Why are Moebius’ 2001 kits so disappointing?

When US-based Moebius Models announced a new series of styrene model kits based on Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: a Space Odyssey, I was initially pretty pleased. After all, it’s a 55+ year old movie, so it’s pretty great that new products are coming out related to it. And for the first time since the 1960s, there would be easy to assemble plastic model kits on the market, not just homemade garage kits.

But the successive kits they’ve released have been a cumulative disappointment and a real waste of potential.

Mediocre tooling

The injection moulds, apparently produced by a subcontractor in China, are not great. They don’t come close to the normal standard of quality from decent manufacturers of military and vehicle model kits today.

Detail edges are soft, there’s massive draft and thus 90 degree edges are flared out considerably, fine details are lacking or grossly simplified, raised panels are thick and tall, panel lines are deep and cavernous, there’s mould release grease on the parts, textures are crude and rough, transparent parts are wavy and uneven, and so on.

It feels like the kits emerged from a time machine from some decades ago, when plastic model tooling was toylike and cheap.

Maybe some people enjoy spending a ton of time cleaning up and reworking all the parts before assembly, just like in the bad old days. Cutting off miles of flash and filing down crummy seams separates the kids from the grownups! But I’d much rather get a nice sharp Bandai kit and put my energy into something else.

Obviously Bandai are top-flight Japanese kit manufacturers, but even the better kits from Round2 and Meng, also made in China, have vastly superior moulds. And when you start at a higher point your finished model will look even better!

Design compromises for injection moulding

There are often noticeable strange features and distorted parts in their products, brought about by the cheap tooling. By contrast, higher-end models from other makers either break their designs into more detail parts, or use side-sliding tools, or both.

This is 1980s-style kit design on the part of Moebius here.

Inconsistent, erratically researched Products

On the whole the general proportions of their kits are reasonably close to the ships seen in the film. But when it comes to details they're all over the map.

There are many features on their kits which never existed on the original models, but which they duplicated from fan-made models. Seriously. This is a typical example of the sloppy and uneven research they did for their kits.

For instance their EVA pod has features, like a pointy top camera cone, which are directly copied from the Scott Alexander garage kits, and which are wrong. The large Orion has two large strips running around the whole body. These are copied from a hobbyist's model build, and only exist because he glued two styrene strips on his model to conceal a join. None of these things are on the real models and sets.

By comparison the Moebius Aries 1B kit is considerably more accurate in most areas, presumably because the original Aries model is on exhibit in Los Angeles and lots of good photos exist.

It's also quite strange, since a number of their 2001 kits were made with input from well-known 2001 hobbyist model makers. Did Moebius get proper research advice from these experts, then throw it in the garbage and just let the factory do whatever the hell they wanted to keep costs down, or something?

Not designed for painting

While the 2001 ships are mostly pale grey or white, there are still details and other bits which are different in colour. The smart way to handle these is to mould those bits separately. You then paint them up separately and assemble. Done. Not only is that quick and easy, but it almost always yields great results.

The Round2 “studio series” TIE fighter, for example, has the black wing panels as separate parts from the grey frame and star parts. No masking required! Paint, then assemble.

To save money many parts on Moebius kits are all one big piece, so you have to mask areas off and paint them. Bleah. In the case of the EVA pod this is actually quite a hassle to do well and get a good finished model.

Not designed for lighting

The Space Station V model in the film is famous for its illuminated windows, shining as it spins gracefully through the black of night. But the Moebius kit? The windows are all solid plastic.

So either you have to laboriously cut out each window with a knife, or else you have to laboriously cut out bits of masking tape and cover each window before painting on thick layers of light-blocking paint. And backlit milky plastic with painted surrounds never looks good.

I’m not a model manufacturer, but I doubt it would have been cost prohibitive to have deeper window moulds that went all the way through. Then you’d have nice clean holes you could simply back with tracing paper. If you wanted to stick LEDs back there, then you could. If you don't want to light it, the openings still look like windows.

Solid windows are a fucking waste of customer time and kind of insulting. Kits with solid opaque windows are toys, not models. Even if you don't feel like illuminating your model, solid windows are unconvincing and look like garbage.

Another example: Moebius spent a surprising amount of effort on the EVA pod interior, getting quite a bit of it right. But the pushbuttons are just raised projections, again in thick milky-white plastic.

That does make for brisk business in aftermarket brass etched pieces and vinyl stickers, to make masking these panels easier – but they could have made holes in the panel with separate buttons.

Money saving measures

I can only presume that they made these dubious decisions purely as a cost-saving measure. I can’t imagine that the market for 2001 ships is huge, and they obviously need to recoup their investment in each kit. Every product is a careful balance between development costs and sales margins.

I’m sure that’s true. But I also think that some careful planning, detailed and thoughtful design, and assistance from an enthusiastic 2001 fan base, could have yielded much higher quality end products.

After all, why wouldn’t any company want to improve their product quality? Why wouldn’t you want to help bring up standards of contemporary model making, rather than just turning out products that feel like junk manufactured decades ago? Especially since other companies out there do produce way better shit than Moebius does.

Who buys 2001 stuff anyway?

The market for 2001 isn't just small, it's discerning. It's not like building model kits with a big casual or youth market, where “good enough” toys are adequate. The majority of customers for 2001 kits are going to be older, detail-oriented builders, not young children. 2001 was one of the first genuinely serious science fiction films, and its director and designers treated its spaceship designs with enormous care. So why not produce something accurate and decent?

This is something that German and Japanese manufacturers seem to understand. They get that if you produce something accurate, detailed, and of high quality then you're not only satisfying the higher end of the market, but you're raising the low end as well. You’re not condescending to your customers the way Moebius does.

Oh, well. Since there's no competition out there, I guess most people are happy with something rather than nothing.

It's just such a terrible shame. No other manufacturer is likely to ever make licensed kits of these subjects ever again. So for these products to be so utterly flawed, and cheaply made with such a big emphasis on their enormous size, is kinda tragic.