Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Thread

[Hayley B]

Which I frankly never understand. I never started watching a "boy show" because they suddenly added female characters.

Me either. But then again. I was a only girl with three brothers. So, I had to have my brothers have a turn with the tv. Sat through TMNT, He-Man, & GoBots. Ended up liking these shows along with them too.

Alot of girls in my day liked TMNT. Yet the media was only thinking that boys do.

 

[CensoredAlso]

But the network insisted they needed a positive female role model

Yawn, lol. Concentrate on making a likeable character first. Of course it's much easier to just fill a quota.

Yeah Mona Lisa worked well with Raphael actually. That was another time when I could believe the 87 turtles were teenagers.

Alot of girls in my day liked TMNT. Yet the media was only thinking that boys do.

There's far too many tunnel vision people in this world, lol.

 

[Drtooth]

Which I frankly never understand. I never started watching a "boy show" because they suddenly added female characters.

It drives me extremely nuts because the female role models in boys shows are better than some of the ones they have in actual Girl's shows. But some of those positive female role models happen organically in a super hero show when there's female characters in the team to begin with. Storm, Wonder Woman, Raven, for example. April was always strong (stronger in the 2k3 series, not being the hostage most of the time). But to add an inorganic character that throws off the balance of the characters in the show to fill some sort of mandated requirement for artificial tolerance? That's never good. Though I do like how they averted having to put Hawaiian Hula-Hula in the 79 Plastic Man show by making him sound like Lou Costello (which would have worked just as well for Woozy Winks anyway) and have him be the bad luck character that actually affects the hero.

Still... they didn't need a girl turtle.

 

[CensoredAlso]

April was always strong (stronger in the 2k3 series, not being the hostage most of the time).

'87 April was strongest in the Channel 6 scenes. I always liked the way she had to sarcastically put up with all the crazies around her, lol.

 

[CensoredAlso]

But to add an inorganic character that throws off the balance of the characters in the show to fill some sort of mandated requirement for artificial tolerance?

I hate to say this, but part of the blame goes to the women's rights groups who go around accusing the networks of sexism, thus pressuring the networks to create quota filler characters with zero personality.

Rights groups are important, but sometimes they can be very narrow thinking.

 

[Fragglemuppet]

On the other hand, how strong is too strong? I love the idea of April, as I've always loved what I call the outside friend, (although I'm sure DrTooth would know the propper term if there is one. The person in supernatural or superhero shows like this, who's not really a part of the main group but is still close to them and knows their secret. Anyway, that being said, I had problems with both cartoon versions of her. In the 80's toon though, her being rescued so often by the turtles wasn't one of them. She had spunk and would sometimes get in over her head. Granted, there's a lot I haven't seen. I've only seen season 1, parts of seasons 2 and 3, and season 6, lol, so maybe it does in fact get old and I just haven't been over-exposed to it. My problems with the 80's April were her constant search for a story without seeming to care how sensitive the situation around her was at least in the beginning, the general fact that she could be just about as cheesy as the rest of the show, and how snippy she could be with the guys.
There were many things I liked about the 03 April. She was inteligent, showed many times that she genuinely cared about the guys, and had realistic problems to face like losing her job, running a failing business, and having her building burned down. My issue with her is that while the other April could seem too superficially bubbley at times, this one seemed a bit flat. I mean, I know there was a limited amount of time, and there was action to get on with, but her boss tried to kill her! Turtles or no turtles, (besides the fact that if there were no turtles she'd be dead, lol), I'd expect her to be maybe a bit more shocked and upset about it than she was! That's just the first example. It seemed to me that she never really showed much extreme emotion. She would get frustrated at the guys, annoyed at Casey, but mostly it seemed she sort of ran at one speed. Homicidal employers aside, we all have days when we're tired, or just lazy, or sad, or just in a bad mood for no particular reason. She just always seemed ready to "go go go" however, and then she added ninjitsu as well? Nothing wrong with wanting to be helpful and get in on the action, I guess, but it seems they tried to make her out as some sort of superwoman, who was almost the same as the guys. They're mutant turtles who've had a combined 4 lifetimes of training! It's not that she can't do it because she's weak or a woman or anything, but she can't expect to get anywhere near their level over night, and she's just plain not them! Getting back to my original reason for this post, maybe a little weakness now and then isn't a bad thing?

 

[Drtooth]

Sometimes it's directly and sometimes it's indirectly (fear of letters), sometimes it's a self imposed pre-emptive strike, sometimes it's the off hand that they'll buy more toys. They do care who watches the shows, but they could care less who buys the toys. Even if Sid from Toy Story type kids buy them to blow them up, what do they care? They have the money. In the case of film, they add flat female characters to get more little girls in theater seats, even though they rarely market the films with said flat characters, giving you a "What was the point of that" aneurism. Like a certain duller than your average movie about a smarter than your average bear.

And here's the WORST thing... it's completely hypocritical with a maddening double standard. Toy companies refuse to add the female characters to the line up most of the time. This never was a problem with TMNT. April (in every incarnation), Irma, Karai, Venus, I think Mona Lisa, and while not produced, there was a planned Starlee figure. As much as I have problems with Playmates, they never shied away from female characters. However, Mattel skipped Mira Nova from Buzz Lightyear of Star Command dooming us BLoSC fans to have an incomplete crew, they hate the women of Avatar: The Last Airbender, Nami was no where to be found in their terrible One Piece line up, I can't remember if they made any of the female characters in Naruto (I never really followed that, though I know they had a smaller PVC of her in a 3 pack with Naruto and Sasuke). And NO female characters from The Batman or Batman:Brave and the Bold.... yet they do have a good amount of female characters in every other DC comics line.

 

[Hayley B]

I kind of would like to see their theme song a couple more times. Their image in the end kind of looked like their cover from their first comic.

My mother just saw this show for a little bit. She just said they look bad. "Not the quality you guys got as kids" - Mom

 

[Drtooth]

In the 80's toon though, her being rescued so often by the turtles wasn't one of them. She had spunk and would sometimes get in over her head. Granted, there's a lot I haven't seen. I've only seen season 1, parts of seasons 2 and 3, and season 6, lol, so maybe it does in fact get old and I just haven't been over-exposed to it. My problems with the 80's April were her constant search for a story without seeming to care how sensitive the situation around her was at least in the beginning, the general fact that she could be just about as cheesy as the rest of the show, and how snippy she could be with the guys.

I really think that April constantly being a damsel in distress kinda contradicted how strong she was trying to get a story. Sure, she was a feisty captive, but constantly a captive none the less. And she was always the victim of some villain of the week, especially when she was turned into a fish woman in the terrible "Rebel without a Fin" episode. I agree, if it's one thing that made April great in 2K3, it was that she trained under Splinter with the turtles in self defense. You'd think April would have learned better in the old series after getting caught by Shredder all those times.

Though, as much as I hate the last Red Sky season, I really liked April's role as the computer using informant that had to communicate with them secretly. Too bad all the best concepts of the show were wasted in one season...

 

[CensoredAlso]

I really think that April constantly being a damsel in distress kinda contradicted how strong she was trying to get a story.

I don't get mad about that as much as everyone else. She's a human, she's not a ninja, of course she's going to get captured. The same would likely happen to your average man. That doesn't mean they're not strong characters. It just means they're civilians, the kind the Turtles are supposed to be protecting.