Should the Franchise Be Going In the Opposite Direction?
 

Hi, I haven't been here in ages, but...

I have been thinking about TMNT a lot lately, continuing on with what Waltz, Eastman and co. at IDW have been doing, watching 2K3, watching the best of the OT, re-reading all of Mirage Vol. 1, playing the video games and watching the 3 original films.

My question is... Is TMNT being too dumbed down? Is it becoming solely a children's property or a property for younger audiences? Should it be? Or should we be getting back toward what Kevin (Eastman) and Peter (Laird) originally envisioned? This is a trend I have noticed with a lot of 30+ year old properties (they are becoming far too kid friendly for the original fans).

Most of us original TMNT fans are now in our 30's and 40's (I'm 34). Is there a point where we become too old for things like the 2012 cartoon, Rise, the Bay films etc.? Are the Waltz/Eastman comics the only recent "serious" TMNT we can get? I'm not saying it should be exactly like Mirage and every aspect should be somber, violent or serious, but does every media adaptation, film, cartoon have to be marketed DIRECTLY toward children?

Why has it become this way? Is it Nickelodeon's fault? Or am I just imagining things/too old and have lost the plot? Should I just shut up and enjoy what I have and ignore everything new?

Well we are allowed some level material intended for an older target audience in the form of comics but I get what you're saying.

Some franchises don't really have a problem with making material for both children and adults. What I mean by that isn't that isn't that the material itself is acceptable for children and enjoyable for adults, what I mean is that parallel material can come out, one for adults and another for children. Here we have two different versions of DC comics characters including John Constantine, who much like TMNT he was intended for an older audience from the start:



Now the problem with TMNT is that Viacom/Nickelodeon might not be entirely comfortable with both making a version where the turtles drink beer stab human beings while still marketing a different version to kids. It can be done, it's just up to the studio heads to accept it.

It should absolutely focus on older audiences. Not necessarily exclusively, and I'm fine with some things that keep the vibe and the heart of what TMNT is while being a bit more family friendly -- 2012 did that rather well -- but the "just for kids" mentality, which wasn't at all true in the beginning, needs to end and it needs to steer clear of trying to become younger and younger. Nick doing "Rise" on a decision to go younger was the opposite direction I had hoped they'd go... If it was up to Nick, would a continued push to go younger someday wind them up on Nick Jr.? The Muppet Babies version of TMNT? (And good god, look how someone took that regular old cartoon and rebooted it for preschoolers.)

Thankfully, Batman vs TMNT threw a bit of a lifeline and a reminder that the TMNT isn't just for the kiddies. Between that and the amount of collectables aimed at adults that have come out in the past few years, at least some people out there get it and know full well there is an older audience and fan base that it still eager for more. And if Nick would prefer to pretend that they don't get it, then I hope they just keep allowing DC and/or others of their own under the Viacom/CBS roof, or whoever they decide to allow a license to, to do with them what they, Nick, don't want to.


Do I need them to be acting all bloody and gritty in everything? Nah. I'm fine with, say, the 2003 level and style of doing things, with the occasional grittier production thrown in the mix. But the 12-year-old behavior and tone of 'Rise' is going too far into the childish zone.

Ideally it should be both for children and adults. I'll never begrudge the next generation of little tykes to have a version of TMNT to call their own complete with toys and games etc. But at the same time we should have a version of TMNT aimed at an older audience like what people are hoping The Last Ronin and the rumoured live action series will be. We too should have some swag of our own and not just nostalgia stuff for the Fred Wolf show (although I don't begrudge Fred Wolf fans from having stuff to buy either) basically all our money is as good as anyone else's they should be exploiting all of us.

Of course young people is were the big bucks are but let's be clear that the most profitable multi media franchise right now is Marvel and they like the vast majority of comic book movies are aimed young people but not little kids. In movies that's were TMNT should not the weird mix of nostalgia for 30 somethings in a package aimed at toddlers like Out Of The Shadows.

I completely agree. Yeah, I mean, in my mind the little ones have and have had their TMNT in every version that isnt the comics. I don't think there shouldn't be something for kids of all ages to latch onto, I just think we need to draw a line for things like toys and cartoons, costumes, bed sheets etc. for kids and then like there needs to be stuff that is for maturer audiences but something you wouldnt b afraid to show your 12 year old... a TV series (live-action) closer in tone to Marvel's Daredevil or Punisher show for those of us that are older fans. Also, to use toys as an example... the Necca/Hot Toys movie figures are nice and adulty for older fans while the little ones can have their 2012 figures and Rise figures. For me, the perfect blend (ALL AGES) of TMNT was the 4Kids Series. I am just old (and possibly bitter) and get dissapointed in the extreme when a new TMNT project is announced and... it's not for me. Everyone raved about the 2012 show so I tried to catch it around 2013 and watched the 1st season in its entirety and by the 3rd episode knew... THEY DIDN'T MAKE THIS FOR ME. About the only thing I can enjoy TMNT related currently is IDW comics and that's on hiatus now, so...

Everything you said is how I feel about TMNT in general. I just wish more fans would be vocal and not be so accepting everytime something comes out just because it's new. I was in the audience at San Diego Comic Con when Rise of TMNT was first leaked and I damn near cried. All of these people my age were cheering. I'm like "Seriously? Are you okay with this?" Fandom (it's the same with Star Wars) just seems to be so happy for new franchise material that they will accept anything that's thrown at them.

Aiming the franchise towards young children is a successful concept. Hundreds of children today grow up with the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Star Wars, Duck Tales, Mario, Masters of the Universe and Transformers. Wait, wasn't that what their parents grew up with?

Yes, it was and production companies know that. Parents are more willing to spend money on their children's home entertainment when the characters are the same as in the cartoons, comics, books, films and video games the parents grew up with.

I'm sorry but that feels like such a corporate answer. Even if your point makes sense (and it does) is TMNT just about profit? Sure, it's a billion $$$ industry by now but what about the art of it? The idea that it's mostly or should be mostly for kids just because that's what makes THEM (the evil overlords in business suits) money completely destroys all that is wonderful and holy about TMNT. Yes, it's entertainment, but how long is it truly going to last for those of us who were the original fans, if it keeps going the route it's going? I will not show my children Rise or the 2012 show. I show them the 1990 movie, the 2k3 series, the Red Sky and Pilot season of OT, stuff that doesn't treat children like they're a bunch of dumb... children. I want my kids to be stimulated, not talked down to.

Nickelodeon owns TMNT, it's solely a children's property now.

All I can say on this is that Eastman and Laird were quite happy to have what amounted to two forms of the franchise back in the day - the edgier, grittier stuff in the original Mirage comics and the more family-friendly alternative in the cartoon/Archie comics.
Seems a win-win to me and I only hope that Nickelodeon can recognise that and not put all of their eggs into the one basket.

It's without question my favorite thing to come out of the franchise over the last 10 years.

For the record, I have absolutely no problem with the franchise putting out kid friendly media (Namely Rise). I do have a problem with it not being very good though.

Agreed. And I didn’t grow up with the 1990 movie, so that was something ‘new’ and edgy to me, as I didn’t see it until a few years ago. Never read the comics and don’t care much for the newer stuff (2012, Bay films, etc.), but the old stuff I like is still there at least.

Would I be unfair in declaring anything that is kid friendly "by today's standards" to be garbage?

Let's look at history for a second... The 87 Toon (OT) was kid friendly but aspects of it can still be taken seriously and watched by adults. The 2K3 show was "ALL AGES" like BTAS or the 90's Marvel shows. Everything after 2K3 has been a disappointment. As censorship has gotten tighter as time has gone on, kids today don't seem to be allowed to be exposed to the same things we were exposed to in the late 80's/early 90's OR "kid's shows" today don't have the allowances that shows we grew up on had. If there isn't at least some evidence to TMNT fans that THINGS ARE GOING BACKWARDS then I can't frankly help them. We are in a very conservative, puerile era of entertainment that threatens to dumb down and turn young children into subhuman idiots with the crap that they are being fed these days.

For a lot of it, no, not really. So much of it has become so dumbed down and derpy. The shift is pretty obvious when old eps of an already silly show like Spongebob are seen in contrast with the newer dumber ones. And I keep waiting for the butt obsession in cartoons to end... (I mean, Ren & Stimpy had the butt thing and durpiness back in my day, but that was that show, because that show was supposed to be weird... it wasn't every show, like that's the only thing that's funny now.)

Then you get a show like 'Rise' that tries too hard to be all cool and up to date with the memes junk, etc, and that show is going to age sooo badly because of it. lol I mean that "dabbing" nonsense was getting old and annoying already well before they decided Leo should do it for some damn reason.

MLP: FiM is objectively one of the greatest things ever, and I say this with no irony whatsoever, BUT, it's an obvious exception and deserves to be in a class all its own. Also, studies show that about 70% or more of the people who've ever watched it were age 15-30. Credit to the showrunners for leaning into it rather than pushing those people away.

Otherwise, though, yeah, "children's entertainment" in the Here and Now is pretty much junk. And a lot of that is by design.

Have to agree with you on that one. Never more than just a casual viewer, but have probably seen all of it and it was a pretty good show and was kinda sad that it ended. One of the rare reboots these days of an old property that was genuinely good, and dare I say even made into something better.

I mean when you take a kids property aimed at little girls and make something even the grown men like...you did something right. "Girl stuff" tends to be so limited and stereotyped, it's nice that a series dads and daughters might both enjoy together is even possible.

Listening to the conversation, I wonder if you're all watching the same cartoons I am. Cartoons have gotten way better then the 80s and 90s. They're able to do more, explore darker themes, have actual violence sometimes, have more continuity and character development, actually being written with end goals in mind, to say nothing of what people can do with representation these days if they so desire. If anything, censorship has gotten far less restricitve. The shows that exist today could never have existed in the 80s, 90s, or event the early 2000s, and thanks to this we have some of the best cartoons to have ever existed, like Adventure Time, Regular Show, Young Justice, etc. I'm genuinely not sure where some of the perspectives I've seen here are coming from.

This weekend, wife and I watched the 2017 MLP movie, followed by the 1986 one. Ooof. Talk about starting off with something that had very little substance to it in its original 1980s incarnation, and finding a way to over-achieve and turn its re-reboot into something that's actually not just "good", but like, super-good in more modern times. They really caught lightning in a bottle with FiM. I don't wanna say the original version was worthless or anything, but... vapid, maybe?

We were both very, very sad to see the FiM show end, but it is what it is. It's our favorite thing we ever thought we were gonna watch one time to make fun of it and then accidentally got sincerely into. Life's funny sometimes.
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Zog: Being only passingly familiar with some of those shows you listed, I can't say much, other than Young Justice was probably not a "kids show".

When I personally refer to "kids shows", I'm thinking mostly of stuff that I see in passing on Nick and Discovery Family and such.

As long as its good I don't really care for example my two favorite animated iterations are 2k3 and Rise

Speak for your own age group I pretty much watched every show in the TMNT iteration and I would rather the latter seasons of 12 than any of the good OT episodes.

Just because there are some shows that go lighter and softer doesn't mean every show is the same, this is a scene from Infinity Train Book 2 a show that just started in January.



Yep because as well all know the TMNT franchise was always known to be timeless and not a reflection of the decade they were released also they used meme humor for like 2 episodes at most.

Well you're missing out a lot by not watching stuff from Netflix, CN or Disney in fact you'll probably love Regular Show

I'm the one guy who doesn't have Netflix. :lol:

On the contrary... the '87 series was a bit ahead of its time. What with the Turtle Com being like an early cell phone but with video already, April often researching info on her computer at Channel 6 as if she had internet, and Donnie sometimes using a portal device as if it were a big flat screen tv... before any of these things existed.

The only thing that really ended up a bit dated about the 2003 is the whole "cyber" thing like it's so cool in that time period and sounds a little silly now.

Dick Tracy had already been using the Two-Way Wrist Computer for a while by then. A significant upgrade to the previous Two-Way Wrist TV and (most famously) the Two-Way Wrist Radio before it.

Just saying. Most cool stuff since 1931 has been ripped off from Dick Tracy. :trazz:

Carry on.

Not really. They're not allowed to have the Turtles kill anybody... so that kind of nixes the whole "ninja" thing right out of the bag.

Yeah, that's incredibly "WTF". Like no, the "good guys" don't need to be mowing down bad guys left and right, but there's no urgency or dramatic tension whatsoever if you know going into a story that nothing "too" bad can ever be allowed to happen. Whatever you're left with is totally toothless.

I mean, for as much to-do has been made about "Superman/Batman/misc. never kill anyone", they kinda do and have if there's a situation when there's no way out of it. The editorial mandate stands BUT it's also implicitly understood on the part of the readers that the One Rule might be broken if circumstances were dire enough.

Like why is one of your main characters carrying two swords if the worst that's ever gonna happen is he gives someone a bit of a scratch? He may as well have a Nerf gun. They all should, if "nobody ever gets hurt TOO bad" needs to be a rule.

F*cking Nickelodeon. Their ownership of the TMNT brand is nothing but a pair of handcuffs.

I dunno, Nick did allow the 2012 Turtles to eventually kill Shredder and show Splinter being murdered by him... but that's pretty bold for Nick and doubtful it will happen again...

edit: And they did surprise us by actually airing that Batman vs TMNT movie, with surprisingly minimal clean up if any. Me thinks Nick might not mind being just a little daring(?) but doesn't want to piss off the parents and censors.

So the Apple Watch basically. (I think?) Though it did take longer to actually happen.

Yeah, that's a bummer. That's part of the issue with Nickelodeon's handling of the franchise.

Since then, I've sometimes thought of:

Would that have been allowed if Shredder hadn't mutated into Super Shredder?

Here's a question... Would Nickelodeon's "neutering" of the TMNT also happen or be the same thing (OR SIMILAR TO) if say Disney owned the TMNT? How much of the "neutering" or "handcuffing" is due to corporate branding and how much of that is due to public perception of the property? Obviously when Laird owned the TMNT 2K3 4Kids happened and, well, it was damn near a masterpiece (the first 4 seasons anyway). There's been a lot of mention, and obviously I agree, that since Nick has owned our beloved franchise that things have softened. Should this have been expected? Is it possible, going back to my OP, that we could see a turnaround... Can we get it in THEIR heads that TMNT should be ALL AGES, not specifically for young people and younger people and youngest people?

No not on the contrary just because a show uses future tech doesn't mean its "ahead of its time" like Leo656 said various of pieces of media have done that before, the 87 iteration wears the decade it was made from on its sleave and there are lots of things that would be consider dated and while I wouldn't consider it a bad thing(There are a lot of media I like where its a reflection of its decade) it kinda disingenuous to call Rise horribly dated just because it used meme humor twice and Leo dabs.

And? It's still going to make that series show its age in not too many years. No getting around that.

So you think the makers of shows are psychic? Like they already know what will exist someday? All shows that loosely predict things that come along later in real life are a bit ahead of the time on coming up with those things, yes. In some cases it wouldn't surprise me if some shows or whatnot even helped provide a little inspiration.

Having tech and things that are commonplace now is not ahead of its time.

Ahead of its time means a show is considered innovative and radical by the standards of the time; more characteristic of a later age.

Disney's Gargoyles would be an example of ahead of its time as it explored concepts and situations that weren't commonly used in most shows. Disney Afternoon shows in the 90's were largely fluffy, and if dark concepts were introduced they'd be resolved with the bit of slapstick.


Gargoyles was one of the first TV shows that actually did tow the line on what was seen as kid-friendly and delve into the dark territory that shows such as Batman would take.

Ninja Turtles in every incarnation is more a product of its current age and the people who hold the right to it.

the 2012 series wasn't a mature show, but it was more cohesive then say rise is. The next incarnation may be more mature or it might go down the rails as far as characters.

Even if they did do a Turtle Version of something like Muppet Babies or Baby Loonytoons. Yes, you are going to get the cutesy storylines such as the "Learning to Share" episode or the "Don't be a tattletale" episode.

But if it can be presented like "Lone Rat and Cubs" had been where Splinter is a struggling parent trying to look after four baby turtles that he didn't really ask for. So while he is looking after them he is learning what it means to be a parent and figuring out how to provide for them and gradually teach them the skills they will need to know in order to survive in a world that won't accept them as they are. That could work.

TMNT can go in any direction. But regardless the origin remains the same.

I wish a new series went in the direction of the IDW comics. That is like the standard for how to do TMNT stories.

I would like a show centered around Mutant Town. I think it would be a fun show to do as an anthology series. You could have the Turtles be a part of it. But show us how things are like for the Mutants trying to live a normal life.

Yeah, I don't think we're all on the same page (or same book for that matter) on this topic or what is being discussed.

TMNT is not Zootopia, but alright.

Nah its the fact they you are using that phrase incorrectly especially when video communication has been in fiction for decades even before the OT turtles did it so it wasn't being "ahead of its time" but rather "following the current trend" when it comes to the appearance of future tech.

Yeah I disagree with that fact 2012 was anything but cohesive especially compared to Rise.

For the love of god, just Google shows and movies that predicted future inventions. Interesting read and maybe you'll understand what the heck I was talking about.

I never said the Turtles as a show did anything first, they are but one example, and all I did was point out a few instances of them having things that to some extent relate to things WE IN REAL LIFE later had that did not exist at the time of the episodes (so no, I'm not misusing that term).... which can be a fun topic to discuss, but no, you want to make something into a fight again.


edit: A good example that kind of blew my mind a little is that the 1990 movie Darkman supposedly predicted the 3D printing of human organs and skin, which is something that is right now in the process of becoming a reality.

But back to TMNT...

I'll take responsibility as I was the first one to be pedantic in this thread.

I know what you are talking about that still doesn't mean "ahead of its time" by that logic Rise must be ahead of its time because Donnie made portable flying devices and extra limbs.

Yeah thats because at the time it was considered futuristic tech and again by that logic almost any show that has some semblance of futuristic tech is "ahead of its time".

Also this is the definition for the term which Victory Angel already stated

https://i.imgur.com/yBXgN9k.jpg

So lets see its NOT innovative or radical by the standards of time because lots of media was doing it before and its not that much of a characteristic of a later age because in the context of the show its considered hi tech piece of equipment that normal people don't have. That's all I have to say and if you want to take it up with anyone blame the people who actually made up the term.

No, because you're just unnecessarily nitpicking word use (when my intended use of the term remains accurate) and either still don't get or purposely ignore what I was saying, as that 'Rise' comment is totally off the mark to the entire point.

Those inventions of 'Rise,' like any series, would only be ahead of their time once that show is in the past AND we by then have the relative equivalent of those inventions in real life. (see: more characteristic of a later age)

Simply put... shows are not ahead of their time (YET) when those inventions are only fiction... but they were when the equivalent of those inventions become real.

Maybe something in 'Rise' will be someday, but we won't know that until then. It's retroactive.

You reminded me to finally get around to watching "Darkman". I don't think I've ever seen it in full!