04-01-2017, 03:09 AM | #1 |
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Baxter Stockman's treatment in the series
I recently caught up to the latest TMNT episodes, including Owari. I was very surprised at what happened to Baxter Stockman. To my complete surprise, he was quickly cured from his mutation in a rather forced, dull manner.
When I thought about it further, I realized, that in all three TMNT cartoon series, Baxter never gets the treatment he deserves. The writers always seem to write his conclusion story backwards. Let me explain. In the original 80's cartoon, Stockman gets trapped in a wormhole, never to return. This ending for Stockman is rather cruel and undeserved. In this series, Stockman started out as a good guy who was abused, tortured, and lied to all the time, which slowly turned him cynical, evil and insane. He did not deserve any of the treatment he got in the series, let alone his ending. The Turtles act like complete jerks and push him into the portal. The guy can't catch a break. In the 2003 series, Stockman is handled in a completely different manner. He's introduced to us as a straight forward bad guy. He's evil right from the start, and totally deserves all the crappy treatment by Shredder and everyone else. However, once again, he gets an ending that is absolutely undeserved. This asshole gets rescued 100 years in the future by Bishop, because reasons unknown. Throughout the series, Stockman was a psychopathic evil genius who sought nothing more but fame and power, and never once hesitated to hurt other people to get it. Yet STILL, he gets a good ending in Bishop's side and suddenly turns into a good guy. What a load of barnacles. Bishop and the Turtles had all the reasons in the world to leave him die in that underground base of his. They had zero reasons to rescue him, yet Stockman gets a jail free card for being evil. At the very least he should have been jailed for life for all the crimes he committed. Moving on to the 2012 series, Stockman once again starts out as a bad guy. He is clearly a spoiled, bitter geek who thinks he deserves more than he actually does, and is seen robbing places with his badly crafted tech. He gets the treatment he deserves by the people around him, HOWEVER, once again, the writers don't seem to know what the heck they are doing, because they decide to give Baxter a good ending this season. He gets cured for NO REASON. Baxter has spent this series being a mean spirited jerk with no sense of morals, and gets rewarded by getting turned back to human and the turtles are like whatever. I know, he laments the turtles for doing that since apparently he liked being a bug, but to me it seems like he complains only because that's what he likes to do, and not because he actually hates being human. All in all, it's a rather comical scene and I'm sure Baxter enjoys being human again at the end. But as I was saying, this ending was totally undeserved. Baxter should have been left as a freak because he's a bad guy. Mikey had no reason whatsoever to waste that dosage of mutagen on him. Sloppy writing at it's best. If the writers want Baxter to be human again for whatever they have planned for him in the next season, they could have done it in a far more interesting manner, like Baxter stealing the retro-mutagen or inventing it himself, or him getting cured by accident. Point is, that scene made no sense and Mikey was being a bigger idiot that what he usually is. See what I mean by all this? Whenever Baxter starts out as a good guy, he gets abuse. Whenever he starts out as a bad guy, he gets to weasel out of all the **** that he's done for no reason. The writers just can't give this guy proper treatment. He's always written backwards at the end. I hope in the final season he finally gets a proper, well deserved ending for his character. |
04-01-2017, 03:22 AM | #2 |
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He got his end, de-mutation.
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04-01-2017, 03:28 AM | #3 | |
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Quote:
The 2003 Baxter is based on the Mirage Baxter.
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04-01-2017, 03:34 AM | #4 |
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04-01-2017, 03:41 AM | #5 |
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Go read the IDW comics then. Baxter has a huge role in that and he stays human its entire run up to this point.
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04-01-2017, 03:55 AM | #6 |
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Barely.
The only real similarities are that they start out as a nefarious mouser developing scientist for whom April works, & later become a robot.
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04-01-2017, 04:08 AM | #7 | |
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Quote:
One of the main difference is that he was killed off in Mirage, Donnie secretly kept Baxter's brain in his room and when Baxter refused to help cure April, Donnie Killed him.
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04-01-2017, 04:28 AM | #8 |
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We all wanted Baxter de mutated in FW at the end and I felt like the turtles were complete jerks to banish him in Limbo forever, stripping him of his one chance to be normal again and destroying his only friend the computer.
Ironically, I didn't feel much for him being de-mutated in Nick. It was a nice plot twist but I didn't feel anywhere as sad for Nick Baxter as I did for FW Baxter so it didn't feel as impactful. But there's still potential with his character in season 5, assuming he managed to escape the building before shredder lit it on fire. But I did like many things about Nick Baxter, like his origin and that he actually got kind of a closure at Owari unlike FW so there's that. 4kids is still the best Baxter of all (tv shows, not comics), hands down. Last edited by FredWolfLeonardo; 04-01-2017 at 04:38 AM. |
04-01-2017, 12:09 PM | #9 |
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It wasn't so much his room as much as it was a secret lab and he had been keeping Stockman alive for several years. When he arrives and says that if his brothers knew that he had been keeping Stockman alive all this time, they would be unhappy with him. But the only reason he had kept him alive at all is because he felt there was something he could learn from him. Now he has come realize that he's nothing but evil through and through. And then Donnie kills him.
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04-01-2017, 01:38 PM | #10 |
Overlord
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Read the IDW comics. They even make trade collections so you don't have to track down individual issues.
Assuming you guys have some money, they're easy to buy online at places like amazon. |
04-01-2017, 01:43 PM | #11 |
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I'm sure the comics are great, but I made this thread with the intention of discussing the three main animated incarnations of Stockman.
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04-01-2017, 04:41 PM | #12 | |
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Quote:
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04-01-2017, 05:49 PM | #13 | |
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As noted in some of my recent posts in the Nick section, specifically my Owari review, Baxter Stockman has always been my favorite character. Allow me to reiterate from before:
Quote:
I think a major issue Baxter has is his lack of screen focus. However, Rat King has had fewer appearances and has always stood out since his debut in Monkey Brains and subsequent disfiguration/mutation in I, Monster. While I feel with the exception of Shredder, who shines better and better in practically any appearance, Baxter seems to get worse and worse after Baxter's Gambit. Although one could fault Phil Lamarr's schedule, the lack of focus on anything really hurts him. Additionally, I'm going to say this, I really don't like his fly form. Despite the homage to The Fly in Fred Wolf, there's almost no reason for him to turn into it outside merchandise. The fact he claims he liked being a fly, as noted by Noxious and others, myself included, confuses me. Since that mutation in Lonely Mutation of Baxter Stockman, the sixteenth episode of the second season, he never appears. The list of episodes he appears in and what he does are as follows:
I am not noting appearances prior to mutation from the first and second season because prior to it, Baxter did something in each episode or the plot. Any opportunity Baxter had to become relevant is rather amiss, he's barely there. Really, besides his two biggest appearances (RtNY and Insecta), all he's here for was to advance the Karai story in season 3, that's it. Not as bad as Fishface or Rahzar, but his mutation hasn't done much for him. It felt like a placeholder just for action or to make another character look intimidating, specifically Shredder. If Owari really is his final appearance of this time, it's a pretty underwhelming send off. Several of the other major villains (Shredder, the Triceratons, and the Kraang) went out with some sort of bang. Baxter, like Armaggon and Lord Dregg before him, really just felt there. I hope to see him one last time in the fold, but it's been a puzzling use of what could've been one of the best Baxters in TMNT. At least there's IDW and 2k3 to satisfy my Baxter needs.
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04-01-2017, 09:13 PM | #14 | |
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04-01-2017, 11:12 PM | #15 |
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He also appears in The Noxious Avenger where he is seen working on the mind control serum.
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04-02-2017, 07:28 AM | #16 |
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I think his best incarnation in animation was 2K3, even though I liked the Nick version a lot in s1. In the Nick version, he just felt so underused. GoldMutant put it quite well, he lacked prominence and was just there because...he had to be as an alum character in the franchise. I guess, given that s3 and s4 had a huge chunk taking place away from NY was a big culprit in that.
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04-02-2017, 11:16 AM | #17 |
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So what was up with that time he was only able to buzz? And nobody thought it was weird, acted like he always did that, then he never did again and it wasn't ever explained? Wasn't that bizarre?
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04-02-2017, 11:47 AM | #18 |
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I always just assumed they couldn't get the voice actor to record for those episodes.
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04-02-2017, 11:49 AM | #19 |
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Actually it was explained, Ciro and Brandon said it was due to budget reasons.
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04-02-2017, 01:01 PM | #20 |
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I assumed it was understood why Baxter was seen but not heard. Same for other characters. These days one cant hire a VA and get up to three voices per hire.That is why the 1987 voice cast did nearly all of the guest stars as well not just the main cast of TMNT & Splinter, Channel Six News quartet, and Technodrome Four. They are already present and contacts read they can get up to three voices out of each for one specific episode. There were roughly 9 VAs that were regular contributors during the run so they made use of them without having to resort to outsourcing often like the Cullen, Musick and Rashad one offs. It is the same reason as to why 4Kids used a certain set of VAs for all of their series. Its all about the money. That is one of the problems with swelling Shredder's right hand henchmutants to six instead of two to three. Getting Fishface and Dogpound/Razhar then Tiger Claw joining up. Later Baxter Stockman is puinshed for failure by being mutated and the same with Bebop and Rocksteady not long afterwards. It wasn't just cramming in so many that made Bradford lose his notoriety and become dispensable but affected screen time for all of them. Nick didn't have their main cast take on secondary characters often so bringing in another VA salary would cost more.
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