I really like that, and I think it's a large part of the appeal of TFs to me. I've never felt so compelled to create something for a fandom before (not even for the Cthulhu mythos), and I think it's because there's so much potential here.

That said, sometimes I like getting hung up on the canon details and using them to help shape my writing. But I'm not going to let Vortex's lack of claws in G1 stop me from giving him claws in fic if I want, and I certainly won't be leery of fusing together aspects from different continuities in anything I write. If people don't like that, there's plenty of other fic for them to read. And if they do, then that's really nice.