Character Portrayals

[Sage Ninja]

Some times when you are watching the show are there times when you feel a little alienated by how a certain character acts or behaves in certain scenes or episodes? You know times when you think the writting isn't staying true to the character, or you just feel that a certain character is being OOC (out of Character).

Now I'm not saying that these little times are always bad because sometimes its fun to see a character act a little differently than how you noramally see them. or sometimes they are not even being that out of character and it is just the impression you got when you first so the episode.

Instances that gave me pause or weirded me out a bit by how a character was acting was in the Cousin Sid episode. When Raphael made a rather insencative remark to Leonardo, about needing karai to stab him more often. Now I know that is was a small remark, but any one else feel that remark was too inscentive even for Raphael. I felt that Rapahel was acting a little out of character at that moment. And that same episode seeing Donatello fight that bad guy in the barn all aggressively like was something I found out character to how he usually acts. it was actually a cool OOC moment because seeing pacifist Don fighting more aggresively was a treat.

Another instance was in the episode Hunted I think that was the name. Where Leatherhead has a nightmare and tries to hurt Mikey. And Leatherhead runs out crying thinking he killed him, and Mikey was faking the whole time! I didn't like how the writer wrote that scene. I think the writer took Mikey's nature for practical jokes to far and made him insencitive in that scene. Especially since orgianlly Mikey was so concerned for him.

Does any one else have moments in the series where they thought the portrayal of a character seemed diffrent from other times?

[Masked Ninja]

Well.... Raph can be Raph, and I always write off that remark as being funnier in his head than it was in real life. I'm pretty conscious of others' feelings, and I have done that.

Now, I can agree on Don. Except for I think most of the fight was pretty in character, but it was that final taunt and punch that threw me. Don was doing his job - taking the Dragon out - and he did it with his usual ingenuity. It was very effective. But if I'd been writing him, he probably would have stopped at the stuffing-hay-in-the-mouth and left him hanging, rather than (almost gleefully) knocking the guy's lights out.

And Mikey in Hunted... I musta missed that whole "faking" thing, because I thought he was a little stunned...? It's been a while, but I never caught the "heh, I pretended to be hurt!" angle. That would be over the line, especially for Mikey, who's more in tune with others' feelings than Raph, IMHO. I did spend that whole episode wanting to give Leatherhead a hug or something, though. Poor croc.

[triplexxx]

Personally, I believe there is a lot more to the turtles than is portrayed on screen. I believe no matter how unusual they may act at times, there really is no such thing as "out of character" for them. They are humanoid creatures capable of any human emotions, feelings, acts, or thoughts. I do believe the new cartoon writers portray the turtles as "stereotypes" too much, and in doing so put too much emphasis on their differences and not enough on their similarities. Character development requires a good deal of variation in one's character, and I have seen very little of this in the new show. They really need to give the turtles much larger atmospheres as individuals.

[Jo Dawn]

My example: Fast Forward.









No, wait! It was a joke!!


Ok, seriously, I've seen some OOC stuff, but I'm way too tired to think right now. However, I've not seen that Don example that Masked Ninja speaks of, but I agree that it's OOC.

The Raph example, I have to think on a bit. It's an interesting character study thought...

[Masked Ninja]

Originally Posted by triplexxx

Personally, I believe there is a lot more to the turtles than is portrayed on screen. I believe no matter how unusual they may act at times, there really is no such thing as "out of character" for them. They are humanoid creatures capable of any human emotions, feelings, acts, or thoughts. I do believe the new cartoon writers portray the turtles as "stereotypes" too much, and in doing so put too much emphasis on their differences and not enough on their similarities. Character development requires a good deal of variation in one's character, and I have seen very little of this in the new show. They really need to give the turtles much larger atmospheres as individuals.

That's true, but in order for it to work, you need to see why they're not acting true to "stereotype." (Leo's angst fest in season 4 being a good example.) For example, with Don's unusually aggressive pwnage, it would have been great to indicate something different about the Dragon that would cause Don to handle the situation differently. Perhaps there was something that made him seriously annoyed during the fight - it would be so easy to do, because he's basically forced to fight this bozo with a broken arm. Slip a little "why won't you just leave me alone?!" into the acting, or something. Then it would make more sense. I agree that you could probably make any Turtle do anything in a story/toon/whatever, but to avoid being jarring it needs to be put in context.

I'll have to think for a bit for some examples of my own.

Haha, Fast Forward. WhattheCRAPdidtheydotoSplin- *cough* Sorry. *cough cough*

[Sage Ninja]

Originally Posted by triplexxx

Personally, I believe there is a lot more to the turtles than is portrayed on screen. I believe no matter how unusual they may act at times, there really is no such thing as "out of character" for them. They are humanoid creatures capable of any human emotions, feelings, acts, or thoughts. I do believe the new cartoon writers portray the turtles as "stereotypes" too much, and in doing so put too much emphasis on their differences and not enough on their similarities. Character development requires a good deal of variation in one's character, and I have seen very little of this in the new show. They really need to give the turtles much larger atmospheres as individuals.

Actually I rather agree with this statment. I actually believe that the turtles have many diffrent facets to their characters. I think as brothers they all interact with each other and find things that are similar to each other on different levels. I notice for instance that when Don is hanging around Raphael he tends to act more active and aggressive and over-all less quite. When Leo is hanging out around Mikey i notice he seems more relaxed and playful and over-all less serious. Like in the Nobody's Fool when they where out playing around on the roof tops together, and then later when he and Mikey did that silly synchranised fighting technigue thingy with Touch and Go. So I don't find unusal to see Leo occasinally acting silly or Don losing his temper. I just thought that sometimes the writers take some of their sterotypes and go over board with them. Like Mikey's love of pracitcal jokes or Raphael's insencitve blunt nature.

And Mikey in Hunted... I musta missed that whole "faking" thing, because I thought he was a little stunned...? It's been a while, but I never caught the "heh, I pretended to be hurt!" angle. That would be over the line, especially for Mikey, who's more in tune with others' feelings than Raph, IMHO.

I might have to watch that scene again really closely one more time. But my first impression of that scene came off as Mikey was pretending to be nocked senceless. I don't rember what, but Mikey made a comment when Raphael picked him up that suggested that he was "all there" when Leatherhead was still in the room and had over heard what he had said. Which means he had to of been conscince to have heard it and still didn't rous him self to show that he was not hurt. I was going WTF at that scene.

That's true, but in order for it to work, you need to see why they're not acting true to "stereotype." (Leo's angst fest in season 4 being a good example.) For example, with Don's unusually aggressive pwnage, it would have been great to indicate something different about the Dragon that would cause Don to handle the situation differently. Perhaps there was something that made him seriously annoyed during the fight - it would be so easy to do, because he's basically forced to fight this bozo with a broken arm. Slip a little "why won't you just leave me alone?!" into the acting, or something. Then it would make more sense. I agree that you could probably make any Turtle do anything in a story/toon/whatever, but to avoid being jarring it needs to be put in context.

That is a very good point. And something to look into. I love analising scenes because sometimes there is something that is valididly there that is to suble to see at first. If I recall right Don was visably hurting because of his arm when he was rolling a barral across the ceiling. Maybe that really pissed him and he wanted to inflict the same pain of the guy that he feeling. But even then that seems a little to vindictive for Donatello.

[ThemanthatwouldbeRaphael]

Originally Posted by Sage Ninja

Some times when you are watching the show are there times when you feel a little alienated by how a certain character acts or behaves in certain scenes or episodes? You know times when you think the writting isn't staying true to the character, or you just feel that a certain character is being OOC (out of Character).

Now I'm not saying that these little times are always bad because sometimes its fun to see a character act a little differently than how you noramally see them. or sometimes they are not even being that out of character and it is just the impression you got when you first so the episode.

Instances that gave me pause or weirded me out a bit by how a character was acting was in the Cousin Sid episode. When Raphael made a rather insencative remark to Leonardo, about needing karai to stab him more often. Now I know that is was a small remark, but any one else feel that remark was too inscentive even for Raphael. I felt that Rapahel was acting a little out of character at that moment. And that same episode seeing Donatello fight that bad guy in the barn all aggressively like was something I found out character to how he usually acts. it was actually a cool OOC moment because seeing pacifist Don fighting more aggresively was a treat.

That was just a joke Raph made. At the time he didn't know how far Leo would take this whole angst thing. He liked the fact that Leo was being more gung ho. As for Don fighting that guy, he was a Purple Dragon! He was gonna hurt his friends, wouldn't you fight aggressivley in that case?

Another instance was in the episode Hunted I think that was the name. Where Leatherhead has a nightmare and tries to hurt Mikey. And Leatherhead runs out crying thinking he killed him, and Mikey was faking the whole time! I didn't like how the writer wrote that scene. I think the writer took Mikey's nature for practical jokes to far and made him insencitive in that scene. Especially since orgianlly Mikey was so concerned for him.

He wasn't faking, he was just out of it for a while, LH hit him pretty hard. Not even Mikey would do anything like that.

Does any one else have moments in the series where they thought the portrayal of a character seemed diffrent from other times?

The only time I see any instances like that, is when Casey acts like the bumbling goof. It's funny sometimes, but others kind of anoyning. Other than that, no.

[Sage Ninja]

Casey being a Joe from Frasier type of goof ball doesn't bother me. And I don't see it as being out of character, because his change over from violent bad-ass vigalante to goof ball happened fairly earlier on in the series. Its kind of like Rocksteady and Bebop being hard core streat thugs that posed an actual threat to the turtles in season one of the classic toon and then turning into endearing bublers for the rest of the series. It happened to earlier on for me to consider the transformation out of Character.

The reason why I made this thread was because I wanted to see other fans reactions to what they thought was out of character behavior of the characters.

Anr instant that I found out of character was when Donatello attacked the dinosaur when it was running away from him and Renent. Now I know that there was some specultion that due to his mutation his judgment was off, but other than that instance you don't see any more slips of judgment on Donatello's part, which you would have expected to see as a follow up to his mutation going all out of wack. So maybe Don attacking the Dino was just a plot point on the writters trying to make a funny.

Another occ moment, even though he deserved it, was Splinter tottally leaveing Mikey hanging when he got challenged to the re-match in the episode Grudge Match. I mean I would expect that from Don and Raph, but I wouldn't expect that sort of pettiness from Splinter. I thought that after teaching him a lesson a little he would give in and lend him a hand. But he never did. Not even a word of encouragement. Which you might have seen from him even if he saw that the training portion was getting taken cared of by Leo. I was alittle supriced at how there was no sign of forgivenss on Splinter's part toward Mikey, even if he was a bit disrespectful to him.