I wish everyone in the TFA fandom saw TFA Optimus's temporary "death" as one of the most important moments in his character development and his personal life story.
OP took the fall for a horrific and tragic accident that was in no way his fault. His punishment was more than just expulsion from the Autobot Academy. Everything he'd worked for his entire life was instantly ripped away. He was functionally "banished" from his home planet and most of the bots he would've considered "family" (one of whom was presumed dead from the accident he took responsbility for.) He was shunned, labelled a failure and a disgrace, while one of the bots who was actually responsible for the Archa-7 Incident was given the rank and prestige that Optimus rightfully deserved.
And Optimus accepted all of this because he'd also spent his entire life being conditioned to believe he didn't deserve better.
In TFA's pilot episode, Ultra Magnus rubbed salt in every single one of the aforementioned wounds by telling Optimus, "Don't try to be a hero...It's not in your programming."
And then Oppy proved he was a hero - a hero worthy of the namesake of 'Optimus Prime' - in spite of everything that happened to him on Cybertron, and all the bots who didn't believe in him.
I didn't grow up watching or reading Transformers, but I knew that Optimus Prime was the franchise's symbol across its multiverse of continuities. of the one of the titular characters in every continuity, I wasn't aware that killing off Optimus Prime is apparently some kind of trope. So when TFA Optimus died in the beginning of his series, I was shocked. The weight of his dying words "So this is what it feels like...to be a hero," followed by his frame graying out, hit me full force.
Sari resurrecting him with her key after only a few moments didn't cheapen Oppy's death or sacrifice for me. As far as I'm concerned, that moment was TFA Optimus's rebirth - his second chance to live the life he deserved, and become the person he was meant to be.
TLDR: I need to release my emotions because I'm pissed off and offended that Keyan Carlile called TFA OP's death "the most egregious sin this show ever committed."
I'd say the show's most egregious sin is probably never revisiting OP's death, or touching on how it acts as the lynchpin between Optimus's life on Cybertron (stuck under Ultra Magnus's thumb in a toxic society/family), and his life on earth as a guardian of the Allspark and the leader of his own found-family.
