Why wasn't Krang an utrom?
 

With some of the recent comparisons between Krang an Ch'rell, it got me wondering: "why wasn't Krang originally conceived as an Utrom for the Fred Wolf cartoon?" Most of the time the answers for how the comic was adapted for the cartoon tend reason along the lines of "it was more kid-friendly" but in this case, it doesn't make sense. Krang was hardly less grotesque in appearance, and some might argue he was more so. And I can't imagine a disembodied brain being more suitable or even easier to understand than simply making him an alien. Sure utroms tended to be peaceful as opposed to Krang but it's not like they weren't already changing a bunch of the elements from the comic. Anyone have any ideas or insight to this?

Uniqueness. Krang being a brain removed from a body & given life = an isolated incident. A race of aliens makes him one of thousands.

Krang also has much longer tentacles than the Utroms do. Compare them and you'll see how much longer Krang's "arms" are.

Likewise that's just the thing, he was a banished warlord who lost his body after being exiled from Dimension x. Utroms don't have bodies.

From what I've read Peter Laird at the time didn't like the idea of the Utroms being evil which the cartoon was going to make them be and so came up with a single villain which was like an Utrom but not one.

I'm sure someone can correct me if I got that wrong.

Dunno where you read that, but it sounds reasonable.

I think he is confusing the comment from why he didn't allow Utroms in the second movie, he didn't want kids to think it was Krang and that the scientist was evil.

But yes I've been asking myself the same question while re-watching the series, I mean why not just a vanished warlord from Dimension X and that's it? The whole body thing made no sense, he spends all of S1 asking for his body back and all he gets is a robot he controls, so his body for all purposes was the robot so he could've easily been an Utrom. This is later shown in a flashback that there are other "krangs" it wasn't until Krangezoids that it was retconned of Krang having an actual body.

Creative license is the only thing I can think of.

Makes sense

I don't see why PL's objection to there being evil Utroms mattered when the show changed virtually everything else from the comics at the time:

- Splinter being Hamato Yoshi
- Colored bandanas
- April being a reporter
- Foot Soldiers are robots
- Shredder working with Krang
- Krang in general
- Shredder having mutant henchmen
- Baxter being white instead of black


Virtually everything else about the original cartoon was completely different from the Mirage comics...so why would it matter?

I love how u bring up Baxter's race and not that fact he was turned into a fly :lol:

Back in 1988 when Baxter became a fly, he only had one appearance in the comics. He wouldn't appear again till Volume 2 which was in 1992 I believe.

You have to remember that back when the original cartoon aired, the Mirage comics were still in their infancy. All the big storylines were just starting.

Because they didn't care about the source material.

Heck...were the Utroms that developed when the Fred Wolf series was started...

OK...so the series was 12 issues in at the time and the Utroms were in what...2?

We first see the Utroms in the last panel of issue #3, first printing March 1985. The cartoon began airing in December 1987. I know cartoons take a long time to animate, but I'm pretty sure the Utrom story arch was finished (or at least written) before they even began production on the cartoon.

True...and the idea of the Utrom predates that. Did they predate the Turtles...anyone?

1986
 

Wasn't it in 1986 it was decided to create a TMNT cartoon?

It's ironic evil utroms eventually showed up in mirage.

My guess is the writers found an alien brain easier to explain to kids.

I refuse to see Ch'rell and Krang as the same character though. Granted they're both pink slugs (easter egg alert), but their characters are pretty damn different. Krang has a sarcastic wit, Ch'rell completely lacks that.

Not to mention that Ch'rell is far more convincing as an evil tyrant. Kraang like most of the OT characters,was more of a comical character.

When I was little I always thought of krang as a alien. And when he said they took my body I just thought he meant robot body and that's why shedder built him a new one. But then you got that whole clone episode where the krang clones grow body's and are some kind of lizard dinosaur mix.

For simplicity's sake, they probably should have just said he was a rogue Utrom. Would have made for some good storylines too; with all the silly, one-shot "alien" episodes the show had, having a few episodes based around the Utroms, showing how Krang was the only evil one, etc., would have added some nice depth to the character and been a nice bone to throw to the Mirage fans. They probably wouldn't use the other Utroms very often, so I'm not sure it would make Krang any less "unique" since he'd be the only one ever shown.

Realistically speaking though, I don't think anyone working on the show ever thought people would be asking about it 25+ years later. Not saying we're bad for it, I just think it's funny that the fans of any given property almost always put way more caring and thought into things than the actual creators did. Makes me wonder why more fans don't grow up to take the reigns of the things they loved as kids, but I guess life's funny like that.