Interestingly enough, Marvel Comics and Toei worked together to make the animated series for both Transformers and G.I. Joe, however only Transformers is popular in Japan. Ironically, you won't have Transformers without G.I. Joe. As the story goes, the tall 12" G.I. Joe doll series released a soldier with clear skin and robotic parts inside called Henshin Cyborg. This figure was so popular that his clear skin was turned silver, and the action figure was shrunken down and called Microman (called Micronauts in English-speaking countries). The Microman series started involving vehicles that transformed, which became a spinoff in itself called Diaclone. These were all taken together (I think by Marvel guys) and turned into the Transformers. This is why the Autobots were all similar scale, and the Decepticons were just the leftovers like jets, a gun, and a boom box (although even the Autobots had the smaller characters like Huff, Bumblebee, Brawn, and Cliffjumper).
OK, so that said, I thought that Transformers: The Movie was awesome. Prime had already been killed off in the Marvel Comics series, and I thought that his death was much cooler in the movie because he went down fighting (rather than being self-destructed by losing a virtual reality video game that Megatron cheated in by using a backdoor passcode). Then a few issues later, Megatron accidentally kills himself by going crazy and zapping the Space Bridge to Cybertron with himself on it. Dumb. So basically, the movie was badass. What I didn't like, at the time, was how Transformers turned to a futuristic theme with the space cars and such.
As for the "Duke is in a coma" thing, that was so incredibly stupid because he was impaled with a spear. I really hated the turn towards Serpentor and how goofy-assed the whole show turned. That same 5 episode story arc featured some really weird creatures and stuff, IIRC. What I liked about G.I. Joe was that it was mostly modern-day weaponry (the Sky Striker was a Tomcat, the Dragonfly was the ??? attack chopper, etc), so when it turned to goofy sci fi stuff, I lost interest. Don't get me wrong, I freaking LOVE science fiction, so much to the point that as a kid, I did not care for fantasy as a genre because I was so stuck on SF. The Joe comic was super violent and people would get killed, and as such it was much more interesting than the animation. Heck, as a kid, that's what I thought was so mindblowing about Robotech---the fact that it showed people getting killed.
So the G.I. Joe movie was pretty cool, in its own way. It was in-line with the comic more than the cartoon. Turning the Vipers into superhuman clones and whatnot was dumb, but it was much more easily digestible than the absurd Michael Bay Transformers movies.
The first Transformers movie was somewhat palatable, although they screwed up the Marvel character designs to the point where only Optimus Prime was recognizeable, and Bumblebee was somewhat passably recognizeable only because he was yellow (his horns were gone, etc). It's like dude, if you want to cash in on my generation on pure nostalgia factor, make characters like Ratchet an ambulance. If you can't make Sideswipe a Lamborghini because you have some stupid contract with GM, at least make him a Corvette, or at least RED, for Bob's sake. However, the Allspark was such a stupid, LAUGHABLE concept. It was somewhat similar to the Creation Matrix in the Marvel Comics that created life, however the Allspark ONLY seems to create mechanical life that immediately tries to kill any human in its immediate vicinity. This not only begs the question as to why it is so precious to the Autobots and as to why they shouldn't just destroy it, but it also completely obliterates the concept of Free Will among the Transformers (like how Jetfire used to be a Decepticon and a friend to Starscream, and became an Autobot), and the whole notion of how the difference between Autobots and Decepticons even came to be in the first place.
I never even bothered watching the second movie. Watching
Spoony's review was enough for me. You can't make a movie that is supposedly geared towards children and still put robot dogs humping girls' legs, magic brownies, and all sorts of other ridiculous crap that I can't even remember. Not to mention that Spike/Buster/Sam dies and somehow goes to Autobot Heaven, as if he had been mistakenly praying to Robot Jesus his whole life without knowing it, and is brought back to life. Holy crap, what the hell? I was given the first movie by my mom on DVD, and I will keep that just for watching with Rifftrax commentary. However, I will not bother to watch the other movies at all. Michael Bay is such a spastic retard. If we all just ignore him and stop giving him money, he will go away. Unfortunately, people today are completely stupid, and appealing to the lowest common denominator is a sure way to make money (Lady GaGa, et al).
I liked that bloodbath type stuff, like Genocyber, FOTNS/HNK, Angel Cop, etc. Oddly enough its my guilty pleasure I break out to watch on a Sunday afternoon when I am sipping down a few cold ones.