Monday Morning Monster; Badger Dog Warrior

This post is not just the Monday Morning Monster, it's a trip in the Wayback Machine as well.  The Badger Dog here is actually a paint-up of a sketch I drew in 2005 for the Wizards miniatures game "Dreamblade."

Dreamblade -- one of the few games based on Jungian analytical psychology.

There's no reason to paint up a sketch to which I no longer have any legal claim, but I always liked the Mujina sketch.  I share this only as a personal piece, painted for fun; the Mujina sketch is copyright Wizards of the Coast/Hasbro Inc., and is used with permission as a portfolio piece.

Games come and go, but copyright is forever.

It was commissioned as "Mujina," for the "Chrysotic Plague" expansion, and I think it was specc'd as a badger warrior in Japanese armor (?) with a symbolic flail.  It wasn't clear to me at the time whether the intent was a true badger or the Japanese badger dog, aka the tanui.  Apparently this is a common problem -- the term is used for one or the other, or for both, or for a third supernatural manifestation in different areas of Japan.  My sketch had elements of both, but I have always had a warm spot in my heart for tanuki and "Mujina" has the enormous belly of that kind.  In the paint-up, the coloration is definitely tanuki.  Although he is missing some other elements, alas...

I don't remember ever seeing the sculpt of the Mujina figure, so this image is as new to me as it is to you.  The grasp on the flail has been very reasonably revised to make the figure more sturdy and easier to cast, and if I thought that miniatures were still being drawn by hand, I would certainly  make note of it for future use.  The armor turned out roughly the same color in both versions, and the mini's flail coincidentally uses the same colors that I painted into the trim. 

But I like my painted guy's expression more.