Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Thread

[Drtooth]

Okay... someone had to have seen last night's season finale.

Gilbert Godfrey Kraangs? The Kraang horribly Cronenberging New York? Leatherhead getting in a brawl with Shredder and losing?

And the whole thing ends with their version of the North Hampton Farm arc, complete with Leonardo being knocked out. The one good thing about them withholding the episodes until after the movie, at least there's no gap between this and the season opener.

Also, I found out why they took so long to get Karai into the toy line up...

they wanted to make her into her mutated form Still weird they didn't incorporate her regular appearance into the line first, like Stockman. She had a Lego before a Playmates toy.

 

[mr3urious]

Now that was an epic finale reminiscent of the 1st live-action movie and the 4Kids episode where they are forced to live at April's old farmhouse. Loved the Gilbert Gottfried-voiced Kraang Sub-Prime, who is implied to be the Krang from the Fred Wolf series.

Overall, the 2nd season was an improvement over the 1st. It had a better focus on developing characters rather than introducing as many of them as possible, and the stakes were raised significantly, especially near the end. I expect the 3rd season to be more about internal conflicts like that 4Kids arc about Leo's fall from grace.

 

[Drtooth]

Personally, I like how this series actually manages to out dark the 2K3 show. Even the wackier episodes like the one with Pizzaface have some pretty disturbing elements to them.

I'm glad they're incorporating the exodus to the family farm. That's a very significant, recurring theme in TMNT comic history. The only major continuity that ignored it was the 80's cartoon. Even the new comic series had them fleeing. That will make the return to New York all the more powerful.

 

[CensoredAlso]

OK, there are times in life where I am delighted to be proven wrong. This, miraculously, is one of those times...I really enjoyed the new turtles film!

I don't care about the plot, etc. Bottom line for me, I liked the turtles as characters. They were consistently funny and likeable, and as an '80s cartoon fan, that's what I look for. Even Fox did a good job; I do think we were all a bit too hard on her (thanks to Bay's nonsense).

I don't know how much Bay actually had to do with this movie. Either way, someone clearly learned the lessons of what went wrong with Bayformers. Finally, it feels like the audience was actually listened to!

In a bold move, I'm going to update my rankings of all the turtles films:

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (1990) - Nothing can ever top that
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (2014) - Yes, I'm serious.
TMNT III (If only because Corey Feldman was back)
TMNT II: Secret of the Ooze (Never really liked this one; too silly. Though Ernie Reyes was fun back then.)
TMNT (2007) (Haven't seen it all, but seemed kinda sterile)

 

[Drtooth]

I don't know how much Bay actually had to do with this movie. Either way, someone clearly learned the lessons of what went wrong with Bayformers. Finally, it feels like the audience was actually listened to!

Eh... I'd argue that the film has the one big sin of the Transformer movies everyone can agree on. TOO MUCH human focus. April is one thing, and tying her even moreso into the Turtles lives by having her more involved with the turtles' mutation isn't out of the question (IDW has her just as involved, albeit differently), but it really seemed like I was watching April O'Neil the movie instead of the Turtles. And Eric Sacks... ugh... I'm glad they listened to the fans and put the proper, Japanese Oroku Saki Shredder in the film, but as a result, Eric was a completely useless character that took up too much screen time and stole roles intended for both Shredder and Baxter Stockman. Oroku could have easily fit in the evil rich guy destroying and extorting the city role. Baxter indeed was supposed to take on his obsessed with science and the make up of the Turtles role but (and I'm not kidding, this was revealed) they edited Baxter out specifically to fit Eric back into the film after they pandered to the audience with Saki Shredder.

And they truly lost potential by not making Vernon slightly antagonistic of April, even though he was perfectly cast.

However, I do think that when the turtles actually got screen time, that was the best bots of the film. I'm one of the few that actually defended the redesigned look and all the little details they put into them, and utilizing actors in giant backpacks and motion capture CGI-ing over them was a brilliant move. That's what more of these CGI movies need, things that actors can actually react to. And I love how the personalities are almost exactly what they are from the current cartoon series. Mikey especially. I LOVE the original movie, but as a kid it was jarring to see Raph's original comic book anger instead of passive aggressive sarcasm.

I enjoyed the film and all, even though I have a few complaints, but it only makes me hopeful we'll see more of a Turtle-centric plot next film.

 

[CensoredAlso]

I remember thinking that about Bayformers. I honestly didn't have that same complaint with the turtles movie. Yeah, the villains weren't entirely captivating. There always has to be something, right?

 

[Drtooth]

The film's biggest sin was keeping Eric in the movie at the risk of ticking off an actor by gutting all of his scenes from the movie to remove him completely. The story goes, Eric was supposed to actually be the Shredder as an inherited title (much like that of Karai in the original comics and 2k3 series), with the additional reasoning that he was Saki's adopted son. The internet complained about it (myself included, and I feel bad about it now), they heard the complaints and responded to them. Which I give them credit for. Unfortunately, the side effect was that he was given the role of 2 other characters, one was scuttled off to the sides (Shredder), one was deleted completely (Stockman). Eh, I'll give a third. Karai was also sort of there. Props to her inclusion, but she should have really been Shredder's right hand Ninja instead of the mercenary that owns the Foot clan she became. But all of that could be fixed with a second film focusing on Shredder and the Turtles. Other than that, I did like the film. Just wish there were more Turtles in a movie about the Turtles.

Of course, the other big lesson they learned from the Transformers movies... the time! The running time was mercifully short (which had the unfortunateness of the human stuff overrunning the Turtle stuff). I've only been able to sit through one of the TF movies, and that was Age of Extinction. And I...well.. enjoyed it, but not immensely. The whole opening bit about the Kaede family just dragged on and on... and it took forever for the Autobots to really make their presence known. The "We found a Transformer" plotline didn't even get going for a ways in. And it really didn't actually get fun until the other Autobots were introduced, at which point Hound stole the movie until Stanley Tucci stole it back. There was a fun movie in there, and the film actually set up some impressive things that got me actually excited for the fifth one (Quintessons might be involved, and there's a slim chance the film could mostly take place in space), but that loooooong slog through the Kaede family's segment of the movie was just... ugh. Seriously, in the right hands, these films could have been far better, even with the same storylines. Just lop off half the human stuff and strengthen the Cybertronians' roles and you got solid pop corn flicks.

And the humans were STILL better than Daniel Witwicky in Headmasters. I seriously suggest they get checked out to see how much of a BAD audience surrogate he is. He manages to out cry-baby Nobita from Doraemon!

 

[Drtooth]

On the subject of the show, while I am enjoying the filler arc of horror movie homages on the farmhouse (the one with April's "mother" is the best one), I'm chomping at the bit for them to get back to New York and introducing Bebop and Rocksteady.

EDIT: Oh... I almost forgot. While clearly not as good or in the league as good as NECA's, Playmates has released comic book versions of the turtles. They're mixed in with the regular figure series, but they're also available in (ripoff) larger packages with reprint comics. But you're really better off buying the regular run figures and checking your local comics store for the reprints. They charge, like, 8 extra bucks for a 4 dollar comic.

 

[Bridget]

So I have finally caught myself up to the latest episodes. First of all, let me just say, I am basically a new generation TMNT fan. I am just now looking back at the old school episodes and movies after being addicted to the new series! I'm love, love, LOVING what I'm seeing so far! I really enjoyed the episode with Aprils "mother" in it! To be honest I was extremely convinced in the beginning of the episode that it was actually her, but obviously I was wrong. Right now, I'm looking forward to the return of Master Splinter, and hopefully the restoration of justice to NYC. The only thing I'm not too happy about is Leonardo's new voice actor.

 

[Drtooth]

By no means do I dislike Seth Green's Leonardo voice. I just wonder why they didn't just go for the sound-a-like they had for several episodes. Jason Biggs got too busy with Orange is the New Black. Then again, Seth Green's got Family Guy, Robot Chicken, Agents of S.M.A.S.H., and a couple others I can't remember at the moment.

In the meanwhile, guess what the hot kid's toy is this season again?! Went to Target last night and only a couple Mouser packs and movie Foot Soldiers were left on the shelves. Respect, yo!