"Predator" is one of my favorite movies of all time and I always liked Jesse "The Body/Mind" Ventura. The Blain character from the movie was extrememly interesting - especially when you look at his weapons loadout. The following is some information about Blain's weapon - a gattling gun!
Released in 1987, "Predator" was an instant box office success pitting a team of US Anti-terrorist commandos, led by Arnold Schwarzenegger ("Dutch"), against a space-born alien Predator hunting for new trophies on Earth.
The cast included a unique blend of individuals, each toting their own weaponry (some rather exotic.) One of the more original characters is played by Jesse "The Body" Ventura - a World Wrestling Federation superstar (elected Governor of Minnesota in 1998.) Jesse Ventura plays "Blain", a heavy weapons specialist. His weapon of choice is the XM134 .223 Minigun - a six barrelled gattling gun (he calls "old painless" in the movie.) Unfortunately, Blain does not survive most of the movie, as he is the second target of the alien Predator creature.
"The first person to fire the gun was almost torn apart by the spent cases that apparently eject with great force, upwards. Everybody that fired the gun after that wore a flak jacket and face mask. The power source for the gun was an industrial power supply with the cables run along the ground and up the leg of the shooter. The firing of the gun was also handled by a second person at the power supply, the shooter would just hang on for dear life. Most of the shooting scenes used light loads or blanks because all that was needed was to show some smoke and fire out of the gun, and the motorized mini gun didn't need any internal pressure or recoil to cycle." - Quote from one of the actors in the movie.
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The figure represents Jesse Ventura's character
Blain. The uniform is a modern US infantry uniform from 21st Century Toys.
The boots are from a 21st Century Toys Vietnam era set. The MP5N sub machine
gun is from the 21st Century Toys US Navy Seal outfit (he used this at the
beginning of the movie and then switched to the Mini-Gun.) The pouches, harness,
and grenades are from various 21st Century Toys outfits. The survival knife
is from the 21st Century Toys Toys R' Us Special Forces set. Finally, the
figure is the 21st Century toys SAM figure with a Hasbro "Gung Ho" head.
The black t-shirt is from a Strike Force (knock off) figure.
Now - onto the main piece of this figure - the XM134 Minigun. The minigun is from the McFarlane Toys Metal Gear Solid Vulcan Raven figure. The ammo belt is also from this set. Luckily, they built the weapon in 1/6 scale and the figure in 1/12 scale (no one else makes anything close to this accurate a minigun in 1/6 scale.)
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| Here is a close-up of Blain. You can see the trademark Hasbro scar on the cheek. |  |
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Close-up of the mini-gun. I used a drill to drill out the cannon barrells. The ammo belt goes to a customized ammo pack on the back of Blain's belt. | |
| Here you can see Blain's bush hat. I glued the edge up so it looks like the hat Blain wore in the movie. |  |
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The modified XM134 ammo box is from the 21st Century Toys Modern Machine Gun set. The ammo belt came form the Vulcan Raven figure and has been attached inside the ammo box and to the minigun. The battery powerpack is a pouch from a 21st Century Toys modern forces set. The power cable (actually a twist tie that holds figures down in the display boxes they come in) is attached via a hole I drilled in the pouch and a hole I drilled in the minigun. | |
| This is a back-side view. You can see the power cable snaking up his side into the battery pack on his belt. The power cable is attached to the mini-gun also. |  |
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This is a picture of Blain (Jesse Ventura) from "Predator". I would say that mine looks pretty darn close - what do you think? | |
| This is a marketing picture of the Metal Gear line Vulcan Raven figure. As you can tell, I dumped the rather silly ammo pack. |  |
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