TMNT Goes Nickelodeon

[ShadowSJG]

Lost me when they said Leo has 'swagger'.

[Meta77]

That so isn't April. There's altering a chacter and outright someone different

 

[Conando]

If it's about the skin thing, April O'Neil actually was an African American in the Mirage Comics. 

[Balding Spider]

25 minutes ago, Conando said:

If it's about the skin thing, April O'Neil actually was an African American in the Mirage Comics. 

Just heard that. Honestly for the longest time even after seeing some art work I thought she was white.

[Milo]

Pretty ambivalent about April's design change.

Not really fond of any of the turtle designs, but I don't necessarily really have a strong opinion against them.

....however, I think Splinter looks absolutely terrible. Maybe he could had been passable if it wasn't for the "stout old man" body shape/proportions.

That said, I didn't really watch much of the previous CG show, so eh. My opinion might not mean much.

[Conando]

6 minutes ago, Balding Spider said:

Just heard that. Honestly for the longest time even after seeing some art work I thought she was white.

In colored art she was pretty light skinned, yeah. Though it's fairly obvious she wasn't the redhead she is in newer media. Her characterization was never all that consistent in the cartoons either, with the 2003 version being closest at least at first.

[Balding Spider]

22 minutes ago, Space☆Yeow said:

Pretty ambivalent about April's design change.

Not really fond of any of the turtle designs, but I don't necessarily really have a strong opinion against them.

....however, I think Splinter looks absolutely terrible. Maybe he could had been passable if it wasn't for the "stout old man" body shape/proportions.

That said, I didn't really watch much of the previous CG show, so eh. My opinion might not mean much.

The problem with this Splinter is that there's a distinct lack respect and dignity in his design. In most popular mediums with the Turtles Splinter is typically shown as an older figure exuding experience in martial arts and in life in general. That's absent with this design.

Looking at it I'd say he looks like he came straight from Samurai Jack.

[Conando]

I suppose that's not surprising since the art designer worked on Samurai Jack. Shit, when I saw Splinter I was thinking Clone Wars Yoda. They could have just gone with him being a brown rat like he always has been.

[Meta77]

4 hours ago, Conando said:

If it's about the skin thing, April O'Neil actually was an African American in the Mirage Comics. 

There's no indication she was. I grew up and still have most the mirage line. Her sister was white "roynin" even so that's not the issue it's just off.  Like if you went with April since well the 80s cartoon to now to suddenly go bam is a bit odd. It be like changing optimus to orange and blue.  but still these designs scream ttg  Ben 10 reboot cash grab

[Conando]

If you take that big of an issue with the amount of melanin in her skin, I would think you'd be just as shocked over how they change everything about her except for the red hair in every new incarnation of the tv series. I would think the most pressing matter is how the turtles are a bunch of different species now, which doesn't make sense considering they are and always have been brothers. And no, April was indeed of ambiguous race in the earliest issues of the mirage comics. Hell, she got her name from Eastman's girlfriend, who was a black woman.

[Kevin]

I don’t care for their new designs at all (at least they got April more in line with how she was in the comics). Splinter’s design looks to be the worst out of all of them.

[AdventChild]

Another problem I actually have with this April is with the glasses and hair style she feels more like Irma and if they introduce an Irma that's looks more like an O'Neil than it'll be confusing as all shell.

[Failinhearts]

Man, these designs look like hot garbage. There are some good ideas at least story and character-wise, and thank god Mikey's saying Cowabunga again.

Meh. Still, I dunno if I'm really gonna watch this show. At least, not a lot. I've never been a guy to watch a show anyway. My attention span's too short. :V

Still... these fucking designs, man.

[Meta77]

5 hours ago, Conando said:

If you take that big of an issue with the amount of melanin in her skin, I would think you'd be just as shocked over how they change everything about her except for the red hair in every new incarnation of the tv series. I would think the most pressing matter is how the turtles are a bunch of different species now, which doesn't make sense considering they are and always have been brothers. And no, April was indeed of ambiguous race in the earliest issues of the mirage comics. Hell, she got her name from Eastman's girlfriend, who was a black woman.

I take no issue with that. I got enough melanin in my body to match her. But simply a throwback to a comic I doubt the designers knew of is a tough cookie to change with her look for nearly 25 years. Her is not as big a change e as girls always tweak their hair bit she's normally 85% of the time red

[Swing]

I really.... can not form an opinion yet. The designs look a touch to unfamiliar for my taste. I first have to see them in action and how the show is animated. But, I have to say, it will take a while until I get used to the new designs. April especially looks like a very different character. Everything about her is new. Face, outfit, skin color, powers why not make this a brand new character instead?

The turtles themselves.... yeah, they are okay I guess. But it is really strange that Leonardo and Raphael switched roles.

[Ryannumber1gamer]

2 hours ago, Swing said:

The turtles themselves.... yeah, they are okay I guess. But it is really strange that Leonardo and Raphael switched roles.

Maybe someone heard Turtle Power from 1990 and thought the "Ralph is the leader" line as accurate.

[Forte-Metallix]

New action figures for Rise of the TMNT have been leaked, giving us another look at the new designs:

Spoiler

Not really liking these, especially April's new "pet".

What's more noteworthy, however, is that Foot Soldiers have been confirmed:

Spoiler

I can only imagine how bad Shredder will look.

Finally, here's a new villain called "Meat Sweats". Eew...

Spoiler

You can see more toys here:

http://collider.com/rise-of-the-teenage-mutant-ninja-turtles-toys/#vehicles-playsets

Oh, and apparently Donnie's cybernetic shell sidekick is called "Shelldon." Clever.

[Ryannumber1gamer]

Y'know, that design just reminds me of nothing about April, and it's not even the race change, it's just the sheer fact the only thing she even retained that can be associated with her is the yellow under her jacket. That's it. 

Even when 2012 redesigned her, she kept a lot of the design choices that still made her look like April. She was a red-head, she had the same colour schemed outfit only altered to be a more teenage design with it being a jersey and such. But this design has nothing that looks like her.

On 2/2/2018 at 1:58 AM, Conando said:

If it's about the skin thing, April O'Neil actually was an African American in the Mirage Comics. 

That's actually a misconception. This was April's original design from one of the earliest coloured covers of Mirage.

In fact, the original concept for April's race was a lot different. She was intended to be a different race before being changed later, said race would've actually been Asian. According to the TMNT Wikia: 

Spoiler

April O'Neil was originally planned by Peter Laird to be an Asian woman, though ended up being portrayed as a Caucasian-looking woman in most published Mirage TMNT works, with the exception of a few more ethnically-ambiguous appearances such as in Issue #4.

 There is reason to believe that April was originally African American, but it was down to lousy colouring. From what info I could gather, April was originally named after Eastman's girlfriend at the time of her creation, and she would later undergo an design alteration by Eastman because he wanted April to resemble his girlfriend more. The explanation of the design was that April recently had gone for a make over and received a perm and a tan (Something we can only assume Eastman's girlfriend at the time had). However, as it's been quite famously shown, TMNT was originally black and white and the turtles didn't receive their multi-coloured masks til the 80s series. This had effects on the other characters in the comic and the misconception stems from miscolouring where the black and white colouring meant the attempt to tan April up to resemble Eastman's girlfriend led to her appearing to have gotten a race change.

[Zaysho]

This is probably the best write up I've seen on the subject: http://tmntentity.blogspot.com/2018/02/was-april-oneil-originally-black-in.html

It might be true that both creators may have had different intentions initially but neither of these came to pass by the time they actually drew her introductory pages. At best Laird suspects the two might have some difference in opinion, but Eastman also had a habit of portraying whoever he was in a relationship one way or the other. April was named after his then-girlfriend/wife, and he might have taken some design cues from her (hence the perm) but nothing the pair oversaw reflected an intention of making her race something else. There were some guest comics that gave her a different portrayal, but those are often disregarded for one reason or another (legally or otherwise).

I just find it weird that this new portrayal is being seen as more true to the creator intent but it's never pointed out that, in all these years, across all these incarnations they never "fixed" this when given the opportunity. It took another company, not the original creators who have no creative control anymore, to do it. I don't think it has anything to do with fan expectations, because each version has always been different. The only Fred Wolf design aspect that I think has ever been consistent were the Turtles' headband colors, and that was because Laird was asked by Playmates to differentiate them for merchandising, and it was also a quick reference during the many years the Turtles all the looked the same (and Mirage still kept the red headbands). Laird did not hesitate to go back to Baxter Stockman's original appearance, and I don't think we even have a clear explanation as to why he was made white in the first cartoon (I heard one person once say it had to do with not having a negative portrayal of black people, but Baxter in the cartoon is portrayed as a victim of Shredder rather than some scientist turned thief doing it for kicks, and we still have Bebop--an original character--as a black kid shaking down people for the Foot Clan before he was mutated, so that isn't it).

I personally don't mind that her race is changed for the cartoon since it's a different incarnation and stuff like this happens from time to time to change things up (and, frankly, it's the only thing I don't dislike), but I don't think it's accurate to say this is as originally intended.

[Ryannumber1gamer]

4 minutes ago, Zaysho said:

but I don't think it's accurate to say this is as originally intended.

I'm surprised this misconception has happened so much to begin with, because considering that the 2003 series did revert a lot of changes to retie them back to the comics (Reintroducing the utroms, Splinter being the pet of Yoshi, as opposed to Yoshi mutated into a rat, April being back to her job as a scientist, and most importantly - Baxter having reverted back to his original appearance). If any show was going to fix such a thing, it would've been 2003.

[PC the Hedgehog]

That Splinter toy looks a lot better than the character art. I think I could actually warm up to his new look. Kinda cute, even.

[Blue Wisp]

#NotMyTurtles

No seriously what the fuck are these designs.

What the fuck happened to Splinter.

What the fuck happened to April. She reminds me of Marvel's Moon Girl, if I looked at her out of context I would've thought she's for a new unrelated kid's show or a superhero animated series. 

WHERE ARE RAPHAEL'S FUCKING SAIS. 

Why change the status quo just for the sake of change? This doesn't add to the Turtles, it just changes who they are because I don't know, a paycheck. 

Hell, fucking Michael Bay's Turtles are a better design than these pieces of shit. How can you even achieve that?

[Forte-Metallix]

Here's our first look at the new bad guy:

Spoiler

An alchemist warrior mutant from the Hidden City, Baron Draxum is the self-proclaimed protector of all mutant-kind. Using ooze, he plans to mutate all of humanity with his insect-like creatures called Oozesquitoes.  John Cena’s recurring character will debut in the premiere episode of Rise of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, bowing later this year on Nickelodeon.

Can't say I'm looking forward to this guy. I miss Shredder already.

[Ryannumber1gamer]

I think I honestly hate this show more and more with every single new piece of information that comes out.

The new personalities for the turtles, maybe with Raph given an exception does not fit whatsoever to me. Leo should not be some kind of fun-loving hot-headed irresponsible dude. His entire character is based around being someone burdened with the role of a leader, having to learn to adapt to his new role, as well as having his personality clash with his brothers. 

And don't get me wrong here. I am not against adding new layers to a character or giving them new personality traits. My problem is that they have to fit. TMNT 2012's Leo is probably my favourite adaption of the character, because not only is his established personality still there, but they add a ton of likeable traits to him that give him more personality. He's a comic and sci-fi nerd, he gets into cartoon shows around space heroes, he acts over the top and more gullible. He still likes having fun and not being serious all of the time. But he was still the most responsible of the turtles, and had to go through that growth. He was still Leo.

This is not Leo. None of this is like Leo. This is Leo in name only at best. Yeah, maybe they pull off something decent with Raph, but if you have to practically butcher one of the other characters to do that, or better yet, if your best idea for an arc is basically "what if we did the leo and raph arc but switch the roles around?" then it is absolutely not worth it.

And if that's what they've done to Leo, and given the character designs of the turtles and Splinter alone, as well as the generic as fuck design of this new villain meant to replace Shredder. I'm not holding my hopes up.

[AdventChild]

On 3/7/2018 at 10:58 AM, Forte-Metallix said:

Here's our first look at the new bad guy:

  Reveal hidden contents

An alchemist warrior mutant from the Hidden City, Baron Draxum is the self-proclaimed protector of all mutant-kind. Using ooze, he plans to mutate all of humanity with his insect-like creatures called Oozesquitoes.  John Cena’s recurring character will debut in the premiere episode of Rise of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, bowing later this year on Nickelodeon.

Can't say I'm looking forward to this guy. I miss Shredder already.

You know it's bad when Dexter's Lab anime parody villain Hookocho looks way better than this generic tripe (sorry for poor quality pic):

It does make miss Shred Head even more, but I do worry how they'll handle his character design and/or concept wise if he appears.