At the time we saw "Predacons Rising", I believe 20. He's kind of a mixed bag at times, he has his mature moments and he has his immature moments.

 

When I first saw an Optimus die in ROTF.

 

When I was little Armada Optimus' death completely shocked me.

But of course, I hadn't seen any other Transformers media at the time and didn't know about the other Optimus deaths in G1, BW, and BM.

 

Animated came a little out of nowhere, but I couldn't really say I was shocked. The 85 Movie was my first expirience with Transformers, and I had no idea who Optimus was to be shocked about his death.

The others just feel forced and obvious

 

I think everyone has that ONE moment, and then after that they recognise the pattern. Each new iteration of Prime is just a countdown til his next death.

I was shocked when Optimus Primal died. I was honestly expecting him to make some last minute escape, even when his pod did blow up I was waiting for him to swoop in at the last moment to save everyone XD

 

Armada 'cuz I was a kid when it happened.

 

I was still a kid when they offed Prime in Armada, but for some reason I thought it was a particuarly badass way to go (and he got better) so it didn't bother me for some reason. Then again I can't say I got too invested in him the same way the original G1 Prime did for the kids of that era.

But the most shocking death for me has to be Animated. Like, goddamn, the show hasn't even started and he's already dead. Sure, he's deus-ex-machina'd back to life 75 seconds later but Animated really threw down the gauntlet against tradition by saying 'fuck this shit we're killing/rezzing Prime now so we don't have to get into this resurection upgrade crap down the line'.

 

Yeah, now about the only way a future show could top it is if he died and came back from the dead in the backstory.

 

RID?

 

Huh. I forgot about that. Good point.

 

Another one over here for BW.

I was a child, unaware of the "All Prime must die" trend, and seeing his body parts flying through space followed by the ominous "TO BE CONTINUED...?" text was a shock. I think that may have been one of my earliest experiences with a form of media that(seemingly) killed off one of its characters.

 

When I first watched Beast Wars as a kid, I was surprised with Primal's death at the end of the season. I was sitting there watching the debris float about in space with "The End?" fading in and I just sat there and silently said: "Optimus?" And I didn't even like Optimus when I first started watching it, I thought he was too much of a goody too shoes. (I missed the Primal Rage episode as a kid) I just wanted to see the bad guys like Terrorsaur get their revenge, and here I was shocked and dismayed they actually won.

I only got the 86 film as a kid because I was watching Armada at the time and I mistook the G1 movie as the Unicron arc from Armada. The description did have Unicron in it so yeah, easy mistake. So when I watched it, I wasn't upset or shocked with Prime's death, just confused. "Wait how long are we in? Well he'll be back by the end of the film right? Well he never returned but apparently he will according to the narrator."

When I did watch Armada from start to finish later on in life, I was surprised with Prime's death in that series, but it was more of a surprise like: "Huh, something actually happened. Didn't see that." After say, Revenge of the Fallen, Prime's death became traditional for me so nothing about it can surprise me anymore unless the execution is good.

 

Why is it now I have the mental image of Mercy from Overwatch flying over to a dead Optimus and shouting "Heroes never die!", bringing him back to life before flying off after I read your post?

 

The only times where Prime's death was in any way shocking was the 86 movie, Armada and Beast Wars. Every other time, I've given 0 frags. Especially with the Aligned Continuity.

 

His death in Marvel G1 run shocked me as a kid...

...because it was so utterly, irrevocably and unconditionally, stupid.

 

none

 

G1, it was new and I didn't see it coming.

As for primal his was a surprise but i didn't expect it to last.

 

This. Armada was the last time because that death came out of nowhere.

I think in Primal's case it was more of a matter of "how is he getting out of this one?" and it turned out he didn't; we all saw his disembodied head fly by after all.

 

By the time I got into Transformers, Optimus had already died a bunch of times, so nothing surprises me anymore. I just know he has to die at some point or else it can't possibly be a true Transformers continuity. I knew they were going to kill him off in ROTF because the rule is, as Optimus Prime, he must die at some point no matter the cost and at that time they had no idea if they'd get another chance to kill him.

 

Sparks didn't exist in the G1 cartoon, and when they wrote it into a draft of the script, it was never actually implemented, and didn't necessarily mirror what Sparks were/are in the continuities past G1. Applying retcon logic doesn't work in this case. It's like applying the Allspark when Vector Sigma was explicitly a thing.

I was 9 when the 86 movie hit, and it definitely affected me. Not as much as Prowl, but still... I think Zombie Prime from Dark Awakening was almost worse, but it had the added slap in the face of the remains of EVERY dead Autobot from the movie being slagged so there was no chance of a resurrection.