Movie Prowl

Allegiance: Autobots
Series: Movie
Category: Custom Deluxe
Year: 2008

Prowl is all about the rules. Back on Cybertron before the war he was the planet's top police officer and crime did not pay while he was around. Despite being one of Megatron's military troops, there was never a question which side Prowl would fight on. He wants a society where the innocent are safe from the criminals. He is Optimus Prime's chief strategist and enforcer. Coming to Earth, the choice of vehicle modes was easy for Prowl. And his first order of business is tracking down Barricade, whose choice of camouflage makes a mockery out of everything Prowl stands for.

Robot Mode: As is becoming the rule for custom reviews, let's start with how this guy is put together. The main body is actually the "new" Movie Bumblebee, the 2009 Concept Camaro. The head, though, hails from Movie Dropkick, while the hands have been taken from Movie Landmine. Now the new Movie Bumblebee is among my favourite figures from the Movie line and I'm rather fond of Landmine and Dropkick as well, so it shouldn't come as much of a surprise that I really like this robot mode.

To make one thing clear here: The Prowl look has been captured quite well here. Despite the inhuman face and lack of shoulder missiles (which cartoon Prowl never had anyway), this robot here is easily recognisable as Prowl. Thumbs up for that. Also, the already very nice hands of Landmine have been improved upon even further, as Limewire has seperated the individual fingers/claws in such a way that each can be moved separately. Very nice. Limewire has added quite a bit of the polished/scratched metal look to the robot bits of Prowl, which in this case is fine and not too much. The car bits look a bit worse for wear, though, something that becomes more jarring in vehicle mode (see below). Still, a very nice robot mode, which captures the look of Prowl well and updates it for the Movie flair. Nicely done.

Alternate Mode: In vehicle mode we pretty much get Movie Bumblebee with a police car paintjob and police lights on top. The car is mostly black with white doors and roof, as well as some writing and an eagle's head added as decals. Unfortunately in this mode the paint application looks a bit rough, somewhat thicker in some places than in others and not one hundred percent around the edges. I've never painted a custom myself, but I've seen Limewire do better work than this, so some point deduction for that. Apart from that, though, a very nice vehicle mode.

Remarks: Prowl is one of the more iconic characters from Transformers history and while he didn't appear in the actual Movie, he did play a part in the surrounding comics. He made a brief cameo in the "Reign of Starscream" series and currently stars in "ROTF Prequel: Defiance". To my current knowledge he's not scheduled for Revenge of the Fallen, but who knows? We might see a Movie Prowl one of these days, if not in the second, maybe in the third one. Anyway, Limewire put together a very nice Prowl. The only drawback here is that the paintjob isn't Limewire's best work, so some points deduction for that. All in all, though, a good, solid Movie version of Prowl.

Rating: B-