Why did the TMNT kick the butt of Shredder so often in the 1987 cartoon?
 

Why did the TMNT kick the butt of Shredder so often in the 1987 cartoon?

Not until season 9 Dregg appeared, at least giving some new stories. Did kids mostly care for the Shredder episodes? Season 4-5 had at least some solo adventures set in rural USA with street punk gangs, gangsters, other aliens than Krang but I don't know if kids liked them.

*In Mirage they just finish him off in the first story, then fight Foot Clan, street punk gangs, gangsters, aliens from other planets like Triceratons who attack the Earth and whatever.
*Archie had a big number of bad guys and girls (but I though Null could be a human). For a while it was like they tried to write him out of the continuing stories before returning in the Future Shark Trilogy with Armaggon and Verminator X.
*In the movies, the TMNT defeat Shredder, but he survives and returns in the second. But then the third and fourth had other enemies.
*Next Mutations had Dragon Lord, Shredder sometimes.
*The 2003 cartoon followed Mirage-Image, so they had more no Shredder stories.

If it wasn't for the 1987 cartoon (and the UK Hero Turtles comics where he also appeared very often), Shredder wouldn't probably be like a something you directly think of when thinking of TMNT.

When I read this, I thought you meant the episodes when the turtles literally kicked the Shredder in his derriere.

Now that said image is out of my mind, my answer would be that usually that's what the plot called for, a quick and certain frustration of Shredder's schemes by the end of every episode. Also, tripping over Rocksteady and Bebop every other episode didn't help him either.

Plot
 

So, the plot is written before it's decided which characters shall be used?

To make you ask dumb questions. He constantly threatened their way of life. Would you have them just sit there and take it? O_o

And in other news, wrestling is fake.

I enjoyed his character and perfer appearances of The Shredder as they are for the most part more entertaining and interesting. The mob and mad scienetist are bland and not as interesting. Shredder was there since the beginning and accidently created them. He wanted them dead and to conquer the city of New York and the world at large. Shredder was presistent in his quest so he constantly was scheming and fighting the Ninja Turtles.

Playmates asked that Shredder be in half of the episodes as to why he was in so many with Krang,Bebop, and Rocksteady. That helped define him as the arch enemy that constantly fight the TMNT. Its like with the all red mask versus four different colors. It was originally done to sell toys and it worked. Overtime it became definitive that Shredder was the reoccuring arch enemy instead of a one shot villain that was apart of their origin.

Every episode villains is just the way that action cartoons was done back in the day. In the 80's you really weren't going to get an action cartoon where the big bad guy only showed up once every now and then.

Because Krang didn't want to get his tentacles dirty.

The show was slapstick camp goodness. A villain in that environment needs to get his keister handed to him at all times and Shredder fit the bill.

Not so much the plot as it's the premise.

Shredder was an 80's cartoon villain. Like all 80's cartoon villains he was contractually obligated to have his ass handed to him by the heroes every episode.

Yup. All 80's villains were scheming jerks who put too much faith in their brainless goons. Shredder was probably skilled enough to take on the turtles on his own, but he relied too much his Foot Soldiers, Bebop & Rocksteady, and whatever silly plan he came up with.

Krang, Shredder, Bebop & Rocksteady just had a great dynamic. When they were on screen they easily stole the show. Most of the episodes without them are of lesser quality in my eyes. I really think the villains helped a lot in making this show as succesfull as it was.

I seem to always remember the Shredder getting the upper hand when it came to combat with the turtles. But as far as plans go, yeah, those always went downhill.

This is not correct. Shredder's role was vastly expanded past its comic origin in the 2003 series; in fact I'd say that was one of the show's biggest problems. Unlike what you said about the 1987 show, in 2003's version many of the other villains were a lot more interesting than Shredder, and I really got sick of him coming back in one form or another. Still, in the comics he came back as a mutant shark at one point, and that I would have loved to see on TV.

Bingo. Or more specifically, if it wasn't for Playmates' heavy influence on the 1987 cartoon, that wouldn't have happened. The comics were already pretty successful in themselves by the time the show debuted, but they had limited potential for merchandising in other areas because they didn't have a very consistant set of characters or locations. So Shredder was given a bigger part.

As to why he had to be defeated at the end of almost every episode, I would say it's because of the less sophisticated nature of the 1980s. Doing a story arc requires that people tune in regularly. I can't even fault their logic much; although story arcs were a big part of why I liked the 2003 show more, I wasn't really able to get a lot out of it until I started watching it online.

Um...basic Children's cartoon formula?
I mean how often did the Thundercats trounce Mum-Ra? Or G.I. Joe waste Cobra? Or Inspector Gadget foil Dr. Claw?

I wish the Shredder would've won in some episodes. Makes the plot a bit more interesting.

I suppose you could consider "Michelangelo's Birthday" and "The Big Rip Off" to be victories for the Shredder. They are the only real candidates I can think of.

Hey, and episode was called, "Shredder Triumphant".

Don't forget Megatron and the Decepticons!

To add to the list Get Shredder,Beneath the Streets if memory serves, and Incredible Shrinknig Turtles he beat them in that one scene single handedly. It is almost like Shredder does better on his own against the TMNT without Krang,his mutant henchmen, and others.

I think that's a fair statement. He teamed up with Krang and created his own mutants in order to beat Splinter and the Turtles. Yet, perhaps he had the inherent ability to do it all along on his own.

Shredder had many many temporary victories. In fact his plans usually succeeded to an extent. The Turtles had to undo what he did more often then they actually prevented him from doing something.

He-Man
 

Can someone compare this to He-Man? I know Skeletor is his arch-enemy, but I have a feeling fe foght Hordak more than the TMNT fought the Rat King.

Actually He-Man rarely fought Hordak. Hordak was a villain on She-Ra's show so He-Man only fought Hordak on the occasions he guest starred on She-Ra.
By the time the Hordak and the evil Horde figures were released the He-Man series had been cancelled so they could start work on the She-Ra series. So they made the Horde She-Ra's villains. I don't think any of them ever actually appeared on the MOTU show proper.

Or "Shredderville", although it was a world where the TMNT didn't exist in the first place.

Another reason could be that Shredder was never truly successful could be he was never fully focused on defeating the turtles. Shredder, because of Krang, seemed more concerned in getting the Technodrome back up and running.

Also, in comparison to He-man: Shredder and his crew were in nearly every syndicated episode while Skeletor and/or members of his crew appeared in most epsiodes with more one or two-shot villains once in awhile, becoming more common as the season went on. Same with She-ra. TMNT, like She-ra only had four episodes where the main villains weren't involved at all (in She-ra's case, none of the Horde at all). That's what the OP is going for. :)

The good guys always win!!!!!!!!!!!Thats why!!!!!!!!!!!!!!everyone knows the badguys never win!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I agree, Shredder's weakness is his lust for power, which includes not having to do anything himself, lol.

Action cartoons back in the 80s required villains to be incompetent and their henchmen to be blithering idiots and to be owned by the good guys in every episode. Even child characters such as Zack humiliated the villains. Shredder suffered from this as well as every other iconic 80s villains such as Megatron and Skeletor.

Shredder did own the Turtles without breaking a sweat in The Incredible Shrinking Turtles, it's too bad he couldn't have done that more often.

Enter the Fly
 

Enter the Fly was also near a Shredder win. The smell from the plant could have killed April.

In the 3rd episode, it was Krang who helped Michaelangelo stop Shredder's mousers, without his help, the other 3 probably would have been finished.

Zack also managed to track the Turtles directly to their lair, and when Splinter discovers this he mocks his students for being so careless that a mere child was able to do it.

Also in "Michelangelo's Birthday", Rocksteady and Bebop manage to steal tricycles from two little tots, but it was quite a struggle for them before they succeeded.

Season 1
 

Season 1 is a continuation, like the Big Trilogy so it is not over until episode 5.

Spider bites can be fatal.

Cool action
 

Cool action like that becomes less in later seasons.

Is it your mission in life to be Captain "Tell Us S*it We Already Know About?"

Hordak
 

And still, Hordak is so famous as a He-Man villain. The She-Ra show is far as famous as He-Man (of course, it's a spin-off). Are there more comics where He-Man fights Hordak.

I always thought Krang helped Michelangelo in that third episode because he needed to prove his skills in order to earn his Android body. But they kicked his butt so often that it became a joke, similar to how April kept getting captured in Season 4. It's similar to the sitcoms of the era: introduce a problem and have everything resolved in 22 minutes, so there was hardly enough time for Shredder to use all of his weapons to his greatest potential before his plans were foiled.

Now that you mention it, April did get kidnapped at a ridiculously routine rate in those episodes, didn't she? Even moreso than normal!

She-Ra is NOT as famous as He-Man, her show has a niche fanbase at best that's lucky enough to have the backing of the MOTU fanbase, and people will always consider Hordak to be a second stringer in favour of Skeletor.

He-Man's comics history isnt exactly a rich one either. I doubt he fought Hordak as many times as you claim.