25 Years of TMNT... Makes Me Sad - Day 4

I apologize for not having updated in a week... I've had other things on my mind, believe it or not :p

So, after seven freakin' awesome seasons, the current Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles TV series is ending. This Saturday is the final episode. That's it, finished, done, soon to be yesterday's news. Now, ordinarily, I wouldn't be too bothered - although I'll miss it terribly, it had an amazing run for a Saturday morning cartoon in this day and age - especially one produced in the US. However, considering that this is the 25th anniversary of the franchise, you'd think they'd go one more year at least, right? Guess not.

I don't know who the blame would go to for its cancellation; I've heard the blame being attached to different entities without absolute proof on who pulled the trigger, so until I can test for GSR, I'll just present the blame as "theories".

One theory is that 4Kids is trying to focus more on making crappy card game cartoons and importing anime. Quite plausible, since this Chaotic bullplop is one of the "big things" right now, despite having ludicrously retarded plotlines and the card game just being an amalgamated ripoff of its predecessors. In fact, whereas Back to the Sewer's animation and art style was watered down a wee bit, Chaotic's was pumped up. This is all retardedly annoying, as Back to the Sewer would still prove to pull in good ratings, and when they threw BttS against new episodes of Chaotic on opposing networks (CW4Kids and the now defunct 4KidsTV, respectively), TMNT was actually drawing higher ratings than Chaotic!

Another theory maintains that because Playmates was funding 1/3 of the show, Playmates dropped out of fronting the money, and Mirage and 4Kids couldn't support their portion of the show. This theory balances on the fact that Playmates at least partially blames the TV show for the lack of toy sales, or at least believes that the Turtles are unpopular because the figures aren't selling. However, this has less to do with any factors other than the fact that most of the figures these days are complete and utter rubbish! If Playmates would get their heads out of their asses and actually release some decent figures that people want to buy, this wouldn't be an issue! Not to mention the fact that they still have yet to release figures for Back to the Sewer... isn't it kind of counterproductive to release them after the show is over?

The final theory bouncing around is that Mirage, or at least the bigwigs over there, don't care. Again, this has merit, as you can see from my rant on Mirage themselves. This is further supported by the fact that when questioned about the show's cancellation, Peter Laird so much shrugged and said that it's not the end of the world if it goes off the air. While anyone would be a simpleton for thinking that the two events are equal, I hate how nonchalant Laird is about the issue. How can you not give a shit about the only reason anybody even knows your name?

Further confusing the matter, is that 4Kids' TMNT panel at the New York City Comic Con was called "TMNT Animation: 25 and Going Strong". All that's coming out (to our knowledge) after this final episode of Back to the Sewer, is a direct-to-DVD feature. How is it 'Going Strong' if the series had only two more episodes at that point?

The worst part is, there's so many plotlines still left unresolved. Admittedly, most of them are quite minor, but they still bug me quite a bit. Some that I can think of off of the top o' my noggin:
-What is the origin of Touch & Go's powers?
-Did Mr. Marlin actually die, or did he survive like in the comics?
-We saw that the giant, demonic, Lovecraftian monstrosity from The Darkness Within survived Leonardo's onslaught. What is it up to?
-What is Bishop's relationship to Agent Finn, and how did he become a monster?
-Is Rat King actually dead?
-How exactly does Ch'rell connect to the original Oroku Saki? Did he learn of the legend of The Shredder and simply fashion his earthbound life after him to strike fear into Japanese villagers? How did he obtain the Heart of Tengu, and thus gain control of the original Saki's Heralds?
-Are Hun and Garbageman really brothers (as indicated in an unreleased episode?)
-What happened to Cody's parents? The show has hinted that Darius did something to them, but it's never elaborated on....
-How did Darius gain control of the noble Inuwashi Gunjin?
-What happened with Darius and the Dark Turtles? Are they still after Cody and causing chaos in the 2100's?
-Who is Master Khan, and how did he gain control of the Foot Clan?
-Why is Stockman working for Hun and not with Bishop, as seen in Fast Forward?
-Why did Khan think that he had defeated the Turtles in the distant future seen in Tempus Fugit?
-Speaking of that distant future, how did Ch'rell and the original Oroku Saki return to battle with Cyber Shredder?

This is all just flippin' nuts. We've got a show that's ending when the franchise turns 25, all of these unanswered questions about it, both within the show and in real life... this isn't Sparta... it's just madness.