Hound's alternate mode of a mobile anti-artillery truck makes the transition to a simplified large toy-- minus the rear bed "cover" that's seen in the movies, which is unfortunately the case with nearly all of his TLK toys. The proportions of this mode overall are pretty darned solid, with few extras in this mode. Well, I should say few OBVIOUS extras-- oddly, the top of Hound's robot head is actually molded in (complete with part of his Knight helmet) onto the front hood, in front of his front window. It's nicely detailed, along with grenades there and a bit of ammo belt, but it's kind of... well, it's rather odd to actually mold in something like that as opposed to just regular ol' vehicle mold detailing. The mold detailing on the rest of the toy gets the necessary details, such as the front grill w/ headlights, paneling on the sides, taillights, and the like, but it's just that, basics-- nothing particularly intricate. The only obvious "real" extra in this mode are the bottoms of his feet hanging off the bottom of his missile pods, which looks a little weird. You can also see his robot hands sticking out behind the front section, but given that the missile pods tend to overshadow them, the hands are easily overlooked (and thankfully, it's just his hands, not the entire lower arms). The color scheme is pretty much all a light pale military green in this mode, though some of Hound's black plastic shows through on his wheels, and his windows are painted black too. To add in some more contrast, he's got some dark metallic gunmetal gray on his front bumper, as well as on most of the missile pods on his back (which unfortunately, due to the transformation, cannot rotate. They can move up a little, but not a lot). There's also some silver on the side and front rails on the front end, and on the visor on his faux helmet on the front. The rest of this mode is unpainted-- the back end could've used a bit more paint like on the taillights, but otherwise he has... adequate... paint for a toy of this size/price.
    To transform Hound to robot mode, fold his missile pods down to become his legs, then slide the section of his vehicle mode (the windows/roof section) back and the rest of his body will auto-transform. The end result is fairly strong, especially for a simplistic Knight Turbo Changer. His proportions from most angles are accurate for the most part-- minus his arms being a bit bulkier than usual, which is the result of the arms being molded on the inside of the side shells of his vehicle mode. You can also seem some gaps in between his body and his shoulders from certain angles, but it's not that big of a deal. That front section of the vehicle mode you slide back makes for a nice pot belly, something most of Hound's other toys have difficulty effectively replicating, at least to the extent it sticks out in the movie. The mold detailing in this mode is incredibly impressive-- the dude's covered in it. He's got the faux headlights and missiles on his shoulders, the "ammo belts combined together" into his lower arms with detailed hands, faux tread-tire feet, relatively short legs with large pads on his knees, and interestingly enough, a flat panel on the top of his vehicle mode flips up during transformation to reveal a panel with detailing showing off his military pouches on his prodigious waist. His headsculpt is also spot-on with a fragmented military "helmet" for a forehead, blue eyes and a silver head, and a gunmetal gray, wiry beard. The paint in this mode is used fairly generously on his legs with the charcoal gray and the black on his feet, and he's got more gunmetal on his lower arms and dull brownish orange on the missiles in his upper arms.  I wish there was some more paint to pick out some of those pouches on his stomach, but otherwise he's pretty varied paint-wise in this mode. In fitting with the "Knight Armor" gimmick, pushing down on a black lever on his upper back will let Hound's "Knight Helmet" spring forward over his normal head. It's a really unique, interesting sculpt, with side Prime-like antennae, a rounded head, and a slim, medieval-style opening for his face, with most of it being covered up by a one-eyed yellow faceguard. In another cool little twist, the open eye has a monocle above it-- it's easy to imagine it rotating down over Hound's lone visible eye in this mode so the makeshift medic can look more closely at a wound. That said, I'm not a fan of the orangish yellow paint-- it looks out-of-place compared to the rest of his color scheme. For articulation, unfortunately Hound can only move forward at the elbows.
    It's a shame Knight Armor Turbo Changer Hound was released in much more limited quantities, being at the end of the TLK line, as I think he's the best toy in the subline. He's got pretty good proportions in both modes, and is larger than any other Hound toy to scale better with some of the larger TLK figures. His mold detailing might not be anything to stare at in vehicle mode, but it's absolutely stellar in robot mode. His gimmick is cool, he's got a decent amount of paint, and minimal visible extras. Sure, he has barely any articulation, but neither does the rest of the line. Mildly recommended, keeping in mind the aforementioned limitation.
 

Review by Beastbot

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