So, I
was at work last night, racking my brains to think of a recurring article that
I could write here. One that I revisited every few weeks to keep you guys
coming back for more… but it took me a long time to think of one because of the
large amount of comic book related blogs you can find here on the Internet.
Finally, I came up with one that I think will be fun to read, fun to write,
informative and funny, while at the same time not being done very much
elsewhere on the World Wide Web. I give you MEDIA HOUNDS. Here, every couple
weeks or so, I’m going to take a comic book character and, instead of the
looking at the cool/stupid stuff he’s done in the comics, focus on the
adaptations that character has had in other media like cartoons, TV shows,
video games and films. We’ll see how accurate they were, how inaccurate they
were, and hopefully have a good belly-laugh along the way.
But,
before we get started, let me make one thing clear. Adaptations are just that:
adaptations. I’m not one of those comic nerds who get mortally offended when
you change a character for a film or TV version. In my opinion, that is the
great thing about comic books today, the things that make them our modern
mythology: different authors write them and tell stories with them constantly,
so the character is constantly evolving, just the oral stories of heroes in
ancient times. Look at Superman: when he started, he couldn’t fly and there was
no such thing as Kryptonite. Over the years and over the authors, those things
happened and he became a better character for it. As long as you take the
character as a starting point and build from it to make something better… I’m
pretty much going to be OK with it. That said if you make that character worse,
well then: I will rip you a new one in the stunning text-only format of this
blog. So,
without further ado! I give you the first issue/episode/installment/thing of
Media Hounds.
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| BEHOLD THE TOAD! |
|
Toad, also known as Mortimer Toynbee, has been a
constant thorn in the side of the X-Men. In the comics, he first appeared in
1964 as a lackey (or a toady, see what they did there?) to Magneto in the pages
of Uncanny X-Men. Since then, he’s been a relatively common character to adapt
to the various adaptations of the X-Men franchise.
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| Does anyone actually
remember when television screens were shaped like that? | | |
Toad’s
first appearance in other media was a small cameo in and episode of Spider-Man and his Amazing Friends. The
episode itself is classic 80’s tripe. Magneto disguises himself as Proton the
Great in order to lure all of the police chiefs to an island prison and
magnetically trap them there.
Hilariously, none of the police chiefs recognize
him, despite the fact he’s wanted by all of them (which Spidey mentions in the
episode), even though the sides of his bright purple helmet are poking out from
the sides of his hood. Toad appears very briefly as one of the prisoners that
Magneto wants freed, alongside Blob and Mastermind. Magneto gives brief
descriptions of all their powers, and he says Toad is “obedient and
super-agile.” I like the way Magneto lists his obedience as a superpower…
MUTANT:
So, what’s your gift? What do you do?
TOAD:
Uh… I’m super obedient.
MUTANT:
What? So you follow instructions?
TOAD:
Yeah, but I do it like… really well.
MUTANT:
Is that useful?
TOAD: Well, everything in my house
runs perfectly because I read the manuals cover to cover and super-obey them.
Also, I’m the only person in the world who can understand those IKEA boxed
furniture kits.
MUTANT:
… Punch yourself in the face.
Anyway,
the episode itself is pretty funny. Magneto eventually is defeated when Spidey
somehow overloads his power and Magneto “can’t control his attraction,” causing
cars and other objects (including a conveniently placed dumpster full of iron
filings) to, I assume, crush him his death as he tries to fly away. Toad,
however, never appears again in the episode.
Toad
also shows up briefly in Pryde of the
X-Men, a pilot show that never went to series based around Kitty Pryde’s
adventures in the X-Men. Here, he’s a member of the Brotherhood of Mutant
Terrorists alongside Blob, Pyro, Juggernaut, The White Queen and Magneto. Since
the whole series is only an episode long, Toad doesn’t get much screentime, but
he’s his usual sycophantic self and he is voiced by Frank Welker – the guy who
does pretty much every voice in pretty much every movie ever. (Seriously, look
up that guy’s resume, you will be stunned by how many times you go “Oh! He’s
that guy?!”) Toad does however at one point attack the inexplicably Australian
Wolverine, giving us this glorious screenshot.
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| There are so many possible captions. Choose one and laugh heartily |
|
Toad
appears in two episodes of the 1990s X-Men
animated series, still as an almost exact copy of his comic book counterpart.
It isn’t until the year 2000 that Toad appears in more than a minor role… Well,
actually, it’s still pretty minor. My point is this next one is important.
In his meatiest appearance to date,
Toad appeared in Bryan Singer’s X-Men movie
played by Ray Park (the guy who is also Darth Maul and Snake-Eyes). Here, Toad
is vastly different to his comic book counterpart. Firstly, he has seemingly
lost his super obedience and is instead a reasonably intelligent enforcer of
Magneto’s. He’s shown working on the big fancy machine, showing a level of
engineering skill, and he battles Cyclops, Storm and Jean Grey single-handedly
before being turned into Louisiana cuisine by Storm’s lightning bolt.
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| Do you know what
happens to a toad when its struck by lightning? It generates Internet memes! |
Ray Park’s Toad also boasts a host of different
powers. Aside from his super leaping (and super obedience), the comic book Toad
really didn’t have any other mutant powers. The film version has the ability to
scale walls, discolored skin and hair, the ability to spit adhesive mucus, and
the now iconic elongated prehensile tongue. That’s right, true believers!
Toad’s most famous power comes not from the pages of the comic book, but rather
an adaptation of that work. The tongue was bloody cool though and quickly made
its way to the ink-and-paper version, as did many aspects of the film’s Toad,
including his thinner, more athletic physique. (In fact, the Ultimate version
of the character when first introduced is very, very similar to the film
version, just greener.) This really goes to show what I was saying earlier
about adaptations. The film version of Toad is not accurate to the source
material at all, but its builds on the mythos and improved it. That’s why so
many comic book characters, even minor ones like Toad, have such complex and
changing histories because unlike more conventional storytelling, we can
introduce a host of different authors, artists, filmmakers, etc. to introduce
new and cool ideas.
Toad’s next outing outside of comic book was a trio of
cross-platform fighting games called Mutant Academy, Mutant Academy 2 and
X-Men: Next Dimension. He is a playable character in all three games, using the
powers and abilities that were by then standard to the comic book, but originated
with the film version: most of his special attacks focused on the use of his
elongated tongue. For some reason, whoever provided his voice in Next Dimension
(I can’t find the name of the voice actor) decided that Toad needed to sound
exactly like Gollum from The Lord of the
Rings and he annoyingly goes “give us a kiss!” and “lickety-lick!”
throughout gameplay. He also hisses whenever he uses his tongue, so I can only
assume he wears The One Ring pierced
through it and the hissing is the air rushing through the hole… (Yeah, that’s a
weird image. Sorry about that one.)
Speaking of video games, he also appeared
in X-Men Legends and X-Men Legends II around this time, being playable in the
second. Legends combines the appearance of Ultimate Toad with the snivelling
personality of the mainstream Toad… Oh, and he’s voiced by Armin Shimerman, the
guy who played Quark in Star Trek: Deep
Space 9 and Snyder in Buffy
the Vampire Slayer. It’s always nice to see those niche actors from old
sci-fi shows have gone absolutely nowhere in their careers…
Of course, during the course of these video games’
release, we also see the airing of X-Men
Evolution. Toad, due to his popularity from the film, has a meatier role
than in past cartoons and his powers more reflect the film version than the
original. Due to the setting of the show, he’s also aged down to a teenager;
Americanized (the original is from York, England, while this version is
obviously from Brooklyn); and given a new punkish attitude, though he is still
rather cowardly, subservient and nearly useless in combat. He’s also renamed
Todd Tolansky for this version.
He had a crush on Scarlet Witch and was a minor
rival for Nightcrawler in the show, but mostly he was used for comic relief:
he’s rejected and whacked around more times than I can count and there’s a
‘Toad smells bad and eats bugs’ joke every other episode. Still, he had one
episode in the starring role and helped the X-Men kick Apocalypse’s big
metallic arsecheeks in the series finale. Not a bad outing for the
Toad-meister.
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This version also
adds super-ridiculous-outfit-wearing to Toad’s list of powers. What’s the point
in that metal fishbowl collar thing?
|
The wise guy, punk attitude of this Toad sticks around
to other adaptations as well. In Wolverine
and the X-Men, Toad’s relationship with the Brotherhood is similar to Evolution’s. He’s a tag-along that
doesn’t really do anything of use for the team (Quicksilver even considers
leaving him to the MRD in one episode). He presents a tough guy attitude, but
quickly chickens out when threatened and is shown to have no combat skills
whatsoever.
And that brings us pretty much up to the present day
in terms of all things Toad. His most recent appearances include a brief
mention in the new Ultimate Spider-Man cartoon
and an amusing appearance in Super Hero
Squad. After being defeated by Thor, Silver Surfer comments “oh, so
that is what happens to a toad when it is struck by lightning. What a
let-down.” He also appeared in the completely crap video game X-Men Destiny, where he has reverted
back to being English, now sporting a cockney accent. Because apparently,
according to American video game designers, there are precisely two accents in
all of Britain: posh upper class (see Emma Frost in the same game) and cockney.
Oh, well. It’s closer than Brooklyn, I suppose.
Well,
thanks again for reading. I hope you’ve enjoyed this little trip through all
the many different versions of Mortimer Toynbee. Let me know if there are any
ideas you have to improve the format or anything like that because as I said
I’ll be writing more of these types of articles in the coming months. Thanks to
all the people with YouTube videos that I nicked these images from and I’ll see
you next time. ‘Til then I leave you with this…
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| I’M FIRING MAH LASER! |
Ta-ra for now.
