As doublespy said, this carries over many of the features of the Ultra Magnus mould and is very much a car carrier trying to be a truck. As a result there are limitations to the truck mode, including the massive hole in the front of the trailer, as well as gaps on the sides and roof of the trailer. But to be fair, there's not a whole lot more you could do to cover up every single hole. The legs already have these huge panels to cover up the sides but the offset is, as doublespy mentioned, making the lower legs chunkier. And there's not a lot of other redeco potential for the Ultra Magnus mould, so I think that a lot of the shortcomings are fairly forgivable.
The G1 fanboy in me wishes that the core head looked more like Powermaster Optimus Prime's cab robot head, with the helmet of course resembling Super Optimus Prime's head. But objectively speaking I can see how that might seem somewhat redundant to younger fans who didn't grow up with G1, and it's important for Generations to appeal to both older and younger fans alike. And making it resemble Orion Pax's face also carries appeal for G1 fans anyway.
The base mode is okay. It's essentially an intermediate mode between robot and truck rather than a proper base mode like we have on the G1 toy. But then again, the G1 toy has a detachable trailer and is a complete brick in robot mode, and isn't a redeco of Ultra Magnus. So all things considered, this base mode is alright. It's better than Fortress Maximus' attempt at a city mode.
The colours actually look better IRL than in photos. Speaking of which...
Agreed. Powermaster Optimus Prime's overall look and colours may seem cheap compared to Ginrai, but it's G1 accurately cheap! This gallery includes comparison photos of G1 Powermaster Optimus Prime and Ginrai, and Ginrai always look nicer that PM OP. But he is not Optimus Prime.Originally Posted by doublespy
I only got Ginrai when he was reissued in 2001. I did not grow up with this toy, it's not part of my childhood nostalgia. My Powermaster Optimus Prime was purchased in 1988, and of course I've read the adventures of PM OP in the Marvel Comics including memorable stories such as the Time Wars, Matrix Quest etc. This red-fisted lighter-grey figure was part of my childhood, so for this reason Powermaster Optimus Prime feels more like the actual character to me than Ginrai.
Even the Ginrai reissue toy has never felt like Optimus Prime to me. And even when Hasbro repackaged this toy and sold it as "Apex Armour Optimus Prime," it still didn't feel like Optimus Prime to me. This is why I was so conflicted over whether to get this toy or Ginrai -- my brain says Ginrai but my heart says PM Optimus Prime. My heart (and my impatience) won out in the end.
I do have one main gripe about this toy though -- Apex's colours. It looks very, very different from Hi-Q and I don't see why it needs to look so different. The head, chest, arms and legs are all separate pieces... okay, maybe they didn't want to gang-mould the legs with the same black plastic frame as the guns and wheels, that might've been too expensive, but surely they could've moulded the chest in the same white(ish) plastic as the head, and heck, mould the legs in the same red plastic as the arms or cab etc. Because Hi-Q does have red thighs and red legs would make it look at least half G1-accurate. I look at Apex's colour scheme and think, "What?!" I suspect that TakaraTOMY's version is going to look much nicer than the colours on Apex.
There is one significant improvement. The panel slots underneath each hand allow you to insert the gun grips into them, holding them in place. This greatly improves over Ultra Magnus' poor ability to hold his own guns securely; without these slots Optimus Prime's gun grip would be similar to Ultra Magnus -- holds okay for display, but prone to dropping them during play. So I'm very much appreciative of this modification.
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Photos
I've tried to Google for images comparing G1 PM Optimus Prime with this toy -- I've found images comparing with Ginrai (or the reissue which is really just Ginrai), but none comparing it with the original PM Optimus Prime toy. I could take comparison pics with my reissue Ginrai but I don't see the point in that because it's a different character and more importantly, this toy isn't based on Ginrai, it's based on Powermaster Optimus Prime - warts and all.I don't know if I'll get Legends Ginrai, but I'm sure someone else will and I hope someone will post comparison pics w/ G1 Ginrai. But until then, here are a few comparison pics with Optimus Prime.
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