COWABUNGA! For people of a certain vintage, San Diego Comic-Con has just brought incredibly exciting news for fans of pizza-loving, crime-fighting mutant reptiles. Nickelodeon and Paramount have secured the global rights to those heroes in a half shell, the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles original animated series — and one of the most iconic television theme songs in history.
Just ahead of the release ofTeenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem in cinemas, Nickelodeon have announced they will be broadcasting the famous Fred Wolf series about Donatello, Leonardo, Michelangelo and Raphael in their original form, and for all 193 episodes of the series which ran for 9 years. The series will debut digitally on Nickelodeon later this month in the U.S., followed by Nickelodeon-branded channels and digital platforms internationally.
Collider‘s Aidan Kelley is currently attending the Paramount Pictures panel at SDCC, where the acquisition was announced during their Hall H presentation of Mutant Mayhem. At the event, the director of Mutant Mayhem, Jeff Rowe, and one of the co-creators of the franchise, Kevin Eastman, were present to offer a preview of the upcoming movie. They were representing the creative crew of the movie which was significant pared down from what would once have been expected, as a direct result of the ongoing WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes. Unfortunately, these strikes prevented writers and actors from attending the Comic-Con gathering as they fight the corporate bigwigs who won’t give them their fair share.
Heroes in a Half-Shell – And They’re Green
In 1984, Eastman and Peter Laird created Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, starting it as a comic book series before it gained massive popularity with the animated 1987 series. This success led to a live-action TV series called Ninja Turtles: The Next Mutation, along with countless film adaptations, in particular 1990’s Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles live-action film which featured Corey Feldman as Donatello, along with two other sequels — including one where the Turtles were sent back to feudal Japan to help villagers ward off an attack. The trilogy has maintained a massive cult following.
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem hits theaters August 2.
via Collider