And so we come to the final entry of this series until the next TV show comes out. I’m not sure we’re ending on a high note. “Better than The Next Mutation” really shouldn’t be the bar to set. I already did my review of the first batch of episodes Nickelodeon dropped when Rise Of The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles premiered. The first episode aired on TV with more available through their site and on demand. The show wasn’t terrible but I would have enjoyed it more had they just done some show about anthropomorphic animals living alongside humans. I went through five episodes and found a terrible adaptation I might have enjoyed as a different product. I didn’t like Splinter, the new de-aged April was also a black girl with attitude (because aren’t they all in modern media), and they dropped the ball on the mutant flood idea the first episode started with. I did like the magic weapons for the same reason I liked the high-tech ones in Fast Forward because it was an advancement in the weapons but as an adaptation it failed hard no matter how good the animation was while the writing wasn’t to my tastes but not terrible.
There were only two seasons and we don’t get anything resembling a serious intro change until season three with this franchise so this shouldn’t take long. We even have an official source to work with as I write this. Okay, let’s see it.
I forgot to bring this up in the previous Nickelodeon intro discussion but both shows are doing a riff on the original theme song, which is fine. I think the previous show did it better but this wasn’t terrible. It certainly matches the energy of the show, gives each Turtle a chance to show off their style, and the song itself isn’t bad. I have no idea what they were singing/saying, but the music was okay. It’s a really short intro but getting a halfway decent intro out of a show at all these days is a miracle. At least it isn’t just a title card.
Still, Nickelodeon did post a karaoke version of the full theme (and an acapella version with the Turtles’ VAs but we won’t go over that one) so maybe we can actually look at the lyrics through that.
Okay, the lyrics work. This is supposed to be about the Turtles’ early years…but what version isn’t outside of the live-action nobody likes? And why is April already there in the first episode? Raphael gets tonfas in place of his sais for some reason and I guess the UK is okay with a mace over nunchucks so Mikey got those instead? The song is okay but overall it just feels like I’m ending this run on a weak note.
So until Nickelodeon or someone else makes a new Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles TV or streaming show that’s it for the intros. Which series had your favorite intros and was it also your favorite series or did you like one of the shows better than the intro?
Okay, you know what? I just went ahead and watched the acapella version, and you gotta see this. It’s actually kind of cool.
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