Breaking: Peter Laird confirms TMNT sold to Nickolodean
Originally here. Confirmed without detail or comment here. GoGreenMachine has the full presser and confirmation from Steve Murphy that at least some of Mirage staff is getting the ole heave-ho.
These are my thoughts, if anyone cares to weigh in. (They're essentially the same comments I made on a friend's LJ.)
Really, if you look at everything it shouldn't be surprising- Peter HAS been losing interest, it seems. You can't entirely blame him for not wanting the entire rest of his life to be centered on running the TMNT. But it DOES surprise me given how much creative control he always insisted on having- I thought that was a sign that he was still deeply, personally invested in what happens with the Turtles.
On the surface some things won't change- the cartoon will muddle along in its mediocre way, toys will be made. Nobody was mourning Volume 4 anyway, but if we lose Tales that would be sad. Makes me wonder what's in store for the live action/cgi movie. And it makes it even more unlikely that Turtles Forever will ever see the light of day. But we're never going to have the fan-creator relationship with Nick that we had with Laird & Mirage. We're not going to have people as open and honest and in love with a creation that's part theirs as Dan Berger or Stephen Murphy or Jim Lawson. I feel kind of bad for them...I wonder how they feel. Is it like having your house sold out from under you? I hope the Mirage regulars still have jobs- Mirage may still exist but I doubt it'll have as much work to do. This is a bad time to be out of work, even for smart creative people.
I'm not really angry or bitter or even greatly disappointed. I'm just...gobsmacked. It's hard to grasp. I'm a little sad. It's very much the end of an era. It honestly feels a little like a defeat- for so long, even at its most profitable, the TMNT stayed creator-owned and creator-controlled. It did deals with the corporate world but it was never exactly OF the corporate world. And now it's just a wholly owned subsidiary. If that's a defeat, it's not really MY defeat, so maybe I'm not entitled to find that sad. But that's how it looks to me. It feels like something's died.
So, a little sad, very surprised. I'm not really sure how to feel either. I think I'd have felt more strongly about it back in high school or even in college. Maybe it's that I've got so much more going on these days, I'm not as much of a full-time fan as I used to be. It's not so much that the Turtles have become a smaller piece of my life as that there are so many more pieces now.
Really makes Turtles Forever feel less like a celebration and more like a goodbye, although I doubt anyone was thinking about it that way at the time...
These are my thoughts, if anyone cares to weigh in. (They're essentially the same comments I made on a friend's LJ.)
Really, if you look at everything it shouldn't be surprising- Peter HAS been losing interest, it seems. You can't entirely blame him for not wanting the entire rest of his life to be centered on running the TMNT. But it DOES surprise me given how much creative control he always insisted on having- I thought that was a sign that he was still deeply, personally invested in what happens with the Turtles.
On the surface some things won't change- the cartoon will muddle along in its mediocre way, toys will be made. Nobody was mourning Volume 4 anyway, but if we lose Tales that would be sad. Makes me wonder what's in store for the live action/cgi movie. And it makes it even more unlikely that Turtles Forever will ever see the light of day. But we're never going to have the fan-creator relationship with Nick that we had with Laird & Mirage. We're not going to have people as open and honest and in love with a creation that's part theirs as Dan Berger or Stephen Murphy or Jim Lawson. I feel kind of bad for them...I wonder how they feel. Is it like having your house sold out from under you? I hope the Mirage regulars still have jobs- Mirage may still exist but I doubt it'll have as much work to do. This is a bad time to be out of work, even for smart creative people.
I'm not really angry or bitter or even greatly disappointed. I'm just...gobsmacked. It's hard to grasp. I'm a little sad. It's very much the end of an era. It honestly feels a little like a defeat- for so long, even at its most profitable, the TMNT stayed creator-owned and creator-controlled. It did deals with the corporate world but it was never exactly OF the corporate world. And now it's just a wholly owned subsidiary. If that's a defeat, it's not really MY defeat, so maybe I'm not entitled to find that sad. But that's how it looks to me. It feels like something's died.
So, a little sad, very surprised. I'm not really sure how to feel either. I think I'd have felt more strongly about it back in high school or even in college. Maybe it's that I've got so much more going on these days, I'm not as much of a full-time fan as I used to be. It's not so much that the Turtles have become a smaller piece of my life as that there are so many more pieces now.
Really makes Turtles Forever feel less like a celebration and more like a goodbye, although I doubt anyone was thinking about it that way at the time...