1:600 "Mighty Hood." Note extreme length of hull, the UP Rocket launchers and the abundance of 4" AA mounts © Andrew Arthur.

When completed Hood, almost universally known to the Britsh Public as the "Mighty 'ood" was the largest and most powerful capital ship in the Royal Navy.
In all but name she was a fast battleship rather than a battlecruiser, being fitted with an inclined main belt which gave equal protection to the thicker vertical armour on contemporary British battleships.
Hood had an impressive appearance, and was undoubtedly the most beautiful battleship ever built, anywhere, and thus was used extensively for "showing the flag" between the wars.
It had been intended to reconstruct her completely in 1939 in a similar fashion to Queen Elizabeth and Renown, because her anti-aircraft armament and horizontal protection were no longer adequate. She would have been fitted with the new 5.25" dual-purpose mounts as in the "King George V" Class, and her horizontal protection was to have been increased. She would have received a new tower bridge structure, new machinery, and the vertical armour and underwater protection would have been strengthened.
The original secondary armament comprised 16 x 5.5" guns in single mounts, but all of these were removed by 1940. Also by that time her full load displacement had increased by 1600 tons and her top speed had dropped from 32 to just under 29 knots.
Her brief and unhappy career in World War II came to an abrupt end on 24 May 1941 after she litterally blew up after being hit by Bismarck’s salvoes, in company with the doomed Prince of Wales. This was compounded with her poor material state, and the lack of protection and damage control onboard.

Pictures of Hood class Battlecruiser

Hood in 1939.

HMS Hood, probably early war, showing the graceful, sweeping line of the hull and the excessive flare.