Crankstart
(Autobot Alliance)
(NOTE: Because this is a repaint, this is not a full-blown review. This mainly covers any changes made to the mold and the color scheme, and merely compares it to Revenge of the Fallen Dune Runner. For a review on the mold itself, read the review of Revenge of the Fallen Dune Runner here.)
Crankstart here has a
rather unique color scheme. Yes, he has the black and silver/gray combo
that's all too common with movie-styled toys, and the light milky gray
is the same shade as the really boring-looking stuff we've gotten as secondary
colors on entirely too many Transformers lately. However, the other two
colors-- the BRIGHT yellow and the dull purplish brown-- help to make this
a lot more original and eye-catching. The yellow-- so bright it could practically
be considered "safety yellow"-- works quite well as stripes along the sides
of the vehicle mode, and contrasts extremely well with the black used as
the main color. In robot mode, though, the safety yellow is the inner half
of the legs before abruptly transitioning to black plastic-- it still provides
good contrast, but such an abrupt color change halfway across the legs
with no paint apps to "ease" the transition doesn't look all that great.
As for the dull purplish brown, it's quite a unique color, and strikes
a nice line between the lighter colors of silver/gray and yellow, while
not being as dark as the black. It might've been a bit too dull if used
widely, which is why just using it for some of the robot parts was the
perfect idea. As far as paint apps go, Crankstart's fairly covered there,
what with the silver windows, gold headlights, light red taillights, and
the aforementioned yellow stripes alongside his vehicle mode. In robot
mode his paint apps are bit sparser, though the color combos on his head
and chest still look very well-done and keep the colors varied.
No mold changes have
been made to Crankstart.
Crankstart's color scheme
takes what would be a by-the-numbers scheme of black and gray/silver and
adds a really nice (if unrealistic) twist on it with the purplish brown
and bright yellow paint apps and plastic. I wish he had a few more paint
apps in robot mode, but generally this is a pretty cool redeco. Of the
four different color schemes this mold has been released in as of this
writing (11/12), only Generations Sandstorm looks better, in my opinion.
Review by Beastbot