Here’s another one from my formative years: the eponymous Khorne Berzerker astride a mighty Juggernaut steed. I owned this gnarly miniature 25 years ago, during my first run-through with Warhammer 40,000.
Well, not this *exact* miniature, but you get the idea. And I was absolutely enamored with it. To me, this model says everything about Warhammer 40k: an insane, bloodthirsty space marine riding a gigantic beast made of living metal.
And did I mention how heavy this model is? It’s solid metal, and if you were to put it into a sock and swing it at someone’s head, you could really ruin their day. Heavy metal, indeed.
This unit has since been re-released as a more dynamic and aggressive-looking plastic model kit, but I always preferred the original hunk o’ metal version.
So last fall, as I was casting a wide net across eBay in an attempt to scoop up all of the fun, vintage metal miniatures I’d enjoyed as a younger man, I found a great deal on an unpainted Juggernaut rider kit.
I went with the classic paint scheme — blood red armor for the rider, and coal blue-black for the steed, plus lots of obligatory brass detailing. And rivets. Oh god, the rivets.
In Grimdark Future, I think I’m actually going to be using the model as a biker…I already have two Chaos biker models, and this guy looks cool and basically serves the same function on the battlefield. Plus this gives me an excuse to paint up the other bikers in blood red Khorne colors!