Talk:Rise of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles/@comment-26423071-20171207174946/@comment-995426-20171208024228

King Phelous:

Not everyone necessarily likes Batman, though. I don't, nor am I really into any superhero comics to begin with. Comparing TMNT with Batman is not exactly a compelling argument to me. And when TMNT is turned into a superhero series, it's less interesting to me, because it makes the characters feel less mortal, less down-to-earth. You have to realize that the whole "heroes in a half-shell" thing wasn't a TMNT comics invention&mdash;it was a TMNT cartoon invention. TMNT comics characters sometimes chide each other for thinking they're superheroes. Am I interested in Casey Jones when he dons a mask and hockey stick and prowls the streets looking for punks to beat up? No. I liked him more when he gave up that stuff and became a dad, especially when he was afraid his darker impulses might turn against April and Shadow. Mirage Mikey chided Leo during moments he thought he acted like Batman. IDW Leo disapproves of Mikey acting like a wannabe-superhero. Mirage TMNT characters that do function as superheroes are often dysfunctional or farcical parodies of the genre, and in Mirage in particular the turtles are very decidedly not superheroes. If anything, TMNT comics are more comparable to wuxia or ronin genres with noir elements, more like Usagi Yojimbo or Samurai Jack, whose protagonists have a sense of honor and are sometimes heroes of chance, but they are not superheroes nor do they try to be. When TMNT tries to become a superhero series, it loses something in the process and it starts to lose me as an audience. So no&mdash;a TMNT/Batman comparison is not going to resonate with me.