Originally written December 2019.
In 1991, Transformers may have been dead in the US, but it still had some life left in Japan. That year’s toyline was called Transformers: Return of Convoy, and aesthetically, was quite different from the classic Transformers we know. Most of the figures in the line had a very Japanese Super Robot aesthetic to them, like the kind of thing you’d see in a space-themed, Burning-Justice-powered kid’s mecha anime, or something the Power Rangers would pilot. At the center of the line was the Autobot’s leader, Star Convoy, a re-incarnation of Optimus Prime (Convoy’s the character’s name in G1 Japanese media.) A massive figure, he changed from a retro-space-truck, to a base for Micromasters (something else the line was full of), to a big, impressive super robot that looked like a cross between the Optimus we know and love, and a Gundam. Of course, like the big, colorful Super Robots he resembled, he had virtually no articulation to speak of, but he still looked big and cool, and even got a reissue in 2005.
For the last few years, Takara’s been taking Generations figures meant for a western release, and excessively repainting and retooling them into homages to older, more obscure, often Japan-only stuff (see: God Ginrai, Convobat, Big Powered, Greatshot and the Seacons, among others). These retools are often interesting in how they repurpose unrelated figures into becoming something totally different, but also have a reputation as having dicey engineering, due to the base figures not being meant to handle what they’re been retooled into. In this case, this new version of Star Convoy is an extensive reworking of the Leader-class Evolution Optimus Prime figure from 2018’s Power of the Primes toyline (POTP) and while retooling Optimus into Another Optimus seems like a no-brainer, POTP Optimus had a totally different gimmick: He was a traditional G1 Truck-and-trailer Optimus, only his cab became a G1 Cartoon-accurate Orion Pax, then merged with the trailer to “evolve” into a G1 Cartoon-Accurate Optimus Prime. Naturally, the new Star Convoy had to incorporate this into its design somehow, and it gets clever with it. But more on that later.
This release is part of Generations Selects, the same online-only (in theory) collector’s line that gave us Combat Megatron and Powerdasher Zetar, meaning, despite being a Takara product developed for the Japanese market, he was available through Hasbro Pulse, though the price tag was a bit hefty. I never owned the original Star Convoy, or the Power of the Primes figure that this is retooled from, so this is a fresh experience for me, and I can see how this figure works on its own terms.
Vehicle Mode
I’ll be upfront about this: They picked the weakest of his modes to package him in, and so there’s going to be a lot of complaining right off the top. This mode’s basically unchanged from the Power of the Primes release, so it doesn’t resemble the longnosed spacetruck of the original at all, but rather, is based on the traditional G1 Optimus cab and truck altmode. That’d be fine if the vehicle mode was fine, but it’s also a really, really janky truck mode.
The front of the truck cab looks fine (and resembles the original G1 Optimus), but the back is blatantly a big mess of folded up robot-mode bits, mostly hands, made worse by the fact that they don’t really peg in or anything, they just kind of flop there, and are hard to align properly. The trailer, too, just has his robot arms hanging out uptop, uncovered. It’s not terribly cohesive, and feels almost like an afterthought. While this is all a part of the original POTP mold, I can’t help but wonder if some of the Generations Selects retooling money might have been better spent trying to fix this up somehow.
Another bit of weirdness: The figure comes with foil stickers you need to apply, in order to give the trailer its G1-style stripes, as you can see:
On one hand, at least they’re not pre-applied, like the original POTP release was (since they’d often come applied really unevenly), but on the other hand, getting them on straight and with no air bubbles is a harrowing experience, especially since this is the kind of foil sticker that will just shred if you fully apply it and decide to remove it later. These stickers feel a bit overly-long for the spaces they’re supposed to go into, and I folded a few of them around some corners to get them to fit. Luckily, they’ve survived multiple transformations unscathed, so they’re at least durable when they’re on there.
Now, onto some positive stuff: I still really dig the colors this mode is in, there’s plenty of silver paint to make it pop, and the premium budget means they got to paint the wheel rims. Plus, for all my grousing, the shiny foil stickers do look good on the trailer.
The whole thing rolls well (even if all of the wheels don’t touch the ground), and the cab clips onto the trailer nicely. You can stash his (G1-style) gun uptop to help make this look a bit more like Star Convoy’s original altmode, too.
Aside from that, the two front flaps of the truck cab’s windows open up, and there’s a Matrix that fits inside. Strangely, instead of the multi-color Matrix with removable core the POTP leaders all had, it’s a solid silver piece, though apparently there’s fictional reasons for this “Silver Matrix” to exist. Despite looking like metal, it’s cast in plastic, and has a kind of odd peg on the bottom, which is there to help it clip into the trunk, among other things.
But yeah, overall, this mode’s kind of a mess. Luckily, it’s all uphill from here.
Cab Robot Transformation
This is actually kind of similar to the old G1 Powermaster Optimus Prime transformation, in that he transforms backwards to get into his robot mode, with the truck front on his back in robot mode. There’s a clever bit here where the panels on the sides of the truck fold up and around to the front, and aside from that, putting him in robot mode is really simple. Getting him back into his truck mode can be a bit of a learning curve, though, in that he’s got a lot of little pegs and tabs you need to fit together, but it’s not a matter of them not working, just remembering where they all go. Pay attention to where everything is before you first transform him, basically.
Cab Robot Mode
This robot’s about the size of a Deluxe, and is also a really, really cool design. Basically, we’re looking at a version of G1 Optimus Prime that’s partially stylized specifically to resemble his original G1 toy, complete with details like yellow eyes, and those three little slits on either side of his mouthplate that the cartoon didn’t have.
The reason for this design homage is delightfully obscure: It’s a reference to a piece of Return of Convoy promotional artwork that depicted a toy-accurate Optimus “evolving” into Star Convoy….which happens to be the gimmick this whole set has. Check it out:
As far as justifying out-of-place gimmicks go, this is a clever one. This isn’t a strictly toy-accurate Optimus, though. This is more like the G1 toy filtered through an Anime Super Robot lens. Instead of being bulky and boxy, he’s slim and lithe, like a Shonen Anime protagonist, or, like a mid-stage Pokemon evolution, with Orion Pax as his first form and Regular Optimus as his final form.
Of course, to accomplish this, all of the truck detailing on his chest and torso is actually fake, with the real stuff on his back, but that’s moreso a consequence of this figure originally being Orion Pax, and they made good use of what they were given. Colors-wise, this is also a very traditionally-colored Optimus, as befits his G1 toy inspiration, and there’s a lot of nice metallic silver and blue paint, and yellow highlights to compliment his unpainted bright red and blue.
Poseability-wise, this is a pre-Siege toy, with a gimmick to incorporate into him, so he’s not quite as poseable as I’m used to. He doesn’t have any kind of waist joint, his ankles don’t tilt, and his wrists don’t swivel. It’s the waist I’m missing most of all, and having ankle tilts become standard has really spoiled me, too. That being said, he’s still got the rest of the standard action figure articulation, and his dynamic sculpt and silhouette lends him well to posing. He’s also tightly-constructed, with no loose joints or questionable bit of engineering, even for an extensive retool. There’s a bit of visible hollowness around his legs, but he doesn’t feel particularly light, at least.
Accessory-wise, he has his large gun, patterned after G1 Optimus’s Ion Blaster. However, for this mode, you’re actually meant to split it in the middle, and turn it into a pair of smaller dueling pistols, that fit tightly (but securely) in his fists.
I love these weapons, because they really fit the feeling of the sculpt being a character that’s more about speed and agility than raw firepower, and he’s got a lot of personality that comes out when you pose him with these two weapons.
Of course, if you want to, you can also combine them and give him a big, oversized hand cannon as well.
If you fish the Matrix out of his back, you find another use for that peg on the bottom of it: It plugs squarely into one of his hands, letting him hold the Matrix. It’s not really a “proper” hold, since he can’t grip the sides of it, but it stays in there securely, and is definitely an upgrade from the POTP figure, which couldn’t hold it at all.
Transformation to Super Robot Mode
By the way, while this guy’s in his small robot mode, the trailer just hangs out, instead of having an altmode of its own. It’s really odd that they didn’t attempt any kind of base mode, considering the original Star Convoy was designed to interact with Micromasters, and the Siege toyline that was released alongside this one has tons of Micromasters in it. I’ve seen some fanmodes, at least.
Anyway, to “evolve” him into his proper Star Convoy form, you ball the small robot up into a head and torso, and unfold the trailer into a frame with arms and legs (and a chrome star in the middle). It’s a pretty satisfying transformation, honestly. The trailer has a lot of chunk to it that you move around, and even the folding, tabbing panels have a lot of mass to them, so it feels really satisfying, instead of fiddly. I will say that I had trouble figuring out the specific way his big form’s shoulders and arms folded back up into trailer mode, but squinting at some photos helped me figure it out. At the end, you plug his torso into the frame with a satisfying snap, and plug the chrome star into the front of it.
So let’s get this problem out of the way: His chrome star has trouble staying in his chest, and pops out if you’re not careful. That being said, the problem’s not as pronounced on mine as some other reviewers suggest, and while it initially liked to pop out whenever I mildly handled the figure, I managed to get it to stay in by a) making sure the torso is pushed as far forwards as I can, and b) pushing hard on the chrome star. However, if it still gives you trouble, there’s a solution shown in Peaugh’s review of the figure (about 10 minutes in), that involves taking the star out, and changing the alignment of the small, red piece it attaches to. I haven’t done this yet, since a) the problem isn’t terribly pronounced on my copy, and b) I’m worried about breaking the chrome part of this when I do it, so, attempt at your own risk.
Super Robot Mode
This is an old, tall Leader Class figure that towers over most recent releases in the scale. This mode is also where the retooling really goes to work, making him into a modern, poseable replica of the 1991 Autobot leader, the Optimus we know and love, through a very Anime filter. Between the shoulder guns, chest star, and other details, they emulated the look really well. I’m particularly fond of his lush headsculpt, with its big Gundam crest.
If there’s one aesthetic quibble, it’s that he still has square windows on his chest, rather than the angular ones of the 1991 figure, something it really feels like they could have retooled. Still, it’s not as much of an eyesore as you’d think, once he’s in-hand.
One thing I like about these colors is that even though it’s the traditional Optimus deco, their balance has been subtly changed in ways that make him feel different, more like one of those Super Sentai robots I keep alluding to. There’s less blue, more grey (hey, those grey fists are accurate in this case!), and a fair bit more yellow. I particularly like the little yellow arrows underneath his shoulder symbols, that’s something we don’t see on Optimus, and really evokes the specific retro Super Robot aesthetic.
Of course, what really evokes that aesthetic even more is the old-fashioned, shiny chrome on his gold chest star, and on the silver crest on his head. Now, usually I don’t really like chrome parts. It can look tacky, and as anyone that lived through Beast Wars knows, it tends to fall apart and degrade if you’re not careful. However, I really like it here, and it tracks with the general “Power Rangers/Bandai/Super Robot” look of the guy.
In terms of build, plastic and handfeel, this guy is odd to me, after Siege. He’s made of smoother, shinier material than I’m used to, and has a lot of big chunks instead of smaller parts, plus, he’s got hollow legs, and hollow backs of the hands. Again, intentionally or not, this feeds into the whole Megazord-esque feel of the guy, and his big, solid parts are pleasant to mess around with in-hand.
In terms of his sturdiness, he has the issue with the star in his chest wanting to pop out, but as mentioned above, it’s not really pronounced on my copy. What’s more pronounced is his ankles being somewhat loose, though one way to make sure they’re as tight as can be is to make sure the strut they’re on is moved far enough back that you hear a click. He’s not going to fall over once you pose him, but you need to take care to put him in a position where the ankles aren’t too critical for keeping him up.
Speaking of poseability, it’s technically a bit better than his small robot mode, in that he has ankle tilts, but he’s also hefty enough that you’re going to want to be a bit careful posing him. He still doesn’t have wrist swivels or a waist, but he’s got the rest of the standard range of joints, and can look heroic enough with them. Still, I instinctively find myself avoiding the more elaborate poses, and I didn’t even attempt my usual “can he stand on one leg and kick?” test. Also, you can rotate, raise and lift the little guns on his shoulders, a cute detail.
In terms of accessories, his Ion Blaster now looks proportionate to his body when you hold it. He can also still hold his Matrix with the same peg on the bottom, though you have to pop his torso out to retrieve it from behind his chest star and two sets of doors. There’s also a special attack mode meant for this version, called the “Big Bang Cannon,” where you split his gun in half, and insert the Matrix between the two parts, presumably empowering his weapon with the Matrix’s energy.
It’s a cool-looking idea, but on my copy, the peg on the front half of the gun is too loose to fit well into the Matrix, and so the whole thing’s prone to fall off if you’re not careful. I can pose it for pictures, but aside from that, I’ll probably need to fix it with a coat of superglue. This might be specific to my copy, though, since I haven’t heard much about this problem. Frankly, playing Quality Control Roulette with a boxed, expensive, online-only figure is stressful enough, and I’m glad that’s the only issue I got.
Overall
If you can’t tell from the prose, I dig the Super Robot aesthetic that he’s pushing, just in general. The Evolution gimmick of the POTP figure always felt kind of super-robot-ish, so this retool gives it an aesthetic that leans into that.
Is he worth it, though? As you’ve read, Star Convoy’s got his flaws, namely a really weak vehicle mode, and some engineering issues in his robot mode. On the other hand, it’s balanced out with a great small robot mode, and a really nice-looking design in general, plus handfeel I really dig. He’s definitely straining under the weight of being retooled into something totally different, though. It’s interesting to specifically compare him to Siege Galaxy Upgrade Optimus Prime, the other figure in the specific subgenre of “taking a basic G1 leader and heavily retooling him into an Anime Optimus.”
While Galaxy Prime is overall a more solid figure, he was a planned retool, instead of a crazy bolted-on after-the-fact idea. And while that figure’s technically better, Star Convoy’s the one that I find more interesting, and the one I feel like messing around with more. Maybe I just appreciate the gonzo Takara attitude of just kitbashing these guys into obscure things, or maybe the base POTP mold is just more fun. Also, I really, really regret selling my Combiner Wars Legends Rodimus, since it makes a good substitute for the Micromaster Hot Rod the 1991 original one came with.
For all of his flaws, I like him a lot. As to whether you would, too, it depends on how his strengths balance out his weaknesses, and what sort of price tag you’re willing to pay for this really niche homage. But I’m happy with what I got
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