Powermaster Prime- where does he fit in?

[Vector Sigma 13]

Im trying to find out where Powermaster Prime fits in the Transformers continuity. I know all about Ginrai and his Japanese counterparts but id like to know where he fits in, in the US storylines. I understand hes in the comic books, but i wouldnt know where. The comic book line is going to be my next little adventure into Transformers. Ive seen some of the up to date stuff but little of the original issues.

Does anyone know if there is a post on here that briefly overviews the comic lines?

[Paulbot]

Powermaster Optimus Prime appeared in the US comics from #42 to #76.

Don't want to say too much more if you've not read the comics, but basically there's more US comic apperances by Powermaster Optimus Prime then the original version.

Unlike Ginrai, Powermaster Prime is the same character in the comics as regular Prime, just with a new body.

[Vector Sigma 13]

Cheers- much appreciated.

[roller]

he also shows up in Season 5 of the cartoon

[griffin]

he also shows up in Season 5 of the cartoon

Since I haven't actually seen it, I can't be sure, but my understanding of that 'season' is that it only has Optimus and a kid as 'bookends' to the actual adventures. Unless they talk about how he became a Powermaster in the cartoon universe, VS13 isn't going to get any answers from there. But I guess it is canonical, if he is actually referring to his adventures in the original cartoon, and is currently in the form of a Powermaster.

Don't want to say too much more if you've not read the comics, but basically there's more US comic apperances by Powermaster Optimus Prime then the original version.

Since you are wanting to know about Powermaster Prime, the following has spoilers, but if you decide to want to find out about it yourself by acquiring all the comics, please skip past the rest of this posting.

Unfortunately, that is probably true by page/panel count, but the Original Optimus did appear in more issues than the PM Optimus, albeit by just 3 (and a couple more if you count the mini-series issues).
We had 80 'regular' issues of the US Marvel Comic, of which the original Optimus appeared in 24 issues (only featured heavily in 10 (of the 80!!!), but his head appeared in 7, and he had brief appearances in 7), while the PM Optimus appeared in 21 (featured in 16, with 5 brief appearances). For the record, issue 80 is drawn like Actionmaster Optimus, but didn't come into contact with Nucleon, so is a difficult one to classify (so it isn't included in the numbers above). It could still be a PM, because Hi-Q is still inside him, but then, the 3 issues Hi-Q was in after Prime's death in #75, could also count towards PM Prime's tally, as he claimed to be Optimus.

(I wasted a little time today with this, but it gave me a good excuse to browse through my TFs comics, so it's all good)

Issues with Original Optimus - 1, 2, 3, 4, 12, 14(5pages), 15(6pages), 16(5pages), 19, 21(3pages), 22(4pages), 24, 26(6pages of his corpse), 34(3pages - flashback story), 40 (virtual image), 48 (flashback story).

Issues with just Original Optimus as a head - 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11.

Issues with Powermaster Prime - 42, 44(is now a PM, but drawn as original for some reason), 49, 50, 51(1page), 52(1page), 56, 57, 58, 59, 60, 62(2pages), 65(3pages), 69, 70, 71, 72, 73, 74, 75, 76(3pages).

Issues with the debatable version - 80.

Issues without Optimus at all - 13, 17, 18, 20, 23, 25, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 41, 43, 45, 46, 47, 53, 54, 55, 61, 63, 64, 67, 68, 77, 78, 79.

The point of all that though, is that it highlights the lack of the central Hero character kids of Gen1 era wanted. We had 80 issues, and only 26 featured 'the great, iconic' Optimus Prime, with another 11 having brief cameo appearances, and 7 just showing his 'head on a bench'. That left 34 issues without Optimus Prime - almost half the entire comic run. More than half if you don't count the issues with just his head sitting on a bench.

It's no wonder the cartoon was more popular, because kids could see their hero Optimus in just about every episode, but in the Comic, he was hardly ever in it. If it wasn't for the UK Gen1 comic (reprinted the US comic, and had extra exclusive stories), the European fans (and us when it started shipping here *shortly* before Ops death) would have had the same lack of exposure to Optimus.

But going back to your original query - Powermaster Optimus - where does it fit in.

Well, from issue 1 to 4 we had the original Optimus running around, but then Shockwave decapitated him, and he didn't get his body back until issue 12. He was fine until issue 24 when he pretty much killed himself to preserve his code of honour, but a copy of something (assumed to be his mind/spark/soul/whatever) was made to a disk (retconned by fans as being reformatted by the matrix to be able to hold his entire personality on an 80s floppy disk.
The Autobots got a hold of the disk, and after a brief Autobot civil war, the disk was taken to Nebulos to create a new body for Optimus, because Nebulos had the technology and experiance following the creation of the Headmasters and Targetmasters.
Optimus was reborn as a Powermaster, because the fuel on Nebulos had been poisoned to keep Cybertronians away for good - the Nebulon partnered with each Cybertronian was the way around using the poisoned fuel.
Optimus and the other PMs left Nebulos, and he went on back to his usual job of fighting Decepticons and sacrificing himself in times of trouble. Problem was, when he later died, his Nebulon partner was bonded to such a molecular level, that he was able to be later 'rebuilt' by The Last Autobot, into Optimus Prime... to sacrifice himself another day (in the Gen2 comic).

[GoktimusPrime]

Should/could this thread be merged with the "Newbies" questions thread?

[Paulbot]

Issues without Optimus at all

My statement was a bit of a guess but I knew I was close to the truth.

However Powermaster Prime was in #52 (in the flashbacks sending the Pretenders on their mission)

[GoktimusPrime]

Powermaster Prime is my favourite of all the G1 Optimus Prime incarnations.

[Sky Shadow]

The point of all that though, is that it highlights the lack of the central Hero character kids of Gen1 era wanted. We had 80 issues, and only 26 featured 'the great, iconic' Optimus Prime, with another 10 having brief cameo appearances, and 7 just showing his 'head on a bench'. That left 35 issues without Optimus Prime - almost half the entire comic run. More than half if you don't count the issues with just his head sitting on a bench.

It's no wonder the cartoon was more popular, because kids could see their hero Optimus in just about every episode, but in the Comic, he was hardly ever in it.

Um... Griffin... exactly which cartoon were you watching? In the cartoon I watched, Optimus was dead for twenty-eight episodes. Plus, the popularity argument makes no sense in that the cartoon only existed during the early most-'popular' years of Transformers - the comics lasted until 1991, which also makes them more enduring (and better) than the cartoon. Plus, of course the cartoon was more 'popular' - people got it for free! We chose to spend our pocket money on the comics while other kids were buying... I don't know, football cards.

Personally, as a loyal Grimlock-worshipping child, I loved the fact that Prime was dead almost as much as he was alive in the comics. We were eighties children in a dark era of comics: Watchmen, The Dark Knight Returns, Spider-Man's black costume and Crisis on Infinite Earths. Transformers comics reflected that.

[Vector Sigma 13]

Should/could this thread be merged with the "Newbies" questions thread?

Ive got no issues with moving this thread if people feel it needs to be.

Thanks for the great feedback guys- im more interested in reading the comics than ever now!