To calm feeling about possible changes to the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles origin and the title change to Ninja Turtles Micheal Bay said

So not to be mean but what exactly makes the Turtle fans more special than us? If Ninja Turtles is all about the fans then why couldn't Transformers be all about the fans?

I know I'm getting older and the mind can play tricks on you as you get older but the Transformers weren't exactly exactly like I remembered them.

Also does this give Transformers fans more footing for the argument that the Transformers movies should be more like they remember Transformers? The argument seems to have been great changes were needed to make Transformers work for non-fans so is there something different about Turtles that means it doesn't need huge changes?

 

Its not going to be all about the fans. He`s made the turtles aliens and they changed the name due to it not being mutants anymore

 

Without any actual tangible material, I consider Bay's assurances to be nothing more than empty rhetoric. He said similar things about the Transformers movies. This, at least to me, isn't all that different.

 

I don't predict this thread ending well...

 

Really what you quoted sounds kinda like what we regularly got told by Bay and co about the Transformers movies, so I wouldn't be thinking Turtles fans have got their own way at all just yet.

But in terms of comparisons to how Transformers was portrayed live-action, the Turtles have already had three live-action movies and a live-action television series so they've already proved the property can translate to live-action very easily with little change, whereas we're regularly told (whether it's true or not) that Transformers wouldn't have worked in live-action without some major changes to many aspects.

But I do get where you're coming from, mate.

 

1) They're lying

2) Transformers had grown back to being a pretty steady seller before Paramount got near it, and they weren't worried. Compare this to the Bi-annual TMNT reboots.

3)Hasbro surrendered a lot more creative control than.......whoever owns TMNT.

Take your pick.

 

The way I look at it is, Transformers had a much greater chance of being a hit than Ninja Turtles does. So they're catering more to those fans, because they're more valuable when it comes to the reception that movie will get. They're also changing more about the Turtles than they did with Transformers, so there's a greater need for "damage control."

 

Dude... lets not go down that road. You are opening a can of worms the likes you will never recover from.

 

No, he didn't.

 

It's the other way around, methinks.

 

Facepalm.

People are freaking out because they perceive that major changes are going to be made to the TMNT origin.

Remember what changed about the Transformers' origin? Oh yeah, NOTHING. Would you like it if they'd made the Transformers some sort of human technology instead of aliens? That's about how TMNT fans like the turtles "being of an alien race."

Was it Variety that called Transformers (2007) "the most fan-influenced major motion picture in the history of the industry?" I know I read that somewhere. It kept virtually all of the jargon no matter how silly, cast a major voice actor because he had the part in a 1984 cartoon show, and aside from a few Decepticon redshirts lifted every character right from the original franchise rather than letting marketing go to town on "cool new" ones (that happened later, but not in '07).

Are we really so pathetic and thin-skinned that we'll pitch a fit about frantic damage control currently going on in another franchise?

 

Makes me REALLY REALLY glad that GI Joe: Retaliation is coming out relatively unscathed. Considering how Rise of Cobra went, ANY GI Joe will be better, period. It looks like at least that John Chu really came through with his promise of making Retaliation worthy of carrying the GI Joe name.

 

Oh yeah, wake me when the TMNT screenwriter is doing free Q&A on the forums like Orci did.

 

I don't actually think the Transformers films made "great changes" at all. In terms of the adaptation of the brand, I actually think the film themselves were pretty faithful. As for the execution of the films as a whole, that's an entirely different matter. But they weren't "unfaithful" adaptations, not by a long shot. All of the basic Transformers “bullet points” were covered, at least for the most part.

Also, and this is a fact, as Don Murphy has made it clear time and time again, it was fan outcry that changed Megaton's head from a faceless beast to the more humanoid head he has in the films. Also, I don't think Cullen would have ever of been approached if the fans didn't shout so much. Bay even says so on the commentary track for the first film's DVD.

 

^Agreed. It was no more changed than from when it went from G1 to RID, then RID to Armada, and so forth.

Honestly, it's no skin off my nose about them being aliens now. I really don't think it makes that substantive a difference, seeing as its only real relevance AFAIK is tied into their origin, not simply their characters (different story with Splinter, though).

However, if the teenager personality act goes as well...then Houston we have a problem.

 

Um

Turtles have stayed pretty true to form over the years and Transformers have been all over the map, I disagree that the brand cares more about the fans for Turtles.

Turtles may have been through changes but have stayed mostly to the same settings and core characters. Transformers have not even had ANY of the same characters in every series and the settings and motivations wildly change for the Transformers.

I think Bay definitely shows in his movies that he is still just Michael Bay doing what he does, his special effects direction and stunt shots are extraordinary. I really would like to see his directorial style evolve a little because for what anybody says, he definitely has talent; people are still entertained and seek out his movies.

I think he and his team were pretty ballsy bringing back Cullen and we take that for granted now. Peter hadn't voiced Prime since the original series to my knowledge and I couldn't even remember the last time I had heard his name outside of Transformers.

Bay increased brand awareness, which meant better toys were issued and it gave Hasbro legs with the franchise in terms of games and bringing back core elements of G1 that were really good back to the fore.

While G1 is always discussed we really need to be aware that there was great spirit and good characters in G1 the stories were often flat and lacking vision. For this reason I enjoyed Season 1 and 3 far more than 2. These were saturday morning cartoons where the bad guys do some stupid yet terrible things and always got their butts handed to them by the underdogs that are stylized as heroes. Transformers was gimmicky and it paid off, God bless the talent involved but there was alot of hit or miss.

Thankfully we got TF Prime andvTF Animated out of it all.

 

This is pretty much the exact same shit that happened when transformers was in production.

 

Also, we have no idea of what is going on with the Turtles. The director said that Bay's comments were “taken out of context”. Let’s not forget that the ooze that mutated them in the first place was of alien origin. And I actually think Ninja Turtles is a pretty good title. I can’t remember the last time I used the full title when talking of the franchise. I always shortened it to either Ninja Turtles or just Turtles.

 

PlanckEpoch, your comment about Retaliation made me  . Not at the actual comment, mind you, because I completely agree with you. I can just picture these franchises as sentient beings, watching us fans from the sidelines.

Transformers: "Look at our fans. They're throwing a hissy fit! Every trailer that comes out, every movie that's released, every sequel that's hinted at; it's a s**tstorm every time."
Battleship: "They're calling me a ripoff of you, Transformers! I mean, a board game about battleships turned into an alien movie? Man, the comments on Comingsoon.net are so hurtful!"
Avengers: "Totally. I mean, how many negative comments can one fanbase have about Thor's helmet?!"
TMNT: "I know, right? A single sentence from Bay has given my fanbase a heart attack. All of these adaptations that are coming out are getting such a rise out of people. They just complain and complain and complain."
Battleship: "Man, I wonder how G.I. Joe is holding up. The first movie was awful, and I bet the sequel is getting a lot of hate. Yo, Joe?"
G.I. Joe: "I'm doing fine actually, thanks. PROBLEM?"

*Let it be noted that I enjoyed the first G.I. Joe movie.

 

Ummm... Orci came for free internet fellatio from the fanboys. If anyone disagreed with something, he was no better than the fanboys about ridiculing them.

At least that's what happened at the live action movie blogs.