Prima Prime of the Thirteen Transformers Age of the Primes Voyager Class Item No.: Asst. G0473 No. G1007 Manufacturer: Hasbro Includes: Star Saber, Matrix of Leadership Action Feature: Converts from robot to armored lunar truck Retail: $39.99 Availability: March 2025 Other: Prime of Primes
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The entire notion of "The Thirteen" is a weird one - they're an integral part to the history of the Transformers, but they weren't a significant part of most fans' experience with the brand. The inspirations for the toy of Prima Prime span decades. A character from "Five Faces of Darkness" provided the basis of the head. The bulk of the coloring and general idea for this toy came from The Covenant of Primus, which in turn inspired appearances in later comics, but before that there were characters who are technically retconned Prima. I guess what I'm saying is this figure is about as good if you know the backstory of the toy as if you don't.

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The toy design does a good job of adapting The Covenant of Primus version of the character through a Fun Factory of G1, with the engineering of a modern toy. While not the first Prima toy as we had some Prime Masters and you could make an argument about a repurposed Optimus Prime toy, I feel like there is little arguing that this is the first toy of the character worth giving any real weight to the character/premise. There's very little character behind the first Prime, so his value comes mostly from his own merits.

At a hair under 7-inches tall, Prima's pretty big. Roughly as tall as the Kingdom Blaster mold, he's a robot that gives almost no indication of his alternate mode. The windshield is on his back, all the wheels rotate out of view. Few flat surfaces resembling a vehicle are visible in robot mode. However, many robot chunks are visible in truck mode. The character has a head that resembles a nameless early Autobot from "Five Faces of Darkness," the mini-series that kicked off the post-movie season 3, with a body that largely resembles the aligned universe incarnation of the character. So it's silver, with some blue. He has a Star Saber with a Matrix in the hilt, and fairly decent articulation. His joints have a good range of movement, and while not colorful - or very silver - he holds mostly true to drawings of the character from various comics or books. He's a new version of an exiting guy who is obscure enough to be "new" to most fans that might be buying him.

Like Tarn, he's a really nice action figure first and foremost. The hips swing forward without restriction, the knees bend perfectly, the wrists swivel, his fingers open, and he's even got something of an ab crunch. It's an unusual toy in that it doesn't look like a modernized G1 release, what with blue clear lights popping out of his chest or a helmet encrusted with parentheses. Being colored like he has gray briefs on is also a fun choice, with shoulder pads to match. I like how he can hold his sword, but I can't say I have any actual affinity toward his character. Without more backstory, he's effectively a riff on the previously available Vector Prime [FOTD #2,804] from last year - who was also a toy with a lesser space vehicle mode and made for a generally good robot action figure. He also has significantly more paint and color than Prima.

Changing it from robot to space truck took some doing - you have to get things aligned just-so, with tabs in just the right places and at unusual angles that make me think I will always have to consult a photo or the instructions. (Who am I kidding, once I'm done writing he'll stay in robot mode forever.) You can store the multi-part sword on the vehicle mode, and there's very little paint or color here. You can see the budget being cut as the parts fit together with a couple of blue painted dots and some silver paint on a grey chassis color you could best describe as, appropriately enough, primer.

The vehicle looks like a mishmash of generations, and that's probably for the best. His shins make up the back of the truck, with lots of detail that remind me of the movies. The front of the toy is a fairly simple angled space truck, recalling countless toys like Energon Inferno or any number of riffs on Ironhide and Ratchet. There are lots of bits hanging off, and it is clear the emphasis was on making a cool robot mode the priority. There are sculpted details here and there, but the way the shoulders hang off his front bumpers and his wheels are of to the side show some clever engineering by way of just having chunks hanging off the truck. As there are no real metrics to judge a space truck, it's hard to say if this is an accurate one. I don't particularly care for it, and I'm usually a sucker for futuristic, fantastical, and especially goofy space vehicles. I would have preferred a truck that has less big shapes bulging out of it, but that's me.

For added vehicle fun, Hasbro made it so the wheels can rotate down for a Back to the Future "hover conversion." This is fun, and I hope they do this kind of thing on more toys... especially ones for kids. I don't think collectors are going to have the level of fun a child would by pretending the truck can fly.

I like having a new guy who isn't a pile of bones or rocks. As a robot-first design of an obscure post-post-addition to G1 history, it's neat. I like the cartoon head, I enjoy the accessories, I don't much care for the colors. If you are looking to explore the Thirteen as toys, this is as good of a place to start as any - but Megatronus the Fallen might be just a little more recognizable (and on fire) if you can find him.

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