Transformers Power of the Primes Optimal Optimus now in stock at Hasbro Toy Shop and at Amazon.com

This guy is one of the only figures in POTP that I haven't found yet in stores. I found Inferno, Fire(Red Moonracer), MoonRacer, and a whole ton of others. Only ones I haven't found yet are Rodimus Unicronus and Optimal Optimus. Keep hunting!

o.supreme wrote:Also I noticed BBTS finally has Optimal Optimus in stock, so I imagine it should be hitting HTS, and general retail soon. How funny/sad is it, that the fan vote character is the absolute dead last to be released in the United States for PotP, even released it before the US market .

wow...just one day nailed it

Also this is pretty unprecedented but... 34 of the 40 standard release PotP items are currently available and in stock at HTS. There are placeholders for 2 others (Wave 2 Deluxes -Snarl and Sludge) that come in and out of stock periodically.

Only Legends Slash and Deluxe Swoop (both from wave one), and PM Megatronus (from wave 3) appear to be no longer available, and wave 4 Deluxe Novastar has yet to make an appearance on HTS. -whether she will or not, remains to be seen.

Personally I've seen them all at retail except for Optimal Optimus (which will probably be coming very soon), and Predaking, which, to my knowledge will not be distributed at B&M retail in the U.S.

So I guess with the exception of the wave 2 hiccup, which Hasbro actually made good on and manufactured more of to meet demand, it seems their 12 month distribution method has worked more or less. It wasn't perfect, but definitely better than the past few lines in which *tail enders* were nearly impossible to find.

Additionally, I'm sure there were plans for Predaking to be available at TRU for US retail distribution, however, the closure of all US stores changed that. I know that to ask Walmart or Target to carry a 160 dollar Transformer is pretty risky, and probably wont happen, but I'm hoping that between now and next year Hasbro can work a deal with some national retail chain to get their big item into stores, unless of course, they decide just making it available online is sufficient moving forward.

Nathaniel Prime wrote:This guy is one of the only figures in POTP that I haven't found yet in stores. I found Inferno, Fire(Red Moonracer), MoonRacer, and a whole ton of others. Only ones I haven't found yet are Rodimus Unicronus and Optimal Optimus. Keep hunting!

I finally found Rodimus unicronus 6 months after sightings started and now I see him at every target. Primal I gave up and picked him up at tfsource. He arrived Monday and sadly all I can say is “eh”. I also own the sdcc version and I appreciate him so much more. I never owned the original Optimal Optimus. I was a predacon and my buddy was a maximal so we’d battle as kids.

I think he’s leaps and bounds better than the original but SDCC one is just so much better looking for me.

Randomhero wrote: He arrived Monday and sadly all I can say is “eh”.

Thats the general concensus. I think its because out of the 3 leaders, he is the one with the least novelty/surprises.

Already out of stock on HTS. Figures... The only figure I've been hunting for as long as I can remember

william-james88 wrote:

Randomhero wrote: He arrived Monday and sadly all I can say is “eh”.

Thats the general concensus. I think its because out of the 3 leaders, he is the one with the least novelty/surprises.

Not even that. I think he pulls off all modes it’s that SDCC one is gorgeous. I caved and got him at a fair price honestly if I had to rate him compared to the other ones it’d be

1: Optimal Optimus
2: Rodimus Prime
4: Optimus Prime

I think they’re all great but OP is my least. I’m so burned out of Optimus Primes.

I love the SDCC Optimal, but have the most fun with the scepter!

Randomhero wrote:

Nathaniel Prime wrote:This guy is one of the only figures in POTP that I haven't found yet in stores. I found Inferno, Fire(Red Moonracer), MoonRacer, and a whole ton of others. Only ones I haven't found yet are Rodimus Unicronus and Optimal Optimus. Keep hunting!

I finally found Rodimus unicronus 6 months after sightings started and now I see him at every target. Primal I gave up and picked him up at tfsource. He arrived Monday and sadly all I can say is “eh”. I also own the sdcc version and I appreciate him so much more. I never owned the original Optimal Optimus. I was a predacon and my buddy was a maximal so we’d battle as kids.

I think he’s leaps and bounds better than the original but SDCC one is just so much better looking for me.

Curiously, I found Rodimus Unicronus early on at Toys R Us. Odd since I never get anything until most other areas have long had them.

RiddlerJ wrote:Curiously, I found Rodimus Unicronus early on at Toys R Us. Odd since I never get anything until most other areas have long had them.

I also found one at Toys R Us really early on. Didn't see another one until Target got them in a few weeks ago.

Autobot N wrote:

RiddlerJ wrote:Curiously, I found Rodimus Unicronus early on at Toys R Us. Odd since I never get anything until most other areas have long had them.

I also found one at Toys R Us really early on. Didn't see another one until Target got them in a few weeks ago.

I totally forgot I did see one at toysrus but didn’t bother thinking “I’ll find one later” didn’t realize later was half a year later. Still haven’t bother with nemesis prime.

Randomhero wrote:

Autobot N wrote:

RiddlerJ wrote:Curiously, I found Rodimus Unicronus early on at Toys R Us. Odd since I never get anything until most other areas have long had them.

I also found one at Toys R Us really early on. Didn't see another one until Target got them in a few weeks ago.

I totally forgot I did see one at toysrus but didn’t bother thinking “I’ll find one later” didn’t realize later was half a year later. Still haven’t bother with nemesis prime.

waiting for black friday or cyber monday

I've realized something funny: in a line where the Leader figures all carry a removable Matrix (meant to interact with the Prime Masters, one of the line's gimmicks)....the only one who has an easily accesible Matrix and the only one where it is visible at all time is that one character who, in his original appearance, never held the Matrix of Leadership.

Funny how that works out, right?

I kinda want SDCC Primal, but mostly for the Prime Masters and the Sceptre. Though I will say, Boss Monkey himself actually looks neat in those colours. I wish the throne was a bit less...shonky though, specifically the black vac-form "seat".

Randomhero wrote:

Autobot N wrote:

RiddlerJ wrote:Curiously, I found Rodimus Unicronus early on at Toys R Us. Odd since I never get anything until most other areas have long had them.

I also found one at Toys R Us really early on. Didn't see another one until Target got them in a few weeks ago.

I totally forgot I did see one at toysrus but didn’t bother thinking “I’ll find one later” didn’t realize later was half a year later. Still haven’t bother with nemesis prime.

I actually found my Rodimus Unicronus at Walmart, right before Walmart stopped carrying the PotP Leader Class figures at all.

Just got P/CP in today, any ever notice the top of his box?

Huh that's clever, but why is it blue? Shouldn't it be red slash purple?

ZeroWolf wrote:Huh that's clever, but why is it blue? Shouldn't it be red slash purple?

I thought the exact same thing?

carytheone wrote:

ZeroWolf wrote:Huh that's clever, but why is it blue? Shouldn't it be red slash purple?

I thought the exact same thing?

Maybe it's less "Autobot" and "Decepticon" colors and more colors representative of each character. Blast Off has purple in his deco, Repugnus has red in his deco, and Punch has blue and red in his deco.

Of course hes out of stock, one of the few figures i was for sure going to buy but now im starting to think ill never get him.

ZeroWolf wrote:Huh that's clever, but why is it blue? Shouldn't it be red slash purple?

The Decepticon symbol has been blue in some series, such as Cybertron (not that the toys got that right). And it might have been done for better contrast when printing it.

Found a countergun for P/CP last night (saw today that Carytheone's using it for Battletrap. I like when figures come with extra random guns, especially in black.)

You made Punch/Counterpunch look like an absolute badass. I love it! He's such a cool character in concept yet sadly he's mostly been relegated to being some 'novelty gimmick late G1 guy'.

Thanks! He's my favourite figure of 2018 so far. The "Counterpunch" form is especially nice. It would have been interesting to see more of the character on the show.. but they had only that one last mini-series.

Cyberpath wrote:Found a countergun for P/CP last night (saw today that Carytheone's using it for Battletrap. I like when figures come with extra random guns, especially in black.)

Ha, I considered stealing that gun for CP (it's been making the rounds on weaponless bots) and you've confirmed I should definitely do just that.

carytheone wrote:

Cyberpath wrote:Found a countergun for P/CP last night (saw today that Carytheone's using it for Battletrap. I like when figures come with extra random guns, especially in black.)

Ha, I considered stealing that gun for CP (it's been making the rounds on weaponless bots) and you've confirmed I should definitely do just that.

Where does it come from?

Cyberpath wrote:Thanks! He's my favourite figure of 2018 so far. The "Counterpunch" form is especially nice. It would have been interesting to see more of the character on the show.. but they had only that one last mini-series.

Now if only they brought headmasters over as the true season 4...

Skritz wrote:

carytheone wrote:

Cyberpath wrote:Found a countergun for P/CP last night (saw today that Carytheone's using it for Battletrap. I like when figures come with extra random guns, especially in black.)

Ha, I considered stealing that gun for CP (it's been making the rounds on weaponless bots) and you've confirmed I should definitely do just that.

Where does it come from?

LG13 / Combiner Wars Megatron.

carytheone wrote:

Cyberpath wrote:Found a countergun for P/CP last night (saw today that Carytheone's using it for Battletrap. I like when figures come with extra random guns, especially in black.)

Ha, I considered stealing that gun for CP (it's been making the rounds on weaponless bots) and you've confirmed I should definitely do just that.

I suddenly remembered I had this in a drawer. (LG13's role was done with the release of MP-36 so I kind of forgot about him. )

Just so it's clear, y'all do know that Punch's car kibble does lock into place on each of his shoulders, right?

Sabrblade wrote:Just so it's clear, y'all do know that Punch's car kibble does lock into place on each of his shoulders, right?

Yes, but it doesn't tab.

Cyberpath wrote:

Sabrblade wrote:Just so it's clear, y'all do know that Punch's car kibble does lock into place on each of his shoulders, right?

Yes, but it doesn't tab.

Yes it does. The little holes go in the little tabs.

Sabrblade wrote:

Cyberpath wrote:

Sabrblade wrote:Just so it's clear, y'all do know that Punch's car kibble does lock into place on each of his shoulders, right?

Yes, but it doesn't tab.

Yes it does. The little holes go in the little tabs.

I know, but it doesn't fit. His arm came off trying, and then the shoulder.

So I finally filed the tab a little bit. This thing had annoyed since day one -- but not enough to do it till just now.

ZeroWolf wrote:

Cyberpath wrote:Thanks! He's my favourite figure of 2018 so far. The "Counterpunch" form is especially nice. It would have been interesting to see more of the character on the show.. but they had only that one last mini-series.

Now if only they brought headmasters over as the true season 4...

Meh. What would have been better would've been Griffin-Bacal not screwing them out of making an actual season rather than a glorified miniseries. The Headmasters is iffy, in part due to the delay on Japan getting the movie. It has some good ideas (such as the Transtector concept) and moments, but it also has a lot of flaws. It's not any better animated than The Rebirth, the Autobots - the new ones, even, not just the "Last year's toy" ones - are incompetent a lot of the time even by cartoon standards, Optimus is killed back off in a sacrifice to save Cybertron, Cybertron is destroyed for no good reason (invalidating that sacrifice and all past efforts to save it), Mars is blown up for no good reason, and honestly it has a bunch of the same problems that Super Link/Energon would have years later. The best that can be said of it IMO is it kept the brand's clout with retailers in good standing in Japan.

Cyberpath wrote:

Sabrblade wrote:

Cyberpath wrote:

Sabrblade wrote:Just so it's clear, y'all do know that Punch's car kibble does lock into place on each of his shoulders, right?

Yes, but it doesn't tab.

Yes it does. The little holes go in the little tabs.

I know, but it doesn't fit.

They fit fine on mine. Been plugged in ever since the day I opened up my figure.

Sabrblade wrote:

Cyberpath wrote:

Sabrblade wrote:

Cyberpath wrote:

Sabrblade wrote:Just so it's clear, y'all do know that Punch's car kibble does lock into place on each of his shoulders, right?

Yes, but it doesn't tab.

Yes it does. The little holes go in the little tabs.

I know, but it doesn't fit.

They fit fine on mine. Been plugged in ever since the day I opened up my figure.

Mine were tight but after a few times they tab on and off just fine. I have seen multiple people complaining about them being very tight and causing stress marks though.

Tabbed, they kind of hinder some of the articulation though. The "Counterpunch" persona/form definitely got the better shoulder deal.

This line has had issues with figures having overly thick or long pegs and tabs. Like Starscream - on mine at least, the pegs on his inner leg panels were so long that they kept his legs from tucking together properly in jet mode.

ZeldaTheSwordsman wrote:

ZeroWolf wrote:

Cyberpath wrote:Thanks! He's my favourite figure of 2018 so far. The "Counterpunch" form is especially nice. It would have been interesting to see more of the character on the show.. but they had only that one last mini-series.

Now if only they brought headmasters over as the true season 4...

Meh. What would have been better would've been Griffin-Bacal not screwing them out of making an actual season rather than a glorified miniseries. The Headmasters is iffy, in part due to the delay on Japan getting the movie. It has some good ideas (such as the Transtector concept) and moments, but it also has a lot of flaws. It's not any better animated than The Rebirth, the Autobots - the new ones, even, not just the "Last year's toy" ones - are incompetent a lot of the time even by cartoon standards, Optimus is killed back off in a sacrifice to save Cybertron, Cybertron is destroyed for no good reason (invalidating that sacrifice and all past efforts to save it), Mars is blown up for no good reason, and honestly it has a bunch of the same problems that Super Link/Energon would have years later. The best that can be said of it IMO is it kept the brand's clout with retailers in good standing in Japan.

Each to their own, I greatly preferred it to rebirth and I'm glad they took gutsy decisions to blow planets up. You say it invalidated the previous saves but I don't see it that way.

Though Masterforce was the best of the Takara trio.

I didn't say "The Rebirth" was better. I think it sucks too - it's a crappy rush job with iffy justifications for some of the decisions, Daniel becoming Arcee's head has some unfortunate potential implications as well as possibilities that would never get to be fleshed out plus since Hasbro still said "Ew girl cooties" the behind-the-scenes reason for it was a failure, the animation is bad, and so much more. The happy ending is the one thing it has going for it.I just think The Headmasters is little improvement.

I would just *love* to hear your logic for how Cybertron getting blown up doesn't invalidate the previous times it was saved (especially since Optimus Prime re-dies to save Cybertron only a few episodes prior - meaning he died a second time FOR NOTHING). Please do enlighten me. Also enlighten me as to what's so "gutsy" about empty shock value, especially with how casual they are about Mars being destroyed afterwards.

But yes, Masterforce is good aside from the continuity issues (which funnily enough would also befall its spiritual successor Transformers: Cybertron). An enormous improvement in animation, writing, and fight choreography.


Moving on from that, here's an exclusive I'm hoping we get either at the tail of this line or during Siege: A second Hasbro release of UW Blast Off... this time in G2 colors to replace the Slingshot redeco from the Combiner Wars G2 Bruticus boxset.

I wouldn't hold out much hope for another release of blast off, it's a good way to be disappointed.

Also it was gutsy because the bad guys got to win the episode, which they only ever really did in multiple part episodes (or off screen like in the movie). I still don't get the invalidation bit though but I suppose you look at the show with hindsight but none of the characters knew what was coming, besides, we all know that if the headmasters had been picked up, prime wouldn't have died, he would have just been put in a coma

Kids grew up. Reason why "Re-birth" was truncated to three instead of five episodes. It was only in Japan that TF was still going strong.

Also, in HM, it was quite ham-fisted with the character transition (TO SELL TOYS). Rodimus just leaving, Convoy dying again (to sell Chromedome and Fortmax). And the story did meander a bit.

MF was a fresh start but the end also was ham-fisted with every transtector magically becoming sentient all because of Devil Z's demise. (interest was already waving at that time even in Japan or Takara would have committed more funds for extra episodes to Toei)

V even got the shorter end of the stick then Zone then BS/RoC then OC.

Well eventually we got Gaogaigar by 1999

Thanks Seibertron! I managed to get Primal from HTS while I was at work Friday (I check the site frequently throughout the day even if I cannot be signed in and on it).

It's also kinda funny how things work out. I have only ever bought 2 figures while at work ever, and both were this year at this job and both were Optimus Primal. Kind of a cool fact about my monkeys

But most importantly: this means my Maximals are complete!!! ...well minus a Blackarachnia, but we're getting there.

Alright, so I finally had time to go to Walgreens today, and sure enough, Wreck-Gar was in fact present, they had two along with a hidden Chromedome. Great, bought a Wreck-Gar and the Chromedome, walked back to campus. Stuff happened when I got back, but when it was over I was able to open both figures up. My Wreck-Gar came with the Amalgamous card, which basically validates why I think Junkion combiner parts makes sense in the first place. At first, I had no issues with this figure. I like the head sculpt, although I do think it's a bit small, the colors work great on this mold, he poses well, and I like how the clip on his reused weapon means he gets weapon storage, something a lot of CW/PotP deluxes didn't really have that much of in robot mode.
However, when I was transforming him the first time, I noticed his shoulders/arms seemed...off. After looking at it for a bit, I realized I have an incorrectly assembled figure, but after trying to figure out what exactly is wrong, I've just confused myself more. What I know for a fact is that he has two right shoulders, with the one on the left side of his body therefore backwards, and he has two matching elbows. However, I can't tell if he has two left elbows or two right elbows, because apparently according to all the stock photography of this figure EXCEPT what's on his box, his elbows are supposed to be swapped from how they were on the Groove mold so the "vents" face outwards rather than inwards. In other words, the stock photography claims that the elbow on his right arm is correct, while the other uses of the mold and his box claim that the elbow attached to his left arm is correct. So I'm confused and annoyed, but I can't really fix it without additional arm parts, he can still transform to bike mode regardless, and I guess it adds to the Junkion asymmetry, so that's not that much of an issue.

What IS an issue is that since he has a second right shoulder, he can't properly turn into his limb modes, as the groove for his arm is shaped specifically for a left shoulder to fit in.
That DOES actually annoy me, as now I have to improvise with his arms on both limbs modes, and that's going to be especially annoying with his leg mode which I intended to use.

Moral of the story: pay more attention than I do, and beware of junky Junions.

Have you tried looking if you can sand down/cut up a part to make room for some clearance? It's a Junkion, I'm sure some asymmetrical customizing won't hurt the figure too much.

Nemesis Primal wrote:Alright, so I finally had time to go to Walgreens today, and sure enough, Wreck-Gar was in fact present, they had two along with a hidden Chromedome.

Moral of the story: pay more attention than I do, and beware of junky Junions.

Don't blame yourself. From the sealed box angle, it would be quite hard to tell if you got a lemmon. Any chance to replace it? Does/did the store allow for "inspections"?

I also had an experience with one PotP figure with two right shoulders too! Damn HB/TakaraVietnamese QC!

How does a planet's destruction NOT invalidate the efforts to save it? Planet go boom = planet permanently un-saved = efforts to save it undone = those efforts invalidated. The bad guys getting a rare win doesn't automatically mean it's good writing. Especially when, for most of said bad guys, it's THEIR beloved home planet too! It might - might - have been salvageable if it had been made more of a plot point beyond that, with the Decepticons ultimately finding out MegaScorpoZaranok was behind it and turning on him, but nope!
And while that was the thing that made me ragequit for a couple years before coming back, it's not the only problem. There's also: nearly everybody being an incompetent boob most of the time, writers getting their notes horrendously mixed up re: MegaScorpoZaranok's name(s) and not fixing it, loss of direction mid-series that rivals Energon, Arcee getting reduced to a secretary, bad animation and choreography so much of the time.. The Transtector idea is cool, Fort Max's sword is cool, Punch's spy role being more than the cheesy "I hear he's nearby..." "..Real nearby" is cool, but there's so much that's dumb or meh.

To distract myself from ranting, I present to you Volcanicus' new toy:

Love volcanius new sword, scratch built or from the webs?

Coming from the UK side of Transformers Twitter, we have a sighting not exactly at retail - as it's in a comic book shop that imports collectables and figures, Orbital Comics - of the Walgreens exclusive (in the US) Power of the Primes Deluxe Wreck-Gar.

Priced next to Novastar at £24.99 (USD 30+ at the time of writing), the figure can be seen in the image below in its packaging, thanks to TF_PFoz. If you come across any similar or any sightings yourself, make sure to use the Sightings Database tool, right here, to help out other fellow Transformers fans and collectors!

It's nice that they're in the country.

...But Orbital Comics is very niche store in London so i wouldn't count this as a mass retail release.

hot damn do i want that Scarlet Spider more and more.

To be fair, if one independent shop got him in others might of as well.

£24.99 seems very steep for a PotP Deluxe. They're usually about £18 with the Voyagers being about £25.