You are here: Home » Featured » Banshee (Micro Ops)

Banshee (Micro Ops)

May 29, 2015 | By Errex More

This Banshee is yet another of the sets released by McFarlane Toys in the Micro Ops line for Halo: Reach.

This is one of the smaller sets, containing one Covenant aircraft and two minifigures. The scale selected for this line is 1:100, which I think provides a decent amount of detail.

The Banshee is a one-pilot craft used by the alien Covenant for aerial reconnaissance and infantry support; it features smooth curved lines and has a pair of articulated wings on each side of the canopy.

The canopy is very large in relation to the rest of the aircraft, and it pivots forward to grant access to the pilot’s compartment. The pilot goes into the cockpit in a prone position and is sculpted in such a way that it will not stand on its own.

The inside of the Banshee has a good amount of sculpted detail that would allow for displaying it with the canopy open.

The only issue I have with this piece is that the entire vehicle is made from a somewhat flexible plastic, which causes most of the thinner pieces in the aircraft to be slightly warped once it is taken out of the plastic blister.

The actual paint application is quite neat and the color selection is game accurate, but another consequence of using this type of flexible material is that the paint applications look duller than they would if they had been applied over a harder surface.

The minifigures included are both Covenant Elites. The Banshee pilot is wearing Zealot armor and the other one is a Ranger. Both figures have articulated waists, which allows some posing variety and/or a better fit inside the vehicle.

The paintjob on both Elites is perfunctory at best, consisting on a rather thick layer of gray paint washed with black ink for shading. The Ranger has additional metallic purple accents added for the visor and his weapon, but the Zealot only has a couple of white dots for eyes.

I could not help but feel somewhat disappointed by the lack of some sort of display stand for the Banshee in this set, but considering that I found it with a 50% Off discount, I can’t really complain that much.