UPDATE: As of April 2013, Micheal Bay has officially announced that the idea of turning the Turtles into aliens has been scrapped and that they are now redirecting it more towards the origin we all know and love. So score one for the fanboys...until the actual movie is released that is.
Fans are a crazy bunch aren't they? One minute some big studio exec. announces to them that their favorite show, comic, or game that they worship is going to be re-imagined into a big-budget Hollywood movie, and before you know it they joyfully squeal with anticipation. Their faces lighting up with such wonder and amazement as they praise this exec. as the very "saint of fandom" for spreading the word of there beloved franchise to the people. Then the next minute they come charging down the streets with their torches and pitchforks gung-ho on destroying this false messiah through twisted medieval styles of torture. And by twisted medieval style tortures I mean insightful comments on IGN like "omg tis guy suckz, and is a homo LOL FTW". Geez that seems pretty harsh for a guy who wanted to make a live-action Akira movie with Robert Pattinson and Kristen Stewart...actually screw that guy - to the iron maiden with him!
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File photo of Dragon Ball Z fans reaction after seeing Dragon Ball: Evolution. |
Ok so it's not too hard to picture why fans tend to freak out when studios like to "change" things up a bit when it comes to adapting a recognizable franchise. All of a sudden characters who didn't have super-powers get super-powers, groundbreaking endings get changed, asians leads turn into white guys, dogs and cats living together - mass hysteria! However far and few have ever gone to the level of hate than producer/director Micheal Bay. You know Micheal Bay right? He's the guy who thought that Transformers was about giant robots who piss, fart, hump, act like a really offensive Amos and Andy sketch, and have giant mechanical balls that just hang out for all to see.Oh, and there's also some fighting in there too but it just looks like a cluster fuck of scrap metal and bolts shot really close-up. But when he's not directing movies where he objectifies women and stereo-types black people in loud CGI spank fests, he also works as producer on his production company Platinum Dunes. They provided such classics like the remake of Friday the 13th, the remake of Nightmare on Elm Street, the remake of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, and is up and coming projects like the remakes of Rosemary's Baby, The Birds, and The Monster Squad. So needless to say he's probably the best person for handling beloved franchises because that's all he seems to do nowadays.
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Someone was actually paid money to make this. |
So to no surprise when Bay found himself in a bind finding franchises to adapt, and because thinking of original ideas really hurt, he decided to follow-up his successes on the Transformers trilogy (in a financial sense I remind you) with the next best 1980's franchise. But when he found out that He-Man was already bought off by the playgirl channel he settled on the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles instead. That seems like a pretty easy task doesn't it. Four mutated reptiles are trained by a mutated rat to become ninjas, fight a guy named after a staples appliance, and eat pizza while saying "dude" a lot. It's an idea so bizarre, stupid, and half-assed that there is no possible way anyone could fuck this up. It's idiot proof! Even for Bay there's no way to screw this up. Well... he sure proved me wrong.
Aliens...aliens...ALIENS!? I - I - I'm speechless. They're aliens now? Was this really that hard to understand? How do you change mutants to aliens? Were Bay and company just so confused by this complex and mind blogging concept of mutated turtles that one day they just watched Ancient Aliens on the History channel and said "Fuck it they're aliens". It's called TEENAGE - MUTANT - NINJA - TURTLES, how hard is that!!! Micheal Bay knows he's making Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and not the Butt Ugly Martians right?
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Say it with me now! |
Fans were, and still are, angered by this announcement as it took the franchises basic premise (being mutants) and threw it out for something a bit more, oh how should I - assanine. Bay has since addressed fans by saying "Fans need to take a breath, and chill. They have not read the script. Our team is working closely with one of the original creators of Ninja Turtles to help expand and give a more complex back story. Relax, we are including everything that made you become fans in the first place. We are just building a richer world". I have a few problems with Mr. Bay's response here. Number one, so somehow an alien back story is more complex than mutating into humanoid creatures? Please explain. Number two, just because one of the creators is involved doesn't mean it's going to work; these are the guys who said yes to the Coming Out of our Shells Tour after all. Also what about the other creator, Peter Laird; he has already stated that he's actually against the whole idea and even made a joke about fans finally getting a fifth turtle. Number 3, Hey Micheal, why don't you ask how "chill" Transformers fans were when you decided to "build a richer world" of the established cannon through dick jokes. Telling fans they need to "chill" because "they have not read the script" and they have "one of the original creators of Ninja Turtles to help" kinda makes you sound like a dick and trust me Bay, these are the people you want to see your movie. It also makes him sound very childish in the fashion that "Oh you don't like it, oh well fuck you! You just need to chill you over grown troll. You haven't read the script! You're not working with the creators! So just shut up, because we're geniuses and you're not". Though to be fair this is the same director who bragged about having a horse sized cock and is solely responsible for kick starting careers; so I really shouldn't be surprised that he'd be angry when somebody says his shit stinks.
Now before fans attack me for "not reading the comics", and that technically the turtles origin was due to a meddling of extraterrestrials I have some news for you - I did read them. I'm a fan of the turtles myself, I became a fan ever since I was exposed to the first live action movie. So though I admit the premise is ridiculous as hell, I have read those stories. I know about the Utroms being stranded on Earth and accidentally coming up with a mutagen that mutated the turtles and Splinter into humanoid creatures. But the problem is Bay didn't say that. He said they were from an alien race, he didn't really say they were mutated from one. Now true he could have meant that they were formed by one, but as more details come out about this movie (plus a recent title change to Ninja Turtles) it looks like the turtles will definitely be aliens.
But while I love to bash Bay, and trust me the guys deserves a good bashing.
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Surprisingly this is the most subtle Bay will ever get. |
He's only one person out of a group of creative people (the writers, the director, and the co-creator) who decided on this idea and went with it. Why such a change was needed to reboot a franchise that wasn't really in danger is still baffling to the mind; especially after sticking with it for twenty years. And now they're acting as if their idea will somehow revolutionize the franchise and have fans who called bullshit eating their words as they bask in this new "richer origin". However they already had a origin, and it worked. It wasn't something complex or ground breaking, but none the less it was an origin that was simple and memorable. It also didn't bring up as many plot holes as this "improved" one does. For example why would these aliens happen resemble to turtles; is it coincidence? Why are they ninjas? Are they ninjas on their home world, and why would an alien race show interests in the teachings of ninjitsu? Why would an alien race whose mastered space travel use crude weapons like katana, sai, nunchaku, and a bo staff? Couldn't they have taken more advanced weaponry? Why are they would they be named after famous artists on Earth? Also wear does Splinter fit into this mess? Is Splinter from the same planet, is he still their surrogate father/teacher, is he even in this movie? So really, this new origin just makes things even more confusing and nonsensical than Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles should be. And yet somehow they ignored all these problems and decided that this was the sure way to reinvent the turtles for "a new generation"! Accept the problem with that is, this generation is not stupid guys. It just happens to like stupid things.
I understand that rebooting a franchise is very hard; no really I do. It's a very difficult task to take the core concepts of very recognizable figures and reinterpret them to appeal to the sensibilities and values of a new generation. But there's a difference between a reinterpretation and a total head spinning 360 degree turn.Yes you could argue that many of the other reboots have changed thing considerably; Battlestar Galactica is a completely different series from the original show. In fact most reboots are completely different from their original source material. Except even with all the changes those reboots made, the core concepts were still there. Battlestar Galactica was still a show about humans fighting robots, Batman is still about a man avenging his parents while being dressed as a bat, Spider-Man is still about a kid getting powers from a spider bite, and I'm pretty sure Superman's still gonna be from krypton. Rebooting the mutant turtles into aliens changes that core concept into something that they aren't. They're not the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles anymore, they're the Teenage Alien Ninja Turtles...well ok now they're the Ninja Turtles.
For those who aren't versed in the culture of the geek or think that the T.M.N.T fans are crybabies. Let's use an even recognizable figure. How about Jesus. Now there's a someone who everybody knows. Let's say Michael Bay is going to make a movie about Jesus. But he wants to make a different kind of Jesus; one who is still the same Jesus that everybody knows, but with a new twist for audiences. So he decides to turn Jesus into...a tomato. Just a tomato. Now all of a sudden christian advocates voice their outrage and followers begin to protest this new movie that promotes the idea that their lord and savior has shed his mortal physique for a tomato. This is why TMNT fans are pissed. They feel that the characters they loved since childhood have been turned something they are not for no real good reason.Sure there's gonna be a Raphael, a Leonardo, a Donatello, and a Michelangelo in this movie; but they're not the same ones that Michael Bay claims will be in there.
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Tomato Christ; Veggie Tales was right all along! |
But you know something, maybe this decision isn't so bad after all. Oh, don't get me wrong it's insultingly stupid and betrays everything that fans knew about the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles; but now I see the true potential of this "masterful idea". For one villains are gonna be much easier to introduce than ever now. Need a villain, no problem they'll come from another planet that hates turtles or better yet secret agents armed with deadly walkie-talkies - brilliant! You turtle fans want a real fifth turtle and not some lame girly one named after some boring old statue, well now you can because they come from a whole planet of them. And why stop there! How about a sixth one, a seventh one, or fuck it fifteen turtles - genius! Not to mention this totally puts that whole team-up with the Power Rangers in so much perspective. It goes to show you just how much good can come from such a really awful idea. Now if you excuse me I'm gonna go cradle my stuffed Donatello doll while rocking myself in the shower in an attempt to cleanse myself of this travesty...might take awhile.
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This actually happened. Never forget. |
