You know how it is when you're a kid in school; usually, you're so damn anxious to leave that you find yourself running all the way home to escape it. Not only are you running to escape the tediousness of school, you're also running because your favourite cartoon shows are on tv, maybe 15 minutes or so after the school bell rings. If you did that when you were a kid, then you were a lot like me. I hated school - always have and always will - so when the bell would ring that signified the end of the day, I knew the sun was only beginning to rise in my little world. For those next few hours before I was forced to go to bed, I was free - free to do anything other than sit at a little table and get yelled at by some old battleaxe who was probably just frustrated that she couldn't be a university professor after she left higher education.

With my freedom, I would rush home from school, sit down, and turn on the tv. From 3:30pm until 5:30pm, I was going to allow my brain to relax and instead allow my adrenal gland to run wild and pump some adrenaline through my body. I would always get an adrenaline rush from watching my favourite cartoon shows after school, because it was like a symbol of my freedom or some other deep bollocks like that. I had two favourite cartoon shows when I was a kid. There was Transformers, which for some reason was only shown at 6am, so when I came home from school, I had to wait until something like 4:30pm for my other favourite show to come on the tv.

It would always start the same way - a cloud filled night sky, complete with a half moon. Suddenly, the scene would blur because the viewpoint was shifting away from the night sky, down towards a street at such a fast pace. Down in the center of the street, there would be a circular manhole cover, leading to a sewer. As you get accustomed to seeing said manhole cover, it's illuminated in a bright purple light, which is followed by a blue explosion! The screen pans back up into the sky, following a large purple ball of light and in that light are four little turtles. Suddenly, poof! Instead of the screen showing four little turtles, we're treated to the shadowy image of one of the cartoon show's main characters. At this point, the logo appears before the shadowy figure, letting you know the title of the cartoon, while that familiar song plays in the background.


Seems familiar, right? You all know about the Teenage Mutant Hero Turtles - those shell backed heroes who were turned from four ordinary pet turtles into mutant heroes and masters of the art of the ninja. What? What do you mean you've never heard of the Teenage Mutant Hero Turtles? You've heard of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles? What are those?

Okay, okay, I'll level with you here. I'm not pranking you. I'm well aware of who the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles are. That picture you see above you, I haven't photoshopped it or anything to dick with you and blur the image of your childhood. If you're from the UK or anywhere else in Europe, then the image above is going to be very familiar, along with the part of the theme song that I just wrote in italics. As for those of you who were born and raised in North America or even the far east, then Teenage Mutant Hero Turtles probably sound like some cheap knock off. Well, it's no knock off; it's very real. Today, we scope out one of the quirkier moments of my childhood as the Rocket Hideout presents to you...


We all know about the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Whether you were a kid during the height of its popularity in the 80s or you were some boring adult who wore a suit to work and worked with a calculator, everybody knew who and what the Ninja Turtles were. It was a staple of the 1980's and a symbol of what the era was. When you think the 80's, you think of over the top perms, Zubaz pants, boom boxes, Transformers, Nintendo, Hulk Hogan and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Or was that just me...?

Like Hulkamania, Turtlemania was was running just as wild. It seemed like everywhere you turned, you had the smiling face of one or all four of the Turtles staring back at you. In the toys stores, obviously, it was in the shape of the toys; in the electronics store, you saw the Turtles on video game boxes. In the clothes stores, there were kids' underwear and t-shirts with them on, and you couldn't even escape them in the supermarket since they were on every cereal box, candy bar, and pizza box you could think of. ← The pizza box is very appropriate, dontcha think?

Especially when you turned on the television, you were bound to see the Ninja Turtles scampering around somewhere, whether it was the cartoon show or a commercial for some product. The Turtles were everywhere. They had taken North America by storm, and it wasn't long before Leonardo, Michelangelo, Donatello, Raphael and all the other characters were dominating the globe. But while everybody in North America enjoyed the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, over in Europe, children were blissfully unaware that their new beloved heroes weren't ninjas, but heroes - Teenage Mutant Hero Turtles. Just what was going on around here?

Well, for some reason when the Turtles were being marketed for their expansion overseas, the United Kingdom looked at all the material that was passed along to them, hyping the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Unfortunately, the creators of the Turtles didn't realize that the UK, and in fact Europe as a whole, were pretty sensitive when it came to the subject of ninjas. Ever since the days of Bruce Lee, the UK and the rest of Europe had some kind of problem with portrayals of the martial arts and ninjas as a whole. According to information that I've been able to find on the internet, “ninja” was too violent of a word, and ninjas were too violent of a subject to be exposed to children. After all, what is a ninja? According to Wikipedia...

“A ninja (忍者) or shinobi (忍び) was a covert agent or mercenary in feudal Japan who specialized in unorthodox warfare. The functions of the ninja included espionage, sabotage, infiltration, and assassination, and open combat in certain situations. Their covert methods of waging war contrasted the ninja with the samurai, who observed strict rules about honor and combat.”

According to this definition, Leonardo, Michelangelo, Donatello and Raphael are mercenaries who specialize in espionage, sabotage, infiltration and assassination. If you ever read the original Laird and Eastman comic books, then you'll know for a fact that the Ninja Turtles were everything that Wikipedia describes a Ninja to be. In fact, if I remember right, the Turtles' mission in life in those comic books was to kill Shredder so that they could avenge the dishonour that Shredder had caused to their sensei, Master Splinter. The comic was intended for teenagers and adult nerds, so such a subject and plotline was fine for them, but when it came to a cartoon and toyline that was to be marketed for kids, the higher ups decided that four Ninjas whose purpose in life was to avenge their sensei by killing their sensei's mortal enemy was just a tad too strong.

Of course, when the cartoon was released, the people in charge of writing and producing the show ensured that the biggest relation the Turtles had to real ninjas were the name and the fact they were good at infiltration and sabotage. The Turtles never killed anybody; in fact, the only things the Turtles ever wasted were the robotic Foot Soldiers (because nobody cares if robots are “killed”) and pizza. Still, while the Turtles' features were changed from menacing black and white mutants from the comics to friendly, cuddly looking Turtles in the cartoon and they never killed anybody, all of that wasn't enough for the UK and Europe. The fact that they were called “ninjas” was still a problem. The only way a solution could be realized would be to change the name of the show. I guess they could have been called Teenage Mutant Turtles, but that just didn't seem enough - it just didn't flow off the tongue right, and so needed a fourth adjective in the title. Fortunately, the theme song to the show probably came in handy. The slogan was that they were “heroes in a half shell.” Hero is a good, wholesome... heroic word... Teenage Mutant Hero Turtles! Perfect! Remove the evil, negative connotation that comes with ninja and replace it with something positive like hero.

Armed with a new name, television networks across Europe now felt confident that they could release Teenage Mutant Hero Turtles to the children of the continent, with no fear of negative backlash from the childrens' parents and other busybodies who like to complain about stuff on television. However, there was another problem - a problem that contained one word.



We all know who Michelangelo is. He's always been known as the party dude. He's the Turtle who wears the orange mask, talks like a surfer dude and, out of all the Turtles, he's the one who loves pizza the most. He's the youngest and most innocent Turtle of the bunch, and those of you who follow the Rocket Blog will know that Michelangelo is my favouritist Turtle of all time. I know what you're now asking yourself. You're saying, “Self, if Michelangelo is the youngest and most innocent of the Turtles, then why on Earth would the censors over in Europe have such a problem with him?”

The answer is that it all has to do with Michelangelo's trademark weapon - the nunchakus. If you don't know what nunchakus are, then let me explain. Their official name is nunchaku - a weapon from Okinawa which is an island off the coast of Japan. They were believed to be derived from a Southeast Asian flail and were also originally used to thresh rice and soybeans by farmers. Here's what they look like.


To put it simply, this weapon is two heavy sticks made of wood, metal, or plastic that are connected to each other by a chain. They take a lot of practice and a lot of skill to master - many years worth of practice in fact. You need years of training in using them so that you don't look stupid and smack yourself in the head when trying to use them. Traditionally, you only use one pair of them (despite the fact Michelangelo had two pairs). They are a multi purpose weapon: they can be used as a blunt force instrument, they can be used to disarm an opponent by using the chain, or they can even be used to choke somebody out with the chain. They're a pretty bad ass weapon, and even though they're not a bladed instrument, they're pretty darn dangerous in the wrong hands (like all weapons, if you think about it.)

This here is another reason there was a stumbling block when getting the Turtles out in Europe.

Talk about ridiculous, right? First censors had a problem with the name, then they had a problem with the fact that a set of nunchakus are seen being used by one of the four Turtles. What's the answer to this problem?

Actually, the solution that the censors found was a pretty simple one. All they needed to do was make sure that they cut out or replaced any and every scene that showed Michelangelo using his nunchakus. I guess it sounds reasonable enough - until you realize that every time the Turtles got into a fight, Michelangelo would pull out his nunchakus and get ready to lay a beating down on Shredder or any of the other antagonists. What you're left with is a very choppy, non-linear cartoon show. I'll give you a few examples from the show, as I remember them.

We'll start with the intro. In the Ninja Turtles version, there's a part of the intro where the Turtles are sprung out of the Turtle van and fly into the air. They withdraw their weapons, which shifts to a sequence showing their weapons in hand with their corresponding colours in the background; however, when Michelangelo's nunchakus come into view in the Hero Turtles version, the scene quickly changes to a clip from the episode “The Incredible Shrinking Turtles” where Dontallo points his bo staff towards what he thought was The Shredder. Then a little later into the intro in the Ninja Turtles version, you'll see the Turtles drop out of a red sky, showing off their weapons, right? In the Hero Turtles version, when it's Michelangelo's turn to drop out of the sky flailing his nunchakus as he does, the screen changes to another clip from “The Incredible Shrinking Turtles”; this time, it's a clip of Shredder looking through a set of binoculars. This was all done to ensure that Michelangelo's nunchakus were never seen in the intro.


Now, if you think that's bad, then it gets worse as we actually get to a few episodes. We'll go back to the episode “The Incredible Shrinking Turtles” as a good example.

In this episode, the Turtles are on the hunt for pieces of an alien crystal, which could spell doom if they're pieced together and used for evil. Naturally, with the Turtles being the good guys they are, they realize they need to find the pieces of the crystal before Shredder can get his hands on them. Eventually, the Turtles track down a piece at a harbour in New York City, finding it on a garbage barge of all things. After jumping in piles of garbage, Donatello withdraws the piece of the crystal which prompts Shredder to leap out of nowhere and snatch it for himself! Now if you know the Turtles, then you know they're not going to take this shit lying down. Shredder tells them that if they want it so bad, they should go after it, which the Turtles do. Immediately, Donatello is literally kicked to the curb by Shredder, so Michelangelo sneaks up behind Shredder to dish out some pain of his own. He's flailing his nunchakus at this point, with his foot haphazardly in the middle of a looped piece of rope on the floor which is attached to the end of a crane. Thinking quickly, Shredder pulls a lever on the crane, and Michelangelo is caught in the rope and hung out to dry, so to speak. Do you think that happened in the Hero Turtle version? Nope.

Here's what happens. Donatello leaps at Shredder and, just like in Ninja Turtles, Shredder kicks Donatello aside. But then, instead of showing Michelangelo sneaking up on Shredder, the focus pans immediately to the rope Michelangelo's foot is in (before Shredder activates the crane.) The scene then changes to Shredder dispatching of Raphael and Leonardo in a similarly easy fashion, before he stands triumphant over the fallen Turtles. So, what happened to the scene with Michelangelo? Well, aside from seeing his foot in the rope (which you can tell is his, because you see his orange knee pad), it's as it he wasn't even there until they show him lying on the ground with all the other Turtles at Shredder's feet. For continuity, this is fucked up beyond belief. Most people would take it as some dumb error on the writer or animator's part, but the fact that stuff did happen to Michelangelo and they just didn't show it not only insults the creative team in general, but childrens' intelligence as well. The censors were probably of the opinion of, “Oh, the kids won't notice!”

Oh yeah, asshole? Well, I watched this episode when I was about five, and I sure as shit noticed. I thought it was bullshit. What happened to Michelangelo, and why didn't they show it? He was my favourite Turtle, so I was pretty vexed as to why they never shared what happened to him at this point. But, it wasn't the first time the focus would be taken off my favourite Turtle for the sake of ensuring children didn't see nunchakus.

Let's take another episode as an example: the episode where Splinter loses his memory. I can't remember what it was called, but it was marketed over here on video as “How It All Began.” In this episode, Splinter loses his memory. Raphael has been captured, and the other three Turtles are talking to Splinter about their history to try and restore his memory. (It should be noted the episode starts with the Turtles talking to Splinter. The whole part where Raphael is captured is cut.) There's one scene early on in the episode, where the Turtles tell Splinter he named them after his favourite artists. This runs into a sequence from the first episode, “Turtle Tracks”, where Splinter introduces the Turtles. Each Turtle gets a nicely animated sequence, showing them using their weapons in front of a background of the respective colours of their masks. Leonardo and Donatello get their full sequence shown, showing off their weapons; however, when we get to the third, Michelangelo, it's simply a close up still shot of his head before the scene changes real quick to Raphael spinning one of his sai in his hand. There's only one word to describe this.

Bollocks!

The continuity of each episode was killed completely. Unfortunately, the problem would get worse and worse, the more Michelangelo was seen fighting in every episode. Eventually, when the cartoon was gearing up to have episodes that focused on each Turtle, something had to be done. I mean, it'd be useless having an episode focus on Michelangelo.  When he got into a jam that needed him to use his weapons, what was going to happen? He reaches for his nunchakus, then a bunch of cards that read things like “Biff!”, “Whack!”, and “Bonk!” come on the screen to block out the ass kicking Michelangelo was dishing out with his nunchakus? The writers decided that Michelangelo's primary weapon of nunchakus had to be replaced - replaced by a Turtle-themed grappling hook. It was a sad, second rate replacement. Further editing would come in the form of the Turtles' exclamation of “Let's kick shell!” being removed as it was dubbed too violent, as well as “Bummer!” (which was one of Michelangelo's favourite exclamations) due to the fact that in the UK, "bumming" is a slang word for anal sex and a "bummer" is somebody who likes to partake in anal sex.

Who would have known a cartoon that was originally based on a silly concept like a Turtle who was a ninja could stir up so much crap in Europe? There were so many things that the censors thought needed cutting.  They should have either rated the show as PG and showed it at a later time in the evening, or not broadcast the show on tv at all and released it solely on video. But then, if that happened, Teenage Mutant Hero Turtles wouldn't have been as profitable, and I'm sure that the people who owned the rights to the license would have wanted that, huh? Curiously enough, all the toys of Michelangelo came with his nunchakus, and the video games came out over here uncensored, as you could play as Michelangelo and kick Foot Soldier ass as much as you liked using Michelangelo's nunchakus. If the people who wanted to protect children were so concerned, they would have ensured that the toys came packed without the plastic nunchakus and that the video games were reprogrammed to either replace Michelangelo's weapon or just take Michelangelo out of the games completely. Then again, video games weren't important enough to be censored back then, and it would have taken too much effort to ensure the toys that came out over here were removed of the nunchakus, too. I guess it was easy enough to paste stills of Michelangelo over wherever scenes of him using his nunchakus were.


While we're on the subject of Michelangelo's nunchakus, you have to wonder - why was Europe so hung up on somebody using nunchakus in the first place? After all, Leonardo was using fucking swords all the time, and they never bothered to cut that out of the show. It would be so easy for a kid to go into their kitchen, grab a bread knife to pretend they're a Hero Turtle, and accidentally cut themselves (or worse). When have you ever heard of a kid getting his hands on a pair nunchakus to bean himself in the face with? I've never heard of such a thing myself. If anything, you would figure that Leonardo and Raphael's weapons would be censored due to the fact that they're weapons made for cutting or stabbing people. In an amusing display of irony, though, in the newest rendition of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles that is released by Nickelodeon, they've taken to censoring many scenes where blades are used. Leonardo's sword strikes have been censored a few times, and one of the main thugs in the show once withdrew a set of switchblades and talked above carving his name on the Turtles' shells. This was blacked out completely over here, as the screen literally FADED TO BLACK then returned as soon as he finished the sentence. I am darn serious about that.


It's all over my head, but then, I guess that's why I don't work in the censorship business. It's probably a good thing I don't work in the censorship business either, because if I did, plenty of things would get released that kids shouldn't see. In my mind, it's up to the parents to monitor what their kids watch on tv and play as video games; it shouldn't be up to a group of people sitting around a table deciding what's appropriate and what isn't. My parents were pretty lax with what I watched. I watched stuff like Terminator II and Child's Play during my childhood, and I haven't become a psychopath because of it. I know when I'm a parent (someday), I'll be closely watching what my kids watch, and if I think it's not good for them to watch, then they won't watch it. I'm not going to let some dumbass sitting in a suit decide what's good for my child to watch, because if it was up to them, my children would probably only watch something like Barney for the rest of their lives. Now, there's a kids' show that can turn a child into a psychopath.

I could go on and on about why Teenage Mutant Hero Turtles was a silly idea, but I think you get the point. What I can go on and on about, though, are the other things that got their nuts cut off when they were sent to Europe. Oh, what? You thought that Ninja Turtles was the only thing to get overly censored over here? Well, prepare to get your bollocks rocked and your minds messed with as I shared some other examples with you.



Preceding the censorship of Michelangelo in Teenage Mutant Hero Turtles, Bruce Lee's classic, Enter The Dragon, was censored for exactly the same reason. Yes, even back then, the UK had this real vendetta against nunchakus that I will never figure out for as long as a I live - especially when they would happily show Bruce getting cut open by Han's metal claw. In the famous scene where Bruce infiltrates Han's underground base, he begins smacking the shit out of the guards and grabs himself a pair of nunchakus. From there, Bruce does the iconic scene where he shows off his prowess with the nunchakus, doing the bit where he flings them around his body which is such a bad ass scene. Unfortunately, the entire scene was cut by the British Broadcasting Censorship people, so in the UK, Bruce went from beating up some guards, to suddenly running into a trap in the next scene. Bullshit.


People who played video games as far back as the NES should be aware of Contra. In Contra, you play as Bill “Mad Dog” Rizer and/or Lance “Scorpion” Bean - a pair of commandos who are sent through 10 kick ass levels to kill the alien scum that they encounter. It was released by Konami in early 1987 and is a must for people who make a habit of playing truly manly video games. It spawned sequels, and in fact, new games of Contra are still being released today.

Well, those in North America and Japan might be surprised to learn that we never got Contra here in the UK until the first Playstation/Sega Saturn Contra game. Instead, what we got was Probotector!


That's right, Probotector. See, censors here in Europe figured that Contra was too close to the name of the rebel group opposing the government in Nicaragua between '79 and the 90's. Because of the somewhat delicate title, the game was renamed Probotector, but it didn't just end there. The human-on-alien violence was figured to be just too mature for NES playing kiddies to be exposed to, so the marines were replaced by robots - Patlabor-looking robots, in fact. Not only that, but half of the aliens were replaced by robots, too. This isn't necessarily a bad thing because, when I was a kid, I was nuts about robots, so Super Probotector for Super Nintendo was a game I rented and played a lot, and now own because of it. Still, the fact that a pair of commandos shooting down aliens is seen as too graphic for children in the UK but not in America is laughable.



In the same way Contra was renamed Probotector, Ninja Gaiden was renamed Shadow Warriors over here in the UK. I own a copy of Shadow Warriors for my Nintendo and still enjoy playing it. Like Teenage Mutant Hero Turtles games, nothing about the content has changed aside from the name. Again, Ninja is too violent of a word.


Here's a funny case that might touch the nerves of some of the more patriotic people who might read this. Everybody knows G.I. Joe. Again, it's one of those iconic things that if you don't follow, then you've at least heard of it. They were very popular toys, going back to when our fathers were kids. Eventually, a cartoon show was made by the same people who made the Transformers cartoon and was soon an international hit with kids everywhere.

However, as has been the trend in this whole article, when G.I. Joe was about to hit the shores of the UK, the higher-ups felt a name change was in order. After all, G.I. Joe had a very... shall we say, American flavour to it - one that threatened to alienate British children everywhere. Because of this, the Joes were rechristened as Action Force - International Heroes! The cartoon was redubbed, changing the names of popular Joes, and in some more extreme cases, some of the heroes identities were changed so that characters became more international. I guess they added a few British S.A.S. members or something. Not only that, but the iconic catchphrase was replaced in what could probably go down as the most unabashed insult ever.



It boggles the mind what the UK and Europe deem appropriate and inappropriate. It's funny. As a child, I didn't know any better and just accepted all these changes, but with the advent of the internet and informative websites, I've been able to discover the truth behind some of my favourite things as a child. Now, in my adult years, I can't help feeling somewhat betrayed. In some ways, parts of my childhood were almost a lie. A lie that was used by British busybodies to cover up what they thought were things too inappropriate for me. To them, I say this - quit being such do-gooders. All you're doing is ruining the fun for the rest of us.