Turtle Tracks: Overview

A few months ago, I hinted that I may look at another mutant group. The only difference between the X-Men and these guys is that these dudes are "awesome", "righteous," and maybe a little "Bossa Nova!" That's right, I'm talking about the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. For this segment, I'll go over a few things. It's not gonna be a themed month with this here. It'll pretty much be a "whenever" thing.

What I'm not going to do is do a detailed look at the two shows I have watched. I haven't seen new show as of yet. If they start to air it on Netflix, I might give it a go. I'll explain why below in my look at my time with the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.

Before The JLA, Spider-Man, the X-Men, Batman, and even Superman, there were the these guys. I don't remember what drew me to the old show. It may have either been the toys, the show itself, or the movie which was out at the time. All I know is this: I enjoyed the crap out of it. For this, I got three sections: Action figures, movies, and TV.

Toys
I don't know how many TMNT action figures I owned. I know I least had each Turtle and Splinter. I also know that I won't be able to pass them on to Rylie or Archie Jr. (possible names for kids) as well.

Let's see what I can remember:

• Michelangelo as a pirate, Donatello as a superhero, either Raph or Mikey in samurai gear, Leonardo as the Wolfman, a duck (I don't remember the name), the original Splinter, some of the original Turtles,...
• Some Turtles that transformed into vehicles, a couple that actually turned into turtles (not real ones, it was like a before/after thing), the movie version of Mikey, and Raph as a rock star (...I think).

All I know is that I don't have them now. I was pretty tough on my toys in my youth. I left them in places, they got broken, or they got taken by cousins. I think I saw the Mikey Pirate around somewhere in the yard.

Oh man... I think I actually owned one of these things! I can't believe I lost it! Ugh....

The Movies
The movies were (for a while) on a different level and I will talk about them later on. I have the first movie on VHS. I remember that my kindergarten class started to watch the first movie, but our teacher took it out because of all of the cussing going on. I or my dad "borrowed" it from my grandparents' house in West Tennessee. It actually still plays well but it does screw around at the part where Danny leaves the sewer for a bit. I first saw the second movie on a trip to Iowa. I literally saw that thing twice in a role. We were at a relative's, so there really wasn't much for a 7 year-old to do.

One wonders why this movie didn't get a sequel...

I saw the third movie on TV and eventually on VHS. I saw the fourth movie right when it came out on DVD. I was confused on whether is a continuation or a "Superman Returns" (aka "they ignore the unpopular movies"). They're supposed to do a reboot eventually and I heard El Diablo's... I mean Michael Bay's, name on it. Let's say that I'm a little worried. I'll talk about it later as well.

The Shows
I'm mostly not going to talk about the old show or the 2003 show because there's not really much I can say about them. I liked them and that's all I can really say. I may talk about a couple of things regarding the shows but not too much. I don't remember too much of the old show except for the first season and some of the last season. I still own a VHS tape that had the episode where Shredder thinks he's Mikey or something like that. A few years ago, I did watch the first season of the show on some website and I loved it. Then I tried to watch the next episode after that. I couldn't get through it.

The special... will be looked at. Oh Yes.....

When I heard of a new TMNT show 2003, I didn't know what to think. I know that I didn't watch it at first. I don't even why, but I'm glad I did eventually. I really liked that show. I think one reason was because it reminded me a lot of the first movie. At the time, I didn't know that the concept came from comic books. I watched the show until the whole "Flash Forward" phase. Then I stopped... go on and guess why. I did look at that lost season on YouTube and I did watch an episode of "Back to the Sewers" (aka the 7th season), but that was it. I did watch the "Turtles Forever" special that had both groups of Turtles and a surprising third group. That was pretty cool and I think that's where I ended my TMNT show phase.

Since I'm not going to look at the shows in some detail, this is what I'll do. There are a few places online that look at the shows in depth. James Rolfe (aka the Angry Video Game Nerd) did a detailed look at the original show on his site Cinemassacre in the summer of 2011 I believe. He also looked at other TMNT related things like... this piece of "Ugh." I will also once again point you towards the guy who did a very detailed match-up with both shows. And those are just a couple of places.

Well, I'm outta here. Stay tuned for a look at these dudes. Peace, God Bless, and "Cowabunga!"


P.S - Oh yeah, I also forgot about this... And for good reason. Wow...