More Than Meets The Eye – Optimus Prime LEGO Set

The first time I remember crying in a movie was in 1986 when I was 9 years old. After the movie, I was left stunned and thrilled at the same time. While waiting for my dad to pick me up, an usher noticed I was by myself and asked if I wanted to see the movie again. Without question, I said, “YES!” Was I crying because my dad abandoned me at the movie theater? No – that’s a whole other story. I sat there in the theater bawling because I witnessed the “death” of Optimus Prime in “Transformers: The Movie” after he took a blaster shot from Megatron when Hot Rod was trying to help.

Let’s travel back to 1984 when I was first awestruck by a Saturday morning cartoon based on Hasbro’s toy line, Transformers. The cartoon brought to life one of my favorite toy lines when I was a kid, and over the next couple of years, I followed the heroic Optimus Prime, who fearlessly led the Autobots in a war against Megatron and the Decepticons. Needless to say, I had an attachment to Optimus Prime, who, in the cartoons and movies, was voiced by Peter Cullen. Never in my dreams would I have thought that Optimus Prime would cross into the world of LEGO®, another one of my favorite toys.

My daughter and I attended our first San Diego Comic-Con in 2022, and it was there in the Exhibit Hall at the LEGO booth where I saw him, LEGO Optimus Prime #10302. He stands nearly 14” tall, and best of all, Optimus Prime transforms without the need to rebuild him. Let me repeat this: Optimus Prime transforms from his legendary robot form into a Freightliner FL86 cab-over semi-truck. I was simply blown away and nerding out big time, but I refrained from making an impulse buy. Instead, we walked the Exhibit Hall, and we found ourselves circling back to the LEGO booth like vultures. I noticed several LEGO sets selling out left and right, and I started becoming anxious, so we circled back one last time, and I asked the LEGO rep, “Do you have any Optimus Primes left?” He replied, “Several.” I was a little dumbfounded that he was not nearly as popular as I felt he should have been. I took a slight pause and thought to myself, “Lucky me, take my money!” The next step was figuring out if he was going to make the trip back home safely. He did, and building him was an absolute joy.

The Optimus Prime LEGO set consists of 1508 pieces. Included in this set are his ion blaster, energon axe, and jetpack. Also included is the Autobot Matrix of Leadership, which can be conveniently stored in Optimus Prime’s chest chamber. When Optimus Prime is in his robot form, he is poseable with some limitations in his lower body; only his hip joints and ankles pivot. When you transform him into his truck form, only his front bumper needs to be replaced, and this is simply for cosmetic reasons. The LEGO set took me about 4 hours to complete. For those of you who are Transformers and LEGO fans, I highly recommend adding him to your collection before LEGO retires him. Happy LEGO building!