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No one has answered this question yet.

Yes. This was confirmed by the producers on the Q&A section of the special edition DVD. It was scripted both to show the intensity of the scene and to ensure a PG rating rather than a G which would have limited showtimes and, presumably, audience.

The complete list of new characters from the movie are:

AUTOBOTS: Arcee, Blurr, Eject, Hot Rod/Rodimus Prime, Kup, Ramhorn, Rewind, Springer, Steeljaw, Ultra Magnus and Wheelie.

DECEPTICONS: Galvatron, Cyclonus, Ratbat, Scourge and his huntsmen The Sweeps.

OTHERS: The Quintessons, The Junkions, Wreck-Gar, Kranix, Arblus, The Sharkticons, Unicron and Daniel Witwicky.

The complete list of confirmed and named movie casualties are:

AUTOBOTS: Brawn, Prowl, Ratchet, Ironhide, Optimus Prime, Wheeljack, Windcharger and Huffer.

DECEPTICONS: Megatron, Thundercracker, Skywarp, Bombshell, Kickback, Shrapnel, Starscream, Dirge, Thrust, Ramjet and Shockwave's death is also implied.

OTHER: Kranix, Arblus and Unicron.

Starscream's ghost and Unicron's head later return alive in the cartoon's 3rd season. Bombshell's, Kickback's and Shrapnel's clones also survive. Dirge, Thrust and Ramjet likewise appear alive later on, rendering their apparent demise in the movie erroneous. In fact, many of these dead characters have cameo appearances either in the movie or in the show—all animation mistakes.

After creating Cyclonus, Unicron also reformats another Transformer to act as his armada. This supposed armada consists of a single robot who is never seen or heard of after his creation. It's probably an error in the script and animation.

The Autobot Matrix of Leadership was created for the movie, and thus did not exist prior to it in the Transformers animation continuity. This is arguably one of the biggest and most blatant plot holes in the series' run, as the Matrix becomes a central artifact after the movie, but was never alluded to in the preceding two seasons, not even when we saw the chest cavity of Optimus Prime (where he supposedly kept the Matrix), nor when the Decepticons managed to nearly destroy or capture him. In the movie's original script, there is no such thing as the Matrix, and only later was it added to the story, but no explanation was given as to why such an important item of power just suddenly appeared out of nowhere.

Unicron's origin is revealed in the The Transformers (1984) Season 3 episode "Call of the Primitives". He was created by a strange gnome-like ancient entity called Primacron, at the dawn of the galaxy. Unicron later rebelled against him and left his creator behind. This origin story is notable for being ignored by each end every subsequent Transformers media. Unicron's "true" origin is related in the Marvel Generation 1 comic series, which depict him as an ancient god of evil and destruction who's capable of traveling across dimensions and thus different Transformers series.

This is the topic of heavy discussion among Transformers fans, and has been so for decades. The movie's visuals are somewhat vague on the matter, but they do reveal the following:

• After Unicron reformats Megatron's body into Galvatron, Thundercracker becomes Scourge, which is a safe bet, with him being in the middle of the scene.

• Two Sweeps, identical in design to Scourge but in the background, are created from the husks of either Shrapnel and Kickback or their clones.

• Bombshell (or his clone) becomes Cyclonus.

• Skywarp in the background is changed into Cyclonus's Armada.

But the answer isn't as easy as this. Cyclonus's "Armada" is shown to be composed of a single robot, one who doesn't ever appear after this shot—in the rest of the movie, he is replaced by a third Sweep. Further, many fans feel that it's simply "wrong" for Cyclonus, the new Decepticon second in command, to be created out of Bombshell, a minor Insecticon character (or even one of his many clones), and that it would be more appropriate for him to be created out of Skywarp. This would make thematic sense, seeing as Thundercracker, the blue Seeker became the blue Scourge, thus it would follow that Skywarp, the purple Seeker (and also a much more important, not to mention popular, character) would become the purple Cyclonus.

It would also make sense for the Sweep henchmen to be born out of the Insecticons, seeing as both groups are relatively minor characters and the Insecticons had the ability to clone themselves—likewise, many new Sweeps appear during the course of the series, and some are explicitly shown to be destroyed, so new ones have to come from somewhere. If we assume that the Sweeps inherited the Insecticons' cloning ability, these new Sweep characters could easily be explained.

Yet the storyboards of the movie clearly reveal that Bombshell's the one who gets turned into Cyclonus, further, they also depict more than a single robot as his Armada.

Complicating matters even more is that not even the people at Hasbro or TakaraTomy (the creators and owners of the Transformers brand) are sure of the answer. Both the Universe Featuring the Wreckers comic (2001) and IDW Publishing's comic adaptation of the movie (2006) follow the movie's visuals by making Bombshell become Cyclonus and Skywarp become the Armada—who, unlike in the movie, is actually shown being destroyed in the comic adaptation, explaining his absence from the rest of the story. However the character descriptions made for the Australian Madman Entertainment (2003) and UK's Metrodome (2005) DVD releases clearly claim that Cyclonus was made out of Skywarp, and the DVD's Sony edition also showed Cyclonus replacing Skywarp on the cover. TakaraTomy's Macrocosmic Seekers story likewise claimed that Cyclonus used to be Skywarp.

But Cyclonus has more origins to offer! His profile in The Transformers Universe (1986) states that Cyclonus was formed out of the parts of several different Decepticons. Some later releases of Cyclonus toys would follow this description. The early Marvel Transformers comics add yet another former identity into the mix: according to these, Cyclonus was once a Decepticon called "Life Spark". This actually is a misinterpretation of a line from the movie's original script, where "Life Sparks" were the spirits of Transformers, analogous to the Sparks introduced much later in Beast Wars: Transformers (1996).

In the original movie draft, Megatron would have survived the trip to Cybertron and would have been present at the Decepticon Hall of Heroes (where Starscream's coronation takes place in the finished movie). Here, during the functioning Decepticons' struggle for leadership, a statue would have crushed Megatron, his Life Spark emerging from his body and drifting off into space, along with a number of other Life Sparks of long-dead Decepticons whose urns got damaged during the fight. Unicron would have created Galvatron, Cyclonus, Scourge and the Sweeps from these Sparks, of which only Megatron would have been known by name. So, according to early script drafts, nor Skywarp, nor Bombshell, nor any of the other damaged Decepticons would ever have made it to Unicron!

Curiously, some aspects of this discarded scene did end up in the actual movie—for example, Thundercracker, Skywarp and the Insecticons are still depicted in certain scenes as being separate and still living characters, even after they've supposedly been turned into Galvatron's troops. During Starscream's coronation, as Galvatron and his gang arrive, they can be seen running away from Cyclonus as he lands, and on the Planet of Junk, one of the Insecticons even has a speaking role! These can be explained as simple animation errors (of which the movie had many) and in the Insecticons' case, they could be the clones of the originals, or the originals themselves if we assume that Cyclonus and the rest were created out of the clones.

As can be seen, it's a very complex matter, and maybe it's best if we chalk it up as simply one of the thousand plot holes and continuity issues that plagued the early Transformers mythology.

One common question that fans often have about the movie is why Ultra Magnus, who has been blown into pieces, could easily be repaired whereas Optimus Prime dies after his midsection is injured. We see during the fight between Optimus and Megatron that Prime receives many hits in the same area, as Megatron batters, cuts and blasts him with a gun. Prime's body simply sustained too much damage to be repaired. Meanwhile, Magnus explodes into many small, but otherwise intact parts, allowing the Junkions to repair him easily. This scene was better explained in the movie's original screenplay, where instead of exploding, Magnus is merely pulled apart. The scene had to be redone after it's been deemed too violent, but since Magnus' rebuilding remained an important part of the story (his toy had to be promoted, after all), he had to survive somehow, and as such, the explosion doesn't damage his parts, only separates them.

The universal greeting has varying transliterations. Fans commonly spell it as "Bah weep gragnah weep ninni bong", however official sources use the following variations:

• "Bah-weep-Graaaaagnah wheep ni ni bong"

• "Bah Weep Graaagnah Wheep Ni Ni Bong"

• "Bah Weep Graaaagnah Wheep Ni Ni Bong"

• "BAH-WEEP-GRAAAGHNAH WHEEP NI-NI BONG"

• "Bah-weep-graaaahnah wheep ni ni bong"

• "Berwip crawna-wi pinibon" (in Japan)

One relatively common misconception about the movie is that there exists an extended version which included more violent character deaths and Optimus crumbling to dust. These are all unfounded rumors that most likely stem from older fans misremembering or confusing scenes from the movie. It is true that there are "uncensored" versions of the movie, but this does not refer to violent scenes that got deleted being reinstalled into the film, but the uses of the profanities "shit" and "damn" being left intact. However, these profanities were actually part of the original movie as it had originally been released to public. Thus, it's the censored versions which are the true alternate editions in this case. It is also true that the original scripts and storyboards featured much more violence than what actually ended up in the movie, but these scenes never got animated and as such can't be part of any alternate cuts. The music that plays during Optimus' death does go on for a few additional seconds that the movie version cuts, but yet again, there is no evidence that the scene itself would have been originally longer, and the rumors of Prime crumbling to dust have never been confirmed.