Dave's Transformers Power of the Primes Rant: Leader Nemesis Prime Evolution Nemesis Prime with Decepticon Giza (Optimus retool) Permalink: http://www.eyrie.org/~dvandom/BW/Gen/NemesisPrime Nemesis Prime is the 2018 Amazon Prime Day exclusive, joining Rodimus Unicronus as making the Decepticon Leaders just be evil alternate reality counterparts of the Autobot Leaders. (Of course, Decepticons got the Titan Class for the year, so it sort of balances.) However, unlike Rodimus Unicronus, the retooling goes beyond a single head swap. Two new heads, new weapons (heavily based on Armada's Nemesis Prime, both toy and cartoon appearance), plus a new-mold Arms Micron inspired by both the original Arms Micron Giza (who was more of a shark) and maybe Aerobolt from RiD15 (TFWiki thinks so, anyway). Mostly, though, this is a pretty deep cut, I only barely remembered that Armada HAD a Nemesis Prime, much less that he appeared in the cartoon and had a version of the Star Saber that was neither the regular one nor the purple Dark Star Saber. https://www.eyrie.org/~dvandom/BW/Gen/LOptimus - Evolution Optimus Prime CAPSULE $50 base price as Amazon Exclusive, but by waiting a while I found one for $38. Evolution Nemesis Prime: Original mold mildly recommended (hence my lack of enthusiasm about grabbing one at full price on Prime Day). This one is slightly better, mostly because of the extra accessories and the way that being black covers a lot of minor aesthetic sins. RANT Packaging: Same trade dress as Rodimus Prime, but in the Decepticon color scheme as seen on Rodimus Unicronus. However, to fit the extra accessories, the box is slightly larger than standard Leader boxes. It's 13" (33cm) tall, 11.5" (29cm) wide, and 4.25" (10.5cm) deep. While the toy does have the rifle that came with Optimus Prime, it's the only accessory hidden behind the character art that intrudes on the window, and the pictures on the back have the rifle stowed out of the way in both modes rather than wielded. They didn't do collector cards for this one, I guess they felt a retailer exclusive Leader toy with 12 variants would be too cruel even for them. The instructions are loose behind the cardboard tray. DECEPTICON: EVOLUTION NEMESIS PRIME Assortment: E2059 Inner Robot: Nemesis Pax Altmodes: Semitractor, Tractor-trailer Transformation Difficulty: Nemesis Pax (17 steps), Nemesis Prime (35 steps), Decepticon Giza (3 steps) Previous Name Use: None with the Evolution epithet Previous Mold Use: Gen(PotP) Prime Master I Got: None Prime Master Ability: N/A Arms Micron Partner: Giza Enigma/Matrix: Dark Matrix of Leadership Weapons: Dark Saber, Giza, Cannons, Rifle Function: Dark Reflection Motto: "I'll do more than shatter your glass!" If OPTIMUS PRIME is the universe's shining beacon, his evil clone NEMESIS PRIME is its doomsday black hole. He possess the same strength and intelligence as the Autobot leader, but is vile and without remorse, and driven to eliminate all in his path. Note that while Nemesis Prime has been used for a lot of evil Optimus Prime toys, the idea of him explicitly being a clone rather than an alternate universe counterpart (as Rodimus Unicronus is) or a fake (Transformers Prime) comes from the Armada cartoon. In Armada, a temporarily disembodied Unicron created Nemesis Prime to destroy both Autobots and Decepticons, and he was able to reconstitute himself (and the Vorpal Saber, upon which the toy's Dark Saber is based) after being seemingly destroyed. However, where Armada's Nemesis Prime was a one-off foe controlled by Sideways (the second destruction stuck), the bio above implies that this Nemesis Prime is his own master, rather than a proxy for Unicron. It appears that the extra steps in transformation compared to Optimus Prime all relate to storage of the extra weapons. Packaging: As with Optimus Prime, the main bot is packaged in Evolution robot mode, with Nemesis Pax as the chest core. The bot is in the lower right, with weapons above and to the left of it. There's four plastic ties (one on each limb) plus a rattan string around the waist, the string holds a plastic shield over the robots torso and pelvis to protect against shipping- related damage. Rubber bands looped around the forearms and shoulders hold things together on the arms and prevent the smokestacks from drooping. Each of the five weapons (Giza is in sword mode) is held in by two plastic ties, and one tie holds in the Dark Matrix. The photos on the back of the box show the Dark Matrix's holder as light gray, while the actual toy has it in black. Maybe there was a plan to paint it silver, but that was cut for cost reasons. Color Swaps: Interestingly, while the mold otherwise showers love on Armada's Nemesis Prime, the light taupe of that toy is not to be found here. Instead, the light color is a regular silvery light gray. The clear blue parts are replaced by clear red. All of the new weapons are made of silvery light gray, as are the top halves of Evolution mode's smokestacks and the thighs (but the hip joints are black). Yeah, all of the rest of the outer armor is black plastic, although the dull silver paint used on the pelvis is a pretty good match to the gray plastic. Nemesis Pax has all the clear red plastic, and the thighs and elbow joints are light gray plastic, otherwise all black. None more black. The Dark Matrix holder is black plastic, as noted above. Paint Apps: Mostly silver, metallic blue, and dark red. Sticker use is subdued and they appear to be decent quality. The Dark Matrix is painted over mostly in metallic purple, feels like it would fit better with Rodimus Unicronus than with Nemesis Prime. The blade of the Dark Saber is painted a deep faintly metallic garnet red. Nemesis Pax robot mode has silver on the faceplate, abdomen, belt and pelvis front details. The clear red chest front has a lot of gloss black on it, with some metallic light blkue details below the faux window. The eyes are painted garnet red. There's a small Decepticon symbol sticker on the left shoulder, and shin stickers with silver and light blue details. Nemesis Pax vehicle mode definitely benefits from the extensive use of black, since all of the arm stuff tucked badly behind the cab calls a lot less attention to itself. As with the robot chest, the clear red pieces on the real windows have black painted borders, and the bits that become the evolution robot's chest (the front wheel wells) are also painted mostly black on the parts facing outwards. Lots of silver paint: on the bumper, grille, headlight borders, side stripe, side window borders, side mirrors, and windshield wipers. The headlighte are metallic light blue, adn the side windows are painted garnet red. The smokestacks are left unpainted. The trailer has no paint that isn't alsy visible in Evolution robot mode (mostly the stuff on the arms, which ends up on the roof), but it has light blue and silver side stickers in the traditional Optimus swoosh, with purple Decepticon symbols near the front end. On mine, some of these stickers got kind of crumpled between application and being taken out of the box. Evolution robot mode has a lot of silver. The faceplate, helmet tablet, abdomen grille, most of the pelvis, and the vents on the shins are painted silver. The eyes are painted garnet red, and the borders of the fake chest windows are painted black. The belt details and the | | > details on the forearms are painted light metallic blue. There's Decepticon symbol stickers on the shoulder fronts, piston detail stickers on the tops of the forearms, and little detail stickers on the kneecaps and toes. Mold Changes: The obvious changes are the new heads, the new Dark Saber, the new Decepticon Giza (see below), and new forearm cannons patterned after the Supercon Optimus Prime/Nemesis Prime toys from Armada. (Supercon being what they called the Deluxe class during Armada.) There don't seem to be any other mold changes to the non-head parts of either robot. Nemesis Pax has a weird face. The eyes are too far apart, and there's a sort of beak trying to poke out between the eyes. The helmet crest is split by a sort of buzzsaw spike mohawk design that the "beak" may be intended to continue, and the chin is super pointy. Spiky bitz, a sort of Chaos version of Optimus Prime's traditional head rather than a redesign of the Orion Pax head along those lines. According to TFWiki, the Evolution robot head mold was first designed for the TF Collectors Club "Toxitron" figure (a new head redeco of Combiner Wars Optimus Prime, apparently initially intended to be a Nemesis Prime anyway), but tweaked to fit this mold. The Dark Saber is a highly stylized interpretation of the Star Saber from Armada, not recognizable as a combination of Mini-Cons, but still containing many of the same details. It's a single piece of gray plastic 5.75" (14.5cm) long with an X-shaped crossguard and a blade that is a sort of elongated kite shape. As noted earlier, the blade itself is painted garnet red. A 5mm peg sticks out of one side of the crosspiece, which is mainly for storage in vehicle mode. The other side of the crosspiece has a rectangular slot, 3mm by 9mm. The hilt is long enough for a two-handed grip, but the figure is not flexible enough to hold it that way (really need rotating wrists for that). The arm cannons are based on those from Supercon Optimus Prime and Nemesis Prime from Armada, but more rounded and generally bulky. They're identical, rather than mirrored, so either can go on either arm. The 5mm pegs on the underside are very short, so they really only go into raised peg holes like those on the Evolution mode robot's arms, they're too short for Nemesis Prime's fists. Each is 3" (7.5cm) long with paired cannon barrels emerging from a roughly semi-cylindrical base. Decepticon Giza: As an entirely new transforming accessory, it merits its own section in the review. Arms Micron is a classification that exists across multiple Japanese Transformers lines, but never really got a lot of traction in the U.S. Basically Mini-Cons with a weapon mode and either a robot or a beast mode, they started being packaged with the Japanese version of the Transformers Prime toys as a way to set them apart (the tradition was carried in on the Japanese versions of Titans Return toys by having redecoed Titan Master vehicles packaged with the Deluxe and bigger toys). Arms Micron toys also showed up in gashopon (vending machine bubble) toys, as store exclusives, etc. Some even combined to make larger weapons. I'd assumed Giza was just a redeco of one of the more obscure Arms Microns that I didn't already have, but it turns out to be a new mold in the style of Arms Microns. (Technically, as it lacks a Mini-Con style of 5mm peg, it's not truly an Arms Micron, but its the same basic idea.) In sword mode, it has a big chunky crossguard area and a blade that looks like a cross between a khopesh, a falchion, and a polearm tip...the sort of weird shape only really seen in fantasy games. The reason, of course, is that the blade needs to look plausibly like wings when split apart. The bird head is along the spine of the sword, which only has one side sharpened (much like a saber or backsword). All made of gray plastic, total length of 4.75" (12cm). The bird's eyes are painted garnet red, no other color. The hilt is a 5mm rod with a sort of fang-like pommel. Compared to the Dark Saber, it looks more like a short sword or very long main gauche. To transform, fold back part of the crosspiece to make the tail and mostly cover the hilt, then split apart the wings and rotate them 90 degrees at their base to make the wings. Bird mode does have some nice avian features like feather-like details at the wing roots, abstract feather patterns on the wings, a feathered crest on the head (which is otherwise somewhat Laserbeak-ish but without the hooked beak). There's a single foot that won't let it rest on a flat surface very well, but it's intended to go into a slot on the Dark Saber. Beak to tail length is only 2.25" (6cm), but the wingspan is an impressive 7.5" (19cm). Little blaster barrels are molded near the root of each wing. No real articulation, unless you count the wings folding down on transformation joints. Other Notes: TFWiki notes that this toy is beset by bad quality control and assembly errors, including things like having two right arms on the evolution armor. Since this is an online exclusive and you can't really go through the boxes to look for one without obvious flaws, that's a problem right there. To store the weapons in vehicle mode requires folding out some of the side panels of the trailer so that the peg holes used in Evolution robot mode on the forearms are accessible. The Dark Saber goes in one of the roof pegs holes of the trailer, with Giza's foot tabbing into a slot on the sword (this works regardless of which mode Giza is in). The rifle stores in a more integrated fashion as with Optims Prime. One of my problems with the original was that so many of the red parts were gray plastic with incomplete and ill-matching red paint on them, a problem almost entirely absent here since almost everything is black. One color match problem is the smokestacks on the Evolution Mode shoulders, where the lower halves are unpainted black plastic. But since they're not even supposed to be visible in vehicle mode, it's not a huge deal. The Pax figure's toes continue to be kinda useless, too loose to keep the figure from just falling over forwards, so you have to either lean the figure against something, or stand it with knees bent and supported just by the toes, no heel contact. Admittedly this is a more dynamic pose, but the small size of the toes makes it pretty unstable as well. Overall: A more thorough change than Rodimus Unicronus, it would have been nice if this could have made it to store shelves rather than joining most of the last-wave toys as an exclusive. Between this and the Optimus Prime version, this is better. If you can get it for less than $50, definitely go for it. Dave Van Domelen, just got Punch/Counter Punch so will review the capstone trio of Amazon exclusives next.