(NOTE: Because this is a repaint, this is not a full-blown review. This mainly covers any changes made to the mold and the color scheme, and merely compares it to Classics Voyager Optimus Prime. For a review on the mold itself, read the review of Classics Voyager Optimus Prime here.)

    Ginrai is an homage to various Japan-exclusive fiery redecos of previous Optimus Prime toys, often referred to as "Fire Guts Ginrai" (hence the nod in the bio). Regardless of his origins, I love the fiery color scheme-- the fiery red and light orange really complement each other well, while the red is still juuust dark enough to contrast well against the orange and keep the color scheme from being too loud. In keeping with the "fiery" theme, Ginrai has a fair number of yellow paint apps too-- on his actual headlights, the faux headlights on his waist in robot mode, and on the yellow vents on his lower legs. Still, if these were the only colors, Ginrai would be a bit too light overall-- good thing there's a decent amount of black on him, which contrasts EXTREMELY well with his orange and red while also oddly keeping in theme with his fiery form, being the color of dark ash or something of the sort. Besides the obvious bits on the wheels, the black is on the middle of his legs, around the vents on his lower legs, on his rifle/smokestacks, on his upper legs and faux grill on his waist, and on his (actual truck) grill. The glossy shade of black that's used for paint looks particularly well-done. To give Ginrai just a bit of a "cool" color to contrast against all the fire, his transparent plastic on his windows and robot eyes is a dark transparent blue-- another color that contrasts well against the light orange. There's also just a TITCH of moderately dark blue paint on his side window details that aren't translucent. There's also your normal robot requisite silver on places like his wheel hubs, face, side vents in his truck mode, the faux grill on his robot abs, as well as a few other minor places. The silver serves as a decent color, but it doesn't contrast as well as, say, the blue or black. I DO really like the bit of chrome silver added to the truck grill, though-- it makes the truck look a bit more "real". To finish off the color scheme, Ginrai has a big ol' light blue "Cybertronian Knight with wings" sigil on his roof (which he can hold as a shield if you untuck his truck side panels and fold in his fist in robot mode-- it looks a little weird, but it's doable)-- and, being blue, it's another nice contrast color against the orange. He also has a "normal" Knight sigil on his left shoulder, in case you still weren't sure of his allegiance.
    No mold changes have been made to Ginrai.
    BotCon 2014 Ginrai takes one of the best Transformers molds of all time and paints it in a jaw-dropping fiery color scheme, with just the right amount of each fiery color and the black and blue to contrast against it. He's also got a pretty darn good number of paint apps. This is the 2nd time that this mold has been used in a "core" BotCon boxset, and I don't even care. It may not be the most original idea the BotCon people have ever had, but it looks great and-- if we consider only the combination of mold and color scheme and not originality or character attachment-- is my favorite exclusive from BotCon 2014.

Review by Beastbot

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