Allegiances: Autobot

(NOTE: Because the following toys are repaints, the rest of this is not a full-blown review. This mainly covers any changes made to the toys and their color schemes, and merely compares them to the original versions of these molds. For a review of BotCon 2015 Oilmaster's Pretender Shell-- the mold used for Optimus Prime's Pretender Shell-- go here. For a review on Generations Legends Swerve w/ Flanker-- the molds used for Optimus Prime's inner robot and Hi-Q, respectively-- go here.)
 

Optimus Prime (Pretender Shell)

Size: Between Voyager and Ultra (in terms of size/mass) (comes packed with Pretender Megatron w/ Spacewarp)
Color Scheme: Red, dark pale brown, pale flat light gray, and some metallic gold, moderately dark flat gray, light flat green, white, black, and light purplish gray
Individual Rating: 7.3

    Given that FunPub made a completely new mold for Oilmaster, it wasn't all that unexpected that they'd repaint it to get their money out of this mold. For the Pretender shell, an ape works pretty well for Optimus Prime, given the whole Beast Wars Optimus Primal connection, though the colors are a bit closer to "classic" Optimus Prime's. (They're actually based on an alternate deco job shown off for the Pretender shell shown at a BotCon back in the '90s.) Most of the "core armor" is a very Prime-y red, with the gorilla fur being a rather flat light gray, with some of the neighboring armor bits on the shoulders, upper legs, and feet a slightly darker shade of the flat gray. There's also some brown on his lower limbs and waist that is both dark and pale at the same time, like it's been "sun-faded" a little. The last color that's used to a fair extent is a really nice metallic gold, which is used on the helmet, as well as the ammo clips and the canisters on his belt. I particularly like how well the gold and red go together, and the brown is a nice "earthy" shade to emphasize the gorilla connection a bit more. I'm not all that fond of the shades of gray, though-- without the kind of paint wash that Oilmaster had, it doesn't look that exciting, even if it's not really all that odd for a gorilla. They also aren't different enough to contrast against each other much. On the face there's some nice white on the teeth and some light green eyes, the latter of which pops pretty well against said gray. (I wish the green had been used a bit more as accent color elsewhere.)
    No mold changes have been made to the "core" of the Pretender shell, but the weapons have been changed from Oilmaster. This time around, Prime comes with an oddly purplish gray-colored version of the classic Optimus rifle that came with "Thrilling 30th" Orion Pax, as well as the long black gun that came with "Thrilling 30th" Legends Optimus Prime w/ Roller. The black gun fits in nice and snugly into his fists or on the storage peg holes on his back, but the larger Orion Pax gun is a little difficult to fit into his fists-- the handle just isn't quite long enough, so he ends up holding it at a slight angle. Not a huge issue, but worth pointing out.
 

Hi-Q

Size: Legends partner
Difficulty of Transformation: Very Easy
Color Scheme: Light milky gray and some black, white, moderately dark blue, and brick red
Individual Rating: 5.6

    Hi-Q is another homage to a previous version of Optimus Prime-- namely, he was the Powermaster for Powermaster Optimus Prime. This time around he's a Targetmaster, and his bot mode has been repainted to match his G1 version extremely well, what with the white body, red arms and upper legs, and black lower legs. He's also got a nice blue on his visor, and even two tiny blue dots on the right side of his chest, just like the original. It's a pretty decent (if not outstanding) color scheme for robot mode, but unfortunately the main plastic color for his toy is that bland light milky gray I despise so much. Making the color more metallic really would've worked wonders in vehicle mode, which in particular is just far too bland for me. The black stripes on the wings and the Autobot symbols certainly help break things up a little, but generally the robot mode is what this toy's all about.
    No mold changes have been made to Hi-Q.
 

Optimus Prime (Inner Robot)

Size: Legend
Difficulty of Transformation: Very Easy
Color Scheme: Black, red, and some white, dark blue, silver, light glossy gray, pale light blue, and yellow
Individual Rating: 8.5

    A toy with this alt mode may be a little different from your typical Optimus Prime, but the Pretender shell was molded to specifically fit this mold inside the shell, and so this mold's what FunPub can work with-- and generally it works quite well. Like several other aspects of this toy, it's an homage to multiple previous Optimus Primes. The more "ruff 'n tuff" truck mode, the wide shoulders, and the grills on the robot chest are an homage to Armada Prime, whereas the darker color scheme and flames on the front of the truck mode are homages to G2 "Laser" Optimus Prime. It's a good color scheme, though, with aspects of Optimus Prime's usual red and dark blue, particularly in robot mode. The red chest works well against the light blue vents and the bits of gray paint, and contrasts very well against all the black plastic. The white upper legs also work great as another "surprise reveal" color in robot mode, and the dark blue on the legs, head, and hands is pretty accurate to previous Optimus Primes, but it's a bit too dark against the black and doesn't quite pop as much as I wish it would have. As far as more vehicle-specific paint, the red flames on the front look marvelous, and there's also silver on the wheel hubs, front grill, and windows, which keeps Optimus' alt mode from looking anything but boring. There's also just a bit of yellow on the headlights and robot eyes, and looks good.
    Optimus has a new headsculpt, and of course it's your typical Optimus head. It's pretty spot-on, with the gray faceplate and forehead vent looking quite nice against the dark blue and yellow. No issues with the headsculpt here-- otherwise, Optimus has no mold changes made.

    Double Pretender Optimus Prime is an awesome and quite ingenious re-use of the Oilmaster toys/molds. I think the Pretender shell and Hi-Q have a bit too much gray, though to be fair those are both fairly accurate to the source material. The real ingenious part here is just how many toys this version of Optimus is referencing-- Optimus Primal, Armada, Powermaster, G2 "Laser", classic G1, a cancelled Pretender shell-- you've got almost half the history of the character all here in one toy. Highly recommended, though not QUITE as much as Oilmaster.
 

Reviews by Beastbot

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