Teen Titans "Trouble in Tokyo" Feature Talkback (Spoilers)

[James Harvey]

As apart of the network's Superhero Saturday, the Canadian channel YTV will air Teen Titans: Trouble In Tokyo this coming Saturday at 12pm (ET).

Teen Titans - Trouble in Tokyo
Original Airdate - September 15th, 2006 (TV Airing) - DTV
February 6th, 2007 (DVD Release)

When a high-tech ninja attacks Titans Tower, Robin, Starfire, Cyborg, Raven and Beast Boy spring into action. Robin finds out that the ninja was sent by a mysterious and menacing Japanese criminal known as Brushogun, and the Teen Titans travel to Tokyo to track the villain down.

Comments?

[RavenFan17]

This is just a bad movie. I'm amazed that the crew that brought us wacky, clever episodes in the past would put out such an uncreative bore.

[Neo Ultra Mike]

I should note that for SOME reason, Cartoon Network is also airing this movie on Toonami from 7:00-8:30 this Saturday. This comes just out of the blue added to yesterday's schedule when it had no sign of being here before, and I don't think CN is celebrating Superhero Saturday (if they were they'd at least have a Fantastic Four marathon of the episodes they'd air to celebrate FF returning to Toonami but aren't). I think CN is just being unpredicatably stupid... yet again.

[DisneyBoy]

Hey y'all, I'm only three years late coming in on this talkback, but whatever...better late than never right?

It was good to see this movie. The Titans series, despite it's many flaws and limited storytelling, still managed to bring us five wacky, memorable characters that squeezed their way into our hearts. Revisiting them now, after they've been off the airwaves for a couple of years was nice.

I was expecting much more of the zany flavor of past Titans episodes in this Tokyo-themed adventure. If Mumbo the Magician could set the minds of the creative team zipping out from one memorable montage to another...it's a bit of a mystery as to why this film's best moments came together late in the second act, almost as afterthoughts to the main - and surprisingly disturbing - A-plot. Seeing Beast Boy mangle the show's theme song (later reprised in the credits) definitely had me smiling. But everything else was dominated by Robin's grim nature. You can only really stomach him on the series when the other four are being louder and brighter...but here, the script revolves around his new, almost Slade-like obsession. The 'murder' sequence, though inventively-staged, can't overcome the limitations placed on our suspension of disbelief. This world of crazy Titans and colorful villains just doesn't include murder or death. To try and play out a Batman-like plotline here with Robin was a big mistake.

I really enjoyed the idea of the villain - an artist with the capbility to create life from anything he imagines - but the reveal was just too late in the game, and the animation, far, FAR too limited to follow-through on the endless possibilities. Recoloring six villains into an army isn't sufficient eye-candy. And we ALL knew the detective was going to be involved in the scheme somehow. They just bit off more than they could chew in the last ten minutes of the movie, and made the rest of the film feel like wasted time.

At some point I was hoping to see actual Tokyo buildings or locations. TT was never set in a real American city, though, so they can hardly be blamed for only bringing across a superficial (and sadly stereotypical) view of Tokyo life.

Probably my biggest gripe is that the animation was all over the place. The first third looked horribly stiff, and the rest was just wildly off-model, though decidedly more engaging. The 'Lost Episode' included on the DVD really wowed me with lovely LOTTO and DongWOO animation. It also left me thinking that maybe four short vignettes might have made for a more cohesive DVD sell than one long movie.

All in all, there are too many misses here. The Tokyo idea is wasted, the villain is wasted, and the movie feels far more dull and serious than it should. If only it was all as fun as Cyborg and Starfire's singing...they would have had a hit.

HollaHollaHollaHolla - HollaHollaHolla MY NA-AAAAAAME! TEEN TITANS!

[Radical Raven]

Honestly, this dissapointed me. It was like on of the weaker episodes of the series... stretched to feature length. I was one of the people wanting them to continue the series via Direct-to-DVD's, but if all the output will be like this, I'd honestly rather they didn't.

[ABrown]

I'm surprised at how many negative posts I've read about this movie. I really liked it. I remember when I first saw this movie, it wasn't long after Superman:Brainiac Attacks had come out. And I was still getting over the thought that Superman:BA wasn't supposed to exist in the Superman:TAS continuity. And so I remember thinking to myself: "so is this not supposed to take place in the Teen Titans continuity either?"

[sdp]

The movie is not bad, its good, however theres stuff that makes it seem like its worse than it really is which includes:



* It came out WAY too late, I forget wasn't it like a year or longer after the show ended? It was finished for a long time before that which is why it takes place before season 5. The DTV was started around the same time the Batman vs Dracula DTV came out and that came out like 2 years before it or more.

* The movie is good but not amazingly, in fact it was a wasted opportunity. There is no reason this couldn't have been as great as other DC DTVs. It failed to get people all excited about TT especially since the show had ended.


And umm.. I guess thats it, they just didn't deliver. But still a good movie.