Let me tell you. How excited I was for
Power of the Prime Leader Class Optimus Prime.
Not very.
I bought him and Roddy... what? Two weeks ago? I only opened him today. I've already mentioned that I was only interested in him for the Orion Pax figure, and now, I am ready to eat some crow. He's pretty great. But, recall my thoughts on Roddy, because they're frighteningly similar in that they are impressive but disappointing in some areas.
Orion Pax is great. He's a modernly posable and wonderfully cartoon accurate. His only flaw is he turns into a... strangely proportioned earth truck and not a Cybertronian thingamathing.
The truck mode is alright, but strangely proportioned as I mentioned. I feel they could have done better. The trailer does a lot more work than I thought it would and is pretty impressive. There are bad spots (the red on the roof and front of trailer) but I find them strangely forgivable.
On to the full Optimus Prime mode:
One thing before moving on, he's only got 3 modes as opposed to Roddy's 4. Just pointing out it out cause Pax doesn't have his Cybertruck mode. Anyways, Prime mode is very impressive, especially compared to my rock bottom expectations. His head sculpt is to die for, and he is so MP-10'ish that its crazy. In fact the only thing he's missing is a wrist swivel and waist joint, everything else is there and fantastic.
Let's talk backpack:
It is not bad. It looks bad in pics, but in hand, I dunno. It's strangely acceptable. Doesn't bug me at all.
What is bad though, is the strange lengthy sticks that are his ankles.
Certain angles are fine. Others not so much. But the posability they deliver is delicious.
In closing, I think he's great. Only there's two things that come to mind however.
1) A Takara take on this would be great, hiding more of the grey trailer bits in red paint. I really can't help but think, a proper Takara release of this would make a wonderful Price cutting stand-in for MP-10.
And (2), I don't have any need for a regular Optimus Prime in this size class (if you get my meaning). Powermaster Prime needs to be this big. Normalmaster Prime does not.
The Leader debut's of this line are both winners. If you've any interest, go get'em