I've talked a little about this before but thought I'd consolidate and flesh it out a bit here.
Throughout all of the Transformers continuities (the notable exception being Shattered Glass) there have always been the "noble Autobots" and the "evil Decepticons". As a child I accepted this at face value but as I got older — and especially as different continuities appeared — I found myself disagreeing with this assertion.
I believe the Autobots are the evil ones. The Decepticons are the true heroes, and Megatron is about as pure as they come.
In the generally accepted comic book canon Megatron was an energy miner — a nobody, in the grand scheme of things. The Autobots ran Cybertron and a great deal of the Cybertronian government bolstered by the Autobot military (led by Sentinel Prime) was corrupt. It was through this corruption that birthed Megatron and the Decepticons. The Decepticons didn't fight for conquest, they were fighting for their rights. They were fighting for their fair share of energy and a better standard of living, something the corrupt Autobot government would not allow purely for profit-driven class reasons.
Megatron was effectively trapped in a system where nothing he could do within the law could have a positive effect on the society he was a part of. It was illegal for him to speak up and illegal to organize, and the entire political system was engineered to keep things that way, to keep the ruling class Autobots in power. The only recourse left to him was all-out revolution. Anything else would have been an impotent half-step, an incomplete effort that would have done nothing more than invite the corrupt to improve their ways and make another attempt at takeover.
So, Megatron found himself at the vanguard of a movement to destroy the corrupt Autobot leadership. And how do you go about fighting a corrupt government with a powerful military at their disposal? Through terroristic tactics. Sneak attacks. Backstabbing. It was the only way to break the cycle. "All warfare is based on deception."
Deception. Decepticons.
Did the Decepticons start the war? Nope. It was the Autobots who fired first, both figuratively (through manipulations of corrupt government) and literally (with the attack on the mining team that Megatron was on the receiving end of). Megatron counterattacked in self defense. Sure, he was brutal, but would you really be expected to be gentle if someone was out to deprive you of life and limb?
In the early stages of the war the Autobots never sought peace with the Decepticons, they sought surrender. Of COURSE the Decepticons aren't going to accept that. As the war raged on their pleas for peace were seen, perhaps rightfully so, as the pleas of a society which was almost ready to give up. You can blame Megatron for draining Cybertron of its resources all you want, but the fact remains that the Autobots were draining Cybertron at least as much as Megatron was. And while the Autobots were fighting to maintain the status quo and keep the Autobots in power, Megatron was fighting for equality and the end to political corruption and oppression. If that meant tearing down an otherwise-unresponsive power base and all that supported it, and there was no other way to affect such a change, then wouldn't the end actually justify the means?
So what about Megatron's obvious contempt for other forms of life? My response to that would be, so what? Humans are at least as contemptuous to other forms of life as Megatron is. We humans routinely stomp out ant nests, poison wasp hives, step on spiders, bomb cockroaches, evict bats, and run over squirrels without barely a second thought, and that's just in our domestic existence. In the broader sense of the world humans are responsible for mass deforestation and ecological rape for the sake of providing power, food and shelter for its population. And why shouldn't we? Those "lesser creatures" don't have the same degree of sentience as we humans have and certainly aren't capable of understanding our needs or why we do what we do. In that regard, humans are no different from the Decepticons.
And that's exactly the kind of contempt that Megatron views humans and most other life forms in the universe. The extension of the battle to Earth and the involvement of the humans was just another resource allocation to Megatron. In his eyes, the humans — a species which he generally regarded with the same contempt as we humans regard cockroackes — allied themselves with the power-hungry socially-suppressive Autobot regime. So, from Megatron's perspective, the Autobots landed on an energy-rich planet that the local vermin were willing to share with them in order to maintain their oppressive rule. Megatron would no sooner enter into talks with the human race than we would open negotiations with cockroaches in our homes. What do we humans do when we move into a house or apartment that has cockroaches in it? We exterminate for our betterment. And so does Megatron. So he's not being "evil" there either. He's just got a different perspective which the humans lack, and if you were to ask him, the humans are incapable of even understanding the existence of that perspective.
Optimus Prime is heroic to be sure, but what are his motives? If peace were truly his primary goal then he would have entered into negotiations with Megatron a LONG time ago, with the first concession being the dissolution of the Autobot regime. He didn't do that. Why not? If he were to tap into the wisdom of the Matrix he certainly would have seen the corruption of the Autobots, right?
Unless the Matrix were already similarly corrupted by Autobot sparks. Whoops.
Mind you, this isn't to say that the Decepticons were saints. Many of the Decepticons were psychotic. Shockwave was particularly nasty. But Megatron, like all good military leaders, made good use out of the materials at hand. Who cares if they were psychotic if they helped solve the problem? And when their usefulness has come to an end and they have nothing left to offer the new society, they're discarded. We humans do the same thing; look at our prison system.
So, there you have it: Autobots are manipulative power-hungry bots seeking to reinstate themselves as the head of a socially corrupt society. Decepticons are desperate terrorists looking to restore their home world and create a dictatorship to ensure Autobot corruption never happens again.
Throughout all of the Transformers continuities (the notable exception being Shattered Glass) there have always been the "noble Autobots" and the "evil Decepticons". As a child I accepted this at face value but as I got older — and especially as different continuities appeared — I found myself disagreeing with this assertion.
I believe the Autobots are the evil ones. The Decepticons are the true heroes, and Megatron is about as pure as they come.
In the generally accepted comic book canon Megatron was an energy miner — a nobody, in the grand scheme of things. The Autobots ran Cybertron and a great deal of the Cybertronian government bolstered by the Autobot military (led by Sentinel Prime) was corrupt. It was through this corruption that birthed Megatron and the Decepticons. The Decepticons didn't fight for conquest, they were fighting for their rights. They were fighting for their fair share of energy and a better standard of living, something the corrupt Autobot government would not allow purely for profit-driven class reasons.
Megatron was effectively trapped in a system where nothing he could do within the law could have a positive effect on the society he was a part of. It was illegal for him to speak up and illegal to organize, and the entire political system was engineered to keep things that way, to keep the ruling class Autobots in power. The only recourse left to him was all-out revolution. Anything else would have been an impotent half-step, an incomplete effort that would have done nothing more than invite the corrupt to improve their ways and make another attempt at takeover.
So, Megatron found himself at the vanguard of a movement to destroy the corrupt Autobot leadership. And how do you go about fighting a corrupt government with a powerful military at their disposal? Through terroristic tactics. Sneak attacks. Backstabbing. It was the only way to break the cycle. "All warfare is based on deception."
Deception. Decepticons.
Did the Decepticons start the war? Nope. It was the Autobots who fired first, both figuratively (through manipulations of corrupt government) and literally (with the attack on the mining team that Megatron was on the receiving end of). Megatron counterattacked in self defense. Sure, he was brutal, but would you really be expected to be gentle if someone was out to deprive you of life and limb?
In the early stages of the war the Autobots never sought peace with the Decepticons, they sought surrender. Of COURSE the Decepticons aren't going to accept that. As the war raged on their pleas for peace were seen, perhaps rightfully so, as the pleas of a society which was almost ready to give up. You can blame Megatron for draining Cybertron of its resources all you want, but the fact remains that the Autobots were draining Cybertron at least as much as Megatron was. And while the Autobots were fighting to maintain the status quo and keep the Autobots in power, Megatron was fighting for equality and the end to political corruption and oppression. If that meant tearing down an otherwise-unresponsive power base and all that supported it, and there was no other way to affect such a change, then wouldn't the end actually justify the means?
So what about Megatron's obvious contempt for other forms of life? My response to that would be, so what? Humans are at least as contemptuous to other forms of life as Megatron is. We humans routinely stomp out ant nests, poison wasp hives, step on spiders, bomb cockroaches, evict bats, and run over squirrels without barely a second thought, and that's just in our domestic existence. In the broader sense of the world humans are responsible for mass deforestation and ecological rape for the sake of providing power, food and shelter for its population. And why shouldn't we? Those "lesser creatures" don't have the same degree of sentience as we humans have and certainly aren't capable of understanding our needs or why we do what we do. In that regard, humans are no different from the Decepticons.
And that's exactly the kind of contempt that Megatron views humans and most other life forms in the universe. The extension of the battle to Earth and the involvement of the humans was just another resource allocation to Megatron. In his eyes, the humans — a species which he generally regarded with the same contempt as we humans regard cockroackes — allied themselves with the power-hungry socially-suppressive Autobot regime. So, from Megatron's perspective, the Autobots landed on an energy-rich planet that the local vermin were willing to share with them in order to maintain their oppressive rule. Megatron would no sooner enter into talks with the human race than we would open negotiations with cockroaches in our homes. What do we humans do when we move into a house or apartment that has cockroaches in it? We exterminate for our betterment. And so does Megatron. So he's not being "evil" there either. He's just got a different perspective which the humans lack, and if you were to ask him, the humans are incapable of even understanding the existence of that perspective.
Optimus Prime is heroic to be sure, but what are his motives? If peace were truly his primary goal then he would have entered into negotiations with Megatron a LONG time ago, with the first concession being the dissolution of the Autobot regime. He didn't do that. Why not? If he were to tap into the wisdom of the Matrix he certainly would have seen the corruption of the Autobots, right?
Unless the Matrix were already similarly corrupted by Autobot sparks. Whoops.
Mind you, this isn't to say that the Decepticons were saints. Many of the Decepticons were psychotic. Shockwave was particularly nasty. But Megatron, like all good military leaders, made good use out of the materials at hand. Who cares if they were psychotic if they helped solve the problem? And when their usefulness has come to an end and they have nothing left to offer the new society, they're discarded. We humans do the same thing; look at our prison system.
So, there you have it: Autobots are manipulative power-hungry bots seeking to reinstate themselves as the head of a socially corrupt society. Decepticons are desperate terrorists looking to restore their home world and create a dictatorship to ensure Autobot corruption never happens again.
R; That Anna Kendrick gif is 
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