(Like all Universe toys, this is a redeco of an earlier TF-- Beast Wars Neo Big Convoy, to be exact, previously only available via the Japanese market. Since I don't have the original mold, I'll be reviewing this toy completely.)

    The evil Optimus clone, Nemesis Prime, is back for another round, this time in Universe as a wooly mammoth! (Or mastodon... I forget the difference...) I rather like the attempt to make a mold that was supposed to have been reserved for a good guy instead made to look evil; the black-and-silver fur, the red eyes, and the blood-stained tusks are really, really nice touches. Only a few robot extras-- a few parts of the robot legs here and there-- poke out underneath the mammoth hair. However, look at the mode for a few seconds and you'll see the problem-- there's tons of little cracks running in between the various plastic parts that make up the mammoth's body, and almost effectively ruin the look entirely by themselves. There's just too many little cracks in the plastic to give the mode a realistic feel. Also, Nemesis Prime can't move in this mode. At all. Pretty much all you can do with this mode are play with his gimmicks-- push down on his ears to bring the tusks up for some goring action, and press back on the tab on his head to make his trunk curve up. They're fair gimmicks, but they only make the mode marginally less boring.
    Probably the biggest single drawback Nemesis Prime has, though, is his transformation. Getting him into robot mode isn't too bad, but getting him back into beast mode... well, "a pain in the butt" isn't a strong enough phrase, really. It's INCREDIBLY annoying-- all the pieces have to line up just right, and the instructions don't help very much. It took me nearly an HOUR the first time I tried to transform him into beast mode. Once you figure out exactly where each piece is supposed to go and in what position, it becomes a little easier, but it still takes a while. The transformation should be fun, not a chore. And unfortunately, Nemesis Prime's is the latter.
    Nemesis Prime's robot mode is much cooler than his alternate mode, and with much better articulation-- he can move at pretty much any point you can reasonably expect on a Transformer of this size, and most of those joints are ball joints, allowing for even greater motion. The proportions can't be beat-- Nemesis Prime has a powerful look to him that is both organic and mechanical at the same time. I especially like the asymmetrical detailing applied to his arms-- one looks "normal", while the other is partially transparent with many wires and panels running through it, almost like it was severely damaged and then repaired haphazardly. It looks really cool. Taking his cues from his Armada namesake, Nemesis Prime has a black and brown color scheme, with some red, teal, and silver highlights. I think the overall scheme goes excellently together and looks great-- it positively drips evil. I would've perhaps preferred a bit more black on the robot parts, but that's a small nitpick. One of Nemesis Prime's coolest details is that, if you open his chest up, he has a "Dead Matrix" inside, as the packaging calls it. It looks great, it's removable from the cavity (see the above pic), and it further cements Nemesis Prime as THE Decepticon version of Optimus. And no one can ever say that Nemesis Prime doesn't have his fair share of weapons-- he has two small, nonfiring weapons under his arms, two large firing grappling hooks attached to his lower legs, and a HUGE double-barrelled gun. In fact, that's what I don't like about it-- the gun is so big, that Nemesis Prime's arm droops under its weight. Most of its mass is actually made up of mammoth parts, too, to the point where it almost looks goofy in its proportions. As for firing the missiles, instead of pressing individual triggers, you turn a circular knob on the gun which fires one missile after the other. It's rather cool, as it means that you won't have any touchy triggers going off when you don't want them to. My most significant complaint about Prime's robot mode is all the mammoth parts hanging off him-- Nemesis is a shellformer, and it shows. I think the halves of his mammoth head, positioned on his shoulders like they are, actually complement the mode, but all the rest of the parts-- the panels hanging off his gun, his hips, and his legs-- not only look odd, but interfere with Prime's range of articulation a great deal. Needless to say, I don't particularly miss the days of the Japanese shellformers.
    Nemesis Prime is a welcome addition to the Universe line, as it marks the first modern mold that was previously only available in Japan being used in this line. However, it's a shellformer, like many other Beast Wars Neo toys, and as such, it has tons of kibble in robot mode, no articulation in beast mode, and an incredibly frustrating transformation. He does have some mighty cool features, but be warned-- his flaws are not insignificant.

Review by Beastbot

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