Dark of the Moon Jolt

Robot Mode: Let’s get the most obvious thing out of the way first: Jolt looks like an unfinished prototype figure. The robot mode is about 90 percent unpainted grey plastic. Now I know a lot of DOTM figures have suffered from Hasbro’s current reluctance to actually paint their figures, but Jolt takes it to the extreme. He’s grey plastic all over. A few scattered paint highlights here and there do not a paint job make. So basically this ruins the robot mode for me right then and there, so when I write something along the lines of “this is good” or “this looks nice” in the rest of this review, you should always imagine the add-on sentence “if it were properly painted, that is” behind it. Okay? Good, then let’s move on.

Design-wise Jolt makes for a pretty interesting robot. While I’m a big fan of the old-school car Transformers with the hood as chest, it’s always nice to see a different design every once in a while. In Jolt’s case the chest is made up of the upside-down rear of the car with several other pieces serving as adornment and everything holding together very nicely despite its jigsaw-look. The arms, on the other hand, while looking good, do have some problems. They’re connected to the shoulders by a very small hinge only, making them prone to flipping backwards, and the elbow design takes some getting used to. The legs are pretty much standard Movie-style legs, nothing special here.

Of course Jolt carries a Mechtech weapon, in his case a blaster that elongates into a bigger, longer blaster. Okay, not the most original transformation ever, but nicely done. I removed the spring from this thing, though, as it wouldn’t stay in its longer form with the spring inside (a common problem with Deluxe-class Mechtech weapons). When he doesn’t need it, Jolt can store the weapon on his back where it can double as a sort of jetpack. Jolt also has c-clip bars on his arms and on the shoulder wings for additional weapons.

So bottom line: Jolt would be a nice robot... wish they’d bothered finishing it.

Alternate Mode: The vehicle mode doesn’t look quite as unfinished as the robot mode. It’s still a lot of unpainted grey plastic, mind you, but thanks to the black textured plates on the hood and roof, it’s only about 60 percent of the car that looks unfinished, not 90. Paint aside Jolt makes for a pretty nice car. There are a lot of visible seams (which might have been better hidden with more paint, just saying), but overall the car looks wholesome and there are no visible robot parts.

Sometimes it’s the little things that really grate, though. Case in point, there are those two ports for Mechtech weapons on the roof, which fill in when no weapon is plugged in so that the holes aren’t obvious... only the fill-ins are grey on an otherwise black roof, so the holes are now painfully obvious. Honestly, what is going on here? If you go to the effort of including these fill-in things in the first place, whose job it is to hide those holes, why not spring for two tiny little specks of black paint to actually finish the job? It’s really beyond me and so obviously cheap and lazy... I don’t have words.

Just like in robot mode, the car mode is pretty good... for a prototype with an unfinished paint job. Two Mechtech weapons can plug in on the roof, the robot arms can extend from the car without breaking up the chassis, all pretty good. Too bad no one was willing to actually finish this guy.

Remarks: After scoring a two-second appearance in the second movie, Jolt was completely absent from Dark of the Moon. His blue ROTF incarnation appeared in some comic books, where he was unceremoniously killed. Hey, Transformers turn grey when they die, right? So that makes this toy here Undead Zombie Jolt, I guess.

The sad thing here is, Jolt is a really nice figure. Nice vehicle mode, nice robot mode, nice weapon with gimmick, there really isn’t anything about him that ruins the toy in any way and I’d have happily given him a B+ or thereabouts... until you get to the lack of paint, which goes beyond boring in Jolt’s case and right into painfully lacklustre and cheap. Now I’m currently on the fence regarding the future of my version of Jolt. I’m tempted to just throw him on eBay and be done with him, but maybe I’ll relent and get out my painting tools to give him a proper paint job. Because then he might actually look like a finished Transformer. Bottom line, though: you should only buy this toy if you plan to apply your own paint job or don’t mind unpainted grey plastic. Otherwise, spend the money on something else.

Rating: D+