Tangkou Of The Living Dead Ooak Custom - "Creeping Stink Flesh"... [¬º-°]¬ "Grr Argh"

28th May 2014

I Just had to share my almost finished "Night of the Living Dead Tangkou Ooak Custom" - I've been working on her for the last four days...

My inspiration came from images of "Bicycle Girl" from The Walking Dead , Scott H. Reiniger as Roger and David Emge as Stephen in George A Romero's 1979 Dawn of The Dead, with a bit of  Sherman Howard as Bub the Zombie from George A Romero's 1985 Day of The Dead thrown in!

I have always (well ever since I first watched Dawn of the Dead when I was six years old), wanted a Zombie doll, but alas in the 1980's Zombie dolls just weren't available to buy for the little girl in your life, or to save up your pocket money for..

Further inspiration came when I discovered a Flickr friend of mine ( blythephotos ) had turned one of her Blythes into a Zombie, so I knew it was possible if you have enough time / vision and skill to make it work,  I carried the thought with me for a few years until I found a suitable candidate for "Zombiedom".

I actually forgot about it until I got into "The Walking Dead" series, and my desire began to resurface, strangely though it took me several more months to realise which doll I could use for the experiment...
                                                     
The base doll is the France Tangkou I bought for custom work see review post here: french-girl-arrived, I chose to use my France Tangkou as a guinea pig after trying several times to customise her and disliking the outcome every time, I'd pretty much got to the stage where I didn't like her anymore and regretted wasting my money on her, so I thought, why not?  If it works I'll fall in love and if it doesn't she'll go back in my "Box of Victims" that she's been sitting in for months an I'll recycle her parts for someone else later on, so it wouldn't really be a big loss.

Here's a recap (before) photo of her before she "turned" ...

                                                              ** Update - 6th June 2014**
                                                                 Finished Girl - Woot!

I replaced her original body with a type 2 Pullip one which I received with a partially customised Little Big Eyes doll which I bought for a separate custom; as the doll's body was very stained due to the dye in her stock outfit seeping into her "skin".

The Flickr friend I purchased her from included the Pullip body she'd been given to replace the original when she bought it for custom.

I'd tried this body on several of my dolls as I didn't like it with the Little Big Eyes head, and her body stains were easy enough for me to fix, so it stayed surplus to requirements, waiting for a head to need it for a number of years.

Anyhoo, the body had been in storage for several years now and was not in very good shape anymore due to it's yellowing with age, and is quite wobbly too, but this of course makes it ideal as a zombie body!

I removed and replaced her original eye chips and eye lashes.  The "dead" skin etc, was produced by adding layers and carving / reshaping the areas I wanted, then painting and sealing, I've added glaze in some areas to make it look as though she's recently eaten too...

After I finished her face/head plates I started the same process on her head cap - with the addition of a cracked skull complete with rotting brain!  *Grin*

                                            ** Updated Update - 25th June 2014**

We went to Bishop’s Wood  Nature Reserve, Caswell Bay, Swansea as part of my Birthday "Day Out" around Swansea's Coastline;which turned out to be the perfect place to take photo's of my Zombie Girl, who oddly found her new name during our photo' session/ dog walk in the woods and will henceforth be known by the moniker "Creeping Stink Flesh"!

Btw, is it just me or does Bishop’s Wood sound like a place name from Midsomer Murders?
Anyhoo, the place is Zombie infested as these photo's will prove, so be careful if you decide to take a stroll down that way...

Something Wicked This Way Comes...

I managed to snap these two photo's before my Son stole not only my camera but "Stink Flesh" too and wandered off into the woods to take the following photographs - that's my boy!

Disclaimer:  I have been told to make it clear that my Son is not into dolls or playing with them!
I'm also not allowed to mention his own doll collection and as I have definitely not done so I can now get on with posting his pictures... Enjoy!!

For a doll that happened as an experiment, I'm very pleased with her. I will probably be changing her body at some point as the Pullip one she has is a bit of a nuisance in terms of pose and hold, aesthetically I think it's perfect - which is why I haven't yet decided whether she's keeping it or not, in terms of a replacement, I have no idea what I could use instead, so right now it stays!

I has such a lot of fun making her, and once finished, playing with her, so I'm definitely going to be making more Zombies in future - I'll probably end up with an army of them!

Here's a "Before and After" just because...

I plan to try other types of dolls though that said I really love the "Big Eyed" look on my girl and the fact that she has the ability to change eye colour from one "dead / unseeing" colour to another, so I guess I'll be using some cheap colour change eye (clone) dolls and definitely at least one Barbie and some minis too ... see what I mean about the Army?!
                                                       

                             

25th June 2014 - Birthday with The Hujoos, Makie & Tangkou Custom - Bliss!

                             Makie & Hujoo photoshoot - Langland Bay, Swansea.

                                                 Pendle and Akimoto relaxing in the sun.

                              Asami, Kasa & maitake soaking up some rays.

  Asami, Kasa & Maitake make a new friend while sunbathing on the beach!

I took this photo' to stealthily include the group of girls who had obviously never seen a Doll Collector at play before, I gave them a little show with my Zombie girl before arranging my Makie & Hujoos for their photo shoots... They must have enjoyed it as they seemed fascinated by what I was doing & appeared to be texting or uploading photographs of the "strange middle-aged woman playing with dolls in Langland Bay"!

So if you see any memes or instagram pic's ... "That's me that is"!

Sadly we didn't get much time to play, so not many beach shots happened that day before we had to pack up and head off to Caswell Bay, which provided us with another opportunity to take some photo's - this time it was my Tangkou Custom's turn to get in on the action...

     
    Zombie Girl's Photoshoot - Bishop's Wood Nature Reserve, Caswell Bay, Swansea.

During our photo' session/ dog walk in the woods found her new name and will now be known by the moniker "Creeping Stink Flesh" - I think it suits her very well!

 I managed to snap these two photo's before my Son stole not only my camera but "Stink Flesh" too and wandered off into the woods to take the following photographs - that's my boy...

For some reason this photo puts me in mind of Lucio Fulci's Zombi 2 aka Zombie Flesh Eaters.

Disclaimer:  I have been told to make it clear that my Son is not into dolls or playing with them... I'm also not allowed to mention his own doll collection and as I have definitely not done so there's no chance of him telling me of when he reads this!

                           

Btw... My Tangkou French Girl Arrived ...

So here's a little photographic review on the deboxing process and my first impressions of her...

I guess I forgot to mention, that my new French Girl Tangkou arrived the other morning, nagdabbit, I have been so side tracked recently, anyhoo, she's here and hmmm as I bought her for custom work purposes, I'm not so miffed as I could have been, but still hmmm I say... and here's why:

She arrived safe, sound and well packaged and her outer box is as stunning, as I expected from buying my Chinese Girl.

 There was no "sets" number on the box front, which led me to believe she may be a later version of this doll,also I noticed the eye lids on the box are the same as "Chinese Girl's" but as Tangkou boxes, passport etc frequently have a mix of several other Tangkou doll pictures in them, I just assumed this was a similar thing, especially as all the "French Girl"s I've seen have the cross-hatched black and pink eyelids.

 The back of her inner box is identical to "Chinese Girl" Tangkou's box, as it the rest of this box art.

She looks really cute in her box, I also love the cover of the outside box. You really can't fault the quality of the design and materials used for the packaging.

She is definitely much cuter in person, than I thought she looked online, and again, the quality of the fabrics used for her costume are just as high quality, right down to the plastic her shoes are made from!

One thing did notice though that I didn't like was she had quite a lot of tiny fluff on her from her hoodie, it was over her top, her legs and even in her hair... One piece was really bothering me, so I decided I'd just gently pick it off... bad move - I ended up with a chunk of her wig as well, which sadly came away as soon as I touched it!

It seems so strange to me that they would have excellent quality in every other aspect, so why not for her wig?!

This time, the box was rattling like mad, when I took possession of it, I found out this was due to the things inside the box breaking away from the tape holding them to the back of the box!

Same items inside as "Chinese Girl" came with, although her "Credit Card" style Certificate is obviously slightly different, due to batch umber etc.

Passport, also identical, taped to back of box under the hair brush, "Alice Band" and stand packet.
Next to this is a small bag with her underwear and feet inside!

First pages of Passport ad "Credit Card" style Certificate... The second page has two diagonal slits at the top and bottom, presumably to hold the "Certificate Card".

This area is however,  slightly too small and so the Certificate can only be held at one corner.

Her feet (at the top left of the bag), below this, the "Heart Button" is for the eye change mechanism.

After taking off her boot (which is of excellent quality, as are her socks), I got a better look at her ankle joint.

It seems weird though, how she has to have her feet removed to wear her - what should be - "made to Measure" boots!

This girl is also packaged with the buyer in mind, and very easy to remove from the plastic inner sleeve, again, using one twist tie to hold her neck in place.

Her feet are held in place with a strip of plastic, which is held in place with a strip of sellotape.

This was a shock, I was so looking forward to seeing those black and pink, crossed hatched eyelids, so it was a bit of a downer  to discover, she doesn't have them!  She has the exact same eyelid make up as my "Chinese Girl"!

Yeah I know the picture on the box has her shown with the pink ones, but in every photo I saw of this girl on the Tangkou websites, she has the black crosshatched ones... oh well :(

Even with no hair and big splodges of glue stuck to her head, she is still a very pretty doll!

As you can see there was a little residue left behind, when I removed her wig, but to be honest, it was actually a lot less than I was expecting!

I contacted 6th Sense to ask them why she has different eyelids  whether this means she is a later version  if this means she is not a limited edition, like the previous "French Girl" and to inform them that the quality of the wig was terrible as the hair came out in a clump after the lightest of touches!

The reply wasn't quite what I was expecting either! - Perhaps I have been spoilt by the amazing Customer Services Dept in MakieLabs?

Even so I certainly didn't expect what I got in reply, 3 days after my query (not bad for a large company) I received an email informing me:

"Tangkou France with black/pink eyelids was the second production runs (2011). 

Regarding advertising, you can find some pictures with the two different colors on online retailers sites and this is why it is written on the item description 'eyelids colors may vary'.

I suggest you, on your next purchase, to ask your seller your eyelid color wanted."

Well I'm glad that cleared that up, next time... I'll definitely ask the seller whether or not the doll has eyelid patterns that I didn't know was an option, after looking online at Tangkou dolls and seeing only "French Girl" Tangkou dolls, that don't have the "pink bow" option, which is why I had no idea this might happen!

"About the wig, the manufacturer intended to make them interchangeable. However, to much glue was used to make them easily removable. So it comes the time to remove it, we have to be very careful. I recommend you to contact your seller and discuss with him about your hair problem."

Hmm, so it's down to the seller, not the manufacturer?  

Also, I didn't actually try to remove it at the time, Aaron said "It's up to you Mum, but I wouldn't customise her, I'd keep her as she is" and I had just started thinking he was right, when that bit of fluff (from the hoodie happened) and voilà chunk of hair in hand, I hadn't even taken her out of the packaging so there was no way I could have removed the wig at that time!

On the plus side she ends with this, in regard to my  Tangkou "Chinese Girl" review ...

I have read your blog and I absolutely love it. Great description with a lot of details and nice pictures!

Thank you. 

You can find that review is here if you haven't read it and would like to: "Chinese Girl" Tangkou Doll Review

I do feel a bit bad about having sarkie thoughts, especially when it comes to the last part of the email, but meh I say Meh, I'm not so sure that the Seller is responsible for the problems I've encountered and all I really would have liked from 6th Sense / Tangkou would have been "Thank you, we've made a note of these issues and will be making sure that the dolls with 2 types of make up style are clearly marked on our websites" or even "Sorry for the issue you've encountered with the wig quality  we will look into this issue, and try to rectify this on future dolls" something like that really, but to pass it off onto the seller I feel is a bit of a cop out.

 Also it has left me confused, so that would make my "France" a first production run, later tweaked and reissued with pink and black eyelids due to hair glue issue?

If so, why was the wig quality issue not addressed at the same time as the glue for the wig issue was?

And if my girl is the first issue "too much glue" type, how come her wig whipped off so easily without leaving load of residue behind on the doll's head or wig?

It all seems a little fishy to me, but having said that, she was a cheap for custom, although if she is in fact a first edition, perhaps I should leave her as is - minus the dreadful wig that is, I already have a replacement on stand by, I just hope it looks good on her o_0