Toy Review - RODIMUS PRIME (Kingdom)

[SharkyMcShark]

Isn't that what SS86 Hot Rod is for?

I can't stand the fake chest on the SS figure. It's a deal killer for me.

[Kyle]

[Tetsuwan Convoy]

Japan released their last weekend and I got mine on Saturday morning. I have a soft spot for Hot Rod and Rodimus. I just love the flamey awesome car design of HR and ponder at the thought process of thinking that a firey red camper van would make an exciting leader toy character dude.
So, ignoring Rodimus' character flaws in the G1 cartoon, I approach his Kingdom with a lot of my own head canon and I like it.
I see this guy as an appropriate upgrade for Rodimus. The individual vehicle mode looks suitably Hot Rod -esque, but with a butt-load of extra oomph! Him coming with a sword and being able to plug the rifle on the side of the car makes me think of this Rodimus as a Mad Max style character. A grizzled fellow who travels alone in a post apocalyptic world, making adjustments as he needs to. Hence the big beefy back end of the car as opposed to the sleek smoothness of HR. The trailer is his guns and weapon storage and back up. Sometimes he takes it with him, sometimes he doesn't. I should just let everyone know I've been watching a fair bit of Fist of the North Star lately as well :P

Transformation is there, but not frustratingly so. Although I extended the grey joint connected to his windshield wot swivel the arms around once. Don't do that as it took me about 2 hours work a way to force that sucker back in place again. Fingers were sore for the rest of the day.
However the end result is an incredibly well articulated Transformer with presence! Dayum it's impressive. In person the face doesn't look as depressed as I thought and the silver is pretty nice.
Like Bidoof said though, his head/neck is a tad too recessed behind his collar.

Accessories wise, the sword (based on a gladius?) is very nice and I have no idea about it except that it shows up in the last page of the Gens Selects comics. I like it though. Fits well, can be plugged into his back. His gun is a little too skinny for my liking, and maybe a tad too long. The main accessory being the trailer is pretty cool and its nice to see that its so easy to plonk Rodimus on it with minimal fuss. Unlike the Masterpiece.... The storage tray is nice, but he can't hold everything all that well, so effect parts are in a collective effect bag. One thing I find intriguing is that the sword can be held under the vehicle (car)and works when plugged into the trailer, but the only lace to stash the gun is under the spoiler. Now when plugged ino the trailer, the gun can't go there and despite all the plugs inside the trailer, there isn't room to place the gun in there, so you end up shoving it in somewhere loose. This baffles me a little bit.

Overall I think this is a great toy. You can tell it's more than a leader figure, but I'm not sure it makes the stretch to commander as such, however, I do not regret spending my hard earned yennies on this guy.

I was excited the moment I saw his debut, and I wasn't disappointed when I opened the box.

[Magnus]

I've had Rodimus Prime since late June, but I've only been playing around with the base figure and rifle, and haven't touched the trailer or other accessories yet.

It seems to me that with Rodimus, you're paying for the engineering R&D and the part count, whereas with Jetfire and Skylynx, you were paying for the size, even if they may or may not have more parts than Rodimus - they certainly aren't as complex to transform as Rodimus. It's kind of like how Studio Series '86 Hot Rod was priced as a voyager despite his size, because he's a more involved and complex figure than a typical deluxe. Speaking of which, I like the fact that although Rodimus shares engineering with Hot Rod, there are steps unique to this figure, so it's not just upscaled with a few mould changes.

I do have a few gripes:

I'm not a fan of the exaggerated cheekbones, sunken-looking eyes, and big chin on the head sculpt - sure, Rodimus is meant to be mature compared to Hot Rod, but this head sculpt looks wizened and gaunt.

The rifle is very thin, almost spindly. I get that it needed to be that thin so it could fold in half, but perhaps I got too used to MP9's weapon (which this is based on), which was chunkier despite being long.

The hands look disproportionately large. It feels like someone wanted Rodimus to have two joints for the fingers as well as an independent index finger, and these were the smallest hands the designers could make with that articulation and while making the hands durable enough to withstand play.

The effect part nubs on his forearm pipes are placed really close together for some reason, and this means that you can't attach effect parts besides the black smoke parts. It also looks weird, since the top nub isn't in line with the middle of the pipe and the middle nub is.

Maybe I'm just nitpicking, because Rodimus Prime is otherwise a great piece. Fear of missing out was definitely a motivator for me, with a bit of curiosity thrown in, but I'm nonetheless glad to have him.

Like Bidoof said though, his head/neck is a tad too recessed behind his collar.

The base of the neck is on a hinge, so you can move the neck forward and the head will come with it. The catch is that the collar will impede rotation somewhat once the neck is shifted forward.