Extinct Attractions: Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles
Welcome to Extinct Attractions. This week, I was feeling hungry for some Italian, so I took a look at a show involving some crime fighting turtles who love to eat.
Via Olympics
Last Sunday, the Olympics came to a close with a rousing gold medal match between the United States and Canada that proved that the U.S. is the true hockey champion of the world. I thought that Italy did a great job hosting the games, with some beautiful backdrops for the outdoor events, particularly my personal favorite, biathlon.
My favorite thing about Italy is the food, though, and the Games got me thinking about pasta and cheese and pizza, especially. And does anyone love pizza more than the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles?
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If we jump back to the 1980s, the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles were all the rage, particularly in the world of comic books and toys. They even spawned an animated television series (because seemingly everyone had one at the time), but what really cemented things was the 1990 movie. Grossing almost $135 million domestically, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles was the fifth-biggest movie of the year and amazingly would have grossed almost as much as this past year’s Lilo & Stitch did in today’s dollars. In fact, it was the biggest independent film of all time at the time and basically put New Line Cinema on the map.
In one of his final works, Jim Henson and team created the puppets for the movie, making the property a perfect fit for the newly opened Disney-MGM Studios, even though nothing about the franchise had anything to do with Disney or MGM, but those theme park rights were available. So on July 1, 1990, the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles joined the Disney fun on the Streets of America with their first ever theme park representation as part of a show. Well, we’ll see if we can really call it a show.
The experience began with the turtles riding in on a van in some pretty rad costumes. They looked pretty similar to the film, but all were full-on walk around characters and a nice little touch. Over some loud speakers, their theme song started to play as their friend April O’Neil emerged on the stage to add some vocals to the mix.
As the singing continued, the gang did some dance moves and showcased part of their karate and ninja skills while twirling around the stage. But with the end of the song, that was pretty much it. The turtles skedaddled off the stage and posed to take some pictures with their adoring fans.
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There wasn’t much to the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles “show” but hey maybe that’s why it was able to stick around until May 31, 1995. Shows like that never get the chance to last for that long, but by the mid 90s a lot of TMNT had lost its luster so it was time to bring properties like the Power Rangers. Nowadays, one would never see a non-Disney owned IP make its way into a theme park, so it really shows how times have changed to just jump on the most popular thing at the time and make it a success.
As always, don’t forget to check out my interactive maps of the Disney Parks throughout the years where you can watch or learn more about all the attractions from every Disney park around the world.
Thanks for reading and have a magical day!