Optimus Prime's vehicle mode is-- as I'm sure you'd expect-- a red-and-dark-blue truck cab. It's fairly G1-esque in terms of the overall color distribution and general look, but Combiner Wars Prime is a bit more curved in his silhouette, a bit more "beefed up" and curvy (a little bloated, honestly), despite the fact that he still is a flat-nosed cab. The proportions are generally pretty good, though, and there's only a few minor extras in this mode. The most obvious ones are his robot feet on the back end (as is the case with a lot of Optimus toys, natch) as well as the obvious combiner waist behind the red cab section, which is admittedly a bit of an eyesore on the back, but does help to cover up the extra windows back there that are used for torso mode. On a more minor note, the gray linear segments down the front below the grill don't look all that great, but are used for the transformation. The gray side-window segments around the painted front windows also look bad, and the windows halfway down the side of the cab are also broken up by a tab used for transformation-- in general the sides of this mode are the weakest, due to all the transformation hinges, tabs, and color breakup that seems to be required as part of his transformation. The silvery blue used for Prime's windows is a pretty nice shade that contrasts with both the red and the light milky gray quite well, as does the silver on the smokestacks and the pale gold used for Prime's headlights. The rest of Prime's color scheme is as you'd expect; dark blue, red, and some gray (unfortunately of the blah light milky gray variety); I'm sure you're pretty familiar with this color scheme by now, and this toy sticks pretty much 100% to that formula. For weapons, Optimus has two guns that are stored on the back section of this mode, and with their detailing look a tad like an "exposed engine", though they're still pretty obviously guns what with the long barrels. One gun can also be plugged into the end of the other to form a rather oddly elongated gun; honestly, it looks kinda weird so I prefer to just have Prime wield them as two smaller guns.
    The transformation to Prime's robot mode is largely taken from his various G1 toy forms, with one impotant difference; the front parts actually split open and fold back to become his shoulders-- his "cab window chest" is entirely fake, and done likely only because that's so much a part of Optimus' iconic look. In a fun twist, compared to just folding out from the back there's a little part on the roof that rotates around a central point, allowing his robot head to flip around during transformation. In this mode, Optimus still retains a pretty traditional look, but "buffed out" a bit, particularly when it comes to his shoulders and thick arms. His lower legs are also a bit thick and rounded, as well. Due to his transformation, his main body front is almost completely flat, but the really nice mold detailing on the abs helps to alleviate this some. He's got a little kibble-- some paneling on the sides of his lower arms, and obvious combiner ports behind his fists-- but generally he's pretty good in that respect, with his combiner chest and waist staying behind his main body and out of the way pretty well. His color scheme is a bit more varied in this mode, with a good amount of his blah light gray (thankfully!) being painted a nice silver on his abs, mid-arms, and lower legs. The fake gold "headlight" bits on his hips are also a nice touch, and his head has all the paint you could reasonably ask for. (Oddly, the Autobot symbols on his shoulders are stickers, not paint apps.) Although he's sparse on mold detailing in some areas because of the general curvy, semi-G1 aesthetic, Optimus still has an impressive amount of detailing in some other places too, like all the little gear-like details on his upper legs and on the middle of his arms. His headsculpt has all the necessary elements for Optimus, but it's a tad pin-headed and overly curvy for Optimus, and thus just looks a little "off". For articulation, Optimus can move at the neck, shoulders (at three points), elbows (at two points), waist, hips (at two points), and knees (at two points); his hips and shoulders-- having to hold up/keep together entire combiner limbs-- have nice, solid clickety ratchets to offer a good amount of resistance. (This said, the hips are slightly mis-aligned, with their angles never quite matching up. This isn't a big deal here, but when he's combined this can get a bit annoying as it's amplified what with the longer limbs.)
    Optimus' torso mode-- "Ultra Prime"-- is a fairly minor change from his robot mode; the arms fold up and the fists fold back to make the combiner ports accessible, the robot legs crunch up a bit to form the upper legs, and the back of Optimus' robot mode splits open with a combiner head folding up as you turn the toy around. From the detailing-- particularly the rather intricate detailing on the chest-- he looks a bit like the core of Energon Optimus Prime's combined form in this mode, a nice homage to Optimus' former combining toy. This also shows in the headsculpt, which is basically a larger, better-looking Energon Prime's, complete with the little circles at the base of the antennae. The head is also painted quite well, though I wish I could say the same for the open chest-- there's plenty of mold detailing there, but no paint to bring out all those details. In fact, in general this mode is rather bereft of paint apps. Optimus' hollow chest cavity allows you to plug Blackjack or Rodimus or any versions of that Combiner Wars Legends car mold in there, but the connection is pretty unstable, unfortunately-- I prefer to re-close the chest cavity after folding the head out, as the bulkier chest with faux windows works better for Prime. The shoulders are generally pretty good and stay where they're supposed to thanks to various tabs, though the obvious fists sticking out behind the combiner ports are a definite eyesore. The waist/upper legs are... well, very obviously just Optimus' regular legs. There's two panels that fold up to help keep the upper and lower parts on each leg connected as one, and the "codpiece" helps to cover up what would be anemic proportions in that area for a combiner, but it still just looks rather weak. The feet off the side of the "knees" look particularly bad, and the panels that are supposed to keep the upper and lower legs together can come undone a bit too easily. For torso mode, Optimus can move at the neck (at two points, including an ability to look down in front of his chest a little due to his transformation), at the base of each antennae, and at the hips.
    Combiner Wars Optimus Prime has pretty decent robot and vehicle modes, with little kibble in either, and a unique twist on his traditional transformation with the front of the cab becoming his shoulders instead of his chest. However, he does look a little "bloated" because of his oddly curvy silhouette that I would've preferred to be more angular. His torso mode is also easily the weakest of the Combiner Wars voyagers', with a general lack of paint, a weak/malfunctioning chest combination gimmick, and a very uninspired transformation of his robot feet into his torso upper feet with some weak panel connections. He's certainly not a bad toy by any means, but the other Combiner Wars torsos are at least marginally better, and the other versions even of this mold I think all look better. Only recommended for Optimus Prime and/or Combiner Wars completists (he does function better as a stand-alone Optimus toy than as a combiner part).

Review by Beastbot

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