing with some extremely piece meet our expectations as to detail. If fans are going to spend
collectible characters to create our designers and fans ourselves, is a this much money and dedicate this
jumbo Power of the Force fi gures! big part of the job. Our R2-D2 is much space in their homes, we are

made of fiberglass, which requires determined to ensure that what
And how does the production a very different manufacturing they’re getting is as close to the
process differ from other statues? process to our usual materials, vintage figure as possible. That

We try very hard to make sure we such as injection-molded plastic, includes the design, the materials,
can stay true to the vintage fi gure, resin, and polystone. Usually, the and the engineering that makes
while also making sure that it will painting is the second-to-last thing the clicking head function work
hold together at this much larger to happen, prior to fi nal approval properly at this scale. That is a
scale and function in the same way from Lucasfilm. But for R2-D2, feature that you would not get

as its vintage counterpart. each piece has been hand-fi nished with a screen-accurate version of

01 / Despite its life-sized proportions, Gentle Giant’s upscaled R2-D2 figure re-creates the original toy exactly, even down to the molding seam on its legs.