Scans_Daily

The original Marvel run couldn't follow the events of the animated movie as they had already killed Unicron. It actually had a pretty happy ending with the resurrection of many Autobots and vanquishing of the Decepticons.

Regeneration did end up killing almost all of the Decepticons but there were quite a few Autobot survivors. It also had a final defeat of all the dark forces against them and gave the Transformers a true lineage. I would call it more bittersweet then anything else.

Most of the TF/GI Joe comics are kind of throwaway. If you do prefer something a bit more lighthearted then maybe check out the ones that were published by Boom Studios I believe it was. They did a whole series of them, 4 different storylines I believe, that were all pretty wacky fun. Transformers turning into Cobra vehicles, Time Travel, Serpentor and even Cobra-La show up.

As for MTMTE, its probably the best Transformers related media I have ever read. Some terrible things do happen, but I don't think its as dark as you think it is. Honestly I think there was only one really dark, depressing issue and you have pretty ample warning for when its coming.