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Tuesday, February 7, 2012

We Are Not "Sewer Heads" - A Note to Playmates and Nickelodeon




Last week when Playmates released their first peek at the 2012 TMNT toy lineup, there was also a series of short videos posted to MTV.com featuring Karl Aaronian from Playmates talking about each of the different lines. In these videos, he drops in the term "Sewer Heads," referring to the long-time Turtles fans.



As press coverage of the new toys grows in the build-up to Toy Fair, this term has been showing up again. And it is because of this recurrence of the term that TMNT fans wish to declare to both Playmates and Nickelodeon:

We are not "Sewer Heads." Please stop calling us that.
It is dumb and rather insulting. Think about it.
Now, I realize that we don't have a "cool" name for our fandom to sound off in your interviews and press releases akin to "Trekkers," "Browncoats," "Whovians," or "X-Philes," etc. But the thing is, all of those names happened organically, by the fans. They weren't assigned by marketing departments. We officially reject this "title" that you've assigned us.

If you absolutely must use something in your marketing copy, we respectfully suggest you change it to the less insulting "Shell Heads." We are not declaring this as our title, and take no ownership of it. But it's better than the name you've given us.

Really, it's probably just best if we stay "Ninja Turtles Fans." After all, Lucasfilm and Hasbro seem to be doing pretty well selling their products to "Star Wars Fans."

TMNT fans, whatever they be called, are encouraged to have their voices heard on this matter. Please send Tweets to @PlaymatesToys and @TMNTMaster. You can also post on the Playmates Toys and Nickelodeon TMNT Facebook pages.

Maybe with some good ol' fashioned Turtle Power we can get use of "Sewer Heads" killed and buried before Toy Fair actually starts.

UPDATE! @TMNTMaster has assured us that we will no longer be called Sewer Heads! Your voices have been heard! Thanks for listening, Nickelodeon!

16 comments:

  1. I second hating "Sewer Heads" It's just one step above "Shit Heads". It's massively insulting.

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  2. Yeah, Turtle fans works fine for me.

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  3. Yeah, I watched those videos a couple of days ago and was like "Sewer Heads? Who says that??" I really don't care for it.

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  4. "Shell Head" is Iron Man's nickname. I like it but it's taken.

    Sayonara.

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    1. I like the moniker "Shellheads" ;) Dylan, I never knew "shell head" was Iron man's nickname, but it's not the name of a fan group, (unless that's what fans of Iron Man are called and I don't know about it) so I think it'd still be up for grabs.

      I've also always enjoyed "Mutation Nation", but I know that it has too many syllables to be easily remembered/used. I would suggest "Muties", but I know that a lot of X-Men fans call themselves that, so we may be out of luck.

      However, I don't know if we get a "choice" in what we are called. Case in point being that Star Trek fans have never really liked the nickname "Trekkies" (preferring "Trekkers"), but it seems to be what has stuck with them. You are more likely to hear them referred to as "Trekkies" than "Trekkers" in almost any non-fan-published piece.

      Also, Rosemary, I have heard Star Wars fans called "warsies", and I've also seen them marketed to as "jedi" ;)

      Everyone wants a LABEL for groups, so we may be stuck with the nickname "sewer heads". (maybe because so many TMNT fans I know have dirty minds! ;) It could be worse, we could be called "sewer dwellers" ;)

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  5. Wow, I can't believe they already backed off. The TMNT fan base's voice must be quite loud indeed.

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    1. They backed off?? Huh? Where did you hear this??

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    2. Follow the @TMNTMaster link at the end.

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    3. Cool! Thanks rose! This is good! :) Hopefully this type of quick response will #1. Be indicative of the type/speed of response fans will receive from Nick, and #2. Be followed up by official action (or non-action, by not calling us "sewer heads" anymore, in this case) on the part of Nickelodeon. :)

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    4. I know that @TMNTMaster technically "is" Nickelodeon, but truthfully, it's someone in their PR/social media department. What I meant by my #2 is that hopefully when that person "transmits the message" to higher ups, the higher ups listen. Hopefully nothing has been printed up using that moniker that can't be easily fixed. ;)

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  6. In latin american and in spain we call ourselves "fans de las Tortugas Ninja" (ninja turtles fans), "simple but effective".

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  7. I think Marvel actually owns the trademark on "Shell Head" so I wouldn't be too optimistic.

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  8. Alternative fan community nicknames:
    Shellraisers (since it's something they already own)
    Shellbacks
    ...
    that's all I got.

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