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“While cartoons and associated toy lines have come and gone, Transformers have endured,” observed the Herald Sun’s Michael Westlake.

Dismissed as a fad when it originally appeared, Transformers - the toys, the comics and the TV series - has prospered for 25 years.

The 2005 version, Transformers: Cybertron, marked the 15th time that the battling ‘bots were transformed into an animated series.

It created a nostalgic buzz in many 20 and 30-somethings, with its nods to the 80s animated movie and original TV series.

But it also ensured that the ‘robots in disguise’ were brought to the attention of an entirely new generation.

As Transformers: Cybertron opens, a planet-gobbling black hole threatens to destroy the Transformers’ homeworld.

Optimus Prime and his army of Autobots take sanctuary on Earth as they work out how to save their planet - but the evil-hearted Decepticons are, as usual, in hot pursuit.

Appearances by series veterans such as Megatron, Starscream and Soundwave triggered happy memories for overgrown boys.

“[They] seem to remember their introduction to the Transformers just as vividly as they remember their first love,” said Vanessa E Jones in the Boston Globe.

Meanwhile, the Transformers’ frantic race to reach the four Cyber Planet Keys that can save their universe provided all the action and excitement that younger viewers craved.

All this added up to another animated success for what the McClatchy-Tribune’s Terry Lawson called “the heavy-metal stars of the toy world”.

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