Hound's alternate mode
for The Last Knight has been changed to a bit "lighter" of a vehicle, though
still a fairly heavy military one-- he's still a large truck, but now instead
of more of a transport he's a mobile anti-aircraft missile launcher. In
vehicle mode, his overall proportions are fairly solid on first look, though
when comparing it to his other toys, the part behind the front driver's
seat/cockpit is a bit longer than it should be. And, although the back
two-thirds fit into the general shape that they should, a closer look reveals
a lot of robot details back there, "hidden" partially by the black strip
of plastic on top of it all in this mode-- you can see the side details
of a lot of Hound's robot mode there, since the back two-thirds IS a lot
of the main body and legs of the robot mode. The back end is particularly
weak, sticking out more than it should and just being an almost-undetailed
block that definitely looks out of place (there are some small taillights
molded back there, but that's it). The most obvious robot extras are definitely
the incredibly obvious robot arms on the inside of the dual missile launchers;
despite my complaints, the other extras are generally acceptable given
the 1-step gimmick, methinks. There's some fairly intricate mold detailing
up on the front, with the ladders molded into the grill as well as several
headlights and a vent on the front hood, plus some more headlights on the
roof and armor panels on the sides. The tires are also pretty well-detailed,
with lots of bumps around the treads. The missile launchers and rest of
the sides have fairly simplistic, hollow mold detailing, though, likely
because they're de-emphasized where they appear in the robot mode. The
color scheme for Hound is pretty basic, with some pale military green making
up most of the front half, while a pale milky tan with some glitter in
it makes up the back half and the missile launchers. It's honestly a pretty
boring color scheme, one that really needed some paint apps or other colors
to break it up, and this toy does NOT have that. The black plastic on the
wheels and a strip down the center does provide some contrast, but there's
almost no paint of any other colors, here. There's a small white block
on the right side under the windows with an Autobot symbol on it-- due
to copyright issues, Hound can't have the Red Cross-ish medic symbols on
him-- and a bit of dull brownish orange paint on the arms inside his missile
launchers, but that's it. Otherwise, he's all just those three colors--
and he REALLY needs some paint, particularly on the sides of the missile
launchers, his windows, and his front grill/headlights. He does have the
Cyberfire UV paint on his front hood, though-- it's an Autobot symbol surrounded
by flames, the usual.
To transform Hound to
robot mode, you just pull back on the front section, turning it all the
way around the back end and then plugging it into the back of the robot
mode. The rest auto-transforms. The end result is actually a pretty darned
good robot mode for a one-step changer; the only real extras are the missile
launchers on the back of his hands, and then the front section of the vehicle
mode is on his lower back/butt, but given how he's posed and how his arms
cover up that back section from the usual frontal view, the latter extra
only becomes visible if you view the toy from the side. The robot parts
are remarkably well-detailed in terms of the mold itself, with movie-accurate
details everywhere-- the ammo belt along one shoulder, the missile launchers
and faux headlights on the arms, the ammo belt-like lower arms, all the
pouches and grenades on the stomach, the wheel fragment-feet, and lots
of more angular armor bits on the legs. His head also has an accurate rounded
helmet and face, complete with beard, although minus his cigar for obvious
reasons. Really, the only thing inaccurate about his robot mode from a
proportional point of view is that his stomach isn't as big as it should
be, but that would definitely cause some more issues with the vehicle mode,
so it's easily overlooked. Unfortunately, where Hound really falls flat--
again-- is with the paint apps. He's still mostly the same two colors,
though his wheel-feet are painted black. But though some of his waist and
hat are painted some more of that light pale military green, it's still
the same color as the plastic. Beyond the blue eyes, you've got no new
colors in this mode, just a SLIGHTLY better breakup of them than in vehicle
mode. No detailed paint on the lower arms or hands, headlights, all that
stuff on his chest, not even his head and face are painted! Ugh. For articulation,
Hound can move back-and-forth at the shoulders in this mode.
The TLK version of 1-step
Turbo Changer Hound has a pretty awesome-looking robot mode, all things
considered, given the gimmick. Just a couple of extras. However, his vehicle
mode has some more obvious extra issues, and the lack of paint to bring
out all these awesome molded-in details all over the place on him is practically
criminal. He's one of the better 1-step changer movie molds out there,
but man, that lack of paint is a real shame.
Review by Beastbot