Out of the two Sunbow shows from the 1980's which one aged better and holds better by modern standards. I have to go with Transformers by a long shot. Don't get me wrong I enjoy and like G.I. Joe: A Real America Hero but after Revenge of Cobra its all over the place. What Transformers did better was until the movie had a very consistent main cast. For the Autobots it was Optimus Prime, Ironhide, Ratchet, and Bumblebee pretty much. Optimus Prime was in 61 out of 65 episode pre movie. In G.I. Joe sometimes it was Duke then Flint then Duke again then Flint and Flint again! Maybe a little bit of Duke with some Flint. Then sometimes some Scarlett and then a lot of Lady Jaye and then a little Scarlett. There wasn't really a main group just some appeared more then others but. Also other both have cappy moments I feel Transformers has less that aged poorly. Sure there "Childs Play" but that better then an episode about make up companies steeling beauty. Not bashing G.I. Joe because I love episodes like the 5 parter MASS Device which is still epic to watch or the episode with the Train full of Gold. Just as a whole I would say G1 aged extremely well. Like a 90% aged well. While G.I. Joe more like a 70% but that 70% is still an awesome 70%.

So yea Transformers.

Plus The Transformers: The movie is better then G.I Joe the movie which I do enjoy to.

 

Transformers. Not even close.

They're both very much products of the Cold War, but Transformers has more internal logic than G.I. Joe and is less jingoistic. Also the notion of a special forces unit with no uniforms and half the Village People is just hard to swallow. Transformers can hand-wave away its super advanced technology and laser guns more easily, as the main characters are alien robots instead of humans.

 

One day I'll watch Transformers, but for now I have no opinion on that. GI JOE aged horribly though, and is just really goofy. Then again, 99% of my nostalgia is with the toys, not the cartoon. I still think the movie is decent enough though, but I haven't seen it in years.

 

An alien war between shapeshifting robots has more appeal, and has received a better update, than a war between the military and terrorist forces.

 

Well I'm a bigger Transformers fan than I am a G.I. Joe fan. But if I look at the shows objectively, I think they've aged about the same. They both have episodes that I absolutely love, and they both have episodes that I don't really care for. With both shows, I think the movies are my favorite thing to come out of the shows.

 

As much as I love Transformers (far more than the Joe cartoon,) I was going to say Joe - especially some of the later episodes - fare better today when viewed. At least visually.

That was, until I realized the last two seasons weren't made by Sunbow, but by DiC. So does that not count? If not, then I revert back to Transformers.  

 

GIJoe got a little TOO real after 9/11/2001. You'd think the concept would be welcomed by 'MERICANS! Unfortunately, nationalism seems to be at a low these days.

Meanwhile, as others have noted, an alien war fought by giant robots kind of transcends geo-political sentiment.

 

Transformers since the GI Joe franchise isn't doing so hot nowadays.

 

Can't you say that the GI Joe brand is kinda dead?

If so then we can tell which has aged better.

 

idk, they are both basically the same cartoon.

 

They both have aged about the same.

 

GoBots aged better than either of them.

::disappears into the shadows::

 

Both are about equal for 'how they hold up' for me. While both are out-there, fanciful shows, GI-Joe is a touch more 'grounded', mainly for having a human cast versus a robot one, which allowed for a few nifty stories that worked on a more gut emotional level than TFs, but on the other side, the S&P of kids' cartoons meant actual harm was super-rare (the 'everyone parachutes out of their planes' thing), where the robots actually got shot or damaged once in a while

Damn right! It's fermented and got mushrooms on it and everything!

 

This. I like both a lot. Actually, I probably like the Sunbow Joe cartoon more now than I did when I was a kid.

 

Dic does not count in this

 

I say GI JOE.

Namely because I'm pretty sure it doesn't have entire episodes mired in period racism toward the middle east with such lovely places like Carbombaya where the population swear by the camels of their mothers.

 

Actually GI Joe had a bit of racism coming from Gung Ho when they met the Oktober Guard. Since it was the Cold War and they were Russians, it was hard to accept them as good guys at the time.

 

agreed

voted - The Transformers (G1)

 

Oh geez, the Carbombaya episode was terrible. I don't remember enough episodes to know if G.I. Joe had anything similar, but I wouldn't be toooo surprised because I think the same writers worked on all the Sunbow shows, didn't they?

I do remember a G.I. Joe episode dealing with "children of the dust" (mixed race kids in Vietnam or Korea, who had been fathered by American servicemen) that was very poignant and maturely written. Basically the kids faced racism /stigma in their home-country and at the end one of the Joes is like "Let's take all the kids to 'MURICA" and they're like "Thank you, but no, this is our home."

 

It was Vietnam and also most of the Joes were like lets bring them to MERICA besides Gung-Ho who said as long as they are happy and safe it doesn't matter (or something)