That's my trick too. I can live with most of it right up until the Cybertron=originally organic bit (and the bat skeletons), and then it sorta goes down the plughole.
My solution has been to just make my own micro-continuity (the Odieverse) based around the G1 Autobots activating a Wheeljack-created Hitchhiker's Guide-esque Improbability Drive invention...neatly explains all plotholes and lets me include any characters I like into a single (mostly consistent) continuity.
Still, the Tankor saga was cool, and Strika and the drone (and Botanica too) were awesome characters.