Is Nick TMNT getting too scary for children?
 

For some reason the writers seem to be on a horror genre crusade with this show. Most of the Season 3 episodes are horror movie influenced.

Do you think the target audience (5-10 year olds) are getting creeped out by these episodes?

Depends on the kid. I'd have been able to take it at that age, my sister however would have been too scared for it.

What Breadwinners tries to show our kids is more scary than this...

Compared to other horror properties that kids are exposed to with the other shows on the air, I don't think so. Yes, it can be creepy at times, but 80s/90s kids had their share of scary shows such as He-Man, Ghostbusters, Scooby-Doo, Beetlejuice, Goosebumps, Are You Afraid of the Dark, all of those Disney villains, and all of us were scared at one time or another. This show is rated Y7, so basically if you are at least seven years old, it shouldn't be too extreme. Though kids under seven may find other shows to watch due to this rating.

believe it or not, kids like to be scared...just not to be scarred

I used to watch Are You Afraid of the Dark when I was a kid. Salute Your Shorts and Ren and Stimpy also had some creepy episodes. Its nothing new for Nick to have shows that get fairly dark.

Hell no. Would it have scared you as a kid, Cubed? You seem to bring up kids getting spooked quite often. Not judging, just curious/surprised.

They just don't make tv like they used to...

Loved that stuff. My sister was 10 when I was finally able to convince her that Are You Afraid of the Dark really isn't all that bad, because it's made for kids.

She got up the nerve at that point... and now she and my brother-in-law are into gory stuff I don't tend to care much for. What have I done.

I highly doubt kids are going to find anything in the TMNT remotely scary.

[Mod Edit by Machias: Let's not be so nasty, shall we?]

I watch the shows, religiously, with my 6 yr old daughter. We've watched all of season 3 together, including tonights ep with the old chainsaw ripping, and the beginning episodes with Jasonesque hockey mask, axe, and all that "horror" themed stuff, and she has not showed any sign of being scared, not in the least.

If anything, she has been finding them humorous, and "cheesy". Mind you too, my daughter is not some weird horror loving, crazy 6 year old, who never gets scared of things. She's all about Barbie, friends Lego, and littlest Pet shop toys and cartoons, and she loves the Turtles, and the shows latest episodes, but no she doesn't find them scary, not at all.

out of curiosity, what did you say before this was edited?

[Mod edit by Machias: It was deleted for a reason. Drop it.]

Doesn't fessing up defeat the purpose of editing? :lol:

I said yes but I don't think it's that scary for Kids between 5 and 10, maybe a little.

For 3 to 5 year old's though, yes.

I haven't been able to watch several episodes of Season 3 with my 4 and 9 month year old daughter as they were too scary. It's a real shame because we had no problems until now. She has been watching Nick TMNT since she was 3 where we have seen all of Seasons 1 & 2 and she only found squirrelanoids, cockroach terminator & fungus humoungus slightly scary but still loved them. Hell, she was even a little scared for Leo in the Invasion as he's her favourte character but Season 3 she was actually shaking and turned away several times so I have to screen them now to see if we can watch them together. God, did I feel bad.

At least she was fine with the big foot one and the croaking but was way too scared with The creep and April's Mom... we didn't finish that one together. And Dreambeavers forget about it. She ain't watching that one.

Hopefully these horror themed ones will be over soon, until then I will have to watch the 'scary' ones by myself.

This season is overkill in terms of horror homages.

I'd say it'd depend on the kid - as a rule, I don't think kids are as "sensitive" to that kind of thing as adults usually think they are. Plenty of kids love scary stuff - and there's a lot of shows/movies we all used to watch as kids where we go back now as adults and think "damn... that was pretty dark!". As kids, we didn't seem to notice it as much.

Just IMO anyway.

Yeah I'll echo the other posters. It really depends. A scary episode here or there isn't bad, but an enitre season of it might be a bit much. I'll have to see how this goes.

I'm hoping it doesn't get worse than April's mom thing. That was terrifying.

It really depends on the kids on how sensitive they are and even with the parents too, as some of them could be shocked and probably end up complaining.

In the UK Channel 5, a recent Viacom acquisition is showing season 2 and some of those episodes are edited to reduce prolonged violence.
Shame, there's some key bits missing - worried about the S2 finale

Yeah, that's shame Channel 5 have been editing things out but I only noticed it in the episode Target: April o' Neil, I was surprised Slash and Destroy wasn't edited. I'm not worried about the season 2 final, that should be ok but I have a feeling season 3 could be heavily edited.

I voted yes. My kids are 3 and 2 and we watched season 1 with almost no problem at all (minus Parasitica). But season 2 I had to skip a few of them and now the only season 3 episode I've let them watch was The Croaking. Otherwise season 3 has had some messed up episodes, which is a shame because I just want to warch a fun show that both my kids and I enjoy.

Now, I know I'm basing my vote over my young children, but I still feel like some episodes are too much (I'm looking at you S3 E3). This dream beavers one has scary elements, but the end calms things down enough for the older crowd I would imagine.

It depends on the child. Here is my 9 year old great looking carefree but my two little 3 years and 2 years they will not be afraid.

There are things in older TMNT material that is aimed for children but are still pretty disturbing.

http://img2.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb2...s/0/01/22f.jpg
http://img1.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb2...isodeGuide.png
http://img2.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb2...tockman_20.jpg

Oh and I forgot, this too:
http://img2.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb2...drako-tmnt.PNG

I do think it depends on the child but from my own perspective of growing up in the 90's, I liked to be scared and there was some real scary stuff aimed at kids in the 90's.

This also may be where the creators/writers of tmnt 2012 get their influences from as they are around my age and grew up on content like ghostbusters, extreme ghostbusters which was worse, ren and stimpy, are you afraid of the dark etc; you ever watch some episodes of moomins?

I believe that for children of certain certain ages it may be too much, but even though 2012 is aimed for kids, throughout the show they have always included content aimed at older audiences, it's probably best to leave it to the parents discretion on what episodes are suitable for their children.

For years, people have been saying part of what made the 90s the golden age for cartoons was that it didn't pull any punches, which is what most cartoons do nowadays.
Now, we get a cartoon that isn't pulling any punches with it's horror stuff, and now you're complaining about it? Geez.
And no, it's not too scary. If One Coarse Meal from SpongeBob and most episodes of Sanjay and Craig and Breadwinners aren't too scary for kids, why would this be?

I think it depends on the age of the kids and what they can handle, and it's up to the parents to monitor it and see if it'll be too scary for them. I probably wouldn't have been too scared of this one, especially at the end when we see how tiny the Beavers actually are.

I appreciate that they aren't afraid to push the envelope when it comes to the show's content. They definitely have faith that their viewers can hang.

Yeah, I feel the same way about this, too. They definitely know how to make viewers watch their episodes.

No way. If my six year old brother can take it, I think it's fine. Just teach kids the difference between reality and fiction.

Revenge of the Fly from the OT scared me when I first saw it because I hate large bugs.

Agreed with most. It depends on the kid. My nephew is almost 6, and he's watched the episodes so far in season 3. While I was creeped out by some the scenes and such that have happened, my nephew mainly thought of them to be "freaky" as in a "weird" sense, but never was he clutching me freaking out. He's actually more afraid of being left alone in the dark, or going to the movies because it is loud and dark in there.

So it depends on the kid.

Also, if they're a bit older, like my nephew, you sit down and explain that whatever happens on the show, is just that. A cartoon. None of it is real. He's well aware Turtles are not real. Or at least, he feels they aren't real anywhere around here, but in New York they are. But he understands what happens on the show, is nothing that can happen here.

Plus, I always ask him during commercial breaks, "Are you okay? This isn't getting scary for you is it?" And he's always like, "No! Plus I have you here with me!" So you know. Touches my heart when that kiddo says that but heh.

And the whole Horror Movie binge lately, I have a feeling that may end after episode 6 'Race With The Demon' Because isn't it the whole Spiritual Turtles episode after episode 6? So maybe the rest of the episodes (up to Episode 13) will be about them training and honing their more spiritual ninja skills. Cause on Tumblr, I saw something (looked official, had Official Nick logo on the top) saying that the Turtles will at least be in the woods/farmhouse up until Episode 13-then I suppose it's back to New York after that.

On Tumblr too, have been pics of the Spiritual Turtles figures (hopefully official figures that Playmates will release soon enough). And what kind of element they relate to, and how each of the Turtles train. For example, the image listed that Donnie pulls rocks to strengthen himself or…something like that. The image made it sound more like whoa. If anyone is interested, I can post that, but again, not in this thread. I don't think that applies to the particular topic of this thread.

But if I had to guess, after Speed Demon Don next week, it won't be so much horror genre esque than more so the Turtles training and further developing their more spiritual skills and such. Finding more about themselves, in which they can return to New York, stronger, better, and reclaim what is theirs and save the world. Again.

Makes me wonder how messed up New York's become since they left. We know the first episode of this season, they mentioned 3 months since. I wonder if even MORE time has passed since then.

I'm not certain. As others have said, it depends on the kid. Although there have been creepy episodes in the earlier seasons, all of the episodes (apart from 'The Croaking') in Season 3 have bumped the horror level a lot. I could see why some might find that as a turn off.

As to if kids understand that these episodes are horror movie parodies which originally have gory and unhappy endings, it depends if they have been already exposed to such movies in the first place. Otherwise, I feel that the references in the show go over their heads and they view these scenes as just creepy or weird.

Like Gunstar said, we've never exposed my nephew to any horror films. So he never got the references, or knows of gory, scary movies. So a lot of this, goes over his head as freaky or creepy. And not so much scared. He's even requested to watch those episodes over and over again. And not once has he seen an episode from season 3 thus far, gone to bed, and had nightmares or anything. So you know, in my case, I don't think he's spooked or scared by it at all.

Well, the rating for the show does say Y7, so if they are under 7, parents really should know their kids well enough to know what they can handle and what not. Then, there are parents that simply don't want to expose their kids to certain things. Horror genre isn't for everyone, there is a reason why it is such a niche genre. That saying, I have two little cousins, 11 and 9, and both love to watch The Walking Dead. Often, their mom does watch the episode ahead of time to make sure nothing too bad happens in it, and if the violence is extra graphic, then she won't let them watch the episode at all, but most of the time, the kids can handle Walking Dead with no problem whatsoever.

So pretty much the consensus is that kids around the age it is listed for won't really be bothered by it, and the ones that younger then that (3-4) say they tend to be be bothered by it some. Pretty cut and dried it seems and fits with why they have it at Y7.

And yet the toys are +3...go figure.

But yeah, with the 3-6 year olds who the show isn't aimed for and have a strong fanbase because... you know the toys, you just have to pick and choose at the moment.

I'm sure that Nick TMNT has quite a few weird senarios in the show, but as it for it being scary I say nay.

There should be a "depends" option there. Some kids are wimpy and can't handle stuff like this whereas others don't bat an eyelid to it. I know for me, these eps wouldn't have bothered me at all because I never found stuff of this nature scary, even at a really young age because when it came to stuff like this, I logically knew that it wasn't real and that it can't hurt me or get me. It also wasn't realistic enough for me to take seriously, especially cartoons.

Unless the eps have something in it that a child does fear in general (maybe like the giant spider playing the banjo...I dunno), then I could see it being scary. I have a fear of spiders....maybe that would've given me a nightmare if I'd seen that as a kid (maybe).

So yeah, it really depends on the kid.

I've seen a lot of good arguments here, but I think this video sums it up beautifully:

(YES, I know it's Nostalgia Critic, but THIS IS NOT A REVIEW!!! This is an EDITORIAL that is literally talking about word-for-word what this thread is about. And let me tell you, he makes a LOT of great points!) Please watch before bashing.