Would the OT still have taken off if the turtles had different coloured bandanas?

[Davetello]

It seems like a trivial question. The mask colours given post-Mirage do seem to suit them.

But if the guys had been given different coloured masks, would that have affected the overall blend of the franchise? Is their mask colour something subliminal that simply added to the mystique?

Imagine if Leo wore orange, Raph purple, Mikey blue and Donnie red, for example. Do you think that would have come to be seen as the natural way of things? Raphael in most iterations was the obvious choice to be the one not to have his mask colour altered, as red is code for anger and rage. However, in the OT that was not his personality, so who knows.

Blue seems to represent calmness, it's a 'cool' (as in calm) colour for a level-headed leader. Purple is the colour of pacifism. Orange is bright and attracts those who are fun-loving. And red has already been explained. In most iterations the colours represent their personalities. Was this deliberate, do you think? or did it just fall into place that way? I can't remember ever hearing this explained.

Equally, if one of them had been given a yellow mask, or a white mask, or a brown mask...would things feel differently?

[CyberCubed]

They clearly picked the colors that represented their personalities, so I don't see what other way they would have gone. Green was obviously excluded because it would blend in with the color of their skin.

Funnily enough black went to Slash (in Archie, IDW and Nick) so we got one more color bandana that accurately represents a Turtles personality.

[Davetello]

They clearly picked the colors that represented their personalities, so I don't see what other way they would have gone. Green was obviously excluded because it would blend in with the color of their skin.

Funnily enough black went to Slash (in Archie, IDW and Nick) so we got one more color bandana that accurately represents a Turtles personality.

That's what I felt but, personally, I've never actually seen that confirmed. But let's assume that, hypothetically speaking, they had cvcked it up and picked the wrong colours for their personalities. Would that have made the turtles less popular and less of a phenomenon?

[Jester]

They clearly picked the colors that represented their personalities, so I don't see what other way they would have gone. Green was obviously excluded because it would blend in with the color of their skin.

Funnily enough black went to Slash (in Archie, IDW and Nick) so we got one more color bandana that accurately represents a Turtles personality.
Pretty sure they just kinda picked them...because late in the game (even some promos pics were taken) Donnie and Mikey had swapped palettes.

[Davetello]

Pretty sure they just kinda picked them...because late in the game (even some promos pics were taken) Donnie and Mikey had swapped palettes.

If that's true, they really fluked it. I mean the four colours suit them perfectly.

[Discogod]

Weren't Mikey & Don's colours were swapped at the last minute? I seem to recall seeing a Don figure with an orange bandana & pads in a Playmates catalogue way back when...

[Davetello]

Weren't Mikey & Don's colours were swapped at the last minute? I seem to recall seeing a Don figure with an orange bandana & pads in a Playmates catalogue way back when...

Yep, Jester said the same.

I can't imagine Mikey wearing purple and Donnie wearing orange. But if that had happened, we might well be sitting here right now saying "I can't imagine Mikey wearing orange and Donnie wearing purple".

[CyberCubed]

The fact that they flipped them before the show went into production says a lot. It was probably decided orange should go to Mikey because it fits his personality.

Also they chose "primary" colors. Stuff like yellow, brown, white, etc. wouldn't have worked as well.

[Davetello]

The fact that they flipped them before the show went into production says a lot. It was probably decided orange should go to Mikey because it fits his personality.

Also they chose "primary" colors. Stuff like yellow, brown, white, etc. wouldn't have worked as well.

Yeah, I figured that. But it's nice to speculate anyway.

[Jester]

http://farm4.staticflickr.com/3730/9925770054_be4d739c00_b.jpg
*image credit tOkKa's flikr.
FOUND IT!!!
http://forums.thetechnodrome.com/showthread.php?t=44940

[Davetello]

Like the posts in the topic say, I look at that and see it as Mikey with a bo and Donnie with nunchaku. Lol.

[IndigoErth]

Not sure I ever knew they had switched those two. o.O Although they must have had some kind of thinking going into it by that point if they chose to do that.

Even if they just kind of stuck each with a color, I wouldn't be surprised if those assignments also helped shape their written personalities over time.

If so, imagine how different they each might be now. If Leo really was in orange, he might have ended up as a flighty, chaotic and ineffective leader.

[CyberCubed]

That's probably very early press stuff, look at Bebop's shades colored red...he looks more creepy instead o gray.

[HeroTurtlesFan]

Wow, interesting to see Mikey and Donnie with reversed colours!

[Prowler]

Weird image... but as a kid, I sometimes would give them different weapons as I played with them. Just for the lulz :lol:

And no, I don't think it'd have been nay different if they had different colors since that's how we'd know them since the beginning. Now if you ask me if things would have been different if they had kept the red bandanas, that I'd agree. As a kid, I'd mix them up sometimes even with the different colors. My first language not being English obviously didn't help much as a 6 year old at the time either. The animators clearly did have some trouble as well based on all the animation errors and those were grown-ups.

[evan2000]

This should help you guys visualize:

http://i.imgur.com/KUvB62I.jpg

[oldmanwinters]

Also they chose "primary" colors. Stuff like yellow, brown, white, etc. wouldn't have worked as well.

Hmm...
http://www.color-wheel-artist.com/primary-colors.html

http://farm4.staticflickr.com/3730/9925770054_be4d739c00_b.jpg
*image credit tOkKa's flikr.
FOUND IT!!!
http://forums.thetechnodrome.com/showthread.php?t=44940

I love the original shades palette for Bebop.

[plastroncafe]

This should help you guys visualize:

http://i.imgur.com/KUvB62I.jpg

Oooooh, thanks for this!

[snake]

http://farm4.staticflickr.com/3730/9925770054_be4d739c00_b.jpg
*image credit tOkKa's flikr.
FOUND IT!!!
http://forums.thetechnodrome.com/showthread.php?t=44940

Neat! I couldn't imagine purple Mikey though.

[Candy Kappa]

Also they chose "primary" colors. Stuff like yellow, brown, white, etc. wouldn't have worked as well.

Except they chose two primary colors and two secondary colors

And fyi, yellow is a primary color.

[ShelleyQuick]

This should help you guys visualize:

http://i.imgur.com/KUvB62I.jpg

This actually extremely helpful, I could get used to the different colors on the different turtles, expect for Raph in purple, I couldn't used to Raphael in purple.

[discordiatookie]

http://farm4.staticflickr.com/3730/9925770054_be4d739c00_b.jpg
*image credit tOkKa's flikr.
FOUND IT!!!
http://forums.thetechnodrome.com/showthread.php?t=44940

It... Looks... So... Wrong!

As for the original question, as a kid I don't think it mattered to me what colours they picked in terms of the turtles' success, or reflection of personality. I think that each turtle having a different colour was a good move in terms of giving them individuality for kids to cling onto (although, as a Mirage enthusiast, I do feel red works best in the comics) but I don't think the colours themselves mattered, way back when...

[Birdman37]

I've never understood how pissed off fans got about the colored bandanas, even still to this day there are certain ppl that have a fit that the bandanas aren't all red.

[pennydreadful]

Yeah, I never really understood it either Birdman.

[Coola Yagami]

I've never understood how pissed off fans got about the colored bandanas, even still to this day there are certain ppl that have a fit that the bandanas aren't all red.

Because, before the cartoons came out, the Turtles did wear all red bandanas. It's a minor thing but hey, if Batman was black and white and wore dark blue or black on the covers, whenever he finally got a cartoon, the longtime fans wouldn't like seeing him wear dark brown.

Remember, the comics came first. THOSE are the turtles. It's hard to think of it because most of us, myself included, saw the cartoon first and for us, the 80's show was the turtles. But just imagine being the fan of a certain comic or whatever, find out there's actually gonna be a cartoon series about it.... and they got the colors wrong or were changed for whatever reason. Spiderman in Orange and Black. Iron Man in silver. The Hulk being a dark blue color. And so on. Hell, making Bruce Wayne blonde or something weird like that.

[Shark_Blade]

If they're all red bandanas it would be so boring omg.

[Leo656]

So, Coola, by that logic... your Batman wears little purple mittens? Superman doesn't wear red boots, he wears blue footsie pajamas? And he doesn't have the iconic S insignia, but rather, a yellow triangle with a hastily-scrawled S on it?

See? That "Red masks came first so it's Proper" argument is really flimsy and flexible. The only thing in favor of it is that it was, indeed, First. But the way something is put to paper First is almost never the way it was done Best.

I've heard all the arguments both For and Against and I really can't see how them being all red would ever have made anything Better in the long run. If it wasn't changed when it was, it would have been changed eventually. No doubt about it. I'm not sure if having those colors be *different* colors would have made things better or worse, but for the sake of creating a brand, they were never going to go anywhere with them all wearing red. That's the plain truth. Mark my words, if they had all stayed in red, there would never have been anything BUT the Mirage books and those books wouldn't have lasted twelve issues.

[Powder]

Rainbow bandanas are synonymous with the kiddified turtles & red bananas represent the pure, original, uncensored, compromised, indie grass-roots turtles. It's not always an issue about the colors themselves or the idea of variation (though some argue they should have a clan color that brands them) but rather what the decision to color code them represents. It means that first & foremost, money drives the creative decisions. What sells best. What kids will be drawn to the most. When IDW's book first came out so many of us were like "Finally! The world will be able to see the turtles for who they were supposed to be, who they are at the core of the property. Gritty, cerebral, grounded, violent, etc. No romping with ten thousand mutants. No pizza fetish. No pigeon-holed stereotyped personalities. Ninjas first, teenagers second. Multifaceted characters." but of course they brought the colored masks into issue 5 & right after that turned it into a Fred-Wolf homage, made a no-kill policy, tons of mutants, & brought in their OT character traits without any backstory. Those colored masks represent watering down the brand, as they have since 1987. So there you go. A creative team who wants to or is allowed to make their turtles wear red is A. Well educated on the history B. Respects the original C. Hopes to integrate the lost aspects of the original series. So that's why a lot of people lose hope when something new comes about & they're not in red, they know there's a certain kind of vibe that it just won't ever have. Granted IDW makes a quality book & the Nick show has certain episodes that conceptually coulda come from Mirage. They're both awesome. Just explaining the mindset of the mask ranters.

If they're all red bandanas it would be so boring omg.

So your best friend would suddenly be less funny if y'all wore the same outfit?

[Leo656]

I'm not going to entirely disagree with that except to say, again, that if they hadn't first added the colors and then "watered-down" the rest of it, there would BE no brand. There'd just be a few issues of a B&W indie comic that only a handful of people would even remember.

Would that be better? I kind of don't think so. I really don't like how SOME of the TMNT is so heavily slanted towards kids, but I understand it, and at least it IS a brand, and a franchise, and as such, fans have options to choose from. I maintain None of that would be possible if they hadn't started with the necessary, marketing-related step of having each Turtle wear a different color. People can dismiss the real-world, cynical, money-related reasons for it all they want, but those reasons are still Valid reasons. There would have been No Toys if they all wore red. No toys, no cartoons, and no movies, and to me, there's No Question if that's true.

Whatever it symbolizes, it's a small price to pay in the Big Picture. No matter what one prefers, here's an Uncomfortable Truth: Not ONE person posting on this board would be here if they hadn't color-coded the TMNT, because there's no chance they'd have ever been exposed to TMNT in the first place. That book would have been swept in the dustbin of history next to Hepcats and Brat Pack, two other critically-acclaimed independent books that nonetheless nobody's ever read or heard of. That's life.

[Powder]

I'm not arguing any of that stuff. Just giving insight to the perspective of those who feel disappointment with each new color-coded reveal. I do however feel that historically the brand is at a point where SOME version, be it a comic or a DVD-only animated series of films, could go all red & have a strong level of success with the right demographic. It's not like they can't still do the different shades of green & varying body types. there are plenty of means to distinguish them from one another.

[Leo656]

Well yeah they could probably pull it off nowadays, but I think they'll forever be gun-shy. There's always gonna be that one putz asking why there's "Four Raph's" and that's enough to kill it. Especially because the people who approve these projects are usually a hundred times more clueless than the people they're making them for. I.E., that putz getting confused might not be one of the fans, but one of the producers, and that's probably why it hasn't/won't happen.

I'm kind of inclined to think it'll happen eventually, one way or the other. I mean, hell, they finally have a movie coming out where Batman actually wears the Batman costume from the comics instead of some armor or molded-plastic nipple-endowed nightmare, so anything's possible. :lol:

[IndigoErth]

I think they should use all red as a enemy confusing tactic on occasion, and works in a nod to the original.

[Leo656]

That'd actually be kind'a clever. I'd chuckle.

[pennydreadful]

That actually would be a good idea, Indigo.

Powder's explanation does clear it up for me; my first exposure was the FW cartoon so I don't necessarily always see things the way that people whose first exposure was Mirage do.

Ideally, if a hardcore version was done where they wore the 4 colors and did actually kill people, would that change the mindset?

[Coola Yagami]

I'm not going to entirely disagree with that except to say, again, that if they hadn't first added the colors and then "watered-down" the rest of it, there would BE no brand. There'd just be a few issues of a B&W indie comic that only a handful of people would even remember.

Would that be better? I kind of don't think so. I really don't like how SOME of the TMNT is so heavily slanted towards kids, but I understand it, and at least it IS a brand, and a franchise, and as such, fans have options to choose from. I maintain None of that would be possible if they hadn't started with the necessary, marketing-related step of having each Turtle wear a different color. People can dismiss the real-world, cynical, money-related reasons for it all they want, but those reasons are still Valid reasons. There would have been No Toys if they all wore red. No toys, no cartoons, and no movies, and to me, there's No Question if that's true.

Whatever it symbolizes, it's a small price to pay in the Big Picture. No matter what one prefers, here's an Uncomfortable Truth: Not ONE person posting on this board would be here if they hadn't color-coded the TMNT, because there's no chance they'd have ever been exposed to TMNT in the first place. That book would have been swept in the dustbin of history next to Hepcats and Brat Pack, two other critically-acclaimed independent books that nonetheless nobody's ever read or heard of. That's life.

I see what you're trying to say but the turtles (comics wise) didn't have as much changes as Batman or any other comic hero that's been around since the WW2 era. Even so Adam West wore more or less what Batman was wearing in the comics at the time. Despite the movie he still wore the blue outfit from the comics in The Animated Series.

The mirage tmnt have always wore all red til the uncertain end of volume 4. I do admit the 80s show and Playmates toyline made it what is is today and pushed it from being more than just some random independant comic. But I do see how fans of the original would be confused when they saw the show and saw 4 goofballs

[Birdman37]

Because, before the cartoons came out, the Turtles did wear all red bandanas. It's a minor thing but hey, if Batman was black and white and wore dark blue or black on the covers, whenever he finally got a cartoon, the longtime fans wouldn't like seeing him wear dark brown.

Remember, the comics came first. THOSE are the turtles. It's hard to think of it because most of us, myself included, saw the cartoon first and for us, the 80's show was the turtles. But just imagine being the fan of a certain comic or whatever, find out there's actually gonna be a cartoon series about it.... and they got the colors wrong or were changed for whatever reason. Spiderman in Orange and Black. Iron Man in silver. The Hulk being a dark blue color. And so on. Hell, making Bruce Wayne blonde or something weird like that.

But I couldn't care less what they wear in terms of colored masks. It just never bothered me one way or the other. I like the original books with the red masks and I grew up on the original cartoon and movies with the colored masks. I never once even thought about the colors before I started hearing ppl crying about them being "rainbow bandanas." It was pretty obvious the major reason they changed the colors to begin with is so it would be easier to identify who is who in the cartoon, especially since they were dealing with kids.

Rainbow bandanas are synonymous with the kiddified turtles & red bananas represent the pure, original, uncensored, compromised, indie grass-roots turtles. It's not always an issue about the colors themselves or the idea of variation (though some argue they should have a clan color that brands them) but rather what the decision to color code them represents. It means that first & foremost, money drives the creative decisions. What sells best. What kids will be drawn to the most. When IDW's book first came out so many of us were like "Finally! The world will be able to see the turtles for who they were supposed to be, who they are at the core of the property. Gritty, cerebral, grounded, violent, etc. No romping with ten thousand mutants. No pizza fetish. No pigeon-holed stereotyped personalities. Ninjas first, teenagers second. Multifaceted characters." but of course they brought the colored masks into issue 5 & right after that turned it into a Fred-Wolf homage, made a no-kill policy, tons of mutants, & brought in their OT character traits without any backstory. Those colored masks represent watering down the brand, as they have since 1987. So there you go. A creative team who wants to or is allowed to make their turtles wear red is A. Well educated on the history B. Respects the original C. Hopes to integrate the lost aspects of the original series. So that's why a lot of people lose hope when something new comes about & they're not in red, they know there's a certain kind of vibe that it just won't ever have. Granted IDW makes a quality book & the Nick show has certain episodes that conceptually coulda come from Mirage. They're both awesome. Just explaining the mindset of the mask ranters.



So your best friend would suddenly be less funny if y'all wore the same outfit?

I can understand that and at least it gives more of a reason than just the simple "I HATE CHANGE" **** which I think alot of ppl actually feel.

[evan2000]

Towards the end of the Nick TMNT theme song, as the turtles pose like the Mirage #1 cover, the sepia effect kinda make all their masks' color appear reddish, probably as a nod to Mirage's origin of having 4 red-masked turtles.

http://i.imgur.com/Amem8I9.jpg

Same goes to the 3rd episode of 4Kids where the origin of the turtles were told, they used the same sepia effect as well:

W-jFAj3AQBM

[neatoman]

This should help you guys visualize:

http://i.imgur.com/KUvB62I.jpg

I like Mikey in purple.

[Panda_Kahn_fan]

If they all wore the same color bandanna I'd call B.S., because clan colors are NOT a part of Japanese culture. Colors worn were chosen based on personality, function of purpose in a given situation, or holiday/occasion/time of year. People who cry for clan colors in TMNT like Celtic clans in Scotland and Ireland have are full of &@%#!

[Gunstar_Red]

Kinda off topic, but was there an explanation in-universe on who picked their colors? Did Splinter assigned them a color (and that influenced their personalities as they got older) or did Splinter gave them options and they chose their favorite color?

[Birdman37]

Kinda off topic, but was there an explanation in-universe on who picked their colors? Did Splinter assigned them a color (and that influenced their personalities as they got older) or did Splinter gave them options and they chose their favorite color?

IDK if you mean in any continuity or what but they did explain in the IDW comics. They started out all wearing red because Raph was missing and it was his favorite color (in their previous life) so the other turtles wore it in his honor. When Raph came back Splinter gave them all masks based on their favorite colors.

[DarkFell]

A few posters here on this thread helped me to understand why the Mirage TMNT had the red bandanas. I thank you. I just assumed that Mirage wanted to distance their versions of the Turtles from the Fred Wolf Turtles. In other words, I didnt know that Ralph went missing in the Mirage version.

As for the colored bandanas, I don't personally mind either one.
I read that Chinese monks in training would choose auspicious colors for their robes. While this insight may not apply to the Turtles, I do believe that personality does play a part.

Rather interesting to see the colors swapped at the last second on the Playmates toys and the Turtles wearing each other's colors.

[Powder]

A few posters here on this thread helped me to understand why the Mirage TMNT had the red bandanas. I thank you. I just assumed that Mirage wanted to distance their versions of the Turtles from the Fred Wolf Turtles. In other words, I didnt know that Ralph went missing in the Mirage version.

Nah, Mirage created the turtles in all red, & it was the big business fellas catering to kids who made them color-coded to sell toys & help children distinguish one from another. Mirage maintained the original look because it's what they wanted, & it made things clear they were not the goofy cartoon characters. & Raph didn't go missing in the Mirage version, it's the IDW version.

[DarkFell]

My bad. I swapped the comic versions. Thanks for letting me know.

[Panda_Kahn_fan]

The all red bandannas are all right, I just think it should just be for some function or purpose or symbolic meaning. My only pet peeve is the 'clan colors' argument is complete, total, and utter bunk.