Alkhema

For my second custom figurine, I chose Alkhema, a relatively minor villain from the Avengers comics. Also known as War Toy, she was created in 1992 by writer Roy Thomas (creator of Ultron) and artist David Ross, for a two-part storyline in the Avengers West Coast series that featured Ultron’s latest diabolical scheme to wipe out humanity. As he had done before with Jocasta, Ultron decided to construct a female mate for himself, this time using the brain patterns of the captured Mockingbird. Alkhema was the result. 

Ultron’s creations are destined to turn on him. But unlike Jocasta, who ended up helping the Avengers defeat him, Alkhema remained quite evil. She just disagreed with him about the best way to kill everyone. While Ultron always prefers mass destruction, Alkhema took pleasure in teasing and tormenting her victims one by one. This difference caused the two psychotic robots to quarrel and eventually go their separate ways.

Alkhema's first appearance.

George Perez's highly improved redesign from 1999.

In her early appearances Alkhema’s design was kind of a mess, like she’d been cobbled together from random parts of other characters (Wolverine-style headpiece, Voltron face, giant Lara-Croft cone boobs, and Terminator-style arms and legs). Her look was finally streamlined and improved for the Ultron Unlimited storyline in 1999, with a sleek robotic body of silver and black with various accents in burgundy. (Many elements from the original design were retained, like the Wolverine headpiece, gauntlet spikes, and two-toed feet.) This was the version I wanted to sculpt.

Looking through possibilities for a base figure, I chose Vixen from Eaglemoss’s DC line. This figurine has a powerful, assertive pose that looks as if she’s challenging someone, raising her left hand with an implied threat. I thought that left hand would work well with Alkhema’s gauntlet spikes.

After removing the base, stripping the original paint, and filing away some small details, I used Milliput to sculpt the details of Alkhema’s armor. Some small details, like the wires running from her shoulder-mounted blasters to her back, were too small too sculpt so I left them off. I filed down Vixen’s head considerably to keep the proportions of Alkhema’s robotic head right – otherwise it would have looked like a human wearing a large helmet, instead of being her actual robotic head.

Some of the details were very difficult to sculpt, and sanding small areas like her face proved challenging too. Her face didn’t turn out as smooth as I would have liked, but overall I think she cuts a fine figure, and I think she looks great standing next to Ultron, ready to decimate anyone who stands in her path (even if that happens to be Ultron!).  

"How best to exterminate humanity, my dear? Let me count the ways..."

For the Eaglemoss-style issue cover, I used artwork from the interior of Avengers: The Ultron Imperative one-shot, by Pat Olliffe with inks by John Livesay.

* ESSENTIAL READING *

1. Avengers West Coast #91 (Feb. 1993). Alkhema and her creator Ultron decimate the Avengers West Coast, before bickering about the best way to wipe out humanity.

2. Avengers #19 (Aug 1999). Now operating independently from her creator Ultron, Alkhema wreaks havoc on the Avengers' main roster until Scarlet Witch's hexes narrowly take her down.

3. Avengers: The Ultron Imperative (Nov 2001). Alkhema creates an entire army of "children" based on the brain engrams of the Avengers; she battles both them and a revived Ultron as well.

Till next time, human.

Next up, Cable's clone from the future, the Chaos Bringer -- Stryfe!