Official Episode Discussion: S2 #6 "Target: April O'Neil"

[Refractive Reflections]

Originally Posted by BubblyShell22

I agree that many plots are ignored and only rehashed when an episode calls for it, but maybe they do that so it's not confusing for people who may not have seen the series yet and may only be looking at certain episodes. If plots are brought up each episode, people might be confused and say, "I don't get what's going on." So maybe Nick is doing this as a way to get people to watch the series and if they tune in late, they won't be as confused if they see a certain episode and won't wonder what's going on. That's my take on it anyway.

Originally Posted by Luckyday

Spoiler:

The problem with this series that it's afraid to be consistent with itself regarding information. It's done on purpose so that you can watch one episode randomly without having watch it in a certain order. This show already a lot of moments of willing suspension of disbelief with the Kraang fighting in the middle of street so I wasn't surprise that Casey came out unscathed. Although I wonder if that has to do with more the parental rating? I don't think it does since Adventure has the same parental rating and Finn gets hurt way more often with bruises and nasty cuts but no blood. (I think)

The way how I'm seeing it is that I can understand, the "Mutagen Man Unleashed" and "Mikey Gets Shellacne" episodes, not discussing about the whole bombshell of Splinter revealing Karai is his daughter since she's not there. But when Karai is back in the series in "Target: April O'Neil" and with Leo fighting her again, one would think that the past developments of "Follow the Leader" would come back up. Now I'm not expecting a huge scene or anything, but like a 30 second conversation near the end of "Target: April O'Neil" before April returns to the lair to keep things moving a bit, or at least some cognitive awareness from the characters (rather then selective awareness with the Turtles remembering the Foot-bots):

Leo takes Splinter to the side after they fought Karai, and starts explaining his dilemma, "Sensei... I don't know what to do here. I mean with the Foot-bots, Karai was going to try to kidnap or kill April, and us! What are we to do now since she's your daughter?" Leo ponders the depth of Karai's vendetta against all of them with knowing that Karai thinks Splinter killed her mother.

Splinter asks with concern, "Did you tell your brothers about it yet?"

Leo responds, "No sensei... I still haven't grasped it. What should we do about her?" April suddenly arrives in the lair and their conversation ends.

Originally Posted by FoxZerro

The thing with two teenagers being able to defeat the footbots can be explained away by their fighting styles. April as a novice is more defensive driven so they wouldn't really have anything to adapt to, and even if they did since she is intent on defending herself not attacking it would be easier for her to adapt to their adaptations.

Casey is a bit more of a stretch, but having almost 18 years of Hockey under my own belt I can say that if you are in a fight and play hockey that you are mostly a brawler, which means to say you don't have any real style you just do what you can to do as much damage as possible while avoiding getting damaged yourself. In addition to being a fighting style which has no real structure it is also much more adaptive to the situation which again would be one of the better ways to fight the footbots based upon what we know about them up to this point.

The Turtles being meticulously trained have predictable ways of fighting so that the footbots would have an easier time learning and assimilating their style. While if they are fighting two individuals who are doing whatever it takes to survive the fight they are being offered such a large amount of data to input that rather they get caught up in the adaptation they would more than likely revert to the original objective which was to target April.

Even with that explanation one can make the argument that their programming was just to get April to the rendezvous with Chrome Dome and as such not to use lethal force. Which would also mean that since April and Casey are not held back by that same restriction they would most certainly have an edge.

Hey I'm open for anything I guess at this point. It's just really hard to believe that these quick adapting robots would find these two teenagers just as troublesome as the Turtles. **shrug**

[ObiWanFan4life]

I have to ask, what's the point of making cyborgs that can counter any technique, if they can't even kill two ordinary teenagers?

[BabyTurtles]

Originally Posted by ObiWanFan4life

I have to ask, what's the point of making cyborgs that can counter any technique, if they can't even kill two ordinary teenagers?

so the turtle can kill them without people worrying XD

[Refractive Reflections]

Originally Posted by BabyTurtles

so the turtle can kill them without people worrying XD

Yeah, I can understand that (to show explicit weapon violence) and it would solve the shortage of human Foot Soldiers that Shredder has, but the show didn't have to advertise the Foot-bots as being several times better and proficient than the human ones though when even April and Casey can elude them. But that's just me.

[The Sewer Lord]

Originally Posted by BubblyShell22

I agree that many plots are ignored and only rehashed when an episode calls for it, but maybe they do that so it's not confusing for people who may not have seen the series yet and may only be looking at certain episodes. If plots are brought up each episode, people might be confused and say, "I don't get what's going on." So maybe Nick is doing this as a way to get people to watch the series and if they tune in late, they won't be as confused if they see a certain episode and won't wonder what's going on. That's my take on it anyway.

Originally Posted by Luckyday

Spoiler:

The problem with this series that it's afraid to be consistent with itself regarding information. It's done on purpose so that you can watch one episode randomly without having watch it in a certain order.

That's OK. But why do they introduce these kind of arcs if they want people to see show randomly? The OT was way better at creating arcs in which it's easy to understand what's going on, like Shredder searching for a power source for the Technodrome? They already have mutant canisters all over the city, why introduce all of these new arcs if you're going to forget about them eventually?

[victory_angel]

I don't know if Karai officially caught onto Donnie having a crush on April. If she hadn't right then, it is plausible that she might put two and two together when she's able to get her wits about her and realize that is something she can use as an ace up her sleeve.

[Electric]

Originally Posted by Luckyday

Spoiler:

The problem with this series that it's afraid to be consistent with itself regarding information. It's done on purpose so that you can watch one episode randomly without having watch it in a certain order.

youre right, in that, they dont do alot of episode taking place directly after another, or this dramatic event caused this major change in the next episode.

but i think its getting better. the karai episode in season 2 was caused and stated by the turtles betrayal of her in season one.
April remained mad the turtles for 5 episodes before she started talking to them again. had someone watched mutagen man unleashed before the season opener, they would be lost as to why she hated them, what homicidal bat and why donnie was working on a retro mutagen.
and as for the next episode, when spike mutates into slash. when slash is in another episode, if someone doesnt see slash and destroy first, they wont understand where slash came from, why he has the relationships with the guys he does and why spike is gone

so yeah, this series hasnt done too much of the episode to episode continuation, but i think its because its still early on. rather than developing a few certain arcs through the first season, they set the base for many that they can develop later

[JTH]

As Stan Lee has said: "Every comic book is someone's first comic book."

The same thing applies for TV shows. If a show has a hard episode to episode continuity, it's hard for a new fan to get into it.

For a show that is still new and still wants to increase it's fan base should follow this for at least 3-4 seasons. Once your fanbase is more than established, then you can follow the strict story arcs.

Heck even the OT did this.

[Vegeta]

Originally Posted by jth

As Stan Lee has said: "Every comic book is someone's first comic book."

The same thing applies for TV shows. If a show has a hard episode to episode continuity, it's hard for a new fan to get into it.

For a show that is still new and still wants to increase it's fan base should follow this for at least 3-4 seasons. Once your fanbase is more than established, then you can follow the strict story arcs.

Heck even the OT did this.

Yep, advice Marvel no longer follows, thus why the comics have become a confusing mess for newcomers.

[Luckyday]

Couldn't they just have "Last time on Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles" like they did for the season finale?

[Refractive Reflections]

Originally Posted by jth

As Stan Lee has said: "Every comic book is someone's first comic book."

The same thing applies for TV shows. If a show has a hard episode to episode continuity, it's hard for a new fan to get into it.

For a show that is still new and still wants to increase it's fan base should follow this for at least 3-4 seasons. Once your fanbase is more than established, then you can follow the strict story arcs.

Heck even the OT did this.

jth, you can't make that comparison, that was a different time though. The reason the OT has an excuse is because that cartoon, and many cartoons of that time (up until the late 90s), were designed for weekday syndication. The fans back then didn't have the internet where they could easily keep track of plots from episode to episode, have DVR, and other technological capabilities to easily rewatch the episodes. For us, we had to actually leave the house (with our parents taking us) either rent or purchase a cassette tape, and keep on eye on the TV listings (if our parents purchased the newspaper or bought the TV guide separately) if we had a hope of following the series.

Nowadays, kids have the internet where they can read about any series and they have these forums. We didn't have the luxury of viewing numerous episodes (over and over) again, or the internet to answer all of our questions. The most we had was our small group of friends at the schoolyard, and forget about our parents or any adults because back then it was only seen as a "kids" cartoon.

The game and standard has changed for cartoons, especially for cartoons that claim continuity. Kids today have the internet and have far, greater accessibility to information for TV shows and are not so dependent on their parents to have access to that information (i.e. they don't have to leave home to go to the library, or video rental store to see TMNT). All I'm trying to convey is that if this cartoon wants to claim "continuity", it has to follow all of its subplots that the show has created itself, especially the dramatic ones (i.e. Splinter revealing Karai is his daughter), if the viewer is take this claim with any sense of legitimacy. If anything, the internet is a tool that is holding the staff (and staff members of other cartoons) to a higher standard because we (fans and the general public) can keep track of their episodes easier.

Plus if your logic is true jth, then what about 4Kids then? They must have done a grave mistake (thereby not permitting the series to have even a greater fanbase), by not following this method for their first couple of seasons and should have had selective, broken subplot lines.

Originally Posted by The Sewer Lord

That's OK. But why do they introduce these kind of arcs if they want people to see show randomly? The OT was way better at creating arcs in which it's easy to understand what's going on, like Shredder searching for a power source for the Technodrome? They already have mutant canisters all over the city, why introduce all of these new arcs if you're going to forget about them eventually?

Right with you there too Sewer Lord.

[victory_angel]

Originally Posted by Luckyday

Couldn't they just have "Last time on Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles" like they did for the season finale?

Yeah I remember Gargoyles used to do that during it's initial first five episodes and then one episode later in the season, and then all the time during its second season. It would have one of the characters say "Last time on Gargoyles" and then there will be a small clip show of parts of previous episodes that were tied to the events of that current episode.

Why not do something like that with TMNT.

____

As for Leo in this episode. I agree they should have alluded more to the knowledge that Karai is Splinters daughter. Such as during the battle that Leo has with Karai he says "Karai, listen to me! The Shredder is not the man you think he is! He's been lying to you your whole life."

Or even better have Donnie or maybe April put two and two together and realize that Karai is Miwa.

I think the only reason Leo hasn't told his brothers yet, is because he doesn't know how to tell them and he doesn't know how they would react. I mean if he did reveal it, Mikey would probably agree with Leo that Karai should be redeemable, Raph may say even if she is Splinters daughter she is a lost cause because the Shredder has been corrupting her, her whole life. And Donnie will be torn about it, on one hand he has no love for Karai nor does he trust her. And I don't think he ever will, particularly since Karai was willing to seek out and kill April who is an innocent in all that is going on. And yet if she is their sister, there has to be some way to save her and make her realize that the Shredder is lying to her.

[The Sewer Lord]

Originally Posted by jth

As Stan Lee has said: "Every comic book is someone's first comic book."

The same thing applies for TV shows. If a show has a hard episode to episode continuity, it's hard for a new fan to get into it.

For a show that is still new and still wants to increase it's fan base should follow this for at least 3-4 seasons.

Heck even the OT did this.

I already adressed this in a previous post of mine.

Once your fanbase is more than established, then you can follow the strict story arcs.

But the Nick show's fanbase is huge. There are over a million of people watching the show, and this is just by taking people who were introduced to TMNT through this show without previously viewing another version into account. The Nick show's fanbase was established ages ago.

[JTH]

Originally Posted by JYX

jth, you can't make that comparison, that was a different time though. The reason the OT has an excuse is because that cartoon, and many cartoons of that time (up until the late 90s), were designed for weekday syndication. The fans back then didn't have the internet where they could easily keep track of plots from episode to episode, have DVR, and other technological capabilities to easily rewatch the episodes. For us, we had to actually leave the house (with our parents taking us) either rent or purchase a cassette tape, and keep on eye on the TV listings (if our parents purchased the newspaper or bought the TV guide separately) if we had a hope of following the series.

Nowadays, kids have the internet where they can read about any series and they have these forums. We didn't have the luxury of viewing numerous episodes (over and over) again, or the internet to answer all of our questions. The most we had was our small group of friends at the schoolyard, and forget about our parents or any adults because back then it was only seen as a "kids" cartoon.

The game and standard has changed for cartoons, especially for cartoons that claim continuity. Kids today have the internet and have far, greater accessibility to information for TV shows and are not so dependent on their parents to have access to that information (i.e. they don't have to leave home to go to the library, or video rental store to see TMNT). All I'm trying to convey is that if this cartoon wants to claim "continuity", it has to follow all of its subplots that the show has created itself, especially the dramatic ones (i.e. Splinter revealing Karai is his daughter), if the viewer is take this claim with any sense of legitimacy. If anything, the internet is a tool that is holding the staff (and staff members of other cartoons) to a higher standard because we (fans and the general public) can keep track of their episodes easier.

Plus if your logic is true jth, then what about 4Kids then? They must have done a grave mistake (thereby not permitting the series to have even a greater fanbase), by not following this method for their first couple of seasons and should have had selective, broken subplot lines.

JYX, please don't give yourself the thought of "Everyone can go to their computer and go on the internet and watch anything they want at anytime."

First off, kids not old enough may not be permitted by their parents to use the internet. Secondly, please don't think that everyone is blessed with the ability to do what we do on a regular basis. For many kids, they may still have the examples you said we had back in the day. You can't make that as an example simple because you believe all kids now a days has internet capabilities, when you know it's just not true.

As far as what you said about the 4kids show, I never got into the show based on the reason you just made...so apparently they did something wrong.

[Refractive Reflections]

Originally Posted by jth

JYX, please don't give yourself the thought of "Everyone can go to their computer and go on the internet and watch anything they want at anytime."

First off, kids not old enough may not be permitted by their parents to use the internet. Secondly, please don't think that everyone is blessed with the ability to do what we do on a regular basis. For many kids, they may still have the examples you said we had back in the day. You can't make that as an example simple because you believe all kids now a days has internet capabilities, when you know it's just not true.

Uh, I'm not talking about "everyone" or "all kids", I'm stressing about the accessibility. At least kids nowadays have the option and choice of doing that unlike the nonexistent 80s and the sparse, dial-up times in the 90s, whether its in private (at home, or at a friend's) or public areas (school or library). In addition, schools are teaching children how to use the computer in this technological age, and are now expecting their parents to have some form of accessibility to computers and the internet for research and reports. If kids are just that interested, they'll look into it. At least its easier for them to find out TMNT information (getting permission from their parents to use the computer), rather than pestering their parents to drive out to a bookstore, or video rental place to find what they could about it back in the day. Furthermore, if kid shows didn't expect a substantial amount of children to use the internet, Nickelodeon and PBS wouldn't be advertising their websites on their networks and designing them for children.

Here's a graph of just how dramatically things have changed (and this is just at home):

Source: http://www.childtrends.org/?indicato...omputer-access

When you have some children using the internet as young as 3 years old, some parents allowing unsupervised internet use at age 8, and a quarter of children under age 6 go online regularly, I think my position has some support.

Originally Posted by jth

As far as what you said about the 4kids show, I never got into the show based on the reason you just made...so apparently they did something wrong.

Hey if that's what you like, so be it. **shrug** I'm just saying that if the show is claiming to have continuity, it would be nice for it to follow the subplots rather than "pick and choose", and to see these characters grow more fully, but that's just my taste. But hey, if you're entertained, by all means enjoy it.

[Whatswiththeheadbands?]

Wow! What a brilliant episode!

Glad April's back to being friends with the guys now.

Two episodes, and Casey still hasn't met the turtles yet. Not complaining.

Looking forward to the next episode! Can't wait for Slash!

[The Sewer Lord]

Aside from all the rants, I have to say I absolutely adored this episode. Basically, here are all the things I liked about it:

• April just had some pretty great development in this episode! It revealed to us that April does love Donnie and that she hangs out with Casey as a replacement. The "There are some things we can't control" line was absolutely the best way to tell us that April is trying to control and surpress her feeling for Donnie because she doesn't want to have a mutant family. Just take a look - her father and love of the life are mutants and she is super-powered creature who is being chased by extra-dimensional aliens. So instead, she tries to be normal and fall in love with a human boy that reminds her of Donnie, hence the line "There are some things we can't control". I still don't like what they did with her in "Mutagen Man Unleashed", but the development she received in this episode was simply wondeful. (Note: I do not ship "Apriltello", I'm simply saying that the way to introduce to her feeling for Donnie in a great way.)
• I love that Kraang's attempts at getting April are mentioned again after being seemingly forgotten at the season premiere. It's great to see that the Nick show still remembers that there are many arcs going on in the show right now (even though it forgets most of them ).
• The conflict between Karai and the Kraang is simply great. Need to I say more?

However, the episodes still has flaws:

• How did the Footbots fail to kill April and Casey -
  
  

  Originally Posted by FoxZerro

  April as a novice is more defensive driven so they wouldn't really have anything to adapt to, and even if they did since she is intent on defending herself not attacking it would be easier for her to adapt to their adaptations.
  
  Even with that explanation one can make the argument that their programming was just to get April to the rendezvous with Chrome Dome and as such not to use lethal force. Which would also mean that since April and Casey are not held back by that same restriction they would most certainly have an edge.

  - I can understand this -
  
  

  Casey is a bit more of a stretch, but having almost 18 years of Hockey under my own belt I can say that if you are in a fight and play hockey that you are mostly a brawler, which means to say you don't have any real style you just do what you can to do as much damage as possible while avoiding getting damaged yourself. In addition to being a fighting style which has no real structure it is also much more adaptive to the situation which again would be one of the better ways to fight the footbots based upon what we know about them up to this point.

  - but why can't I buy this?
  
• Chrome Dome looks... well... boring? Why does he look like Bradford? The OT Chrome Dome looked so cool and whenever he appeared it was magical. There isn't even a reason for to name the robot "Chrome Dome". And why didn't the turtles notice he looked like Bradford? But I guess this was already said.

Otherwise, it was a great episode. I still haven't seen the new episode with Slash, but at least this episode gave some hope about it.

[Klunk1234]

Love this episode! April is back and ready to continue her friendship with the boys. She finally realizes that what happen to her father was an accident. I love the final scene when April gave Donnie a kiss and he is thrilled with happiness.

[sdp]

Episode was good, but nothing special to me I liked it I'd rank it my fav. after the Mikey's zit episode. Casey is a bit boring on this one and annoying though 2k3 Casey was a bit dumb too but he had more redeeming cualities, hope Casey gets better. I don't particularly like April so episodes focused on her doesn't help things, at least the arc of her being mad at the turtles ended, I didn't think it was played out very well and glad it didn't last the whole season. I really don't like the robot foot. And wow Karai isn't very interesting, I don't like her getting so much focus. Also I didn't like that it was just Bradford with steel arms, I understand why it was done but I kept thinking that even though I really liked that design and was sad to see it go after Bradfords original introduction.

[Sumac]

Another filler, but quite awesome one at that.
April patches things with Turtles and Donnie. This is good.
Shades of "Capril", which is not good, though, Casey was a bit more tolerable than in his original episode.

Chrome Dome - in name only relative to his OT version. Though, it was quite a good idea to reuse original Bradford design for him.

Karai as awesome as ever. Shredder as stupid as ever. Well, some things never change.

Overall, nice heartwarming episode.

And once again this anime parody (I think it parodies some specific series).