The problems with cartoons as advertisement.

[neatoman]

I've seen a few places online where some people don't understand why it might be a problem with this concept. It's an argument I have used against the Fred Wolf cartoon (but to be honest many of the problems caused the advertise applies to the other TMNT cartoons as well) and I figured we might as well have the discussion here. There are basically two ways of taking an issue with the concept:

1. The first one, and the problem I personally have with it, is that the need to advertise tends to eat into the writing. Such as characters that only exist to advertise their action figures could eat up episodes that could be spent on the main characters, or characters could be phased out simply because their action figures are going off the shelves.
2. The second, more ideological one, is that it might not be entirely ethical to blur the line between advertisement and entertainment. While that isn't my own stance, it's worth noting that these sorts of cartoons are straight up illegal to air in some countries, precisely because they are considered advertisement towards children.

Now I should point out that a show turning action figures into characters does not inherently make a show bad. If the toy company doesn't interfere too much with the production and the show has clever writers, you might never suspect the show was intended as advertisement. The problem is that the toy company might make very strange demands that make more sense for normal advertisement but not so much for something meant to pass for entertainment.

An example of a cartoon that was very obviously on a tight leash from the toy company was the original Transformers cartoon. The first episode alone feature the introduction of over 30 "main" characters, then proceeds keep introducing new characters over the first two seasons so frequently that the show just started to neglect explaining where they came from and acted as if they had always been around. Then there is that movie where quite a lot of them drop dead and are replaced with a completelty new set of characters for the third season.
These are simply not creative decisions that would be made if the toy company had not been so heavily involved with the production.

As for TMNT... Remember how the 2012 Turtles had two ugly eyesore cars even though the show tried to emphasise stealth? That would be a fairly clear example of a somewhat less fundamental problem, as it does not alter the main cast of characters, but still one clearly caused by the need to market toys. Doesn't matter if just a single one of these vehicles grinds against what the show tries to be, both needed to be there to make the kids more likely to want both.