Maybe some people do? But 'despise' is strong. My experience is that TF fans that know JG1 don't despise it overall. The timeline has differences. But there are interesting concepts there. Then, certain characters get 'assassinated' when imported into certain 'western' continuities.

(Though these days docs are probably printed 'redacted' with daklighting (?) applied?)

So in that headcanony G1 style universe Megatron is the tank/gun bot who turned on labor movement, whereas Megaempress, a construct created by Labor with crash tender mode, is their response who can overpower the authoritarian with her special ability, which she is tempted to misuse and become him.

I really like his lightbar colored optics.

This vaguely reminds me of that scene in Dracula (1992) when suddenly a wolf is loose in London and young princely Dracula is courting Mina and they start petting the wolf together and, like, their gloves touch or something.

It's pretty but that whole aft fighter jet looks small next to that truck.

(I love you, Transformers.)

Notice it's from Angel.

There seriously wasn't anything controversial about it unless one is an enjoyer of a certain news channel. The takes in the first season were pretty mainstream liberal (not super leftist or progressive) messages about immigration, gender, etc. It remained children's programming based on toys.

It's awesomely bad, there's no such things as logical size and scale, Swindle will sell out any and everyone, something something misogyny.

There are good things, too. Hot Rod is pink. Mirage makes an appearance. We got to see their version of Cybertron. Leige Maximo in an animated series. Girl character holds the Matrix. Thrash and Mo remain fairly likable protagonists. Decepticons exist. Breakdown is kinda rougishly charming....

There really are other people in the fandom disappointed for multiple reasons: the timeskip, morally compromised Hot Rod, the ending that leaves characters in less interesting state, characters modeling poor activity only to be corrected, Robbie's barely addressed alien grooming trauma....

There are some who have a reticule or other mod on their left eye/optic which may or may not have been damaged, like SG Blurr or Shadow Striker.

There's a Perceptor who lost both optics, and another who replaced his right optic with a targeting reticule.

Cybertron Dirt Boss has a right optic mod.