Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (early known as
Teenage Mutant Hero Turtles in some European countries due to controversy at the time) is an
animated television series produced by the studio
Murakami-Wolf-Swenson and the French company . The pilot was shown during the week of December 14, 1987 in syndication as a five-part
miniseries and the show began its official run on October 1, 1988. Since then the show and franchise has become a world-wide phenomenon. The series featured the
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles characters created in
comic book form by
Kevin Eastman and
Peter Laird. The property was changed considerably from the darker-toned comic, to make it more suitable for children and the family. The initial motivation behind the
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles animated series was that, upon being approached to create a toy line,
Playmates Toys was uneasy with the comic-book characters' small
cult following. They requested that a television deal be acquired first, and after the initial five-episode series debuted, the California toy company released their first series of
Ninja Turtles action figures in the summer of 1988. The two media would correspond in marketing style and popularity for many years to come.