Set Price: ~$25 (U.S)

Prima Prime (Prime Wars)

Size: Prime Master
Difficulty of Transformation: Very Easy
Color Scheme: Milky gray, transparent light blue, silver, and some light sky blue
Individual Rating: 3.5

(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 the original Prima Prime. For a review on the mold itself, read the review of the original Prima Prime in the "Throne of the Primes" set here.)

    Unlike the othertwo Prime Masters included in these "Prime Wars lookback" sets, Prima Prime never got his own Prime Master set, but rather his original version was included in the SDCC-exclusive "Throne of the Primes" set. Thus, for those who aren't interested in getting that big-ticket item, Prima Prime here might prove more of a draw than the Prime Masters in the other sets. He still has the same general "heroic good guy/Prime of Light" look to him, but like the other "Prime Wars Trilogy" Prime Masters, he's largely made of transparent plastic. For Prima, it's a light blue plastic, which of course fits him well. In robot mode, his chest and lower legs are of a milky medium gray (thankfully not light gray, so it doesn't look that bad), while his helmet and the outside of his arms are painted a spiffy silver color. I don't like how the inside of his arms looks transparent, but leaving the face of his robot head unpainted was a good call, methinks, as it lets his head light up with a light source behind him, which is certainly fitting for what he represents. The silver/blue color combo is pretty nice-- at least for a figure this small-- and the gray makes for an okay substitute for the silver. Unfortunately, in core mode only the actual "pec/ab" Prima symbol is painted a light sky blue. It's a nice color, but with the rest being a transparent light blue, there's no paint to help bring out all the myriad other details on the front of the core mode.
    No mold changes have been made to this version of Prima Prime.
 

Punch/Counterpunch

Allegiance: Autobot or Decepticon
Size: Deluxe
Difficulty of Transformation from Vehicle to Robot: Easy
Difficulty of Transformation between Robot Modes: Very Easy
Color Scheme: Dark blue, orange "cheesy" yellow, and some charcoal black, silver, black, light metallic purple, light blue, and light red
Individual Rating: 9.2

    Punch and Counterpunch-- both sides of the same dual-personality TF character-- both have the same alt mode. (You think this would clue in the Autobots and Decepticons to his dual identity, but I guess not.) Anyways, he's a dark blue generic sportscar, and this mode is largely flawless. The generally curvy proportions are pretty spot-on, and the only robot mode extras are the little bits you can see inside his clear plastic windows. (Speaking of which, his side and front windows are clear plastic, but his small rear window is simply painted silver-- presumably because putting additional transparent plastic there would make the large piece too structurally compromised, I guess.) He doesn't have any decorative tampos on him, but beyond the blue and clear plastic, there's black wheels with eye-catching light red paint on the hubs. His front grill/headlight details-- which are fairly angular in appearance-- are mostly painted silver, with the main headlight on each side also being covered with a piece of clear plastic, and the very middle of the grill having some black paint on it. The rear of this mode is also fully detailed, with places like an area for the license plate, exhaust vents, and taillights present, although unfortunaely only the taillights are painted (red). I would've liked a bit more paint overall, but some interesting details like the vents on the front hood help break up all the smooth blue a bit. Since he's listed as being part of the "Power of the Primes" portion of the "Prime Wars trilogy" look-back subline on Amazon, Punch/Counterpunch comes with a piece of charcoal black Prime Armor. However, he can't really use it as a leg/arm, since the toy isn't made to combine with others, so its connection to PotP is pretty tenuous. Still, he can store a Prime Master in it, and his robot chests have holes if you want to plug it in there as Prime Armor, so he can interface with it a bit. He also has a small orange-yellow gun, which can store on the underside of the car mode. The Prime Armor can only store in the peg hole on the top roof, though, so it sticks out a bit more.
    The transformation to Punch's robot mode is fairly straightforward; the back half of the car mode opens up, swings down and out, and then collapses slightly to form his legs, while the sides separate a bit to form the arms, and the middle section of the front hood folds back into his chest. The end result is a pretty decent robot mode, though the legs are a bit too long proportionally-- particularly the lower legs, which have no discernible feet. The car front-halves are angled backwards behind his shoulders at about a 45-degree angle. I wish they had collapsed a bit more onto the shoulders, but they don't look outright bad. The arms are pretty decent overall, and the chest and head are pretty well-proportioned. The amount of mold detailing on the arms, body, and upper legs is pretty impressive, with vent-like details quite prevalent, along with angular chest/ab details on the chest. The headsculpt is also pretty stellar, with two large, triangular side antennae, a small hole in the center of the forehead-helmet, small side chin guards, two light blue eyes, and a silver face plate. The color combo is broken up considerably more in this mode with an orangish "cheesy" yellow plastic used prominently on Punch's body, shoulders, and the lower part of his head, as well as being painted slightly on the top of his shoulder-car bits. His fists are a nice Autobot red (though the inside of the fist holes are orange), and he's got some silver and red paint on his upper legs, too. He has a silver-backed Autobot symbol in the middle of his chest, with some Morse code-esque dots and lines below it. Lower the Autobot symbol and you'll see a hole to plug his Prime Armor into, if you wish, or he can awkwardly hold it in one of his hands, or on his back. For articulation in this mode, Punch can move at the neck, shoulders, elbows (at two points), inwards slightly at the wrists, waist rotation, and movement at the hips (at two points) and knees-- thus he's fairly well-articulated. Some ankle or more shoulder movement would've been appreciated, though, and there's some ugly gaps slightly below the knee joint that become all the more apparent if you bend them a bit.
    The transformation from Punch to Counterpunch is incredibly easy-- for the most part, you just turn him around. Then readjust his shoulder armor so they're facing out and not back, flip around his fists, and push up on his helmet to angle it back and show his Counterpunch face and hide his Punch face. Done. This mode keeps more of the two-tone "dark blue and black" color scheme, with Punch's orange-yellow barely being visible in this mode-- even his fists are now blue, though still with orange around the interior of the fist holes. The darker colors certainly fit a Decepticon better, though I'd be lying if I said the breakup was as good here as in Punch mode. The chest looks pretty good, with some clear plastic on the faux windshield and a silver-backed Decepticon symbol (which again, you can fold down to reveal a hole for his Prime Armor). The arms and legs have the same proportions as Punch's robot mode, since they're just the backside of those limbs. As opposed to just using the back half of the car for legs, though, there's some detailing on Counterpunch's lower legs--some flat vented details near his flat black feet, and some light metallic purple used on his kneecaps, which I really wish was used a bit more on the toy. The head uses Punch's black helmet, but now has two red eyes, a dark blue face, and a silver chin, with some small side vents on the vent. It definitely looks more eeevil than Punch's head. I like the shoulders in Counterpunch's configuration considerably better, as they enhance the silhouette more and help make the red on the tires stand out. Plus, they allow him to have more inwards movement at the shoulders (though other than that, he's got the same articulation as Punch).

    The first non-Botcon exclusive release of a "modern" Punch/Counterpunch toy makes for an excellent car mode, as well as a a pretty good robot mode, too. My main complaint with it is that the robot modes are just far too similar-- I mean really, beyond the shoulder configuration you basically just turn him around. I really wish Hasbro had made an effort to make the two robot modes more legitimately different than just essentially the back and front of the same mode. That said, he still looks good in all three, minus some minor issues like knee gaps and lack of real feet. The transparent Prima Prime he comes with is a fairly forgettable extra, but if you aren't getting the "Throne of the Primes" set it's actually a new Prime Master for you, unlike with the other two "Prime Wars lookback" sets. Highly recommended, overall.
 

Reviews by Beastbot

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