A studio other than Fred Wolf?
 

I'm just wondering, what would the first ever TMNT show was produced by another studio? It all depends on the studio of course but what would be different about it? Would it have been more accurate to the comics? Even less? Shorter? Longer?

Just to get the ball rolling, here are a few suggestions.

• Sunbow
• Dic
• Ruby-Spears
• Hanna-Barbera
• Filmation
• Saban

DIC Entertainment = Produced Captain Planet, so maybe more environmental-polticial messages?

Filmation = stupid messages after the episodes, like "Don't play with fire".

Hanna-Barbera = Stuck in the late-1960's and early-1970's? Turtles, meet the turtles, and have a cowabunga time!

Saban Entertainment - Next Mutation 10 years earlier?

One thing that would have been interesting is if Ninja Turtles (1987) was produced by Hanna-Barbera. It had kid versions of its classics as its last real putout before being bought by Turner Broadcasting in the twilight of William Hanna and Joe Barbera's careers. That being said what if it produced the Ninja Turtles cartoon and the success never changed? Would Hanna Barbera have been bought out by Turner Broadcasting? The early years under the Turner banner put out Johnny Bravo and Dexter's Laboratory and that was really it. Would there have been a renaissance of sorts because of the TMNT and not just early put out if bought out? An interesting concept!

All those companies cartoons in the 80's were either horrible or too toned down for kids. Superfriends was produced back then, it is damn near awful.

Censors were much tougher during the 1970's and early-1980's.

Yeah, the original cartoon seems tame for today's standards, but at the time it was actually considered the most violent/action packed cartoon of its day...until Batman: TAS came out in 1992 and revolutionized kids cartoons. There are a whole bunch of articles back then about parents complaining about how violent the TMNT show was, and protesters which seems laughable now.

I doubt any other show would have had self-aware humor and characters with personalities that bounce off each other the way the Turtles did, as well as Shredder/Krang and the villains. Plus all the sci-fi plots and parodies carried the show.

Censors were still tough when Heman debuted in September 1983:

https://io9.gizmodo.com/12-insane-fa...uni-1619470015

It's a shame the Christian Soccer Moms ruined kids cartoons for a decade because they thought Little Timmy could not be exposed to characters punching each other in action cartoons.

I think much is because by September 1973, when Superfriends started, the USA had just left North Vietnam (starting after the Paris peace treaty in late-January that year). The hippie and flower power movemenst had been big, and the international peace movmenet would remain strong until the early-1990's.

If Hanna-Barbera made TMNT they probably would have rebooted it every year like Scooby-Doo and then released a hundred straight to DVD films with WWE wrestlers.:lol:

To be honest the animation would have been too fluid as well.

- Sunbow - They eventually went under I think. Probably would have produced it for a few years, cancelled it and then years later spend my three weeks of work experience with Metrodome pleading for them to release the series. :D

- Ruby-Spears - even with a handful of successful animated shows they still went bankrupt. We probably would have got two years with little ambition or inventiveness the Fred Wolf series provided.

- Hanna-Barbera - see above.

- Filmation - can't see this happening. They may have thought it was a good idea but the animation would have had the usual cheap, limited quality from Filmation's other series. Add to the fact Filmation was more or less gone by the time the FW series premiered.

- Saban - the problem here is that back in the 80s Saban wasn't making cartoons so not sure how this would have worked.

- Dic - ah now DIC I can see producing TMNT. The show would have been allowed to continue for a good number of years and the animation would have been more consistent. It would have looked like The Real Ghostbusters so yeah this definitely could have worked.


I remember reading a rumour that one of the shows to most get attacked by these types of people to the point of cancellation was The Legend of Prince Valiant. The final straw I think was one of the female characters appearing nude in the water. Obviously you only saw her nude shoulders but that apparently got the show cancelled.

Filmation
 

Filmation closed on 3 February 1989

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Filmation

So we would maybe get just two seasons

Eh, more likely just one. Bravestarr, their final series, premiered a few months before FW's TMNT, and the only things Filmation made after 1987 were a film for Bravestarr (which saw a very limited release in early 1988 ) and a DTV Snow White movie which had its US release delayed until 1993 because of the studio's closure. They were in no shape to do a series like Ninja Turtles beyond the obligatory 5 episode mini-series.

I'd like to see a TMNT series produced by Sunrise or Madhouse.

But with TMNT becoming popular, maybe Filmation could survive for a longer time?

Unlikely. Star Trek: The Animated Series did pretty well at the time but they didn't have the money to continue making it. I think Filmation would have lost interest if they started making seasons of TMNT, then again the animation would have been quite stilted so probably for the best.

I think Sunbow could've done a good job; they handled the Hasbro shows with a decent level of quality, and probably wouldn't have gotten as totally silly as Fred wolf did. I could see the rest of the series staying as serious as season one did under them.

I don't see TMNT under Sunbow turning out well as Transformers is a testament to that. Yes I know the show was a phenomenon but it was a worse cartoon than the FW series. We dodged a bullet.

Since the first season of FW tmnt was animated by toei, what if Laird and Eastman decided that they (Toei) could produce the show as well in Japan and have it dubbed in English by Funimation like in the case of the Dragonball TV series so that its exposed to a wider audience.

Then we would probably have major interests for anime and manga outside Japan by 1989 instead of 1995.

I can see that working. We would have got at least eight seasons although it's worldwide popularity, TMNT being a household name would have been less likely. Probably niche.

Funimation didn't exist until 1994, and didn't dub the Dragon Ball franchise in-house until 1999.

Oops, my bad.

I guess that some random studio could've then dubbed it while the show would've been animated by Toei for its entire run rather than just one season.

Would've made for some pretty cool and interestinvly animated episodes.

Hannah Barbara produced Swat Kats I don't think they were "Stuck" in the 60s/70s

I would have loved to see what Hannah Barbara would have done with the property

Looking at the quality of animation for Captain Planet as well as their most famous shows the animation would have been too fluid and cartoonish. Like I said they have a tendency to get bored and reboot their shows every few years apart from maybe The Flintstones.

TMNT done by the Swat Kats team would have been pretty rad and possibly closer to the original comics in tone.

I feel like you literally just "quoted" my post and did not read it. Swat Kats would be a good indication of the tone and animation quality would have been sense Swat Kats is most similar to TMNT.
And when you say most "famous shows" I am assuming you are being critical of animation quality of shows produced in the 60/70's???? This is another reason why Swat Kats would be a better comparison, bc it was produce in the 90's just like TMNT.

Also you should do your research on Hannah Barbara a lot of their shows lasted years ex: Dexter's Lab, Power-Puff Girls, Johnny Bravo, Courage the Cowardly Dog, (KND I believe as well) A lot of their show last a long time. Also Hannah Barbara would not have control over how long a show would run sense they do not own the property, but are hired help.

Also You claim Hannah Barbara was too cartoonish, but what would you call the OT animation then???? :lol: If thats not cartoonish I don't know what is :lol:

I do agree
I think it would have been closer to TMNT 2k3 or at the vary worse the OT Red Sky era imo Swat Kats was somewhere between those two imo

I had no idea about that show. Having seen the intro on YT I think you're right about that.

Hannah Barbara was known for it's wacky animation. The FW series had much more solid animation to it's characters. Hannah Barbara animation was mostly too fluid but yeah there were exceptions such as you mentioned Swat Kats and The Real Adventures of Johnny Quest.

Man, think of the awesome that would be a Studio Mir TMNT show.

On average, yes, the Fred Wolf animation was infinitely better from a technical standpoint than the typical HB cartoon. Better staging and "camera angles," no doubt. The TMNT animation suffered especially during the season 3-4 mass orders for syndication, but the CBS-era episodes have lots of polish to them in regards to cell shading and little to no reliance upon recycled cels.

Yeah. The overall motion of the characters and how stuff like gravity was treated was more real...at least for a cartoon series anyway.

Flintstones crossover:

The turtles travel back in time to Earth during the Stone Age

Donatello: "-It's impossible. There are no scientific proof for humans and dinosaurs coexisting."