If you were above the age of the target audience when you first saw it...

[neatoman]

... What is your opinion of the first cartoon?
Keep in mind, this question is only for people who did not watch many or any episodes of it before they were older than the target audience. The people who do not have childhood nostalgia for the cartoon.

I was a too young to watch it when it stopped airing so when I first watched an episode I was about 14-15. Not to go into too much detail, I've never held the first cartoon in very high regard in terms of quality. It's undeniably important to the franchise but I can't say it's good when simply judged as entertainment.

[CyberCubed]

I had completely forgotten about most of the episodes when the DVDs came out so it was like experiencing them for the first time. I enjoyed most of the episodes.

As long as you accept the show for what it is, a fun, episodic and silly show about good guys versus comical and goofy villains, it's great entertainment.

The OT came at a time when cartoons were meant to be fun turn your brain off entertainment. That's why adults can still enjoy it.

[Refractive Reflections]

My response is similar to CyberCubed's. I enjoyed the series moderately back then as a kid, but I forgot most of the plots, villains and individual episodes by the time I became a teenager and was interested in other hobbies, but after watching them again through adult eyes (wondering what I saw in it back then), I enjoy its charismatic tone especially the chemistry with the voice actors. (Can't say the same for some of the other cartoons I rewatched back then, such as Super Mario Bros. which is just red-face, funny embarrassment moments sometimes with the live-actor intros before the actual cartoon began.) There are a lot of finer details in the OT (subtle humor, breaking the fourth wall, and deeper themes such as with the economy with Kerma's gold machine and importance of publicity in "Turtles on Trial"), that I never bothered contemplating before as a kid but noticed in the cartoon again, which actually made me have a deeper level of appreciation for it.

I showed my younger cousins the OT the first time (they generally knew about it but never really bothered with TMNT worrying that it was "too old") last year when they were 20, 17, and 13 years old and they enjoyed the series more than I did since it was the first time they experienced it. Now they aren't enthusiastic to watch it all the time, but they usually bring up viewing the series whenever I stop by and visit.

It really depends what you are looking for in this series. If you want easier, lighter plots (remember it was designed for syndication, so the plots had to fit within one episode) with a generally comedic tone (and some occasional serious moments) and feel good endings, then you'll enjoy it. If that's not how you want to enjoy TMNT, then it won't be enjoyable.

[ABrown]

Originally Posted by CyberCubed

I had completely forgotten about most of the episodes when the DVDs came out so it was like experiencing them for the first time. I enjoyed most of the episodes.

Seriously? In the late 90's, I went to all of the local video stores and rented every VHS I could find. The video stores near me, pretty much all of which have gone out of business, carried many VHS tapes from the original cartoon. It hadn't really been that long since I'd seen many of the episodes from the series. And I still remembered the majority of the rest of the episodes from seasons 1-4. I didn't remember the episodes from seasons 5-8 as much because I was far more interested in sports and video games from 1992-1996.