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Remembering the Ninja Turtles |
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Written by Jenne Osterheldt, McClatchy-Tribune
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Friday, 23 March 2007 |
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We arrived a full hour before show time, but the line still snaked around the theater, back toward the concession stand.
A preview showing of "TMNT" attracted hundreds of eager fans. And not just kids. Adults waited, too. But we weren't surprised. After all, it's a movie from our time, the quirky 1980s.
"I think it comes down to the nostalgia of it all," says Van Sneed, 23, my fellow turtle-loving friend.
"The '80s were kind of undeniably cool," he says. "Because of the melting pot we lived in then, there were so many different things going on, from the big hair bands to hip-hop. There was this big mix of stuff that shouldn't go together" — like turtles and martial arts — "but it's connected because of the mood of the decade."
Every generation might think theirs is the coolest or the most original, but there's something about the '80s that just won't fade away.
The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles are just the latest in a line of icons of the 1980s to make a comeback.
Toys such as Cabbage Patch Kids and My Little Pony have resurged in recent years. On the fashion front, old-school Mohawks, skinny jeans and super glossy lips have reappeared. Pop stars like Gwen Stefani and Fergie infuse their music with sounds of the '80s. And some of our favorite cartoons — "Scooby-Doo," "Transformers," "He-Man" — were reintroduced, thanks to Cartoon Network.
Trinessa Fisk, a 28-year-old Missouri mom, says the '80s revival helps her connect with her children. She and her 5-year-old son, Marcus, watch "Scooby-Doo" together. Her 2-year-old daughter, Brooklyn, loves Strawberry Shortcake — the very same heroine Trinessa loved as a child.
"Being a child of the '80s, and now having children of my own, the '80s comeback makes it easier to relate to them. We have more in common in comparison to the older generations and their kids," she says. "It opens the doors of communication. It's like we have something to share with our children. I think it's a good thing."
Van says seeing so many trends and movies from his childhood come back allows him to see them from a different perspective than he did as a child. The Ninja Turtles are now more to him than just fighting reptiles.
"When I was a kid," he says, "I loved how bright and colorful they were. I had all the action figures, and, to me, it was a movie about turtles who were ninjas. But seeing this movie now, I see that it's also about a disjointed family trying to reconnect.
There's a lot we didn't get as kids. Now we can see those underlying details and story lines."
For me, the biggest perk of being an '80s baby involves more than movie remakes or my favorite cartoon or getting to rock Rainbow Brite T-shirts.
We're all adults now, some of us married and raising kids of our own, but the memories of our childhood live on. We don't need scrapbooks. Our memories dance across the silver screen. They live in the toy aisles. They sing our songs. And they walk the runways.
Being a child of the '80s is golden because our childhood never dies — until the '90s become the "It" decade and we get to relive our teenage years.
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Jenee Osterheldt:
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