That Thing You Do! is a 1996 American musical written and directed by Tom Hanks in his directorial debut; he also co-stars in it. Set in the summer of 1964, the film tells the story of the rise and fall of a one-hit wonder pop band. The film also resulted in a musical hit with the song "That Thing You Do". (Wikipedia)

One of the more memorable lines from the film involves one member (Steve Zahn) of the band, reflecting upon their collective fate, asking another member (Tom Everett Scott), "How did we get here?" His response is "I led you here, sir, for I am Spartacus."

It is often mentioned that the execution of the Archduke Ferdinand and his wife in Sarajevo by Serbian nationalists was the catalyst for the beginning of the First World War. While that event did have an effect, forces were already in motion prior to that circumstance that really laid the foundation for that war.

In the late 1950’s the Israeli Defense Force was faced with an ageing armory consisting mainly of up-gunned M50 Shermans from the end of World War II. To update and modernize this fleet of vehicles they purchased second hand Centurion Mark III and Vs. They were quickly upgraded to local specs and were named Sho’t (“scourge”). The Sho’t series of tanks served from the late 1950’s to the early 1990’s in Israel’s arsenal, through a number of upgrades culminating in the Sho’t Kal Dalet. The Sho’t Kal Dalet came into service sometime around 1985 with an upgraded laser range finder and thermal gun sleeve.

Videoaviation is a small company out of Italy manufacturing big things; in this case, they provide large scale modelers the items missing from many of our 1/32 models to bring them to life, particularly in a diorama setting if you have room!

Having built their Dash-60 Power cart earlier this year, I was aware of the quality of Videoaviation products… and this continues with this simple, effective set of two firebombs.

The BLU-27 firebomb set will produce two, Vietnam-era Napalm with stabilizing fins. The BLU-27 was utilized as an effective anti-personnel weapon during a war where the world was less concerned about environmental issues. Common employers of this weapon were the A-26, A-1, F-100, F-4, and F-105 (not so much when their mission changed later in the war). I don’t know if these were certified for use on other aircraft.

Following up the first two in this series, The Russian Aviation Colours 1909-1922: Camouflage and Markings, Volume 1 Early Years and Volume 2 “Great War”, comes MMP’s latest tome. This book, focused on the ‘Red Stars’ is planned to be followed by at least one additional volume on ‘White Armies’ (Volume 4). The authors leaned heavily on Russian private archives, as well as archives, libraries, and museums.

The book is a nice hardbound unit, with a nice glossy cover, and 167 pages on high-quality stock with a matt finish. Mainly clear black and white period photos are supplemented with modern day color photos, color period posters and postcards, colour side and top views, and colour unit emblems and personal markings. The text is in English and quite readable. I counted 311 black and white photographs to go with an additional six color pictures. There were 99 color side profiles and another 132 color drawings highlighting markings details.

This set is designed for the Italeri 1/32 scale F-35A Lightning II kit. This set contains 1 sheet of etched brass details for the landing gear bays and weapons bays. There are panel faces for the nose gear bay, boxes for the weapons bay, nose gear doors, main gear and other miscellaneous details. The instructions are the normal Eduard instructions with clear drawings showing where the PE parts go and what details need to be removed from the kit plastic parts.

The first step deals with the nose gear bay and doors. There are a few panel faces to be placed in the bay replacing the molded detail. There are also a couple of boxes to be folded up and added to the gear doors. The added details improve the looks of the kit parts.