S is for Sawyer's Bespin Cloud-car . . . Not!

Twin fuselage craft go back at least as far as the weirder output and ideas of the German aircraft maker Blohm und Voss and others, of the Nazi era, and any real resemblance to the international-orange cloud cars serving the floating city's of the planet Bespin, in a galaxy far-far-away and long-long ago, is purely coincidental, not least because this probably predates both the Movie, and possibly the birth of its Director!

Sawyer's of Viewmaster fame are believed to be behind this superb piece of pulp sci-fi' made solid, in a chunk of polystyrene (or even a Bakelite material?) with four lenses, sorry - engines and pilot/gunner's windows! Because, when it's not being a spaceship, it's a pair of not very effective, novelty binoculars!

 

The decoration revealing its twin-use directive are simple 'panel lines', raised on the surface, above we have what I think is the top, with two cockpits laid-out at the fat (front?) end, and a hint of tailplanes raised at the thin ends. Four cannon holes or ray-gun/laser-ports are lined-up along the leading edge of the connecting airplane/wing.

So, it's a ground attack/support fighter-bomber, in the tradition of the Mosquito, Lightning, Black Widow or Beaufort! The underside (or what I consider the underside) has similar surface detailing for folded landing wheels, bomb-bay doors and tail-wheel cabinets, along with the call sign/identifier PF-939 (for Plastic Fighter?).

 

The lenses have been wedged-in under pressure, to get stuck-fast against more raised lines of polymer, and I'm thinking, if I use a rubber mat and wooden dowel, I may be able to get them all out to clean the interior, and polish the lenses, but that's for another day!

 

Two holes in the outer winglets are for a neck-cord/strap, but the cord that came with it wasn't long-enough to go over a five-year-old's head, so even if it was original it got removed as a rather stained and dirty remnant, beyond the stores required, going forward!

 

At 40/45mm it's a single or twin-seater?

But at smaller scales it could have a crew of six or more, and looks like a serious piece of intergalactic war-kit, with a busy maintenance schedule, when back on Terra Firma! I phuqing love this stuff!

I wonder if George Lucas had one?