AHM #12 Spoilers within!

Originally Posted by Lunar Archivist

My interpretation is that the story is an allegory about the pointlessness, the price, and the aftermath of extended warfare. The Autobots and the Decepticons have been fighting for millions of years. Both sides became so focused on beating each other that they lost sight of their original objectives and began accumulating massive amounts of collateral damage without putting much thought into it: hundreds of innocents worlds and billions of innocent beings were dragged into their civil war and exterminated, Cybertron was rendered all but uninhabitable by the swarm, etc.

Then the Decepticons essentially won the war (at least temporarily). The reason that All Hail Megatron might seem devoid of a deeper plot is because it started with their victory and essentially asked the question, "Well, now what the heck do we do?" The Decepticons spent millions of years honing the art of warfare against the Autobots and perfected it. And now their adversaries are gone. When you fight for the sole purpose of winning and then finally succeed, what, then, is your purpose in life?

We see the Decepticons take every possible path. Megatron, as big as an asshole as he is, admittedly had a grand vision: he wanted to create a new order while systematically dismantling the Decepticon war machine, even though he realized that, if he succeeded, he'd be rendered an obsolete relic with no place in the empire he'd create. Starscream and the Decepticons he got to join him mistakenly believed that Megatron was now directionless and decided to forge their own path. Some, like Bombshell, Skywarp, and Reflector, just decided to indulge their sadism by conducting inhuman experiments and genocide.

The Autobots were also forced to take a long, hard look at themselves. Optimus Prime realizes towards the end of the series that, in a sense, his troops were no better than the Decepticons because they'd essentially never given a second thought to all the innocent beings they'd sucked into the war. That's why he decided to take the first step in changing that by going back to Earth and liberate it.

Originally Posted by Fosterlager

It seems the concept should have been fleshed out beyond the pitch "What if the Decepticons were on Earth unopposed by the Autobots?!" The Jazz/Prowl leadership thing was weird, the Sunstreaker traitor arc seemed tacked on, and the Ironhide-Mirage bit was lifted from an episode of RiD with the Spychanger versions of these two.

And upon reflection, it was fucked-up how Skywarp would just execute Thundercracker like that. Starscream directly opposed Megatron and Skywarp didn't do a thing, just stood on the sidelines and waited to see which way the fight went. Hopefully that wasn't a fatal blast and he just warps an unconscious Thundercracker into a starship holding cell for judgement once Megatron recovers.

Originally Posted by Fosterlager

And upon reflection, it was fucked-up how Skywarp would just execute Thundercracker like that. Starscream directly opposed Megatron and Skywarp didn't do a thing, just stood on the sidelines and waited to see which way the fight went. Hopefully that wasn't a fatal blast and he just warps an unconscious Thundercracker into a starship holding cell for judgement once Megatron recovers.