I had fun looking at Cybertron Metroplex last week, so I thought I’d pull out another one of my favorite Cybertron figures that has hitherto escaped being featured on FigureFan Zero. He’s Vector Prime and holy shit was I excited when I saw the pre-production photos of this guy. I thought he was one of the most gorgeous Transformers ever made. This guy reminds me a lot of the movie style designs that were appearing in the later episodes of the Sunbow cartoon. There’s no in-package shot, so let’s just go right to his alt mode.

Hells yeah! Vector Prime is a bitchin space cruiser. One of the things I love most about this design is that his transformation is bewilderingly simple, and yet the alt mode works incredibly well. The ship rests nicely on the bulky backside, complete with wheels, and he’s got some cool guns slung under there as well. There’s also a firing missile concealed in the nose of the ship.

There’s so much sculpted detail on this ship that it’s easy to get lost in the clutter. The surface of the ship’s hull is littered, and I mean LITTERED, with exposed gears and while Hasbro did paint some panels of these with a nice gold application, I really wish I had the customizing skills to have at the rest. A little paint and a lot of time and patience would make Vector Prime’s alt mode even more amazing. But even as he stands now, it’s hard to think of another Transformer that got this much attention to detail in the sculpt. One day, I may at least have a go at panel lining him. Damn, do I love the design of this toy!

In addition to the crazy detail in the sculpt and the snazzy paint apps, Vector Prime makes good use of translucent blue plastic for the windshield, tiny wings, and some sensor devices on his undercarriage. And then there are the solar panel wings on the sides. They look great in the clear blue, but the plastic is very soft and these things are ridiculously prone to warping. I made the mistake of putting mine lose in a storage tote a couple of years back and when I took him out they looked like they were beyond hope. A lot of effort with a hair dryer brought them back close to their original state, but these things are not to be trifled with!

Another cool feature of Vector Prime is the way he incorporates his minicon, Safeguard. Most minicons just do their own thing and you can stick them onto the larger robots for power ups, but I always thought there was missed potential to better incorporate them into the designs of the bigger robot’s alt modes. Hasbro did a pretty good job with figures like Cyclonus and Thrust, but then didn’t seem to bother with others. With Vector Prime, there’s an actual indentation where Safeguard plugs in to give Vector Prime a huge cannon. Nice!

As already mentioned, Vector Prime’s transformation is as easy as it gets. You just fold his legs out, position his arms, fold the front half of the ship into a backpack, and turn the head to face forward. It’s ridiculously simple, and yet the robot mode is a thing of beauty. He has one of my favorite headsculpts of any Transformer from the period and all that great sculpted detail from his alt mode carries over beautifully into his robot mode. The angled shoulder armor looks great, and the backpack isn’t too bulky. The solar panels fold neatly to his sides, and I even dig the way the hull plates slide ever so slightly back to better reveal his fists. I also really love that huge round compartment in his chest. The whole figure hits that sweet spot of late Sunbow aesthetic when there was more of an outer space orientation to the show and we got to see a lot of older Cybertronians that we didn’t see earlier.

Did I forget to mention that Vector Prime has a translucent blue sword that stores conveniently in his backpack? He does!

Let’s not depart without saying something about Safeguard, because he’s on my A-list of cool minicons. His alt mode is a little spaceship with a very large gun. As already mentioned, he incorporates nicely into Vector’s alt mode and can quickly detach to fly off on his own. Because most of his alt mode is one big cannon, he can conveniently attach to either of Vector’s arms to give some added fire power. I kind of wish, Hasbro had given him a post to fit in Vector’s hand because then he would have been a proper Target Master. He can also store away by attaching to Vector’s backpack.

Safeguard sort of mimics Vector’s transformation. He’s definitely one of the better looking minicons in robot mode. He could use a few more paint apps on his torso, but otherwise he looks great and has nice articulation for a minicon. His arms rotate at the shoulders and have ball joints in the elbows. His legs rotate at the hips and have hinged knees.

Vector Prime is pure Transformer love. Hasbro went crazy with him and it shows. I’m always happy to get another space-faring alt mode, and the robot mode’s design is both beautiful and bad ass. There’s a ton of clever elements to the design of this figure, and yet the transformation isn’t one of them. But he’s a great example of how you don’t necessarily need an over engineered transformation to make an amazing figure.  He’s one of my all-time favorites, and he can usually be found standing on display with my Classics collection. The mold has been brought out a few more times since his original 2005 release. At the ’07 Botcon he was repainted into the glorious Alpha Trion. It was a great use for the mold and it is a strikingly beautiful figure. I’d love to add him to my collection someday, but not enough to blow $450-500 on him. He was rolled out again in 2009 in a rather unfortunately f’ugly repaint as part of the Universe 2.0 collection. If he’s missing from your shelves and you don’t want to splurge on the Botcon exclusive, I recommend going with the original release. You can still pick him up for at or below his original MSRP of about $20-25, and he’s worth every damn penny.