Character studies · Optimus Primal (Rise of the Beasts)
The gorilla is not a truck
waiting to stand up.
Optimus Primal and Optimus Prime share enough of a name to invite a small mistake. The gorilla makes the correction fairly quickly. With these Blokees kits, I wanted to look at what changes when the alternate form is a creature’s body rather than a vehicle with panels to rearrange.
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In this story
Prime is here too. This is Primal.
Rise of the Beasts brings the Maximals into an alliance with Optimus Prime and the Autobots. The 2023 film credits Peter Cullen as Prime and Ron Perlman as Primal. Similar names, two separate characters.
The gorilla makes the distinction much faster than a cast list. Broad shoulders surround a compact head, with long arms leading down towards the hands. Mechanical plates follow an animal-shaped body instead of leaving a vehicle’s front end across the chest.
That is where I would start with the beast-mode kit: the large shoulders and the low head between them. The surface is busy, but the body plan is easy to follow. It brings a different kind of weight to a group of upright robots.
The upright body gets its own kit.
Classic Class 71145 is the separately catalogued upright robot. Its head sits higher above the chest and its legs take a larger share of the outline. Beside the beast-mode figure, the change in posture becomes clear.
These are two building figures, not a sequence showing one kit transforming. I would choose the pair for the contrast between the bodies. The broad upper mass and dark mechanical surfaces connect them, while the arrangement of the limbs changes.
The gorilla would still be my first choice. A shelf full of standing figures already has plenty of straight backs and heads above shoulders. Primal can introduce himself a little differently.
