They're Heroes in a Half Shell and They're Green

I had a conversation last night that provoked such a strong reaction from me that I felt a little disturbed by it. You know when a movie comes out like Spider-Man or X-Men and it creates a nationwide surge of interest in the older Spider-Man or X-Men stuff, and there’s always that annoying friend you have that’s like “Look, I basically am the biggest Spider-Man fan ever, no one knows more about Spider-Man than me.” And you’re like “Wait, really? I’ve never heard you mention Spider-Man before, but that’s cool, I…” And they get all fired up and start blushing furiously and basically spitting poison with each word and say stuff like, “I have been watching Spider-Man MY ENTIRE LIFE. My mom basically swaddled me in spiderweb. My middle name is Peter Parker. I wrote my thesis on wall-climbing. And I POSSESS this concept, and every time you even THINK about going to see that movie, you owe me a dollar.” And you’re sitting there wondering if they will actually start throwing punches if you try to offer up your opinion on the movie. The only safe way out is to say “Oh, I thought it was pretty good, but I don’t really know much about Spider-Man,” but then you still have to deal with your friend’s disgust that the filmmakers “TOTALLY LEFT OUT THE MOST IMPORTANT CHARACTER” and the story “MAKES NO SENSE” without the “TWENTY-FIVE YEARS” of backstory and a genealogy of who’s actually related to whom.

It’s possible that someone might have to remind me of how obnoxious this is when the new Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movie comes out.

I’m not going to lie to you. I am a girl. I have never been a tomboy. I liked unicorns and Laura Ingalls Wilder and all that stuff, and I never read comics or played with action figures. It never seemed odd, however, that I was glued to the television every afternoon at 4:00 pm to watch what is possibly the weirdest and most addictive craze ever to hit the FOX airwaves.

The premise is this. This rat learns martial arts from his master, the master gets screwed over by this bad guy, and the rat vows to avenge him. Luckily the rat happens upon some radioactive ooze and becomes a giant mutant rat. Four turtles also wander into the ooze, and now everyone’s a mutant ninja and they live in New York. Each turtle has a distinct and entertaining personality, color, and weapon, and they’re teenagers, which means the rat has trouble keeping them in line. They fight bad guys, with the help of two humans, Casey Jones and April O’Neil, which I have just realized are going to be the names of my children.

By all accounts, it would seem ridiculous for a prissy kid like me who hated getting dirty and thought almost exclusively about the Baby-Sitters Club to get into a bunch of muscular turtles. But get into it I did, and my mom and I meticulously put together an April O’Neil costume for me that the other kids could only envy. I drew the Turtles constantly, usually eating pizza and always in glorious color. And every afternoon I fought an inward battle over who was my favorite Turtle. It usually went back and forth between Raphael and Donatello, but I’d occasionally have a weak moment for Leonardo. It was his sense of honor that killed me, and the ninja swords are a sexy weapon, I don’t care what you say.

I haven’t yet been able to decode exactly where the all-consuming appeal of these teenage, mutant, ninja turtles comes from, but it’s overwhelming, for me at least. When it was brought up last night, the amount of stuff I remembered from the TV show and the original movie was astounding. It must have been a really well-written show, because I seriously thought I was feeling tears well up. How embarrassing would it have been to get choked up about a radioactive rat? “What’s up with Susan? Did she just stumble out of the bar in tears?” “Splinter, dude, Splinter.”

He is kind of cute though.

I’m pretty sure I’m not alone here. And I think we can all share ownership of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (that’s a fact, Jack!) even if it’s just because, to quote a friend, they made pizza cool.