Changes you admired or disliked

[neatoman]

Originally Posted by ObiWanFan4life

I love this show. The characters are well-written and the action is phenomenal. However, the turtles in this version act more like twenty or thirty year olds instead of teenagers.

To be fair, the Nick cartoon is really the only incarnation that actually writes them as teenagers, the rest just kind of think they need to joke around a little and calls them teenagers.

The way I rationalise this is that they're mutated turtles and don't have to age the same way a human does, like how a human is still a child at eleven yet a dog is at the end of it's life span. From what I get real turtles mature faster than humans but live longer lives.

[Netkeeper]

Ah yes



Sometimes I forget



The 2k3 turtles



Aren't actually teenagers



But I'm not quite sure what they are



If they're not teenagers



Wait just a freakin minute



YOU LIE. They most certainly ARE teenagers.

[Myko]

I think they're written "teenagerly" enough. If they were like most real human teenagers they would be unbearable.

[neatoman]

Originally Posted by Netkeeper

Ah yes

http://38.media.tumblr.com/60a81c210...aga8o1_500.png

Sometimes I forget

http://38.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_me...yb9vo3_250.gif

The 2k3 turtles

http://33.media.tumblr.com/dfc1d536d...gzio4_1280.png

Aren't actually teenagers

http://38.media.tumblr.com/af2f31913...87cko8_500.gif

But I'm not quite sure what they are

http://31.media.tumblr.com/79d0b6f21...4ndco2_400.gif

If they're not teenagers

http://38.media.tumblr.com/bcd5fd55f...yb9vo1_250.gif

Wait just a freakin minute

http://38.media.tumblr.com/ca282b96d...3o4_r1_500.gif http://33.media.tumblr.com/777feefac...3o3_r1_500.gif

YOU LIE. They most certainly ARE teenagers.

Yeah there is certainly some effort in there but I think what a lot of people mean is that a lot of the time they were potrayed with the responsibility, confidence, judgement and competence of adults (which I have no problem with since they've been trained to be like that).

Basically what they're saying is: There is more to being a teenager than goofing off once in a while.

[Netkeeper]

Yes, absolutely. Glad someone gets it. The world these turtles were raised in required them to be responsible and competent, so they were. [Especially Leonardo, dang.]

[Leo656]

I kind of concur with that, based a lot on my own circumstances. My life put me in a position where I had to be, more or less, a "responsible adult" at about 13. Even beyond myself, though, I knew a lot of "kids" who held jobs and acted "mature" far beyond their years. Literally the only people I knew who acted as "stereotypically teenager-ish", like Nick Mikey, were the people who did way too many drugs and were just completely fried. That's not how "normal teenagers" act, in my experience. It kind of bugs me when people say that; it's not true, and if anything, the characters often come off as some 40-year old's half-memory of what being a teenager is like, filtered through the cracked lens of someone who is decades removed from their own experience.

The way they act is a parody of how teens act, basically. It's not exactly true to life. 2K3 may have skewed a little too far the other way, but it's still more accurate, from my perspective.

[Netkeeper]

Exactly. Characters like Nick Mikey come across as tryhard in the writing. I mean, there were some teenagers who acted kinda like that, I myself being one of them at around that age. I was a youngest and was allowed to act as immature and dependent as I wanted, so that's just how I developed. I was kept in a very safe, sheltered, and controlled environment for the first ten years of my life, and as a teenager I was still very kid-like in a lot of ways. [Also, I was insufferable. I still have old forum posts from as early as 2005 to prove it.]

But nearly everyone I knew swayed more towards the mature side of the scale, wanting to act like little adults. While I never understood this and to an extent still don't, it's just how teenagers are. They want to grow up already. They'll indulge in silly behaviour and do a lot of stupid things because their minds aren't yet fully developed, but most of the teens I knew and still know [I hang out with a LOT of 16 - 18 year olds] are in a huge hurry to grow up and try to act mature. Add this tendency to the 2k3 turtles' environment and upbringing, and you DO have a bunch of little adults.

[Coola Yagami]

I kinda see three kinds of teenagers. The wild party types that wanna party, get laid and buy their first car. The kinds that spend more time studying and getting ready for whatever college they're striving for. And the kind that do both.

Even the party ones are mature and responsible in their own way since they're working hard to get jobs for the cash they need for cars and dressing to impress the ladies.

The thing is, most if the silly selfie type teens are barely 13 or 14. The turtles being 15 are already closer to the 'time to stop acting stupid and plan for the future' kinda age.