Hightower
(Landfill Part)
Vehicle mode is a crane.
Hightower is extremely kiddy-looking in this mode, even more so than his
similarly-structued team member, Heavy Load.
It is much more "square" in design than a real crane, not to mention the
fact that the base part is MUCH bigger than on an actual crane. The crane
hook appendage is also much shorter than on an actual crane; much, MUCH
shorter. You really can't envision the crane picking up anything much higher
than it upper body, which kinda limits its functionality. The hook is also
molded shut, so you can't hang anything on it- nuts, that would've been
kinda cool. What's kind of cool is that several people have come up with
a "gunner" sub-mode for Hightower; flip the hook part of the crane arm
in and the gun part out, and you have a cannon! That's pretty neat, but
it still doesn't make this mode much better. THe robot feet are also very
apparent on the back side, and the robot face and hands are also a little
obvious on the upper body and in the middle of the sides, respectively.
The front bumper also looks pretty crummy, since there's a pretty large
gap between the two bumper plates.
Hightower's robot mode
is awesome. Sure, detaching and than re-attaching the upper part of the
crane is a pretty cheap part of the transformation, but at least it's effective.
Hightower is rather short for a deluxe, but he makes up for it in bulkiness.
His upper arms and lower legs are very bulky, giving him a "tough" look.
For such a bulky toy, he's also pretty articulated in this mode- he has
three points of articulation for each arm, and four on each leg (two of
them being in the feet, which is very rare for a Transformer). However,
his feet are also very large and floppy proportionally, making them look
a bit dorky. At least his large feet and lower legs give him very good
stability in this mode. His face is also pretty well done, with a "visor"
for his eyes. He has a very stern look, which adds character. The upper
part of the crane on Hightower's back may be viewed as an extra in this
mode, but it doesn't get in the way much at all and it doesn't look that
bad. Hightower has not just one, but two weapons for his robot mode; a
really large and long gun made out of his crane arm, and a very small gun
that comes out of a container in the driver's seat. These two guns contrast
with each other very nicely.
Becomes either both
the arms or one of the legs for Landfill, depending
on the configuration.
A rather kiddy vehicle
mode, but a rockin' robot mode. Recommended over Heavy Load, but only slightly
more- they're both still neat toys in robot mode.
Review by Beastbot