Nostalgia is killing the TMNT?
 

I know it's something against the rules of the forum to bash "hate" on the 1987 serie, but it's discussion and as long as we remain polite to eachother, I think it isn't a bad thing.

By the way, what do I mean with the title? I think that the immensive popularity of the original 1987 adaptation is suffocating the others.
The childish, yet famous, aura around it makes the others look just like the same. And sadly, for a lot of people, impression is way more important than expression, so who wants to look like a kid these days?

Outside of kids, being the classic 80's nostalgic as become a horrible trend these years. Just look in the r/TMNT of Reddit. Tons and tons of people who doesn't do anything but posting pictures of the 1987 adamptation's action figures and various collections.

I'm not saying that the entire TMNT community should hate the 1987 adaptation or not be a fan of it, but since isn't the newest (and personally the best written) people should atleast try something new.
For example, I've been watching the 2012 adampation recently and it as alot of pros and cons. There is no perfect TMNT adampation, that's why people should open on more version instead of concetrating only on that classic one.

Just asking you guys what do you think about it. I'll patiently wait for your detailed answers!

There has been a few threads on this already. Overall it doesn’t matter too much as the only source material is Mirage and outside of some serious Netflix show there’s nothing else that will be made based on it.

Also most of the people you mention are casual fans who barely know anything TMNT after their childhood. It’s very similar to Pokémon fans who only like Gen 1 and the original 151 Pokémon and nothing afterward because they only remember what they liked when they were kids.

Yes but that kind of "casual" fan looks more than the 60% of the entire community (talking of TMNT).
Pokémon's Gennwunners (as they are called) are usually picked on and downgraded because of their lack of critisism and stuff.
Also, if you have a link of those discussions I'd like to read them.

Yes, it's technically against the rules to "bash" that show, but the rules were written in 1999. That is to say when TMNT consisted of hard to come by comics, a toyline, more accessible (though worse) comics intended to market said toyline, one OK movie, two obviously bad movies, a nightmarishly awful live-action show, some video games and of course that cartoon. At the time, the Fred Wolf cartoon really was the majority of what TMNT was, and most of the other stuff was either a tie-in or the show was intended to market it. So at the time it might have made sense to consider "bashing" it little more than a reason to cause flame wars. Of course now it's 21 years later and the Fred Wolf cartoon and its direct tie-ins no longer make up the majority of the franchise, and given the higher quality standards the flaws of the show have become more evident. It's also a bit unclear what constitutes "bashing", but it can't be the same thing as pointing out the flaws of the show or admitting that you dislike it, such a rule would be insane and is obviously not how it's enforced. I've only ever seen one person claim that it should be enforced, and he only seems to do so because he's unable to defend the show without resorting to appeal to popularity, the subjectivity argument, what-about-isms, personal attacks, etc. Basically, the rule is defended by someone who can't argue in favor of show properly, which I take as a sign that the rule could only be enforced frequently if it was to shield a bad TV show from legitimate criticism, which is straight up silly.

Anyway, TL;DR. The rule is vaugely worded and was clearly written under circumstances that are no longer relevant, which is probably why it's not really enforced.

Anyway, with that out of the way, is nostalgia "killing" TMNT? If you mean that hinders economic success, then I don't know. The 2012 TMNT cartoon did represent a partial return to old ideas (mostly in the form of characters and some concepts) and was (allegedly) a huge success, but did overall have very little in common with nostalgic versions beyond the superficial, the success might have come from its own ideas? The second Platinum Dunes movie, although carrying over some of the bad ideas from the previous movie, did mostly try to emulate the Fred Wolf cartoon but was a total flop. And we shouldn't really forget that the 2003 cartoon was intentionally getting away from the Fred Wolf cartoon and still ended up on the air for six years. So if I had to come up with a conclusion as to wheter or not marketing TMNT with ties to the Fred Wolf cartoon works in its favour, I'd say there's a neutral effect. You could do that but it doesn't seem to have an effect. It's probably just better to try and make a good product, then let brand name recognition and word of mouth take care of it.

Creatively... Well, it does seem to stifle the creativity a bit, not gonna lie about that. If the franchise just keeps bringing back the "Krang tries to take over the earth with a Technodrome" bit along with other things simply because they're "recognisable", then we're basically just getting the same thing over and over again. And they're not even good bits. It's probably better in the long run to come up with new material or digging up (quite frankly) better parts of the old stuff. And if you're going to reuse the bad stuff just because people recognise it, then at least rework it into something legitmately good.

As long as they don't ban me, I'm fine.

Economically no. TMNT seems an average franchise, not a "dying" one. For "killing" I meant the community as a whole.

The community, as I said, is full nostalgic people, who just can't get over the 1987 serie. And being the most popular, it takes away possible new fans due to the social impact that could have to them. Yeah it's stupid, but it seems like that.

About lack of creativity: it could actually make the show very repetitive, but too much creativity can bring something like the newest show. Disapponting because too different (I'd like to watch the show so badly, but my country didn't broadcasted it).

I think that the nice example of "rework" is the 4kids show, due to the fact that have alot of old characters from the 1987 one, but with a different role and maybe even character. That's why nobody got disappointed.
It's like having a box full of action figures, creating each time a different story or different way to tell it.

By the way, I'm going any further with this thread; because it just looks pointless for me now. Not because of you eh. I just think it was rushed and useless.

I wouldn't blame the 1987 cartoon itself.

Rather, a huge chunk of people who watched the cartoon in their childhood (and barely remember any of it by the way), are now refusing to check out new versions because tmnt is a kids-only fad in their eyes.

And with so many new franchises to compete with, especially in the Internet age with so many options, its gonna be a challenge for any new tmnt version to stand out and make a huge profit among the new generation of kids.

I think it was the difficulty with having a consistent kid audience that led to the higher ups aiming for older fans by trying to bank on Fred Wolf Nostalgia in the IDW comics, Nick cartoon and the Second Platinum Dunes film (to varying levels of success).

Yeah sorry, I didn't mean to blame the show.
My complain was mostly directed on the "community" itself, as you better explained.

About the marketing and competition thing, I was thinking of the same before writing the last post. I just felt guilty for blaming the choices of the directors.

This is a good thread, but there has been plenty of TMNT that has had it's own identity but also been well received by the fanbase. The '00 show, TMNT '12 are perfect examples that had their own identity even if they paid homage or crossed over with Fred Wolf.

And I know I'm in the minority on this part, but I thought that the TMNT CGI cartoon/movie thingy was pretty good.

And there was enough reinvention in those three examples that FW didn't choke them out. I think the real problem is that many of the other examples are truly poor takes on the franchise. Rise, the Bay flicks.... not good by any comparison.

Reading of a veteran of the forum saying that my thread is good, makes me so proud (I'm dumb).

Anyway, the problem isn't for us, already in the TMNT world, but for who tries to approach it.
Even if the 2003 and 2012 show are well received, nobody gives two shells about them.
And newcomers just probably give up, thinking that the only turtle show in existence is that goofy 1987 version.

Then do you not think the mods should change the rules, I mean change it to anything else?
I say this because I'm really getting frustrated with the FW series being used to be jumped on:

Since this site is based on the original TMNT cartoon (1987-1996), original cartoon bashing of any kind is not allowed.

I mean if the mods are okay with neatoman and others taking a dump on the cartoon should it not be changed to:

Since this site is based on the original TMNT cartoon (1987-1996), original cartoon bashing of any kind is allowed.

Not trying to be clever here but I'm frustrated with the indifference this site takes towards the forum rules they set up. All I want is there not to be any confusion as to what is allowed and what isn't in regards to the 80's cartoon series. :-?

Calling the writers lazy and hacks? Making out a writer is worthless just after they've died? A poor taste April Fools joke done out of spite?

Or...you're own personal bias and values are the issues.;)

Oh no go ahead, people love using this series as a punchbag. :roll:

I agree to an extent nostalgia is somewhat to blame. Either give us new Fred Wolf TMNT or don't. Stop tip toeing with cameos and references. Neatman will say my opinion doesn't matter because I like 80's cartoons and that this one especially holds no value other to laugh at. He of course doesn't realise the IDW series he's obsessed with is built from elements of the FW series. How's that for not having an argument?

IDW and the franchise as a whole needs to stop relying on pushing any TMNT nostalgia unless it wants to return faithfully to that world. It needs to create new material without relying on previous iterations. I assume that is something everyone can agree on. :)

Why are you still fixated on the idea that he favors IDW when that literally has never been stated? Watching you desperately try & throw stones at what you assume is his favorite iteration is both petty & sad. Why are you posting on Tuesday? Did you sneak into the ward's rec-room?

To be fair, I found the FW tmnt on Blu Ray April Fools joke to be pretty funny, since I fell for it.

Please dude, don't use sarcasm...
It's confusing to understand on written threads.

I don't think Nostalgia for the OT is killing this series, but it is the series that caused them to fall in love with the series. However, what is sort of smothering the franchise is people wanting to see references to previous incarnations.

References and Easter eggs are good and all as it does help keep the attention of the older fans. Still, if all you want are focused on is the references and easter eggs, you will fail to appreciate the story and what things they are trying with a newer incarnation.

Too many references and homages to other versions or other franchises can ruin the story.

Take the farmhouse arc for example. The first time the Turtles go to the farmhouse it is when they have suffered their first major defeat and they need a space to lick their wounds, regroup, and recover. With the 2012 incarnation that could have been a slew of the turtles and family dealing with existential issues with themselves and with each other.

But instead, they use it as an excuse to say "Oh we're going to bring a reference to this, and to this, and this, and oh we have pay homage to this."

And that just made that arc feel like a slog.


It's like watching a Harry Potter film and then instead of appreciating the effort that went into the movie and how they were able to translate the story to film, you do long diatribes about how the film sucks because it didn't make everything accurate to the book.

Every version of this franchise will be different, and that is okay. April doesn't need to be a grown woman with a job in every version. The Shredder doesn't need be in the first season of every version. Heck, the Turtles don't even need to be teenagers in every version.

You can have incarnations where they are little kids (without having to go into muppet baby situations) and it can still be entertaining.


You can also have incarnations where they are adults and facing what that means for them now that their childhood has ended.

By insisting a version needs to be like the previous version is not letting people who have the rights to the series explore and experiment with what could be done with this series. It won't always make sense and it may not be what you feel it should be. But that doesn't mean the franchise is ruined, there is still 30+ years of other material to enjoy until the next version. Or just planning out your own version in the mean time.

My title was a bit exaggerated, and I admit it. But I also have to say that the old serie never really attracted me, due to the influence of the 2003 serie, so I'm not certain about the last sentence. Each version could make you fall in love with the turtles.

I'm totally into this quote. But the use of nostalgic/referencial elements, 70% of the times, gives guaranteed profit (just look at Nintendo), so is not that weird that such big company like Nickelodeon (that needs guaranted profit) tried to referene both of the older series. In fact, alot of 2012 original elements are just "wut?".

Your idea is perfect, but I would add the progressive change of plot, just like in the 2003 and 2012 adaptations. I mean at first is more concentrated on the characters, making them look funny or easily distinguishable, and as the story goes on, concentrate more on interesting and "serious" episode plots.

Sorry, my connection lagged and made two posts.

I think constantly revamping the character designs is making a good contribution to killing it, some later adaptions have worked, but many go too far. You can play with stories, levels of seriousness kid-level or adult-level, voices, and whatever else, but when it comes to cartoons/comics, in spite of the saying books shouldn't be judged by cover, appearance is definitely, how do you say, "9/10 of the law".

If you mean character design esthetically, I'm ok with that.
But except the Bay turtles nothing as really come close to a bad or exaggerated design.
Yeah maybe ripped Raffaello (Raphael) of Rise of the TMNT looks abit weird, but is not THAT bad.

If you mean character design psychologically , I do not agree.
The best way to revamp a TMNT character is trought that. Just look at Casey Jones, Karai and Splinter trought the series.

I'd agree that Platinum Dunes and Rise went too far in redesigning the characters, but I can't say the original design choice of "four identical guys with different weapons" was perfectly fine either, and making the masks different colors was about the lowest effort to fix it.

We obviously don't need Donatello to have an oversized head, and goggles, and thick glasses, and wrist gadgets, and a tech staff, and some proton pack all at the same just to tell him apart from his brothers. At that point, there's almost reason for the purple mask anymore, other than tradition I guess. But while it is certainly overcompensating for a bad design choice in the past, that doesn't mean they don't have the right idea.

If we stick to Don as an example, what can we do to make him look different from brothers but not call it a day with a different mask color or going bananas?

Personally I believe keeping the boys looking alike, save potential color difference in clothing and skin, has contributed well to keeping the limelight going for the franchise. Some things you can change, but some traditions you don't want to stray away from, some things shouldn't have too much effort put into them or try to be improved upon.