If he wanted to create something new, he would have called it something like Pretendobots or something. You can't trade on a name and brand and pretend like you have no responsibility to the history behind it all. If you want to do something new and revolutionary, do your own thing apart from it. Don't ruin something for a lot of folks who have an investment in the success of the franchise just because you have an artistic vision you'd like to indulge.

Optimus Prime I could kind of deal with, but the rest of the character designs I've seen are a mess.

If he falls on his face with this he deserves to fall hard.