Ah yes. Optimus Prime. What would transformers be without Optimus Prime. Oh wait, it would be the post movie series. Or possibly Beast Wars. Considering Beast Wars was the best Transformers series ever one could possibly make arguments against having Optimus Prime around. On the other hand… Rodimus Prime. I think I can rest my case. Optimus Prime is certainly the cornerstone of the Transformers universe. Hasbro knows this. I don’t have exact figures but I’d say despite all of the Ironhides and Mirages out there, Optimus Prime has been the most reused Transformers name ever.

Does it count as reused if it’s the same character or just a repaint?

Anyway, there’s good reason, Optimus Prime is the leader of the Autobots. He’s the Superman to his Justice league, he’s the he’s the Red Power Ranger, he’s the number one big cheese in charge. Generally speaking he’s the one that comes through and saves the day. That’s what leaders are of course, valiant courageous front line powerhouse fighters. They most certainly are not shadowy behind the scenes guys who send waves of troops out to fight while they sit idly in their bunker a million miles away.

This Optimus Prime is certainly one of the better Primes we’ve seen. Not quite as poseable and spiffy as RiD’s Prime (Fire Convoy for you Japanese line lovers) and not quite as perfectly accurate as 20^th Anniversary Prime, and not quite as all around awesome as Beast Wars’ Primal, this Prime still stands out as a good blend of everything good about previous Primes. He also turns into a regular “Cab Over” style semi like his G1 counterpart. Something that hasn’t happened in a while (Yes I’m ignoring that god awful Energon prime with his thunder thighs). This is a Classics toy though, what else would you expect? They even got Megatron to turn into a gun again.

Of course in keeping with the Classics mindset, he also isn’t just an old blocky 80s style semi. The cab starts to sweep back a bit at the windows and tops off in an aerodynamic air dam. He’s definitely a modern semi. To make things a bit more dynamic his old boring straight stripes have been replaced with more stylized and angled lines. Sadly, as Classics is a “filler line”, Prime is missing one crucial component. His trailer. Almost every Prime has had a trailer, some of the trailers make bases, many of the trailers merged with Prime to make armor. This prime is completely lacking in the trailer department. It’s a shame too because this semi design looks really naked without a trailer. I love the Long Nose Cab Deluxe Prime toy, which also lacks a trailer. That Prime’s design works well without something towed behind him. This prime’s squareish design seems somehow empty without more.

Anyway, enough about the trailer and the semi, the alternate mode is the boring required part of this toy. Let’s move on to the robot because the robot is what it’s all about.

I posted a photos of my display of G1 toys to a board once and was asked “Why display them in vehicle mode, if you’re going to do that why not just collect die cast cars. Of course if I’m just going to display my toys in robot mode why not just collect say, Gundams (I used to). I’ll admit that the robot mode of Transformers has more appeal to me, and Optimus Prime holds true to this.

This is not a perfect revamp of G1 Prime, if you’re looking for that you’ll have to go for one of the other recent homages available, probably the Robot Masters version. This is a very good representation of Prime and what he is though. A big Red and Blue robot with a semi for a chest. Looking across the entire Classics line, it’s almost as if Hasbro has reinvented G1 using the styling of Dreamwave, the comic distributor that revived Transformers comics recently. This prime’s narrow waist and detailed big boots really give it a modern and “edgy” appeal. The design evokes the original Prime with no doubt from it’s design and colors but this prime is considerably more sleek than his G1 counterpart. Frankly G1 prime is a really doofy looking robot. This guy is tough and bad ass.

Still he has issues. I almost want to call this the best of the Classics line, and it probably is the best of the Wave 1 toys. However newer toys such as Mirage and Jetfire have pushed things a bit farther along. The more I look at this toy there are design aspects I don’t like.

For example, the arm vehicle “kibble”. It’s not a huge distraction but it just sort of hangs there with no real place to go. At least Bumblebee’s doors peg into place. Prime’s doors are just there and the free swivel joint attached to them doesn’t help.

Then there is the Truck mode’s wheels. They make a sort of backpack behind his abdomen but the fit is really tight and they tend to limit things a bit in inconvenient ways. Speaking of backpacks, his larger weapon can be used as a backpack. It actually looks better this way. This weapon is the air dam from the truck mode. It folds around on itself to form a gun but the gun looks really odd in the end. The handle position is way off for it’s length for starters. His primary black and silver gun formed from the smokestacks isn’t much better. It looks like it wants to be a really cool pistol but the peg for his hand is on the gun’s stock. Like his other gun, it’s more about bad handle positioning than anything else. It can be split in two however to form two loose fitting matching hand guns.

Finally I really hate Prime’s feet. They bend a bit due to transformation but their size prevents prime for standing flat footed pretty much ever. Any pose more dynamic than “Standing legs together” will result in stability issues.

Don’t get me wrong here; this is a really good Prime toy. It’s just got a lot of minor issues that prevent it from being a really great toy. I still prefer the deluxe Armada Prime to this one myself (other than size issues). If you’ve already got a Prime you really like you might consider passing on this one if you’re trying to limit your Classics display. Otherwise he’s pretty a pretty nice toy all around. Honestly, I can’t believe I just had a legitimate leaning towards not recommending this toy.

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