Baxter Stockman

[Krangstein]

Do you know who's idea it was to make Baxter Stockman white? And who decided on Making him a Fly? Was it Michael Reeves, who wrote the episode that made Baxter this way, or was it decided before that he would be a Fly? Wasn't the toy released before the 'Enter: The Fly' episode aired??

[Coola Yagami]

well, the figure wasn't released that much after the episode first aired, so the show was most likely first and they gave the heads-up to Playmates.

[Krangstein]

But who decided to make him a fly??

[***First of Two Latin Kings***]

Whoever was writing the show had obviously seen the movie "The Fly" with Jeff Goldblum and Geena Davis (it's a remake of the original). Baxter becomes a fly in almost exactly the same way that Seth Brundle (Goldblum) does: he invents a teleportation device, and there's a fly in it, and so he and the fly are put back together as one entity. It's really interesting because the device he invents is a lot like what the utroms used in the old comic and new cartoon, and throughout the movie, his human parts are rotting away and falling off, much like what happened to Baxter in "Insane in the Membrane." LOT of strange coincidences.

[trexmaster]

Do you know who's idea it was to make Baxter Stockman white?

Racism? The idea that a black person can't be an evil genius (condemned either to non-evilness or evil idiocy)?

[Krangstein]

Racism? The idea that a black person can't be an evil genius (condemned either to non-evilness or evil idiocy)?

Why couldn't he be black and evil? political correctness? that's so stupid.

[trexmaster]

Why couldn't he be black and evil? political correctness? that's so stupid.

Or, alternatively, they didn't think an evil black could have any intelligence. Or maybe something completely different.

[Coola Yagami]

They didn't want to portray a black guy as a geeky, nerdy, incompetent Shredder's bitch. It could have even gotten the show banned.

[VaughnMichael]

They didn't want to portray a black guy as a geeky, nerdy, incompetent Shredder's bitch. It could have even gotten the show banned.
that's what I believe also

[trexmaster]

They didn't want to portray a black guy as a geeky, nerdy, incompetent Shredder's bitch. It could have even gotten the show banned.

Strangely, the new show hasn't gotten banned even though it makes Baxter black. Either the new Baxter has greater intelligence or competence, or the anti-racist sentiments popularized in the sixties have died down a little.

EDIT: I just remembered, Bebop before his "mutation" was black! And Bebop obviously makes Baxter look like Albert Einstein for the comparison. So, no, I don't think trying to avoid an old anti-black stereotype had anything to do with Baxter's whitening.

http://www.thetechnodrome.com/images/albums/Bebop_and_Rocksteady_Together/mutantsunmutated.jpg

[Space Lieutenant Josh]

Baxter's character on the old show and new show is completely different anyway. On the old one he was insane, but more misguided than evil. He was also not arrogant-- arrogance is the biggest part of the character now.

Baxter is nobody's bitch on the new show, either-- he is often the X-factor in plotlines and changes the outcome between, say, Shredder and the turtles. I mean, the old one was white, but he was more or less a completely different character, too-- from this one or the one that had appeared once in the comics at the time the old show had aired.

[Coola Yagami]

Well, in Bebop's case, the effect is minimized by the fact that Rocksteady was also mutated and was just as dimwitted and was white. I doubt they would have tried to make both Bebop AND Rocksteady into 2 black braindead thugs without looking racist.

[Anarchistguy]

Well the thing is, they weren't THAT stupid when they were human.

[Sage Ninja]

I think the old toon was trying to avoid being seen as racist. I mean having a black guy acting all subserviant and pathatic, and basically getting treated like a slave (hell, he called Shredder Master) would have offended a few peoples feathers.

[Krangstein]

I think that Baxter Stockman in the original series is was a very interesting charachter. I think he got more character developement than any other character on the show. First of all, he wasn't really evil to start with, just misguided and eager to make a name for him self. Shredder uses him though, to destroy the turtles and Baxter becames more and more frusterated with Shredder's selfishness. Shredder really did treat him like a bitch. That was Shredders mistake though because Baxter was very intelligent and a much better assistant than Rocksteady and Bebop could ever hope to be.

As the series unfolds, Baxter becomes more evil and more independent. This is obvious in the episode Curse of the evil eye, when Baxter takes revenge on Shredder for how he treated him (reminded me alot of the new series). Angry at Baxter, Shredder sends him to Krang to be killed, but gets mutated instead to a Fly-man. Now this is where Baxter really becomes crazy and more dangerous than ever. In the rest of the series, we see a bitter and loony Baxter try to destroy the Turtles and Shredder every chance he gets. Shredder even tries to use him agian in his plans to kill the turtles, promising him to turn Baxter back to human. But of course he never does. Now who said Shredder isn't evil enough in this series?? I think what he did to Baxter makes him a very evil and dangerouse villain. What do you think?

[Sage Ninja]

ICAM Krangstein!!!

I felt sorry for Baxter in this series, because he really was just one of those people who wanted acceptance and admiration. He just reminded me of a geeky teenager who gave into peer presure and did rotten things just to be accepted and feel belonged.

Although I don't think he was the most developed character in the classic toon, I can think of some other characters that where more developed. Baxter I think was just the only character that got most screwed over with out much provoction.

And a friend and I where discussing Baxter's whiteness the other day and why the writters made him white. I think they thought tjat modeling him after Alber Eignstien (I know I butchered the spelling shut-up people :x ) with the crazy wild hair and pasty white complexion. Heck i'm surpriced they didn't give him an accent, since the old toon was so big on pimping cliches the way they did.

[Krangstein]

ICAM Krangstein!!!

I felt sorry for Baxter in this series, because he really was just one of those people who wanted acceptance and admiration. He just reminded me of a geeky teenager who gave into peer presure and did rotten things just to be accepted and feel belonged.

Although I don't think he was the most developed character in the classic toon, I can think of some other characters that where more developed. Baxter I think was just the only character that got most screwed over with out much provoction.

And a friend and I where discussing Baxter's whiteness the other day and why the writters made him white. I think they thought tjat modeling him after Alber Eignstien (I know I butchered the spelling shut-up people :x ) with the crazy wild hair and pasty white complexion. Heck i'm surpriced they didn't give him an accent, since the old toon was so big on pimping cliches the way they did.

good point. I just love how got more loony with every season. Well, that's
what being a fly does to your sanity.

[Coola Yagami]

'Well don't look at me.. I have the brain of a fly..."


Ah, one of Baxter's bext moments "Now I'm going to pay you back Shredder. Now you'll see what it feels like to live the rest of your life as a fly!" *zaps Shredder with the MutaZoo Ray and turns him into a lil fly*

As for Bebop and Rocksteady, they weren't that dumb in the first eps, mutant or not. They were just typical uneducated street thugs.

As the series went on they fell for the usual mistake cartoons make (make the somewhat dim-witted dumb characters into complete retards) by making them dumber and dumber season by season. Like Homer Simpson.

[Krangstein]

'Well don't look at me.. I have the brain of a fly..."


Ah, one of Baxter's bext moments "Now I'm going to pay you back Shredder. Now you'll see what it feels like to live the rest of your life as a fly!" *zaps Shredder with the MutaZoo Ray and turns him into a lil fly*

As for Bebop and Rocksteady, they weren't that dumb in the first eps, mutant or not. They were just typical uneducated street thugs.

As the series went on they fell for the usual mistake cartoons make (make the somewhat dim-witted dumb characters into complete retards) by making them dumber and dumber season by season. Like Homer Simpson.

Lol. It's the first time I've hear Rocksteay and Bebop compare to Homer Simpson :)

[Sage Ninja]

personally (and I may be just being optimistict about this) but I don't think Bebop and Rocksteady where really as dumb as we all believe. I think the two pretended to be stupid just piss Shredder off and foil his plans because he turned them into freaks. Heck I think they where secretly in cohoots with the turtles and they worked together to screw up Shredders plans. LOL

[CylonsKlingonsDaleksOhMy]

There is some evidence that could say Bebop and Rocksteady were not as dumb as we believe. There were some times when either mutant did come out with something surprisingly intelligent, or made them seem intelligent than you thought, like saying words you think they would'nt say. But it was for comic effect though, and never something that would help them achieve to succeed against the turtles.

One example is Bebop calling the turtles home of the sewers "sub-standard housing" in 89 season, which i think would've been a bit too intellectual to come out of their mouths!

[Coola Yagami]

Or in the 'Rhino Man' episode, when Bebop and Rocksteady kept having to rescue this or that, Rocksteady said "This is gettin monotonous!"

[CylonsKlingonsDaleksOhMy]

You see, quite smart mutants after all lol.

[Sage Ninja]

Or in the 'Rhino Man' episode, when Bebop and Rocksteady kept having to rescue this or that, Rocksteady said "This is gettin monotonous!"

I thought that was a parody on Return of the technodrome when Shredder said it!

And hey another instance where R+B seemed kinda smart, I forget what episode this is in but its the one where this black haired woman from space comes to earth looking for a ring that empowers her, and she has Bebop and Rocksteady work for her and at one point she gets the ring back and grabs a ball of fire in her hand and extigishes it by squeezing it.

Well Rocksteady comments that she shouldn't have done that and the aliene woman scoffs saying that because of the ring she can't be burned, to which Rocksteady points out that she might be safe against the fire but her ring isn't, and the ring melts.

Does any one remeber this?

[Jester]

Wasn't the reason OT Baxter was made white was because Bebop, also a villian was black, and they didn't want to over do the "black guy = Villian" strain?

Maybe we should ask Peter Laird of Dan Berger...

On a side note: Why was Mutating Bebop white?