TURTLES ON OPRAH
May 13, 2014 12:52 PM   Subscribe

The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles on "The Oprah Winfrey Show". A slight bit of context can be found on Tumblr.
posted by kmz (43 comments total) 28 users marked this as a favorite
 
This is one of those mis-planted bits of erroneous history the Illuminati sprinkle around to throw time travelers off their trail, isn't it?

Because there's no way this could have really happened in our time line.
posted by Curious Artificer at 12:58 PM on May 13, 2014 [6 favorites]


I love this post, but I hate what it just put in front of me, if that makes sense.
posted by GrapeApiary at 1:00 PM on May 13, 2014 [2 favorites]


This is truly unbelievable. $0.59 crunchy tacos at Taco Bell? (12m49s)
posted by JoeZydeco at 1:03 PM on May 13, 2014 [2 favorites]


The Tumblr post mentions "and a grown woman wearing a Turtles costume just sitting in the audience, unexplained." I'm not about to watch the whole 43 minute video to confirm but I'm guessing it was Michelle Ivey. I mean if there's anyone famous for being a grown woman obsessed with TMNT it's her.
posted by komara at 1:05 PM on May 13, 2014


This is Alternate Reality stuff for sure.

Speaking of The Turtles, there's a great new book about them by Richard Rosenbaum: Raise Some Shell.

(JoeZydeco: I can remember $ 0.49 crunchy tacos... and even $0.39 tacos when they went on sale! I'd buy 'em ten at a time and probably took a few years off my life.)
posted by Fuzzy Monster at 1:07 PM on May 13, 2014


No, please don't do this to me, I don't have the time to watch this. The TMNT were my superhero obsession around this time. I think I've mentioned this before on MeFi, oddly enough, but even though I was an intensely rational kid, that kid-part of my brain absolutely believed, really believed, that I might possibly someday become, as in literally mutate into, a ninja turtle.

Also I was telling my one-month-old the other day that someday when her mother isn't paying attention I was going to let her have a Hostess Ninja Turtle pudding pie and I don't even know if they make those anymore.
posted by uncleozzy at 1:15 PM on May 13, 2014 [3 favorites]


That must have been hard for the guys playing the Turtles. But at least their costumes allow some amount of plausible deniability. "No, that was not me playing keytar in a Raphael costume on the 'Coming Out of Their Shells' tour. Can you prove that it was me?"

But April... poor April.
posted by Team of Scientists at 1:15 PM on May 13, 2014 [1 favorite]


The Turtles are using that voice, the adults-trying-to-sound-kid-cool style, that most people notice is phony by the time they turn 12. I'm more used to hearing it used on Christian kiddie shows, and it seems more out of place here, what with the (relatively) higher production values.
posted by benito.strauss at 1:15 PM on May 13, 2014 [3 favorites]


It is so fuckin' weird to me that anyone needs context for this - I'm getting old, I know.

I remember watching it live and in the context of the times it made perfect sense. It was also part of the downward slide when the Turtles started being incredibly lame for me.

Like, I get that if you weren't there, this seems like one of those baffling moments of pop culture ephemera that border on the unbelievable, but if you were familiar with the TMNT marketing machine (and the fact that Oprah wasn't much more than a talk show host at the time), this was just another thing.

I remember so clearly the moment the Shredder showed up and I just thought, well I guess that's it: the Turtles aren't cool anymore.
posted by FAMOUS MONSTER at 1:20 PM on May 13, 2014 [2 favorites]


I remember a review of the first X-Men movie wondering why the mutants where feared and reviled, they would celebrities! Much less freakish than the typical tabloid tv denizen... So this is a peak into that reality.
posted by The Whelk at 1:23 PM on May 13, 2014


Seriously -- if you've watched the Coming Out of Their Shells in its entirety, even just a year or two out from original TMNT love... it's terrifying to believe that it ever got this far.

And yes, Famous Monster... the Shredder was insane.

I think the premise was that the turtles killed him with music?
posted by knownassociate at 1:36 PM on May 13, 2014


If that popped your synapses, you might want to brace yourselves for Barbara Walters' 1991 interview with the live-action movie turtles.

You'll cry over it like Donatello did.
posted by Smart Dalek at 1:39 PM on May 13, 2014 [3 favorites]


I guess that's it: the Turtles aren't cool anymore.

That's how I felt as a kid when pro wrestlers (like the Ultimate Warrior, for God's sake?!) would show up on The Tonight Show or Arsenio Hall. The adults lived in some backwards universe where late-night talk shows were cooler than Saturday morning wrestling, and from our childhood perspective it was a mindwarp. I can't imagine having been into the Turtles and then seeing them on Oprah or Donahue. Ugh.
posted by cribcage at 1:45 PM on May 13, 2014


I've always loved the fact that a couple of guys doing a Frank Miller parody became richer than Frank Miller.
posted by gwint at 1:49 PM on May 13, 2014 [8 favorites]


Keep your eyes on the kids in the audience.
posted by zarq at 1:59 PM on May 13, 2014 [7 favorites]


They look shellshocked.
posted by naju at 2:03 PM on May 13, 2014 [1 favorite]




I can't imagine having been into the Turtles and then seeing them on Oprah or Donahue.

I was 5 at the time and way into the Turtles, and I have a vague memory of watching this and being deeply confused. Forget the soft rock and the pacifism and Oprah—the weirdest thing for me was the splotchy, melanotic mottling on their scalps. It looked wrong.
posted by Iridic at 2:22 PM on May 13, 2014


OMG, thank you so much for that link zarq, if nothing else because it leads to Mortal Kombat Live and watching Shang Tsung talk about positive messages and non-violence and raising money for charity.
posted by kmz at 2:23 PM on May 13, 2014


Evanston, Illinois. My three cousins, raised without television, are somehow huge fans of the Ninja Turtles. So when the original movie came out, we of course went to the local theater opening weekend. I believe it was the day that you set your clocks forward, because I was a little late and arrived just as the lights were dimming. The theater is packed full of kids, mostly boys ages 3 to 9 with a bunch of dads and moms sprinkled in--probably about a 5:1 ratio, kids to adults. The preview the theater chooses to play before the movie starts: RoboCop 2. The preview plays and noisily ends; my uncle turns to me and quietly mouths "Jesus!".
posted by blueberry at 2:23 PM on May 13, 2014 [6 favorites]


I watched this on broadcast as a kid. Oh... oh my gu---
posted by dagosto at 2:24 PM on May 13, 2014


This is why we have 10-year term limits for decades.
posted by Kabanos at 2:38 PM on May 13, 2014 [5 favorites]


That's nothing compared to when the Samurai Pizza Cats were on Maury.
posted by oulipian at 2:56 PM on May 13, 2014 [1 favorite]


I've always loved the fact that a couple of guys doing a Frank Miller parody became richer than Frank Miller.

He's probably caught up to them since then.

Whatever you think of it, this is something those kids in the audience will remember for their whole lives, and maybe the kids at home too. Like an LSD flashback.
posted by Kevin Street at 3:07 PM on May 13, 2014 [1 favorite]


A slight bit of context can be found on Tumblr.

I don't think I've ever seen those words used together in that order before.
posted by marxchivist at 3:19 PM on May 13, 2014 [9 favorites]


I loved the Turtles (I beat the swimming level on the Turtles NES game with ease) but never took to the Coming Out of Their Shells stuff. It didn't make any sense.

But this video puts me into some sort of nostalgia K-hole, especially that theme song and opening montage. And I didn't even like Oprah. I don't know what's going on anymore
posted by Ray Walston, Luck Dragon at 3:35 PM on May 13, 2014


That actually hurts to watch. Augh.
posted by Iosephus at 3:47 PM on May 13, 2014


The Tumblr post mentions "and a grown woman wearing a Turtles costume just sitting in the audience, unexplained." I'm not about to watch the whole 43 minute video to confirm but I'm guessing it was Michelle Ivey. I mean if there's anyone famous for being a grown woman obsessed with TMNT it's her.

So, she's some sort of inverse brony? A hertle, perhaps?
posted by Atom Eyes at 4:20 PM on May 13, 2014 [10 favorites]


April: "The more you get to know about the turtles, the more attractive they become."
posted by HeroZero at 4:27 PM on May 13, 2014


OMG, thank you so much for that link zarq, if nothing else because it leads to Mortal Kombat Live and watching Shang Tsung talk about positive messages and non-violence and raising money for charity.

This is my face after watching that: 0.0

Steal his soul, Shang Tsung!
posted by ersatz at 4:29 PM on May 13, 2014


The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles on "The Oprah Winfrey Show".

Oh, are you sure it wasn't actually...

[places large-rimmed red glasses over red headband on green testudino-hominid forehead]

...Sally Jesse Raphael?
posted by cortex at 4:32 PM on May 13, 2014 [9 favorites]


YEEEEEAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHH
posted by cortex at 4:32 PM on May 13, 2014 [3 favorites]


The State's Robert Ben Garant was a turtle in the 90's
posted by cnanderson at 4:33 PM on May 13, 2014


At 36:32 Raphael gets a little passive aggressive with the "what's so special about your dad?"
posted by stltony at 6:17 PM on May 13, 2014


From the Tumblr context: As far as I know, no other copy of this exists. I have never found it online, and all I’ve seen on YouTube is a video of the final ten minutes, with a warped aspect ratio.

I'm thinking that Oprah didn't want this video found. Ever.
posted by bibliowench at 6:47 PM on May 13, 2014 [1 favorite]


Wait, wait....the voice of Rafael is Bob Odenkirk, ya?
posted by tristeza at 8:54 PM on May 13, 2014 [1 favorite]


WHERE ARE THE BACKS OF THEIR SHELLS



this is deeply upsetting
posted by Doleful Creature at 9:35 PM on May 13, 2014 [1 favorite]


At 36:32

You are stronger than me.
posted by thelonius at 9:51 PM on May 13, 2014 [3 favorites]


This is amazing! My friend was Michaelangelo's personal assistant during this tour, and one of her coolest experiences was meeting Oprah. She'll be thrilled to see this!
posted by jenny76 at 5:23 AM on May 14, 2014 [4 favorites]


kmz: "OMG, thank you so much for that link zarq, if nothing else because it leads to Mortal Kombat Live and watching Shang Tsung talk about positive messages and non-violence and raising money for charity."

Oh man, I missed that. Thanks for pointing it out!
posted by zarq at 6:34 AM on May 14, 2014


jenny76: "My friend was Michaelangelo's personal assistant during this tour, "

That has to be one of the coolest things to put on a resume, ever:

"Personal Assistant to Ninja Turtle"
posted by zarq at 6:37 AM on May 14, 2014 [3 favorites]


They spent $125 million to make the movie coming out this August, produced by Michael Bay.
posted by eye of newt at 8:59 AM on May 14, 2014


zarq: That has to be one of the coolest things to put on a resume, ever:

"Personal Assistant to Ninja Turtle"


I had known for her years before she casually mentioned it. Told her that that's the kind of story you have to lead with!
posted by jenny76 at 9:24 AM on May 14, 2014 [3 favorites]


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