Toon Zone Talkback - Nick Acquires Rights for "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles"

I'm actually gonna side with Cybercubed on this one. The 2003 TMNT cartoon's first 5 seasons definitely rival the darkness of the Batman:TAS episodes. Watch episodes like "The Shredder Strikes Back," "Rogue In The House," "Same As It Never Was," "Scion Of The Shredder," and many others. I think it's definitely at the same level of darkness that Batman:TAS was.
 
I know who the main artist is his name is Alex Deligiannis. He's on a deviantart and he has a blog both full of good TMNT art bear in mind it's nothing official for the show but it shows some potential go check it out
 
Nope the characters themselves were owned by Mirage Studios. All Fred Wolf owns is the rights to the show itself. If they want to find a network to air it and give the rights to they can if they want to release DVD's they can without anyones permission. Krang Bebop Rocksteady and there likeness was all mirage(Now Nick). They can be in comics videogames or even a new show if Nick wants them to.

The main reason they havne't been used wasn't because of the rights it was due to the fact that Peter Laird (The Creator and at one point owner) didn't want them used since he is out of the picture they can be.
 
Wow, Nick/Viacom is just taking every good Saturday Morning action show there is. They nabbed rights to Power Rangers, Winx Club, and the Ninja Turtles, any other show they acquire rights to recently?
 
You know if Nick does use the old toon villains, I wonder if they're going to give them drastic redesigns or keep their old school like like "Turtles Forever" did.
 
But when all is said and done, the mainstream (and definitely just about everyone in their mid-to-late twenties and older) is familiar with TMNT as a franchise involving human-sized mutant turtles that hang out in a sewer with a rat and run around eating pizza and screaming "cowabunga dude!" while fighting a guy with cheese graters on his arms. Internet nerds and the hardcore fans are able to accept these characters when they're played seriously, but at the end of the day the entire concept is complete lunacy. Like it's been said, Eastman and Laird created the characters and the name "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles" in the first place because it amused them.

I'm looking forward to Nick's take on this, because it sounds like it's going to hark back to what I grew up with in the late '80s and early '90s. And I don't think that's a bad thing. We had an alternate take on turtles this past decade and now it's time to stir up the pot a little.
 
It's my understanding that they Mirage actually owned those characters hence why 4kids could use them in the Turtles Forever. Peter Laird and Kevin Eastman made concept sketches for those characters before they were made into toys and used in the cartoon.
 
On 10/23/09, the announcement was finally posted on ninjaturtles.com:

"Howdy folks,
If you haven't heard the news, Peter Laird has sold all intellectual property rights to the TMNT franchise to Nickelodeon. So Nick now owns the TMNT lock, stock and barrel. Of note, Peter did retain the right to publish up to 18 TMNT comics per year should he choose to do so - thus Mirage Publishing will remain in business at least until May, 2010.​

Check out the press release from Viacom (they own Nick and numerous other entertainment companies) here.
Check out Peter Laird's comments about the deal here.
At some point, Nick will assume control of the ninjaturtles.com domain name and Mirage will no longer be involved. Let me say it's been an honor and pleasure talking with all of you over the years and I'll miss this job more than I can say - but all good things come to an end and when doors close, doors open...
Speaking of which, I will be creating a new Mirage Studios web site for us to continue posting news and info about our comics. This site will be up and running soon and hopefully there will be a link here before any major changes take place.
I'm tempted to say "So long, and thanks for all the fish" - but we'll still be here for a bit and we'll definitely be around at the new Mirage site once it's established. So please keep checking back here to find the new Mirage Studios URL over the next few weeks - and have an awesome weekend.
Cheers!
- Dan "​

 
"Standard run"? There's only been two real series.

Nick runs under a self-imposed production cap of about 65 episodes. If thse show's a mega-hit they'll go past that (like with Spongebob, OddParents, and Rugrats).

This is something, of course, that's easily circumvented through multiple iterations of the Turtles, as I said. And it's a self-imposed production cap so they can just ignore it. But the cap is still something to bear in mind.

And of course there's more to this acquisition than making a TV series, they're making another movie.
 
OK, that TMNT episode was indeed TMNT episode was "Batman dark". Now can we please move on from this? Please? I'm begging you...

Whether or not this one episode of the 2K3 TMNT series was "Batman dark" or not is irrelevant since TMNT is widely recognized as a "kid friendly" franchise, as it has been for 2 decades. Plus, the producers of the upcoming show have stated that the new series will be more reminiscent of the 1987 series anyway. Let it go. Seriously.
 
Nick has no episode cap. If a series is successful, it keeps going. Many examples of Nick shows going over 65 episodes: SpongeBob, Rugrats, OddParents, Hey Arnold!, The Wild Thornberrys, Rocket Power, and CatDog (just barely). That’s only their animated shows, several of their live-action shows have gone over 65 too.

I just don’t understand why everyone has to forecast gloom and doom for a show that is still three years away from airing? Nick didn’t buy the Turtles property just to mess it up and throw it away in the vaults.
 
They probably cast him as Donatello instead of Raphael because they want someone who can do the tough New York accent for Raph, which has pretty much been a part of the character since the first movie back in 1990.

I know Rob Paulson has a lot of range as a VA, but he probably didn't have the voice for Raph that the producers wanted.
 
No, I wouldn't say that early...

Since Viacom won't be airing 2K3 on Nickelodeon until at least September of next year, it's more likely that Winter 2011 would be the earliest we'd see Turtles Forever on DVD.
 
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