Optimus Prime's deaths in the G1 comics were also pretty traumatic. The first time was when Prime allowed himself to be killed because - wait for it - Megatron had beaten him in a LAN game. Even though Megatron was exposed for having code-hacked the game and won by cheating. It's similar premise to "Heavy Metal War," only that in the G1 cartoon the penalty was exile, not death - and Optimus Prime agreed that Megatron's cheating voided the agreement. Whereas G1 comic Optimus Prime adamantly insisted on keeping his word and maintaining his honour, and that Megatron's hacking changes nothing. Snap. As much as I generally prefer the G1 comics over the cartoon, this wasn't one of the comics' more shining moments. Although Optimus Prime's second death in the comics, going Kamikaze into Unicron's maw while opening the Matrix, was pretty damn epic (arguably the most epic demise of Optimus Prime evah) . . . but of course, being bathed in Matrix energy during the explosion actually kept Optimus Prime alive (although shredded), allowing him to crash back on Cybertron and die a slow and painful death! It would've been more humane him to have just properly blown up and died from the explosion. Then of course Prime used his dying breath to whisper something to Prowl that he did not want to hear! Oh... if only he had a table to flip! Then Prime's death in G2 was just downright gruesome, with Optimus allowing the Swarm to consume him.

Prime's death in TFTM at least looked like a 'peaceful passing,' whereas his comic deaths were just painfully agonising!