By The Power of Red Skull

 The magical sugar cube of destiny!

By a trick of the light, it looks like he has a Terry-Thomas gap in his teeth.
Now I wish I'd painted one.

Being very distinctive and irredeemably evil, Red Skull has assumed the mantle of premier bad guy in the Marvel Crisis Protocol universe (until Doctor Doom shows up).

With his inclusion in the second Core Set, Red Skull now has three versions of his character - a distinction shared with Captain America, Black Widow and Spider-Man (still waiting on that Doctor Doom, guys).

The first one is a stately pose, admiring his cosmic cube (still my favourite); for the second one, he gets boosted by shiny leviathan armour (and some goons).

For the latest model I've painted, he's clearly in party mode, unbuttoning his leather trenchcoat and letting his hair down.

On the tabletop, he has my favourite leadership ability of the three: one that can benefit his underlings' attacks, but inflict cost (or actual damage) afterwards, which is a pretty good depiction of his management style.

Painting-wise, his all-black ensemble made it easy to progressively drybrush greys and then wash down with Nuln Oil. I remember with his original version I used red contrast over a zenethal highlight skull, whereas this time I went direct for layers of red. There's a slight difference, but I couldn't tell you which one I prefer.

The cube was Ulthuan Grey with that old reliable Frostheart contrast. And the suitcase he's standing on was a series of brown highlights and Snakebite Leather washes. I think it's intended to be metal, but I wanted some warmer tones, and quite like the fact that Red Skull came to fight with a Paddington-like suitcase.

One more step towards total domination (of my miniature cabinet).