If you had Cartoon Network growing up, chances are you remember hanging out with
Robin, Starfire, Raven, Cyborg, and Beast Boy.
That's right, here on ToonedUp we're counting down 107 facts you need to know about Teen Titans.
The orignal, we're not... no we're not doing the new one.
In a rare move by a network, Cartoon Network asked the show’s creators to take risks. Sam Register,
the former Vice President of Cartoon Network, told the creative team, “I want you to do
things you’re not supposed to do.”
Here’s a story about a man named Brady.
Or should we say Killer Moth? The villain’s house is decorated identically to that of
the classic sitcom family, the Brady Bunch.
The theme song of Teen Titans is sung by Japanese
pop/rock duo, Puffy. In the United States, they’re called Puffy AmiYumi to distinguish
them from Sean Combs, also known as Puff Daddy, Puffy, Diddy, P. Diddy, or as my uncle calls him,
Puff Dragon.
There are two versions of the songs that
alternatingly play before episodes. One has the lyrics sung in English, while the other
has them sung in Japanese. The show’s voice director, Andrea Romano, revealed that when
the Japanese theme song is played before an episode, it will be a silly one. When the
English theme song is played, the episode will be more serious.
Exceptions to the theme song rule of serious
and comedic episodes are “Nevermore” and “Every Dog Has His Day.”
The lyrics of the Japanese version of the song are not a direct translation of
the lyrics of the English version.
If you’re curious about what the Japanese
theme song’s lyrics really mean, listen to Beast Boy in “Teen Titans: Trouble in Tokyo".
He sings a translation of them.
Beast Boy’s real name is Garfield Logan.
Cyborg’s real name is Victor ‘Vic’ Stone.
Starfire’s real name is Koriand’r, or
Kory Anders.
Robin’s real name is Dick Grayson.
Terra’s real name is Tara Markov.
Raven’s real name is...just Raven. That's so Raven, right? No? Okay.
Thanks to the popularity of Teen Titans the cartoon and the series’ version of Raven,
her comic counterpart was brought back from the dead. Hopefully I become popular enough
in my lifetime that the same thing happens to me.
The show’s Raven has telekinetic powers, unlike her DC Comics self.
In the episode “Mad Mod”, the titular character Mad Mod tries to brainwash the Titans.
He forces them to keep their eyes open and plays strange patterns for them on his hypnoscreens.
This is a reference to the Ludovico technique from the film A Clockwork Orange, which was
used to make the character Alex incapable of violence and sexual thought.
Mad Mod is actually voiced by Malcolm McDowell, who played Alex in "A Clockwork Orange".
Teen Titans makes numerous references to Gotham City, the former residence of Robin and the
home of his mentor, Batman. The two were partners before Robin joined the Titans.
The show’s animation style takes influence from the anime FLCL.
Beast Boy’s love for mopeds also comes from FLCL. Haruhara Haruko, the show’s female
lead, has a Vespa motor scooter.
Marv Wolfman is a comic book writer who worked
on DC Comics’ The New Teen Titans. He contributed to the show by writing the episodes
"Deep Six” and “Titans East.”
While the show’s version of Terra vacillated
between being good and evil, her original comic book self was just evil.
She and Deathstroke even had a little something something going on
outside their scheming and spying.
The first Teen Titans episode to air was “Final Exam”, but it was actually the third episode made.
In a similar 1 and 3 number swap, the Teen Titans episode “Car Trouble” was the 11th
made, was the 13th to air.
Slade Wilson goes by the name Deathstroke
in the comics, but it sounded too violent so producers went with using his real name for the television series.
In the comics, Slade, or Deathstroke, is a
high priced bounty hunter rather that a someone looking to rule the world. Kind of like Boba.
Boba Fett.
Brother Blood’s background was completely altered when he made the transition from comics
to TV. Instead of being a demonic cult leader he became more of a criminal mastermind.
Hynden Walch is the voice of Starfire.
You may also recognize her as Princess Bubblegum in Adventure Time.
Tara Strong, a veteran voice actress, auditioned for Teen Titans and thought she’d be a sure
fit for the role of Starfire. She’d previously played Bubbles from The Powerpuff Girls, who
was a similar character. However, Hynden Walch blew producers away with her audition and
nabbed the part.
Don’t feel too bad for Tara Strong, though.
She ended up being cast as Raven!
Much of the show’s second season was based on The New Teen Titans comic arc,
“The Judas Contract”, by George Perez and Marv Wolfman.
The show’s lineup of teen heroes is based on the “classic” lineup from the 1980s
comics of Marv Wolfman and George Perez.
Kid Flash, or Wally West, is missing from the lineup,
but was added later. Wonder Girl could not be used at the time because of the "Wonder-Embargo".
With the success of the show, the comics brought
back the old lineup as well, teaming the characters up with younger proteges to mentor.
DC Comics optioned Teen Titans to be made into an animated series way back in the early
1980s. At the time though, the rights to Robin, in conjunction with the rights to Batman,
were already held by another animation company.
Early on in the show’s development, showrunners considered throwing out Robin’s red shirt
and green underpants, which in this context sounds like an awesome Christmas outfit, and
going for a look more on the way to Nightwing’s costume.
In the New Teen Titans comic, Garfield Logan was called Changeling, but the show’s creators
wanted to go with the character’s original codename, Beast Boy, which kind of sounds
like a German trying to pronounce “Best Buy.”
Around the time the series began airing, the comics changed Logan’s codename back to Beast Boy.
Teen Titans marks the animated debut of The Doom Patrol.
The show’s lineup of the team included Mento, Elasti-Girl, Negative Man, and Robotman.
The show’s creative team made the decision
to keep Beast Boy from speaking any human languages while in an animal form.
If you were jealous of Mad Mod’s little Teen Titan figures from the episode “Revolution”,
go out and hunt them down for yourself!
And you can one up Mad Mod by getting Robin as well!
Raven’s mother Arella is the only mother of a Titan to be seen in the show.
Because of this, Raven is the only Titan to have had both parents make an appearance.
If you exclude the silhouettes of Robin’s parents in the episode "Haunted".
David Slack, a writer and producer on Teen Titans,
was completely star struck when he met Wil Wheaton, who voices Aqualad in the series.
Wil Wheaton, in turn, was completely star
struck when he met Marv Wolfman. Wheaton is a huge fan of the comics.
The fifth season of Teen Titans differed from the previous four by having one large story arc.
Writers felt that by the time Season 5 rolled around, the Titans had saved the
world from Trigon and matured enough to handle bigger problems.
The series’ creative team originally wanted to have Terra in more episodes of the second season.
They wanted to make it feel like she was really a part of the group, so that when
she betrayed the Titans, it would come as a greater shock.
Hey guys, gonna take a quick break from all these 107 facts to talk about next week's programming.
Next Tuesday on Cartoon Hangover, we have 107 facts about BoJack Horseman.
And next Thursday we've got 107 facts about DuckTales on Channel Frederator.
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Slade was probably the series’ most recognizable villain,
but initially producers didn’t even know he’d be in a story arc. They originally
just planned to have him be the man behind everything, in the same vein as Dr. Claw from
Inspector Gadget.
But why did they change their minds? After watching a few episodes, the show’s creative
team realized that they were teasing something big, and if it wasn’t delivered, they were
in for some disappointed fans. They couldn’t figure out how to resolve the issue until
the legendary Bruce Timm visited Glen Murakami’s office. He looked at the scripts for the episodes
“Masks” and “Apprentice” and shared his opinion that the story was about Slade
trying to snatch Robin away from his team.
If you’re watching this video, you probably
love the Teen Titans. But do you know when the group made their first animated appearance?
It actually wasn’t in Cartoon Network’s show. The Titans originally appeared in three
7-minute cartoons as part of 1967’s “The Superman/Aquaman Hour of Adventure.”
Back then the team consisted of Aqualad, Wonder Girl, Kid Flash, and Speedy. That’s right.
Founding member Robin was missing.
Producers had a difficult time finding a voice
to fit Raven. Voice director Andrea Romano brought Tara Strong in, who tried using her
Batgirl voice to audition for the role. Before she left, she also tried a more raspy voice, which got her the part.
The theme song for Teen Titans sure is catchy.
And we have producer Glen Murakami to thank for that. He wanted the series to have an
iconic theme song, like Transformers or Spider-Man.
In the comics, Gizmo is a middle-aged dwarf.
In the series he’s been redesigned as a pre-teen kid.
When producers were redesigning Terra for the series, they wanted to make her more contemporary
than her comic book counterpart. Instead of a super-hero costume, she was given a more normal outfit.
In Teen Titans, Aqualad has the power to control
water through hydrokinesis. Glen Murakami has said this ability was given to him because it
“seemed more anime.”
The heroes Mas y Menos were created just for
the animated series. Creators wanted to have speedsters on the Titans East team.
Writer and producer David Slack has said that the creative team was flying by the seat of
their pants for the first season of the show. In later seasons, things were more planned out.
The villain Soto, from the episode "Every Dog Has His Day",
is actually named after one of the directors of Teen Titans: Alex Soto.
Beast Boy doesn’t really eat meat. Coincidentally, neither does his voice actor Greg Cipes.
Cipes has been a vegetarian since he was 8, and in 2009 he became a vegan.
Tokusatsu fans may have already noticed this, but for Cyborg’s design, Glen Murakami was
influenced by the super android from Kikaider.
For his fourth season debut, Trigon got a
spankin’ new redesign. Producers felt he needed to be meaner and scarier.
Sam Register, the former Vice President of Cartoon Network, is a huge fan of Marv Wolfman
and George Perez’s New Teen Titans comics from the 80s, which is why Teen Titans was
one of his top choices for DC properties to adapt.
Fans of Red X should send their thanks to Sam Register for suggesting that the character
be brought back after Robin ditched the alter ego.
For the second iteration of Red X, the show’s creative team drew inspiration from Star Wars’
Boba Fett, Speed Racer’s Racer X, and Joshua from Teen Titans Issue 20.
Producers went with portraying Aqualad as a swim team or pro surfer type of guy.
Of the more serious and less dude-ish variety, though.
Sam Register wanted Titans East to have a bigger role in the show, but the creative
team wasn’t so into the idea. When working on episodes with the other Titan team, they
sometimes felt like they were making spin-offs.
The episode Mad Mod was originally going to be titled “Detention.”
The episode "Winner Takes All" was originally going to be titled “It’s How You Play The Game.”
The fifth season of Teen Titans has thirteen episodes,
but at one point it was going to be twenty.
There were a number of plots that were scrapped
when the fifth season was shortened. Slade and the Brotherhood were going to team up,
Chief and Robotman were going to be involved in another story, and Thunder and Lightning
and Red Star would have made a reappearance.
Glen Murakami has said that the creative team
worked together elements of Wolfman and Perez’s 1980s Teen Titans with elements of Cardy and
Haney’s 1960s Teen Titans to create the series.
In the first episode of the series, Slade
is served tea by a butler who is none other than Wintergreen. In the comics, Wintergreen
is Slade, or Deathstroke’s, regular sidekick.
When Beast Boy says the line “You’re just
jealous ‘cause I sound like a rock star,” it’s a pointer to his voice actor Greg Cipes.
In addition to voice acting, Cipes is a reggae-ska rock singer.
Greg Cipes is also a professional surfer, which may explain Beast Boy’s chill manner of speech.
By the time the show reached its fifth season, it had been mandated that the creative team
reduce the number of villains with a red and black color scheme. This is likely why Adonis’
color scheme is different in his cameos.
Starfire appears in sixty-three episodes of Teen Titans.
Trigon was originally voiced by Keith Szarabajka, but beginning with Season 4, the actor was
changed to Kevin Michael Richardson.
For the most part, Gizmo and Jinx were voiced
by Lauren Tom. But in Gizmo’s final two appearances and Jinx’s final appearance,
they were voiced by Tara Strong.
You may have noticed a change in Beast Boy’s
voice halfway through the show’s first season. Greg Cipes’ voice actually broke at that
time, which forced him to use a higher pitch.
During the chase scene of the episode "Mad Mod",
Puffy Ami Yumi’s song “K2G” plays. Originally, a song sung by Hynden Walch, or
Starfire, was going to be used, but it was replaced. Curious fans can find the unused
tune in the extras of Season 1’s DVD release.
Raven can read six languages. English, German,
Latin, Romanian, Rumanian, Ancient Sumerian, and Sanskrit.
The original working title of "Teen Titans: Trouble in Tokyo" was "Teen Titans: Tokyo".
Akira fans will love this one. When the Titans are watching Sumo in Teen Titans: Trouble
in Tokyo, five teenagers are shown with their backs towards viewers. One teen is wearing
a red jacket with a pill on the back. He’s Kaneda from Katsuhiro Otomo’s "Akira".
"Teen Titans: Trouble in Tokyo" premiered at
San Diego Comic-Con on July 22, 2006. It aired on Cartoon Network
on September 15, 2006 and was released on DVD on February 6, 2007.
In most shots of Cyborg, his eyes are gray with no pupils,
but close-ups reveal that he has dark blue eyes that do indeed have pupils.
Robin’s alternate dimensional counterpart Larry’s real name was Nos Yargkcid. This
is, of course, Dick Grayson spelled backwards.
Out of all the Titans, Robin has appeared in the most episodes.
The only two he missed out on were "For Real" and "Lightspeed".
According to producers, Robin is 5’ 4”.
Raven is the same height as Robin.
Starfire is two inches taller than Raven and Robin at 5’ 6”.
Beast Boy is the shortest at 5’ 1”.
Producers incorporated traits from different iterations of Robin, including Dick Grayson,
Jason Todd, Tim Drake, and Stephanie Brown, to create the Robin in the show.
Robin is seen without his mask in the series a whopping total of two times. The first time
was in the episode "The Sum of His Parts", and the second time was in the movie
"Trouble In Tokyo".
Robin spiky hair isn’t au natural. It takes
effort. The teen hero styles his hair with gel after he gets up in the morning.
Starfire is never animated with a navel, despite
the fact that her animation model sheet includes one.
Starfire differs from her comic book counterpart in the fact that she’s more modest and kind.
She also wears a much less revealing outfit.
Starfire has nine stomachs! Where does she fit them all?!
Starfire’s real name, Koriand’r, is actually
said by Galfore in the episode "Betrothed". You can hear it if you pay attention when
the two are yelling at one another in Tamaranean.
Starfire is allergic to metallic chromium.
It’s a common condition in Tamaran.
Speaking of allergies, Raven dislikes chickens and is allergic to their feathers.
It’s a shame Raven doesn’t like chickens
because she does like waffles and I hear the two go well together. She also likes pizza,
but to a lesser extent.
Any Teen Titans fan knows the words of Raven’s spell. “Azarath Metrion Zinthos.” Azarath
is the dimension she originates from, but Metrion and Zinthos have been revealed to
have no meaning.
Raven is the only character to have her birthday celebrated or even mentioned in the show.
It’s been revealed that the show’s head writer, David Slack, intentionally had Beast
Boy and Raven written in the vein of a “married couple.” Their relationship was one of deep
loyalty and affection, but also of conflict and personality clashes.
Over the course of the series, Beast Boy says “Dude” around 114 times. Duuuuuuuuude
Beast Boy is great at origami.
Cyborg loves meat and hates tofu.
Cyborg has a total of 35 weak spots.
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