Allegiance: Autobot
Size: Leader
Difficulty of Transformation to Rodimus' Robot Mode: Easy
Difficulty of Transformation to Rodimus Prime's Robot Mode:
Color Scheme: Moderately dark red, dark red, black, light orange, yellow, and some silver, transparent dark blue, and light chalky gray
Rating: 8.9

    Like the other Power of the Primes Leader class toys, Rodimus has an "evolution" gimmick, in which the toy has both a "normal" and an "upgraded" version for both the vehicle and robot modes. First, let's take plain ol' Rodimus/Hot Rod. In vehicle mode, this is very much a G1-update; he's quite square overall for a sportscar, with relatively little mold detailing and an overall look that calls back to the G1 toy pretty directly, but with a flatter top. With the G1 toy, the front window section at least curved up, but here pretty everything is angles. The cockpit itself is actually rather small even by Hot Rod proportions, and doesn't stick up enough from the surrounding parts to really look "right"; that's my biggest issue with this mode. Another, much smaller, issue is that on the back end, there's an obvious gap in the middle which is the spot in between his two robot legs; I'm not sure why Hasbro didn't just include a little peg in the middle of his legs to have them connect to each other, but alas, that's not the case here. This mode is kibble-free--always a plus. All of the important details are here, too-- the symmetrical flames on the front hood with an Autobot symbol in the middle of them; yellow, simplistic angular headlights; a three-pronged yellow fin-like spoiler; three exhaust pipes on each side of the toy; and a nice dark, transparent blue color used for the cockpit plastic, which helps hide the fact it's a shallow cockpit and there isn't much behind it, in actuality. There's a couple of simplistic shapes on the spoiler and tailpipes, but other than that the mold detailing is VERY basic and honestly a bit disappointing for a Generations figure, even one that's supposed to be streamlined. A bit more detail on the front grill in particular would've been appreciated. The color scheme takes a somewhat dark red and pairs it with a light orange on most of the front hood, along with some yellow on the spoiler and the dark blue on the cockpit. It's a pretty good color scheme overall, with the red, yellow, and orange complementing each other pretty nicely while the blue in the cockpit provides some decent contrast. There's also yellow paint on the headlights (and of course, the flames) and some silver on the tailpipes, which helps for some accents. That said, in a really weird decision, the middle portion of this mode is a noticeably darker, duller shade of red plastic than the rest of Rodimus; it looks a bit off, as it's not enough of a difference to make for some obvious contrast, and looks almost like a mistake. Still, it's relatively minor, overall.
    Rodimus' transformation to his robot mode is pretty simple; heck, you can figure most of it out by just looking at the bottom of his vehicle mode. The tailpipes fold up and the sides fold out to become his arms; the top/roof/spoiler section rotates around; the back end splits apart to become his legs; and then the robot chest opens up so you can rotate in the front bumper and out the robot head in its place before clamping it shut again. (The hood section from vehicle mode is actually not used in this mode; he's got a "faux hood" chest for this robot mode.) Overall this is a pretty solid Rodimus, with generally good proportions. The only exception to this are his arms, which are a little too skinny when looked at from a straight-on view. There's also a little bit of kibble; the tailpipe and car sections do stick out in front of his fists a bit (definitely making the arms the weakest part of this mode), and the cockpit hangs down below his butt some. They're not huge issues, but noticeable. His lower legs could stand to be just a TITCH larger, but that's really being persnickety. The mold detailing in general stays fairly sparse in this mode, though parts of him that demand more intricate detailing-- like the fists and head-- are sculpted pretty well. Rodimus' curved helmet with circular "earbuds", a few minor angular details, and a "normal" face is replicated pretty well here. The color on his flamed chest, the small waist flap, the fairly skinny legs and the bulkier lower legs; it's all good here. The color breakup is also pretty accurate to the G1 toy, with orange dominating the main body, upper legs, and hands, while his trademark spoiler sticks up behind his back. He's got some black on his lower legs and wheels, as expected. He does have some more of that slightly darker red on his waist and some smaller connector parts, to boot. There's a rather unique light chalky gray used for parts on his upper shoulders and his face, which looks good and may have just a tad of a purple/blue tint to it, which is a bit odd but it's only slight. The flames and Autobot symbol on the chest are, of course, done marvelously once again. Unfortunately, those awful foil stickers are used in this mode, for the triangular details on Rodimus' shoulders and lower legs. They really should've just been paint, as they don't fit in with the rest of the figure at all. Rodimus has a two-part black gun, which can be combined into a longer sniper rifle and that has some fairly intricate mold detailing on it that is pretty G1-accurate. For articulation in this mode, Rodimus can move at the neck, shoulders (at two points), elbows (at two points), hips (at two points), knees (at three points), and up-and-down at the ankles slightly. I do wish his shoulders weren't so narrow, but otherwise he's fairly well-articulated in this mode.

    For Rodimus Prime's vehicle mode, you just fold the tailpipe sections on the side of Rodimus' vehicle forward, then push him back and slot him into the cavity on the trailer. Then you close panels around the rear half of this vehicle mode, rotate the angular tailpipes down, and there you go. This mode is generally quite solid, and pretty accurately replicates Rodimus Prime's "Winnebago" trailer while also adding a fair amount of new molded details, unlike the core Rodimus figure. There's panels of all sorts on the sides, along with a few vents. The top has some more rectangular panel lines, and two little pegs on the top for Prime/Titan masters to stand on. There's also two holes near the back for the toy's guns. The proportions of the trailer are pretty solid, overall. The feet are a bit obvious on the backside (particularly because of their color), but they do at least fit up flat against the backside. More annoying from a frontal angle are the obvious Prime mode fists just kinda sticking out there on the front of the trailer portion. From the sides and top they're covered, but not at all from the front. The top of the trailer is mostly the same dull red that was used only for the middle of Rodimus' car mode-- why IS there this odd change in red here?-- but it's still a solid shade. There's some more light orange on the lower sides, which helps make the trailer look more eye-catching, along with a bit more orange on the front top of the trailer. Unfortunately the flame details on the sides are those awful foil stickers, and what's worse is that they're right around a hinge, so after transfomrations they tend to curl up/bend a bit at that portion-- this is definitely my biggest pet peeve about this mode, by far. There's also two Autobot symbol foil stickers on the front sides of the trailer. One last thing, is that I really do love how they added the elongated exhaust pipes that rotate down to the car's exhaust pipes to make them longer and help integrate the car with the trailer more. It's lovely.
    Previous toys that have both "Hot Rod/Rodimus" and "Rodimus Prime" robot modes have mostly just had Rodimus kinda "elongate" into Rodimus Prime, but wow, this toy really has some creative ideas. The "core" toy basically does the splits and flips around a few different ways, with producing the chest (from the ACTUAL car hood this time), the head, the same rear spoiler on the upper back, and the legs from the original form the shoulders on this toy. The front portions of the trailer attach to form the arms, while the rest of the trailer slots in and mostly forms the legs and waist. Overall, the end result is quite solid, and most definitely a "bigger" Rodimus toy with bulkier, stronger proportions but still within the realms of normalcy. Let's get the bad stuff out of the way first, though; yes, the upper Rodimus legs are quite obvious between Rodimus Prime's shoulders and his head. From a side view, the "shell" of much of the top portion of the trailer also just hangs behind Rodimus main body and waist. These are definitely the two biggest issues with those mode-- particularly the former, as there's no way to really hide those orange legs from the core toy. On a lesser note, the core toy's arms are slightly visible behind the chest, where they curl up and slot to form the bulk of the body. There's also small shells of the front of his trailer below his lower arms. Otherwise, everything's pretty soild; he's got some nice, sturdy legs with wide feet for stability despite the back kibble, and all of his connection points are very solid, so nothing jangles around loosely. The new headsculpt is great, keeping Rodimus' core details but making the chin and other features larger and giving him a sterner, no-nonsense look on his face. His mold detailing is a bit more intricate here, emphasizing his larger size, with some added angular lines and piston-like details on his feet. There's also some more foil stickers on is lower legs, replicating some G1 details-- against the black, though, they don't look that bad. He still ends up with exhaust pipes on the sides of his arms-- just the angular pipes from his trailer, this time, and they still look great. The same general color scheme of Rodimus' is present here, with black legs; light orange upper legs, chest, and a bit on his lower arms; and red arms, head, sides of the chest, and waist. Where the core toy shoulders connect to his lower arm pieces, though, there's that weird red color mismatch. He's also got a bit of gray paint on his fists and on his face, with some silver on his center headcrest and transparent dark blue eyes. You can lift up Rodimus Prime's chest and, indeed, there's a Matrix in there, and you can poke out the included translucent crystal in the center and fit in a Prime Master if you so desire, just like the other PotP Matrices. For articulation, Rodimus Prime can move at the neck, shoulders (at three points), elbows (at two points), wrist rotation, and movement at the hips (at three points), knees, and ankles (at two points)-- so he can get into some pretty awesome poses.
    Power of the Primes Rodimus/Rodimus Prime is an awesome idea, and for the most part it's carried out pretty well. The transformation to his "super" robot mode is ingenious, and his other modes are quite good as well. That said, there are a few issues that juuust keep him from being a "must buy"-- foil stickers, especially those unfortunate ones around the hinge of his trailer; obvious legs behind his head in Prime mode; fairly unsightly "shell" kibble behind his back in that same mode; and some fairly thin arms in his normal robot mode. Still, this is definitely my favorite mold of the "Evolution" PotP molds; recommended.

Review by Beastbot

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