Review: #408
Name: Optimus Prime
Brand: Transformers
Allegiance: Autobot
Line: Generations - Titans Return
Year of Release: 2016
Size Class: Voyager (Wave 3)
Mold Status: new
DIAC:
Diac is the Titan Master that comes with the Voyager rendition of Optimus Prime.
He is casted in grey but surprisingly has some painted details, the silver head (which sticks out) and blue legs.
Poseability is as you'd expect with Titan Masters with balljointed shoulders and head.
TRUCK MODE:
Optimus, as you'd come to expect, transforms into a truck. This is inspired by his G2 rendition of a tanker truck.
There are ten wheels and all of them roll, which is nice (considering Hasbro's recent decrease in quality, it would not be surprising if they decided to use faux wheels for some of them).
As part of the Titans Return line, there is an included card which shows off the character art.
Size-wise, above is a comparison against The Last Knight Voyager Optimus and you can see that the Titans Return version is longer, but slimmer so that it feels smaller in your hands but is pretty much the same mass.
The tank portion is painted silver (at least, the back two-thirds of it) but in an annoying trend of this line, the blue striping and Autobot insignia are sticker pieces and straight out of the box, they are creased or peeling off.
There are a few areas to situate a Titan Master, the main one is that there is a sitting area on the top of the tanker (the cab portion is used for transformation, thus cannot have a hollow area in it).
You can also attach the robot weapons onto the side, and Diac can sit in the gun.
Most of the paint budget went into the tank with the mismatching smokestacks a bit of a distraction, plus, the cab and tank is one solid piece (no swivel there). However, this is a still a good vehicle mode.
TRANSFORMATION TO JET MODE:
To get from the truck mode into the jet mode, it is surprisingly simple. The cab splits in half to fold out to the side. The tank splits into half so that you can fold out the jet nose and the wings, and that's pretty much it.
JET MODE:
As part of the gimmick for Voyager figures in the Titans Return line, Optimus is a triple-changer and his second alternate mode is a jet.
Unfortunately, while using the tank as a fuselage is a great idea, and the front doesn't look too terrible, the designer couldn't do more about the rear. The two halves of the cab just sit underneath the wings and looks terrible.
Jet mode is slightly shorter than tanker mode, and thanks to the wing span, appears wider and bulkier.
Diac sits in the exact same place as tanker mode. An ingenious design is that it uses the same wheels as tanker mode to roll in this mode.
The weapons also attach in the same places. There's not enough room underneath the wings to put them there like on a normal jet Transformer. Stickers are used for the cockpit's windshields.
As a third mode, you can understand the compromises that had to be made. Yet, this is still the weakest mode of the figure. If the wings were longer, then it would help.
TRANSFORMATION TO ROBOT MODE:
Again, the transformation is a simple process but that makes it all the more elegant. It's interesting to see how the cab unfolds to form the robot's arms and the shoulder pylons, while the legs are your typical affair.
ROBOT MODE:
Again, taking inspiration from the G2 figure, Optimus Prime in robot mode has shoulder pylons and a faux chest which looks like the truck's windshields.
In this mode, he carries a fair bit of kibble on his back, being the folded up jet wings and tailfins, plus the tank's side pieces.
The headsculpt is classic Optimus Prime, with pop-up side pylons to bulk up the head (you can leave these down if you wish).
Optimus is chunky in this mode and feels very solid.
Poseability is excellent. Lacking a waist swivel, he has joints for his shoulders, elbows, hips and knees.
His large feet allows him to be stable in all poses.
His weapons are a sword and a double-barrelled gun.
It is a little bit of a shame that he doesn't have waist swivels to use the sword to its full potential.
The forearms are quite chunky since they contain the front wheels, which makes it slightly awkward when posing.
He can hold the weapons in either hand. Due to the head pylons, this restricts the balljointed neck but Optimus makes up for it since the head is on an assembly that can turn so he still retains passable head movement.
There are various paint applications to highlight the intricate sculpting, more than you'd expect.
Optimus makes a nice pairing against the Megatron figure of the same wave.
A fun robot mode that looks quite decent.
OVERALL:
At first glance, it may not seem like it but Optimus Prime is a really fun mold. With a good truck mode, a weak jet mode and an excellent robot mode, this is a fun figure well worth the purchase (especially if you can't wait for the remold Octone in the final wave).
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