History Headscratchers / CaptainPlanetAndThePlaneteers

%%* I can't find it no matter how hard I look, but I distinctly remember an internet attempt somewhere at creating a DarkerAndEdgier version of the show that was very messed up, but was... [[YourMileageMayVary arguably good.]] Captain Planet is a primordial force of destruction, the heroes are actually eco-terrorists in service of a vengeful, human hating Gaia, and each receives his or her power by dying in a way that relates to his element. If I remember correctly Linka is a young eastern European prostitute who dies from tuberculosis, Kwame is a child soldier in Africa who is killed in battle and buried in a mass grave under dust and dirt, and Ma-Ti is outcast by the people of his village for being androgynous (I couldn't make this up if I tried) and dies alone in the jungle. I don't remember many other details.
** So Wheeler and Gi are [[Franchise/ANightmareOnElmStreet Freddy Krueger]] and [[Franchise/FridayThe13th Jason Voorhees]] respectively?
** This kind of reminded me of a thought I'd had for a 'more mature' take on Captain Planet. In Greek Myth, Antaeus is a half-giant and the child of Gaia and Poseidon. Now, stay with me here. In the version of the myth I had read,Gaia had given him a very specific kind of protection: whenever he would 'touch her lap' his wounds would be instantly healed. Gaia's 'lap' being the Earth itself. Captain Planet is Gaia's own child, having been saved from his death at Hercules' hands. The rings are used to summon him from Hades so that he can earn absolution and enter a better afterlife. Or... something. I just found the parallel between 'Healed by nature' and 'healed whenever he touches the ground' interesting, and thought that there could be a way to link Captain Planet to a mythical counterpart.%%
* During his review of one of the comics, Linkara pointed out something interesting. If Kwame has complete power over earth, then he is [[PhysicalGod EFFECTIVELY GOD OF THE ENTIRE PLANET!!!!!]] Seriously, he can manipulate entire continents if he really wants to, but instead he can't even realize to simply pull up a pair of rock hands to grab the terrorists surrounding him and the [[FiveManBand Planeteers.]] Heck ALL of the Planeteers are pretty much loaded with the potential for being utter badasses if they considered the sheer scale of what they can do: Linka could have tornadoes pop up wherever she wants, Gi could control the water in people's bodies and make them do her bidding, Wheeler could bring up a firestorm (a large fire that effectively fuels itself, and is nigh unstoppable), and Ma-Ti of all people could MindRape people into submission.

** The real answer is probably that Ed Asner (the voice actor for Greedly) was mostly retired by the time Captain Planet rolled around, and was thus the most likely to have a free schedule all the time.

** OppositesAttract.

* Why does no one make a big deal about the existence of Gaia and Captain Planet!? They are gods! But everyone just sees them and thinks "Cool! Lets go green!" Whaa-?

* In the Hitler episode, why did Hitler have a fu man chu instead of his Chaplin-esque mustache? That's weird, random, and I have no idea why it's there.

* When the USSR fell apart they changed Linka's origin to "Eastern Europe" instead of the Soviet Union. Why didn't they just change it to say she was from Russia?

* Even though Wheeler comes from a working class background, why do the writers constantly treat him like he comes from a place of privilege? Even if he's white American dude, he's was homeless before he was summoned by Gaia.

** With at least Greedly, it is implied his family suffers from several generations of deformities which causes them to develop unusual skin color, deformed faces and teeth, and pig-like ears. So people may just feel "sorry" for these rich disfigured folks who, like Lootin Plunder (no excuses for that one though...) seem to be [[WellIntentionedExtremist honest but utterly ruthless businessmen]] who just want to build businesses and jobs for others, and make some big cash, but aren't exactly warlords.

* Gaia acts all motherly towards the Planeteers. Does this technically make her a single mother of five?

** I don't know if what he was trying to do would have had that effect. If it had, though, it would have been one doozy of a HoistByHisOwnPetard, given that he'd presumably die along with the rest of the world when it got destroyed by a nuclear war.
* We see the eco-villains' future grand-children(?) in a future episode. My question is, who had a kid with Verminous Skumm?! Plunder and Blight are attractive and rich, but why would someone procreate with a filthy humanoid rat who lives in a sewer?

* At the beginning of "Smog Hog", Junior mentions his father giving him a bike for his last birthday. Given that Greedly is horrified by Junior deciding to use it after Captain Planet saves his life ("How can I pollute on a bicycle?!"), why did he give it to his son in the first place?

** Given that Skumm's schemes (from drugs to {{Forced Transformation}}s) often involve stripping people of their right minds, the poor girl (whoever she was) may not have had a choice.

* In "Trouble On The Half Shell", why don't the JASON Project scientists do anything to help? They can see what the robot's cameras are showing just as well as the boy piloting it can, why don't they give control back to one of the engineers who presumably has more experience piloting it? I mean, if a research robot is the only thing that can help the Planeteers defeat villains, I want a trained person piloting it, not some random kid at a science center.

* We see the eco-villains' future grand-children(?) in a future episode. My question is, who had a kid with Verminous Skumm?! Plunder and Blight are attractive and rich, but why would someone procreate with a filthy humanoid rat who lives in a sewer?

** I don't know if what he was trying to do would have had that effect. If it had, though, it would have been one doozy of a HoistByHisOwnPetard, given that he'd presumably die along with the rest of the world when it got destroyed by a nuclear war.

** Hate is evil's most powerful tool. It was hate that caused the Hatfield-[=McCoy=] feud. It was hate that the Capital from the Hunger Games uses, by having the District's kids kill each other driving a wedge to keep them from rising up (again). It was hate for the white man that had Crazy Horse lead his tribe to slaughter Custard's men. It was hate towards the natives that caused said rage in Crazy Horse. It's hate that has lead to so many murders, assassinations and massacre. The Ku Klux Klan, Aryan Brotherhood and groups like that RUN on hate. A burning hate for sharks (be it from ''Jaws'' or something else) has caused thousands of sharks to GET THEIR FINS CUT OFF by angry fisherman. A long hatred of wolves by many cultures almost drive wolves extinct. The settlers of Tasmania HATED the Tasmanian Tiger, and now it's gone (unless the sightings of them in the last few years was true)! Hell, just look at Hitler! The guy sent millions to their deaths and started the DEADLIEST WAR IN HUMAN HISTORY by using hate. In fact, Captain Planet was rendered useless by just how EVIL Hitler was. Hate is to evil is what Heart and love are to good.

** There's also the fact that the Planeteers are supposed to serve as role models for others; people are likelier to listen to role models who they feel understand their position (e.g., Linka would be the best member of the group to handle something for an event raising awareness about drugs). Wheeler is uneducated, but he's relatively compliant once he finds out ''why'' you should do or not do these things. He's the only city kid in the lot; he probably is much more convincing than the other Planeteers, who all grew up in the country.

** it was a beaded necklace, given during the Mardi Gras festivities. Linka most likely was aware of what was traditionally expected from her under such circumstances.
* Why wasn't there a Planeteer from Australia? The dynamic of the four Western elements plus heart is better aesthetically, but they couldn't BS a sixth element like lightning or something? Especially since Americans were ''obsessed'' with Australia during the eighties. He would have been the Breakout Character!

** Unfortunately, ice is frozen water, so it's already under the dominion of the Water Ring, although the [[https://captainplanet.fandom.com/wiki/Water_Ring Water Ring]] for some doesn't work on ice.
%%** Ozone. Unfortunately, the penguin would really only be able to use its power right after the 'Strayian, and you couldn't CutLexLuthorACheck because they'd have to relocate... to...%%
** Don't think of the characters as representing ''all'' continents, so much as those regions of the Earth that are in greatest need of environmental protectors. Australia's low population density means it doesn't produce anywhere ''near'' the level of pollution of the other continents, and Antarctica's pollutants all wash up or blow in from elsewhere. But North America, Asia, and eastern Europe have all had ugly environmental records, and Africa and South America are focal points for overexploitation of natural resources.

%%*** As Ben Croshaw said in his ''Resident Evil Umbrella Chronicles'' review: "Do you remember what the villains from ''Captain Planet'' were like? How they'd steal an oil tanker and deliberately run smack into a beach to teach all the sea lions a lesson in complacency? Do you remember wondering why they didn't just sell the oil at huge profit and not have to get beaten up by a big blue man in little red pants? Well that's basically the Umbrella Corporation."%%

** Supposedly, it was what kept the conflicting elemental forces of the other rings in balance when Captain Planet was formed, and it could technically let you communicate with and command animals with your mind. What makes it lame, though, is that it ''only'' works if both its user and the animal it's used on isn't in a drugged-induced, brainwashed, or highly agitated state, and it can't be used for offense or other aggressive intent (for example, Ma-Ti can use it when he's tied up to get some squirrels to come in and chew through the ropes, but he can't command a pride of lions to chew on some poacher meat). This doesn't seem to make sense, since all of the other rings could be used for attack. However, in the comic, he actually got some forest animals to fight with him, including a wolf and a bear. The problem is that he is morally conflicted, not that he can't use his powers aggressively. In the comic example, he asked the animals if they wanted to fight, instead of just commanding them; most probably, the wolf and bear had no reason to fight, but did it because Ma-Ti asked them to do so. It's like helping someone carry something – you would likely assume they can handle it, but would help them if they asked.

*** On a more probable note, Ma-Ti doesn't need his ring to get girls... but he can certainly use it to know if a particular girl is interested in him, and if it's more than just celebrity infatuation, and why. Not to mention, if any of the Planeteers went evil... sure, Wheeler could go into arson, and Gi could flood everything, but Ma-Ti has ''mind control''. He could create an army of followers, or convince herds of elephants to trample you, or tell you to go kill yourself. That's a pretty impressive power. Think of him as having the potential of Dark Phoenix without all the deaths and resurrections.

%%** There are several good uses. Is your boat leaking and you need to rig up a pump? Heart! Are you starving with nothing to eat? (Animal) Heart! Are the bad guys running away with the help of working circulatory systems? Heart! Is your circulatory system not quite good enough for you to follow? Heart! If nothing else, he could at least drop giant hearts on the bad guys.%%

%%** Maybe each Planeteer contributed a distinct part of Captain Planet:
--->'''Gaia:''' OK, Planeteers, time to make Captain Planet. I want you each to imagine something different about him.\\
'''Kwame:''' I'm imagining him with green hair.\\
'''Gi:''' I'm imagining him with blue skin.\\
'''Ma-Ti:''' I'm imagining him being full of lame puns.\\
'''Linka:''' I'm imagining him going down like a wimp every time he gets smoke blown in his face.\\
'''Wheeler:''' I'm imagining him in his underwear.%%
* Kept on hearing while the show was on that, in the last few episodes, Gaia made two more rings for two more Planeteers: one for electricity, one for magnetism.
** That's false. The closest thing were evil versions of the rings created by Dr. Blight in "Mission To Save Earth". Plunder got a Deforestation Ring, Nukem got a Super Radiation Ring (naturally), Sludge got a Smog Ring, Skumm got a Toxics Ring, and Dr. Blight got stuck with the Hate Ring, which it's about as useful as that Heart Ring.
** What is the use of Deforestation Ring? You point it at trees and they vanish?
** Hate is evil's most powerful tool. Was it not hate that caused the Hatfield-[=McCoy=] feud? Was it not hate that the Capital from the Hunger Games uses, by having the District's kids kill each other driving a wedge to keep them from rising up (again)? Was it not hate for the white man that had Crazy Horse lead his tribe to slaughter Custard's men? Wasn't it hate towards the natives that caused said rage in Crazy Horse? Is it not hate that has lead to so many murders, assassinations and massacre? The Ku Klux Klan, Aryan Brotherhood and groups like that RUN on hate. A burning hate for sharks (be it from Jaws or something else) has caused thousands of sharks to GET THEIR FINS CUT OFF by angry fisherman? Did not a long hatred of wolves by many cultures almost drive wolves extinct? The settlers of Tasmania HATED the Tasmanian Tiger, and now it's gone (unless the sightings of them in the last few years was true)! Hell, just look at Hitler! The guy sent millions to their deaths and started the DEADLIEST WAR IN HUMAN HISTORY by using hate. Hell, Captain Planet was rendered useless by just how EVIL Hitler was. Hate is to evil is what Heart and love are to good.
* In "Greenhouse Planet", when Kwame and Ma-Ti got shot into space, their powers were unable to return to their rings, and thus re-created Captain Planet in a substantially weakened form, composed only of Earth and Heart. He only had those powers, and a ridiculous pink-and-green color scheme. It was interesting, since we got to see some interaction between him and Gaia, but the question is: if this happened with everyone but Ma-Ti being shot into space, wold it produce a "Heartless" Captain Planet? Would this Cap'n go around tearing up forest-encroaching farms, sinking oil rigs, throwing power plants full of people into the sun and so on? And... most importantly... would this have made the series better?

** Some anti-environmental people here are in for a lesson -- it's only very high level of pollution of any kind including hate, toxic, smog, and etc. To recall in one of the Marvel Comic issue of Captain Planet that two of eco-villains attempt to waste the superhero with toxic waste -- but it didn't work -- and they blamed Dr. Blight for giving them low grade toxic waste.
*** That never happened in the cartoon - he went down *constantly*. And seriously, how good is your pollution fighting superhero if you can take him out by dumping the massive amount of pollution on him that he needs to be fighting in the first place? It sounds like the Marvel writers were at least trying to make that weakness workable. The show writers never did. Captain Planet's powers were not well defined. Oh, and seriously? Why the assumption that the only people who hate this show hate the environment? That's a straw-man if there ever was one.
*** That doesn't change the fact that the creators of Captain Planet made his only weakness ''the exact thing he was created to fight!'' Being anti-bad-writing is not equivalent to being anti-environmental.

*** However, consider that oil may stop Captain Planet from getting energy from the sun, especially when hit in the globe area.
*** It may be toxic, but so is sulfur, various kinds of acid, and oh yeah, for something that was shown to not only heal Captain Planet but hurt Captain Pollution, ''hot lava''. Captain Planet being hurt by oil was just Turner herpaderping "oil is evil". Captain Planet is essentially the embodiment of SUV Environmentalist thinking... what is actually good and bad and "natural" is not as important as what all your friends you see at the coffee shop and the organic food mart think is good and bad and "natural".

** There was an episode where they flashed forward to a possible future where Wheeler married Linka and had eight kids and another one on the way, which turned into yet another Anvilicious Aesop about how waste is bad.
** In another one, an alien put the Planeteers in a zoo, saying that they were an "endangered species". When one of the kids points out that there's six billion humans, the alien respond that this is their point -- there are too many humans for Earth to sustain.
** "Frog Day Afternoon" was pretty hilarious in this department -- lot of opportunity, everything left unsaid. At the beginning, both Linka and Wheeler got shrunk. Later, Wheeler gets big again, but Linka's miniaturization hasn't worn off yet, so he puts her in his shirt pocket... and takes off the towel she was using to cover herself.
* Nothing against the Russians, but has anyone else noticed that Wheeler, the sole American who could've been the voice of reason, is relegated to ButtMonkey status, while one of the strongest characters on the team (who frequently sets said American straight) is a ''Communist''?
** For some, it's preferable to the American guy being always right and always there to save the day. It can be listed as one of the reasons why the show was so good, actually - you have G.I. Joe if you NEED American heroes.

*** Captain Planet advocates eco-capitalism, and the show is far from socialist. In fact, it shows Linka's home country run-down as well. Somebody watch "Missing Linka" again. This show is FAR from communist, and not so liberal either. Many of the heroes are corporate people who do the right thing, or green entrepreneurs. Also, watch "Missing Linka", and you will find out that the show does portray the former USSR's pollution problems. And in "Bitter Waters", she takes her country's unemployment problems hard.

*** The problem is that at the time of the show, the Soviet Union had one of the worst environmental records on the planet. Russia is still recovering from the effects to this day. Depicting the Soviet Union accurately could have shown Linka disgusted with the effects of the callousness of her society and trying to change things. Not pretending that the Soviet Union was a mystical land of environmental perfection while America is a bombed-out wasteland (something viewers of the show in its target audience of ''Americans'' would immediately call foul on). The show's bizarre myopia did not present an accurate picture of the world, which is particularly damning since the show was theoretically attempting to educate.
*** It's worth noting, though, that many areas of Soviet Union really did look like that. The country was simply too large to foul up all at once.
*** Communists are usually depicted as industrious people who organize together to exploit the land of its resources in order to make things for everyone. They are on the [[HarmonyVersusDiscipline discipline]] side.

*** Except that showing Wheeler as a pompous, moronic, always-wrong dumbass was purposeful and the whole point of his existence. Everything in ''Captain Planet'' is views held by Ted Turner, its creator, and he is VERY anti-American. This is why Wheeler is the way he is, why he alone of the entire cast is only identified by his last name, why America is portrayed as a post-apocalypse wasteland while the rest of the world is shown as a garden.
*** Wheeler's tendency to be "pompous and moronic" is rather a plot point to showcase the day's behavioral "lesson" -- admittedly, most of our world's environmental problems could be salvaged or lessened if people change their attitudes, and there's a ''lot'' of people who are "pompous and moronic" about the environment out there, just like Wheeler, independent of their nationality. Yes, it could've been much better written, perhaps shared among the other Planeteers, but it shouldn't really be chalked that up to his nationality; he simply was the one who had the brash, impulsive personality. And regardless of his thick-headedness, Wheeler had a lot of positive qualities that kids could emulate, as well. Of course, if one is determined to be anti-Ted-Turner from the beginning, it will seem like the United States are always presented in a bad light in the show. Probably the only "post-apocalypse wasteland" in the show would be Brooklyn, and that was, again, for plot purposes. And in quite a few episodes, the country was presented in a good light.
*** Maybe that's why the show was popular outside the US. Presenting the American as the ButtMonkey is very uncommon - or was then, now is more common - and many people in other countries probably felt that the change was refreshing and for some people, accurate (that's not to say Americans are dumb, though is probably the stereotype, especially in the case of a teenager), for many people in other parts of the world the typical American teen would indeed act like Wheeler: unaware of other's peoples problems, ignorant of other cultures and basing his knowledge on television. Wheeler feels like the stereotype of the "improve the world" American who thinks the answer is always "America is great, make the world more like us". Whether you are American or not, if you fundamentally disagree with some of America's ideas, you are going to find a character like Wheeler to come off as annoying at times. If you are someone who agrees with that statement, then the other characters not thinking like Wheeler can come off as just as annoying.

*** Huh, Greedly going green, but not going good. His son and grandfather probably wouldn't be happy if he did anything truly wrong, and he really does care about his family, so he'd probably listen to them and turn a new leaf, for good. Darn!
*** For some reason, I picture him as being behind stuff like "Carbon Offsets" and whatnot. Appearance of being green without actually HAVING to do anything.
*** The real answer is probably that Ed Asner (the voice actor for Greedly) was mostly retired by the time Captain Planet rolled around, and was thus the most likely to have a free schedule all the time.

** That bothered me too. I remember one episode where they shut down a nuclear power plant, and Captain Planet drilled a hole through the Earth's crust so they could build a geothermal plant in its place. If you can summon a superhero who can eliminate pollution and give everybody clean alternatives at no cost, why isn't he doing that all over the place?
*** Well, duh. If Captain Planet's just going to go around ''giving'' people alternative energy sources and cleaning up their trash, humanity won't learn not to destroy the environment - they'll just sit around waiting for Captain Planet to fix everything. He's ''supposed'' to be used sparingly.
*** Don't geothermal plants pollute more than nuclear? That's not pure water they're getting.

*** Since he always says that when he's done fighting pollution, the catchphrase may have had a more literal meaning; he was returning the rings' elemental control to the wielders. Less an inspiring thing to say and more along the lines of "I'm done with it, so...!" Further evidence occurs during "Two Futures" when Captain Planet is too weakened by the pollution Blight caused to dig out her and Wheeler. He tells the others that having friends like them means Wheeler still has a chance, just before using that CatchPhrase and returning their powers.
*** In "Two Futures", Wheeler uses time travel to keep himself from taking the ring (and having to spend all his time with a bunch of superior kids who give off a condescending aura towards him). This means Hoggish Greedly, Rigger, and Blight win because you can't summon a fully-charged Captain Planet with only four Planeteers. ... So Gaia couldn't just give the ring to somebody else who ''did'' want to join?

*** I always assumed Captain Planet was supposed to represent our ability to escalate issues. Yes, in the show it was a lot more concrete, they would find themselves put in a situation like "Oh look! [[ArtisticLicenseNuclearPhysics The nuclear reactor is about to blow up!]] We puny humans cannot possibly hope to contain this on our own! We ''need'' Captain Planet!", which of course does not happen in real life. Also, these situations were much more of an immediate threat than environmental issues generally are in real life: people would get sick ''now'', animals would die ''now'', the land would be left barren ''now.'' In real life, however, it's also very unlikely that five teenagers will take down issues of that much impact on their own. They can work on the small things-- cleaning beaches and organizing recycling rallies and convincing other people to live green. When it comes to things like fighting corrupt corporate conglomerates or the abuse of technology, however, there isn't much they can do by themselves, unless they decide to go eco-terrorist, design bombs in their spare time and then plant them on these conglomerates' [=HQs=]-- which is not something the show (or anyone) should advocate. In real life, people who are aware of these transgressions usually look for support, signatures, sponsors, go to the authorities, go to the legal system, you name it, in order to take on these massive corporations and actually win. Yes, a lot of the time it seems like the characters just sit back and let Captain Planet do the hard work, but the idea is that the rest of the episode is there to show you that these characters actually learn a lesson and resolve to behave better in the future when it comes to the environment. Captain Planet was supposed to be a metaphor for the idea that humanity is stronger as a whole. They have to give the kids an avatar to look up to, and superheroes are especially effective in calling kids' attention. Erin Brockovich would probably not be very effective to keep the show's intended demographic entertained.

** Their names. Duh.
*** Greedly aspires to be Plunder. See above.
*** Greedly loves his family, and ultimately his schemes are all motivated by his desire to provide for them. Plunder loves money, and seeks wealth for it's own sake.

** Their looks.

*** Pseudo-Hitler nearly killed Captain Planet just by hating him. I figure real Hitler would make him explode, leaving us with Captain America or someone else capable of Hitler punching as the hero, and we couldn't have that!
*** It's regular Hitler. It was just a pre-toothbrush-'stache Hitler. Shortly after the events of the episode he decided the Fu Manchu required too much maintenance and he went for something a little simpler.

* I can't find it no matter how hard I look, but I distinctly remember an internet attempt somewhere at creating a DarkerAndEdgier version of the show that was very messed up, but was... [[YourMileageMayVary arguably good.]] Captain Planet is a primordial force of destruction, the heroes are actually eco-terrorists in service of a vengeful, human hating Gaia, and each receives his or her power by dying in a way that relates to his element. If I remember correctly Linka is a young eastern European prostitute who dies from tuberculosis, Kwame is a child soldier in Africa who is killed in battle and buried in a mass grave under dust and dirt, and Ma-Ti is outcast by the people of his village for being androgynous (I couldn't make this up if I tried) and dies alone in the jungle. I don't remember many other details.

** This kind of reminded me of a thought I'd had for a 'more mature' take on Captain Planet. In Greek Myth, Antaeus is a half-giant and the child of Gaia and Poseidon. Now, stay with me here. In the version of the myth I had read,Gaia had given him a very specific kind of protection: whenever he would 'touch her lap' his wounds would be instantly healed. Gaia's 'lap' being the Earth itself. Captain Planet is Gaia's own child, having been saved from his death at Hercules' hands. The rings are used to summon him from Hades so that he can earn absolution and enter a better afterlife. Or... something. I just found the parallel between 'Healed by nature' and 'healed whenever he touches the ground' interesting, and thought that there could be a way to link Captain Planet to a mythical counterpart.
* Something that was kinda lampshaded by Linkara during his review of one of the comics that I must point out. If Kwame has complete power over earth, then he is [[PhysicalGod EFFECTIVELY GOD OF THE ENTIRE PLANET!!!!!]] Seriously, he can manipulate entire continents if he really wants to, but instead he can't even realize to simply pull up a pair of rock hands to grab the terrorists surrounding him and the [[FiveManBand Planeteers.]] Heck ALL of the Planeteers are pretty much loaded with the potential for being utter badasses if they considered the sheer scale of what they can do: Linka could have tornadoes pop up wherever she wants, Gi could control the water in people's bodies and make them do her bidding, Wheeler could bring up a firestorm (a large fire that effectively fuels itself, and is nigh unstoppable), and Ma-Ti of all people could MindRape people into submission.

* The villains of Captain Planet all represent or personification traits, mindsets, or actions that hurt the environment or people. Hoggish Greedly represents resource abuse and greed, Looten Plunder represents unethical or illegal corporate actions and screwy capitalism, Dr.Blight represents overuse of technology and unethical scientific research and actions, Duke Nukem represents ozone damage and the dangers of nuclear power and radiation, Verminous Scumm represents crime, urban decay, and disease and epidemics, and Zarm represents fascism, war, hatred, and bigotry. So what does Sly Sludge represent?

*** I'd say apathy and never looking for a long-term solution.
** Short-sighted greed, I'd say. He's like the people who say we can't have environmental regulations because they'd damage the economy.

* In one episode Sly Sludge has a garbage disposal business where he gets rid of the trash by dumping it in a volcano. It seems like a good idea! What's the harm?

** Also, if I remember my lessons correctly, volcanic soil is supposed to be fertile. So, the garbage might screw up the volcanic soil.

** You're right; I'm with Linkara on frustration at the utter "lack of imagination" regarding utilizing the ElementalPowers.

*** This natural/unnatural distinction bugs me. It's so freaking arbitrary. Lot's of species have gone extinct because another species popped up that ate them all or ate their food source and caused them to starve, but it is somehow special when humans cause another species to go extinct? I mean, yeah, we are one of the few guys who have caused a [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass_extinction_event mass extinction event]] all by ourselves, but we are not alone... [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Oxygenation_Event the great oxygenation extinction event]], for instance, was caused because a certain kind of bacteria released enough oxygen into the atmosphere to kill pretty much everything else. They didn't plan it or anything; it was just a byproduct of their existence, and it is the same when we cause most species to go extinct (with a few planned exceptions, like the eradication of smallpox).
*** It depends on the byproduct, though. The biggest cause of extinction in recent times is loss of habitat. When we tear down green areas to make furniture or build giant supermarkets, effectively leaving some species without homes, it's not exactly a byproduct. Humans ''could'' and ''have'' lived without wooden furniture or without processed foods-- while cyanobacteria cannot stop producing oxygen. Theirs is a biological imperative, while we just want to have a better quality of life even if it is at the expense of the environment. That's what makes the difference, and technically that was the reason why humanity was being "judged" in that episode.
*** Take eutrophication as an example. One of the affects of humans fertilizing their lawns with unnaturally high levels of phosphorous and nitrogen is that the excess phosphorous and nitrogen runsoff into bays and lakes. This limiting nutrient causes the phytoplankton and zooplankton to grow too much, too fast, which therefore clouds the bay, which therefore causes the fish to die off, which therefore causes birds and other animals that depend on the fish and crustaceans for food. If humans did not introduce the massive amounts of nitrogen and phosphorous to the bays and lakes via sewage, than the entire deadening of a body of water and in some cases, a whole biosphere, simply would not have occurred.

*** Those species before us which killed off other species ultimately caused humans ansestors to win over the other creatures and therefore their victory (existance) which means it was a good thing. Us killing off other species now is limiting humans resources, making the world harder for humans and could possably cause more change than humans can handle and kill them off. This makes us killing off other species bad.

* So... Why did the creators think a relationship between the stereotypical American capitalist idiot Wheeler, and the tightly wound communist soviet Linka would work out at ''all''?

*** Gi definitely has flaws and personality... hell, she is the Planeteer closest to KILLING somebody.

* What bugs me is that Captain Planet's weakness is the same thing he's fighting against. It'd be like if Batman had a weakness against clowns, or Superman was allergic to bald people.
* The problem I have with the show is that it's fundamentally misanthropic. It gives off this vibe that the world would be a better place if humans didn't exist, which kind of misses the point of what environmentalism should ultimately be about - the preservation of the human race.
** Again, this is the main problem with the brand of environmentalism that Ted Turner practices... it's more about identity politics than actually helping anything. As noted above, Turner (and by extension, the show) thinks that it doesn't ''really'' hurt the environment when people other than Americans or capitalists create industry... thus Russia is a pristine wonderland of tiny hamlets and green hills and America is a warzone cityscape that views things like Yellowstone as furniture waiting to happen.
*** Wrong...there are many episodes where the AMERICAN CAPITALIST creates an environmental sustainable business or follows an environmental acceptable practice. Episodes like "High Steaks" for example. The troper above simply does not know what he is talking about.
* Ok, maybe this is a minor thing, but they had a jet that could hold all of them as well as supplies, fly anywhere in the world in seconds, and ran ENTIRELY on solar power. I get the idea that it was meant to aim at present day people but when you have apparent super-tech I always sort of wondered why they didn't share the technology with the people of the world (as easy access to energy would solve a lot of problems)

* As Wheeler is always portrayed as 'off-page' with the rest of the Planeteers and seems disinterested in social issues, why did Gaia even recruit him in the first place? Even if he really is the most environmentally conscious American in Ted Turner's world view, couldn't she have gone to Canada?
** Presumably because he was street smart and understood inner city issues. He might not be the most environmentally-aware person but in the AIDS and gangs and drugs episodes, he actually understands what going on ("Nobody made him take the drugs, he did that himself" or "They don't see a future for themselves, territory is all they feel they have.") while the other Planeteers are shown to be unable to comprehend the situation at all.
** [[TheWatson Every kids show team needs a moron that the others can explain things to so that the kids watching can also be educated]].

* I remember an episode where the gang and a fully formed CP where framed and arrested. The gang busted out, while CP basically said "Nope! I'm going to stay in jail till you guys prove our innocence!" Um... why? The Captain is an elemental spirit created by a Goddess. How can the US Law do anything to him? If he was so uptight about the law, why didn't he have the gang stay while he went and saved the day?

* To go with my above headscratcher, why does no one make a big deal about the existence of Gaia and Captain Planet!? They are Gods! But everyone just sees them and thinks "Cool! Lets go green!" Whaa-?
** Actually, the characters ''do'' get rather surprised by the appearance of Gaia. Captain Planet is a superhero, though, and is known through the entire world, so I wouldn't think locals would be ''too'' shocked to see him stopping pollution or natural disasters. Also, they both probably don't accept worship or call themselves Gods, though both of them are quite clearly divine.
* How is Linka TheBigGuy?
** Her forceful personality and willingness to drop a tornado on your ass?
** She is Russian. Russians get that position by default on any team.
** Because every group of five (or four, or six) ''must'' be shoehorned into the FiveManBand trope whether it fits or not.

*** It never said she was from Russia, it said she was from the Soviet Union, which dissolved midway through the series, so they had to change the intro narration. Also, at one point in the first episode, Wheeler asks if she is Russian, and Linka insistently states she is Soviet, all implying she was from one of the non-Russian USSR nations; while it is never specified which, many fans believe she is from Ukraine, given that the Chernobyl disaster happened only a few years prior to the series starting.

* So, I was watching this Captain Planet episode, and the characters are on a farm with lots of pollution. They're about to be run down by farm equipment like tractors, and they can't use their superpower rings because apparently they don't work when there's too much pollution around. What the crap? They have the rings so they can FIGHT pollution. If the rings don't work when there's a lot of pollution around, they're not going to be very effective, are they? Same thing with Captain Planet's weakness being pollution. It's stupid. Did the characters (and the writers) even think that through?
** The writers did think it through, Captain Planet is weak against pollution because Gaia is weak to pollution. Remember all their powers come from Gaia. If Gaia dies or is affected, their powers are gone or weakened, and so is Captain Planet.

* Why did the Planeteers bother summoning the Big Blue Mullet all the time? Sure, he's powerful (variably), but he can be taken out with a bag of dirty diapers. The Planeteers' rings grant them control over the elements that is never completely defined. They always acted like they were utterly boned if they were separated and couldn't summon, but they were far from helpless. Surely they could realize that they are more than capable of taking out the poorly conceived schemes of stereotypical industrialists on their own every once in a while. They never even attempted to use their rings to their full potential. What's the point of giving the kids powers if they never use them right and completely lose them just to make somebody else fight for them?
** Agreed, it's like we never see the kids use their rings. They give up quickly, making one wonder why Gaia chose them for the job. It's also a bit jarring that we never get to see the rings used to their full potential. Come on, there are ELEMENTAL POWERS here, surely they could've done some cool things.
*** Somebody needs to watch "The Conqueror" because that episode explains why the kids do not have superpowered rings.
** Actually, I'll take a serious swing at that: Captain Planet can fly and is semi-invulnerable. And really the flying thing is pretty much the more useful of those two. Most of the rest of the stuff he does could be replicated by the rings, but flying around quickly on his own power to put the elemental abilities into action was pretty useful. Of course, Gaia could have just stuck a flight effect on the rings and accomplished the same thing. But at that point you loop back around to out-of-universe explanations... Captain Planet is much more ''marketable'' than the Planeteers are. Without summoning Captain Planet, avowed communist Ted Turner could not make millions of dollars by selling "Earth Armor Captain Planet" action figures.
*** Pretty much. Some episodes show that using her ring Linka can just barely sort of fly herself but it takes massive focus and any jolt will send her plummeting to her death. Planet doesn't have that limitation. And even if he gets weakened by pollution, keep in mind a regular non superhero will probably take it just as badly if they get toxic waste sprayed on them. Captain Planet at least just needs it washed off and he's good to go.
* I get the whole "Hitler=hate" thing, but shouldn't have Hitler have had less of an effect on Captain Planet, given that the Nazis were [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nazi_Germany#Social_Policy pro-conservationalist, pro-animal welfare, and anti-smoking]]?
** They were trying to say hate was as effective as pollution. Unfortunately, they also showed racists in one episode having zero effect on Cap (one of the Western-styled episodes) and so it really didn't work. What Cap was reacting to was kind of unclear because of this.
** My theory is that it wasn't really Hitler's hatred that affect Cap, but the fearsome handlebar mustache that they gave him for the episode.

*** In one episode, Wheeler uses time travel to keep himself from taking the ring (and having to spend all his time with a bunch of superior kids who give off a condescending aura towards him). This means Hoggish Greedly, Rigger, and Blight win because you can't summon a fully-charged Captain Planet with only four Planeteers. ... So Gaia couldn't just give the ring to somebody else who ''did'' want to join?

* There's a joke that there should've been two other Planeteers to make sure all the continents were covered: an Aussie with the power of Electricity (who, of course, just happened to be a young clone of Paul Hogan), and a talking penguin with the power of Ice (yes, it's stupid; but Stupid = Funny, right?).
** AND adding those two would expand the FiveTokenBand to a MagnificentSeven!

*** As Ben Croshaw said in his ''Resident Evil Umbrella Chronicles'' review: "Do you remember what the villains from ''Captain Planet'' were like? How they'd steal an oil tanker and deliberately run smack into a beach to teach all the sea lions a lesson in complacency? Do you remember wondering why they didn't just sell the oil at huge profit and not have to get beaten up by a big blue man in little red pants? Well that's basically the Umbrella Corporation."
*** Then again, almost all villains, even children's ones from the 1980s, have a discernible motive, even if that motive is as simple as "acquire money/power by whatever means I feel like." According to their profiles on the website, most of them do have ''some'' kind of reason, but apparently the show wasn't so good about making sure they had one every time.

*** There are some [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rolling_coal real world]] people who operate on that Captain Planet level of ridiculous "fuck the environment to show those environmentalists who's boss" bullshit, too.

** It's hard to keep on laughing at Ma-Ti once you realize: (a) He's Latino and probably going to be the hottest guy in school once he finally hits puberty, and (b) He has the power of '''heart''' over girls. That kid's gonna get more than you ever dreamed possible. NOW ask what kind of a lame power is Heart.
*** One that would be useful for someone [[SexualHarassmentAndRapeTropes with]] [[MindRape no]] [[LovePotion scruples]]. In any case, being one of the Planeteers would be enough to make sure he gets a girlfriend. Also, would it be that hard to find someone who'd volunteer for that? Love is the point of being in a relationship. All the better if it's not balanced on your finicky emotions.

** Google image the pentagram of the elements and look through a few pictures. 1. The ones that do have anything like "heart" is actually called "Spirit" which they could be MUCH more original with and not as lame. 2. A few of them do not have 'spirit' that whole "element of metal"? That's not some person wanking off to try and make a cool suggestion, in a lot of cultures that IS the fifth element. Of course Ted Turner would never use it, because the ability to summon a sword out of thin air is just terrible.
** There are several good uses. Is your boat leaking and you need to rig up a pump? Heart! Are you starving with nothing to eat? (Animal) Heart! Are the bad guys running away with the help of working circulatory systems? Heart! Is your circulatory system not quite good enough for you to follow? Heart! If nothing else, he could at least drop giant hearts on the bad guys.

** There's a thought that he looked and acted like Mark Summers of Double Dare. Which raises the question - why does the defender of the earth brought to life by the spirits of the elements look like an artificial 1980s television personality?
** To appeal to viewers who were raised on artificial 1980's television personalities.
** The pilot episode mentions that Captain Planet's appearance and demeanor are pulled from the minds of the Planeteers -- apparently, the Planeteers are big fans of artificial 1980's television personalities.
*** Tom Cruise was originally going to be Captain Planet's voice actor, so they based the design off him. However, Cruise backed out at the last second. When the pilot mentioned that little factoid, they were supposed to reveal the Planeteers based Captain Planet's appearance after Tom Cruise, which was pulled from their minds. Creepy.
*** Including the ones who lived devoid of technology and therefore had zero exposure to 1980's television personalities. Didn't at least two of them live in isolated tribes?
*** To recall correctly: Wheeler was the child of two extremely poor Americans living in a version of New York City that looked post-apocalyptic, Kwame was from a family of rural farmers in central Africa, Gi's parents were (perhaps) Korean or Chinese marine biologists, Linka is the daughter of coal miners in rural Russia, and Ma-Ti was from an isolated South American Indian tribe (and his tribe's shaman was training him to be the successor before he got called away). Interesting that Gi was the only one from a family background middle class or higher - her toy's bio actually notes that she was able to start college at 14. But yes, none of these kids should have really even known what Double Dare was, especially since cable TV would have been too expensive for Wheeler's family to afford at the time and he used to run away from home all the time, anyways. These characters had a lot of [[TheyWastedAPerfectlyGoodPlot potential that was wasted.]]
*** Actually, cable was quite common in the poor sections since it was relatively easy to steal. There were no cable boxes, it came straight out of the wall to your TV. A common gag involved a neighbor stopping a cable guy coming out of someone else's house, offering him 50 bucks, and asking him to hook them up with free cable. Notice, they only ever made this joke on the networks, but scenarios like this were rampant.
** Maybe each Planeteer contributed a distinct part of Captain Planet:

'''Wheeler:''' I'm imagining him in his underwear.
* Kept on hearing while the show was on that, in the last few episodes, Gaia made two more rings for two more Planeteers: one for electricity, one for magnetism. Can anyone confirm whether or not this is true?
** False. The closest thing were evil versions of the rings created by Dr. Blight in "Mission To Save Earth". Plunder got a Deforestation Ring, Nukem got a Super Radiation Ring (naturally), Sludge got a Smog Ring, Skumm got a Toxics Ring, and Dr. Blight got stuck with the Hate Ring, which it's about as useful as that Heart ring.

** The Hate Ring makes to fail to call useful animals to do evil.
** Whoa, what do you mean, hate is useless? Hate is evil's most powerful tool. Was it not hate that caused the Hatfield-[=McCoy=] feud? Was it not hate that the Capital from the Hunger Games uses, by having the District's kids kill each other driving a wedge to keep them from rising up (again)? Was it not hate for the white man that had Crazy Horse lead his tribe to slaughter Custard's men? Wasn't it hate towards the natives that caused said rage in Crazy Horse? Is it not hate that has lead to so many murders, assassinations and massacre? The Klu Klux Klan, Aryan Brotherhood and groups like that RUN on hate. A burning hate for sharks (be it from Jaws or something else) has caused thousands of sharks to GET THEIR FINS CUT OFF by angry fisherman? Did not a long hatred of wolves by many cultures almost drive wolves extinct? The settler's of Tasmania HATED the Tasmanian Tiger, and now it's gone (unless the sightings of them in the last few years was true)! Hell, just look at Hitler! The guy sent millions to their deaths and started the DEADLIEST WAR IN HUMAN HISTORY by using hate. Hell, Captain Planet was rendered useless by just how EVIL Hitler was. Hate is to evil is what Heart and love are to good.
* To recall one episode where, because two of the Planeteers had been shot into space or something, their power was unable to return to their rings and, so, returned and re-created Captain Planet in a substantially weakened form, composed only of Heart and Earth. He only had those powers, and a ridiculous pink and green color scheme. It was interesting, since we got to see some interaction between him and Gaia, but the question that occurs to me is: if this happened with everyone but Ma-Ti being shot into space, wold it produce a "Heartless" Captain Planet? Would this Cap'n go around tearing up forest-encroaching farms, sinking oil rigs, throwing power plants full of people into the sun and so on? And... most importantly... would this have made the series better?

*** Recalling an episode in which Captain Planet was summoned without Heart- he turned out to have a darker color scheme, and rather then protecting the Earth, was just kind of a jerk.
*** The eco-terrorist Captain Planet, possibly with a Mirror-Mirror style goatee, almost certainly would have made a superior half-hour.
*** Hang on. There was no such episode where he was summoned without his heart power. Were you thinking of Captain Pollution or the episode where Wheeler falls asleep in the tunnel ride, and dreams of an overpopulated world where he and Linka have a bunch of kids? In that dream when Captain Planet was summoned to quell a reactor fire he was one surly, nasty-tempered person, sick of it all. Reflected in how the other Planeteers had lost all enthusiasm for their work and Gaia had aged into an old woman.
*** Actually, they did INDEED do that. No goatee, but five of the regular villains got together and made five "Opposite" copies of the Planeteers' rings. Ti recall correctly; Radiation, Deforestation, Smog, Toxics, and Hate. "By your powers combined, I am Captain Pollution!"
*** What's not getting here is how in one of the comics it seems Captain Planet has shown up whilst Ma-Ti was unconscious (thus unable to provide heart in the summoning) and turns out A-OK. Anyone able to clarify here?

** For its "lame" reputation on this wiki and elsewhere, there's no resistance to be fascinated by an animated American kids' show that has actually depicted drug use and death and actually used the words "dead," "AIDS," and "sex" (among others). Not that they could get away with that today...

** Some anti-environmental people here are in for a lesson--it's only very high level of pollution of any kid including hate, toxic, smog, and etc. To recall in one of the Marvel Comic issue of Captain Planet that two of eco-villains attempt to waste the superhero with toxic waste--but it didn't work--and they blamed Dr. Blight for giving them low grade toxic waste.

*** [[SmallReferencePools There was a Marvel comic?]] Also, that doesn't change the fact that the creators of Captain Planet made his only weakness ''the exact thing he was created to fight!'' Being anti-bad-writing is not equivalent to being anti-environmental.

*** People who argue for an incoming Malthusian crisis without knowledge of how technological advancement has enabled a few farmers to feed vast swathes of population or how the demographic transition model predicts that the world population ought to stabilize at around the same time all countries become developed nations can be bugging. Not one of the show's proudest moments. Although the problem with this is in RealLife with an upcoming oil crisis, if we lose oil in our use of goods and transit food will be scarce; after all, in real settings we get over 80% of our food cost and energy consumption due to the use of petroleum based products (fuel, chemicals, packaging, preservation) so yes, over population CAN and may one day be a real threat to our existence.

* Nothing against the Russians, but has anyone else noticed that Wheeler, the sole American who could've been the voice of reason, is relegated to ButtMonkey status, while one of the strongest characters on the team (who frequently sets said American straight) is a ''Communist''? My Dad summarized the show quite nicely: "Socialist propaganda".
** [[EagleLand Isn't it obvious?]]
** I'll take THAT over the American guy being always right and always there to save the day. I'd list that as one of the reasons why the show was so good, actually - you have G.I. Joe if you NEED American heroes.
*** It's going against the trends of the time. A CyclicTrope can be [[ParodyDisplacement funny like that]].
*** [[SarcasmMode Because portraying Americans (or any other nationality, for that matter) as perfect normal people who are only sometimes right and sometimes wrong is quite impossible, only as either]] [[{{Eagleland}} jerkasses or always right]].

*** Which, really, answers so much of what's wrong with the entire show. Ted Turner advocates communism... while being one of the richest men in the country. That ultimately tells you all you need to know about why the show is so shallow and nonsensical.
*** You can be rich and left-wing, JK Rowling donates to the Labour Party, Duncan Bannatyne it's pretty leftist too, and well, up to the beginning, Friedrich Engels -one of the fathers of Marxism- was a wealthy industrial.
*** Captain Planet advocates eco-capitalism, and the show is far from socialist. In fact, it shows Linka's home country run-down as well. Somebody watch "Missing Linka" again. This show is FAR from communist, and not so liberal either. Many of the heroes are corporate people who do the right thing, or green entrepreneurs.
*** Captain Planet may or may not Eco-Capitalism, but it does so in a way that can be phrased as "inept". While the Soviet Union is not shown to be the paradise on Earth that some people think the show is like, the fact that North America gets a worse riff in comparison is laughable.
** Talk about not doing the [[http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/fortune_archive/1992/07/27/76680/index.htm research]]
*** Watch "Missing Linka", and you will find out that the show does portray the former USSR's pollution problems. Also she takes her country's unemployment problems hard in ""Bitter Waters".

*** The problem is that at the time of the show (as the previous troper has pointed out), the Soviet Union had one of the worst environmental records on the planet. Russia is still recovering from the effects to this day. Depicting the Soviet Union accurately could have shown Linka disgusted with the effects of the callousness of her society and trying to change things. Not pretending that the Soviet Union was a mystical land of environmental perfection while America is a bombed out wasteland (something viewers of the show in its target audience of ''Americans'' would immediately call foul on). The show's bizarre myopia did not present an accurate picture of the world, which is particularly damning since the show was theoretically attempting to educate.
*** While that's a fair point, it's worth noting that many areas of Soviet Union really did look like that. The country was simply too large to foul up all at once.
*** "Is there a stereotype about communists having something against maintaining a habitable world we should be aware of?" Yes. Communists are usually depicted as industrious people who organize together to exploit the land of its resources in order to make things for everyone. They are on the [[HarmonyVersusDiscipline discipline]] side.
** Just wanna point out, while they could've afforded Wheeler being right once in a while, him possibly being "the voice of reason" has nothing to do with his nationality or his home country's form of government. It doesn't have anything to do with Linka being Russian either. It was just the personality they gave him, regardless of where he was supposed to come from. As far as the nationality issue goes, I'm not from the United States nor am I Russian/Communist, but considering how often Communists (or Russians in general) [[DirtyCommunists are portrayed as the bad guys in fiction]], it was a refreshing inversion if nothing else, although Linka certainly wasn't always right. All the characters in these series are sole examples of their races or nationalities-- in a case like this, it's not racist to have one of them be the captain of the IdiotBall team. It ''is'' bad writing, though.

*** I always saw Wheeler's tendency to be "pompous and moronic" as a plot point to showcase the day's behavioral "lesson"-- admittedly, most of our world's environmental problems could be salvaged or lessened if people change their attitudes, and there's a ''lot'' of people who are "pompous and moronic" about the environment out there, just like Wheeler, independent of their nationality. Yes, it could've been much better written, perhaps shared among the other Planeteers, but I never chalked that up to his nationality, just the fact that he was the one who had the brash, impulsive personality. And regardless of his thick-headedness, Wheeler had a lot of positive qualities that kids could emulate, as well. Of course, if one is determined to be anti-Ted Turner from the beginning, it will seem like the United States are always presented in a bad light in the show. I'm not from the US, but as far as I remember the only "post-apocalypse wasteland" I saw in the show was Brooklyn, and that was, again, for plot purposes. And I seem to remember quite a few episodes where the country was presented in a good light. In fact, I remember thinking Washington D.C. was a beautiful place and probably would be very nice to live there or visit-- until Verminous Skumm and his Bliss happened, of course, but the people in Washington weren't really at fault for that, unless you want to count Skumm as a U.S. citizen.
*** Maybe that's why the show was popular outside the US. Presenting the American as the Butt Monkey is very uncommon -or was then, now is more common- and many people in other countries probably felt that the change was refreshing and for some people, accurate (not that I want to say Americans are dumb, though is probably the stereotype especially in the case of a teenager), for many people in other parts of the world the typical American teen would indeed act like Wheeler; unaware of other's peoples problems, ignorant of other cultures and basing his knowledge on Television.
** This is a fair point. Wheeler feels like the stereotype of the "improve the world" American who thinks the answer is always "America is great, make the world more like us". Whether you are American or not, if you fundamentally disagree with some of America's ideas you are going to find a character like Wheeler to come off as annoying at times. If you are someone who agrees with that statement, then the other characters not thinking like Wheeler can come off as just as annoying.

* Doesn't Captain Planet himself go against the message of the show? ''"THE POWER IS YOURS!!!''...to sit back and do nothing while the man does all the work for you."

** FridgeLogic - The Power is YOURS...to summon Captain Planet to save the day for you?

** Better yet, just get a sheep from Australia or New Zealand. With the power of Wool. Or, y'know, just pick a sheep up from [[Creator/GeorgeOrwell Animal Farm]] so it can be [[DirtyCommunists Linka's pet]]. Or at least let the Planeteers have a Kangaroo TeamPet.

** Ozone. Unfortunately, the penguin would really only be able to use its power right after the 'Strayian, and you couldn't CutLexLuthorACheck because they'd have to relocate... to...

** To recall correctly, Verminous Skumm was a radical, crazed anarchist, creating chaos simply because he wanted to see the world burn. Nolan's Joker, pretty much.

** Money was usually the motive. Not to fully remember any names, but there were also: a scientist manipulated by Greedly who used dolphins to loot a sunken Nazi warship, exposing them to dangerous chemicals in the process; a wild horse [=smuggler/poacher/whatever-that-would-be-called=]; rhino poachers who were after the ivory; exotic pet smugglers; several who attacked Gaia directly; and several times they just had to help people in general (homeless, school gangs, overpopulated third-world countries...)
** [[http://www.turner.com/planet/mission.html Apparently...]] "Given the fact that we dealt not only with real-life issues, but also with children, our challenge lay in the concern that children might come to the conclusion that if their parents worked in a polluting industry, they were somehow villainous. Our answer to that issue was to create villains who were intentionally exaggerated, plainly operating outside the law in an otherwise realistic setting. The eco-villains emerged as characters symbolic of the planet’s environmental problems rather than representative of the actions of individuals."

*** As Ben Croshaw said in his ''Resident Evil Umbrella Chronicles'' review: "Do you remember what the villains from Captain Planet were like? How they'd steal an oil tanker and deliberately run smack into a beach to teach all the sea lions a lesson in complacency? Do you remember wondering why they didn't just sell the oil at huge profit and not have to get beaten up by a big blue man in little red pants? Well that's basically the Umbrella Corporation."
*** There's a problem with that. Almost all villains, even children's ones from the 1980s, have a discernible motive, even if that motive is as simple as "acquire money/power by whatever means I feel like." According to their profiles on the website, most of them do have ''some'' kind of reason, but apparently the show wasn't so good about making sure they had one every time.
** Hoggish Greedy seemed to be more a lower-grade Looten Plunder, an amoral entrepreneur with a tendency to mess with the environment. Which makes you wonder about when he realized there was money in eco-friendly ventures, performed a FaceHeelTurn... would be become an equally amoral Eco-entrepreneur?
*** His son actually did do this, after nearly choking to death on smog.
** It seems that most of the villains just liked polluting for the heck of it, and just used money to rationalize it to themselves. Given a choice between getting money by polluting and getting an equal amount of money by not polluting they would doubtless go the former route.

** Duke Nukem definitely seems like an interesting case, because he's basically a walking nuclear battery. His motive was to spread radioactivity so he could feed on it, but that's definitely an ability that he could have used for tremendous good (say cleaning up all the acreage in Belarus that to this day is unlivable), so his motives are definitely more evil than some of the others, because he could have gotten what he wanted and saved the world in the process.

** In no particular order: Verminous Skumm wants to wipe out humanity so that his people can be the dominant species; he believes that coexistence between his species and us is impossible, and considering that he and his thrive best in conditions unlivable to us, he's probably right. Doctor Blight is brain damaged, and belongs in a high security mental hospital. Hoggish Greedly is a bluntly stupid man with far too much inherited wealth and power, who gleefully runs polluting and destructive operations as his way of flipping off the rest of the world. Looten Plunder is into large, short-term profits and doesn't care at all about the effects of his methods. Duke Nukem is a sociopathic mutant who thrives on ionizing radiation and so seeks to increase the availability of his "food," again without caring what happens to anyone or anything else. Sly Sludge... no idea. Real people in his field are normally very interested in recycling and reclamation technologies.
** Sly Sludge is lazy, that's his problem. He gets rich off of lazy garbage disposal scams.
*** Lazy, stubborn and short sighted. That was Sludge's thing. In his focus episodes he was typically using some quick disposal scheme for fast cash and work that would blow up in his face (literally in the episode where he tried dumping all the trash into a volcano) because he didn't think the environmental problems the Planeteer's would confront him about were a big deal. Or he'd find out about some experimental technology, steal it and try to use it to clean up garbage before it was ready and it would inevitably go out of control. Then he'd try to bail and leave everyone else to deal with the problem while trying to save as much cash as he could. He was almost a big a threat to himself, as almost every one of the Sludge episodes has Sludge himself needing rescue by Captain Planet. It's telling that in his final ep he decides to just start a recycling business and go legit because he'd finally caught on that his schemes never worked, never got a profit and nearly killed him almost every time.

** Supposedly, it was what kept the conflicting elemental forces of the other rings in balance when Captain Planet was formed, and it could technically let you communicate with and command animals with your mind. What makes it lame, though, is that it ''only'' worked if both its user and the animal it's used on isn't in a drugged-induced, brainwashed, or highly agitated state, and it couldn't be used for offense or other aggressive intent (for example, Ma-Ti can use it when he's tied up to get some squirrels to come in and chew through the ropes, but he can't command a pride of lions to chew on some poacher meat). This makes no sense to me, since all of the other rings could be used for attack.
*** Weird since in the comic he actually got some forest animals to fight with him(including a wolf and a bear). The problem is that he is morally conflicted; in the comic example, he asked the animals if they wanted to fight instead of just commanding them) not that he can't use his powers aggressively.
*** You'd think if a wolf and a bear wanted to fight somebody, they wouldn't need Ma-Ti's permission.
*** Less asking for permissions and more helping when asked. Likely, the wolf and bear had no reason to fight but did so because Ma-Ti asked them to do so. Like helping someone carry something; you would likely assume they can handle it but would help them if they asked.
** In other words, Ma-Ti is to land animals what Aquaman of the Super Friends was to sea animals.
** Useful doesn't always mean explosions. Ma-Ti got most of the AllUpToYou episodes due to the heart ring's telepathy, which also bailed everyone out even if it was ''their'' [[ADayInTheLimelight episode]]. Plus, part of the power seemed to be immunity to the IdiotBall...
** Heart is actually one of the ''most'' useful powers. Instant telepathic communication with anyone on earth, the ability to calm angry people and animals down, limited telepathic control, one would assume it would include mind reading and deception detection (Not sure if they ever showed this but it makes sense it would be part of his power set.) The problem is that Ma-Ti never found anything original or useful to do with it because he had no imagination.
*** Heart is the power that gives Captain Planet his love, emotions, morality; without Heart, Captain Planet would have no humanity. Imagine what would happen [[http://Drizles.deviantart.com/art/And-That-s-Why-You-Don-t-117847873 if they forgot Heart...]]
*** It's hard to keep on laughing at Ma-Ti once you realize: (a) He's Latino and probably going to be the hottest guy in school once he finally hits puberty, and (b) He has the power of '''heart''' over girls. That kid's gonna get more than you ever dreamed possible. NOW ask what kind of a lame power is Heart.

*** On a more probable note, Ma-Ti doesn't need his ring to get girls... but he can certainly use it to know if a particular girl is interested in him, and if it's more than just celebrity infatuation, and why.
*** Not to mention, if any of the Planeteers went evil... sure, Wheeler could go into arson, and Gi could flood everything, but Ma-Ti has ''mind control''. He could create an army of followers, or convince herds of elephants to trample you, or tell you to go kill yourself. That's a pretty impressive power. Think of him as having the potential of Dark Phoenix without all the deaths and resurrections.

*** My problem with "Heart" is simple. Google image the pentagram of the elements and look through a few pictures. 1. The ones that do have anything like "heart" is actually called "Spirit" which they could be MUCH more original with and not as lame. 2. A few of them do not have 'spirit' that whole "element of metal"? That's not some person wanking off to try and make a cool suggestion, in a lot of cultures that IS the fifth element. Of course Ted Turner would never use it, because the ability to summon a sword out of thin air is just terrible.

*** To appeal to viewers who were raised on artificial 1980's television personalities.
*** The pilot episode mentions that Captain Planet's appearance and demeanor are pulled from the minds of the Planeteers -- apparently, the Planeteers are big fans of artificial 1980's television personalities.

*** To recall correctly: Wheeler was the child of two extremely poor Americans living in a version of New York City that looked post-apocalyptic, Kwame was from a family of rural farmers in central Africa, Gi's parents were (perhaps) Korean or Chinese Marine Biologists, Linka is the daughter of coal miners in rural Russia, and Ma-Ti was from an isolated South American Indian tribe (and his tribe's shaman was training him to be the successor before he got called away). Interesting that Gi was the only one from a family background middle class or higher - her toy's bio actually notes that she was able to start college at 14. But yea, none of these kids should have really even known what Double Dare was, especially since cable TV would have been too expensive for Wheeler's family to afford at the time and he used to run away from home all the time, anyways. Writing this out makes me realize that these characters had a lot of [[TheyWastedAPerfectlyGoodPlot potential that was wasted.]]
*** Actually, cable was more common than you think in the poor sections since it was relatively easy to steal. There were no cable boxes, it came straight out of the wall to your TV. A common gag involved a neighbor stopping a cable guy coming out of someone else's house, offering him 50 bucks, and asking him to hook them up with free cable. Notice, they only ever made this joke on the networks, but scenarios like this were rampant.
*** Maybe each Planeteer contributed a distinct part of Captain Planet:
*** Gaia: "OK, Planeteers, time to make Captain Planet. I want you each to imagine something different about him."
*** Kwame: "I'm imagining him with green hair."
*** Gi: "I'm imagining him with blue skin."
*** Ma-Ti: "I'm imagining him being full of lame puns."
*** Linka: "I'm imagining him going down like a wimp every time he gets smoke blown in his face."
*** Wheeler: "I'm imagining him in his underwear."

** False. Anyone who watched the show religiously as a kid and cannot find any evidence or recall any proof or instance where this happened. Sounds like FanWank or fanfic characters.
*** Yeah, it was four rings... one single ring to cover the electromagnetic force, plus one for gravitation and one each for the strong and weak nuclear interactions. [note to first/third replies: ''[[SmallReferencePools this is a physics joke]]''. Move on.]
*** Why would you need two different guys for nuclear powers? And considering how anti-nuclear Turner was, it'd be surprised if he ever even let Nuclear power of ANY kind (even the natural atomic kind) be portrayed in a good light.
*** It's a reference to [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fundamental_force the fundamental forces of physics.]]
*** Regardless, there's still no proof of its existence in the show itself.
*** The only thing to come up with is the episode where the bad guys cloned evil versions of the rings. Plunder got a Deforestation Ring, Nukem got a Super Radiation Ring (naturally), Sludge got a Smog Ring, Skumm got a Toxics Ring, and Dr. Blight got stuck with the Hate Ring, and it's about as useful as that Heart ring.
*** Wondering what is the use of Deforestation Ring. Like--you point it at trees and they vanish?

*** Hang on, if all the rings other than Heart = Heartless Captain Planet, then where is his nobody, Captain Explant? </obvious Kingdom Hearts joke>

** Obviously, he ''can't'' just live on his own outside the rings. The rings are needed ''because'' he can't exist permanently. Why? That's like asking why saying "Wingardium Leviosa" causes objects to float. That's just the way the magic works.
** That and presumably his existence depends on that of the kids, since he's made of their combined personalities and physical features. They don't have him out all the time because summoning him renders the rings inert of their elemental powers while he's out, and they don't want to leave themselves vulnerable. He's used mainly as a last resort.

* It bugs me that considering it was a kids show, Linka and Wheeler had tons of UST, but that it never lead anywhere. So many possibilities, so little payoff.
** I remember watching an episode where they flashed forward to a possible future where Wheeler married Linka and had about five kids, which turned into yet another Anvilicious Aesop about how waste is bad.
*** Did they also mention that overpopulation is bad? Because, you know, ''five'' kids is a bit more than just replacing the parents...
*** I don't know about that episode, but I remember one where aliens put the Planeteers in a zoo, saying that they were an "endangered species". When one of the kids points out that there's six billion humans, the aliens respond that this is their point -- there are too many humans for Earth to sustain.
*** [[SarcasmMode Yeah, because it's not like scientists can just use their knowledge of technology and genetics to produce a viable crop that could feed billions of hungry people. That'd just be silly...]] Wait...
*** Yeah, people who argue for an incoming Malthusian crisis without knowledge of how technological advancement has enabled a few farmers to feed vast swathes of population or how the demographic transition model predicts that the world population ought to stabilize at around the same time all countries become developed nations just bug me. Not one of the show's proudest moments.
*** Although the problem with this is in RealLife with an upcoming oil crisis, if we lose oil in our use of goods and transit food will be scarce; after all in real settings we get over 80% of our food cost and energy consumption due to the use of petroleum based products (fuel, chemicals, packaging, preservation) so yes..over population CAN and may one day be a real threat to our existence.
*** [[SarcasmMode And there's definitely no way for the population to shrink before they go extinct.]]
** "Frog Day Afternoon" was pretty hilarious in this department -- lot of opportunity, everything left unsaid.
** Then there was the episode in which Linka and Wheeler got shrunk. When Wheeler got big again, Linka's miniaturization hadn't worn off yet, and he puts her in his shirt pocket and takes off the towel she was using to cover herself.

*** You can be rich and Left-wing, Jk Rowling donates to the Labour Party, Duncan Bannatyne it's pretty leftist too, and well, up to the beginning, Friedrich Engels -one of the fathers of Marxism- was a welthy industrial.
*** God, the stupidity here is mind-blowing....Captain Planet advocates eco capitalism, and the show is far from socialist. In fact, it shows Linka's home country run down as well. Somebody watch "Missing Linka" again. In fact this show is FAR from communist, and in fact, its not as liberal as you think as well. Many of the heroes are corporate people who do the right thing or green entrepreneurs.
*** Captain Planet may or may not Eco-Capitalism, but it does so in a way that I can best phrase as "inept." I agree the above tropers give the show content itself a bit of a short shrift (especially in regards to the Linkacentric episodes), but while the Soviet Union is not shown to be the paradise on Earth that some people think the show is like, the fact that North America gets a worse riff in comparison is laughable. As for Ted Turner himself, you don't go buddy buddy with Fidel Castro and say the things he has (especially making explicit endorsements of Communism) and claim to be an Eco-Capitalist. At the very least, I can say that mistaking the show itself for being so is a forgivable mistake.

*** I always saw Wheeler's tendency to be "pompous and moronic" as a plot point to showcase the day's behavioral "lesson"-- admittedly, most of our world's environmental problems could be salvaged or lessened if people change their attitudes, and there's a ''lot'' of people who are "pompous and moronic" about the environment out there, just like Wheeler, independent of their nationality. Yes, it could've been much better written, perhaps shared among the other planeteers, but I never chalked that up to his nationality, just the fact that he was the one who had the brash, impulsive personality. And regardless of his thick-headedness, Wheeler had a lot of positive qualities that kids could emulate, as well. Of course, if one is determined to be anti-Ted Turner from the beginning, it will seem like the United States are always presented in a bad light in the show. I'm not from the US, but as far as I remember the only "post-apocalypse wasteland" I saw in the show was Brooklyn, and that was, again, for plot purposes. And I seem to remember quite a few episodes where the country was presented in a good light. In fact, I remember thinking Washington D.C. was a beautiful place and probably would be very nice to live there or visit-- until Verminous Skumm and his Bliss happened, of course, but the people in Washington weren't really at fault for that, unless you want to count Skumm as a U.S. citizen.
*** I don't want to be rude but, maybe that's why the show was popular outside the US. Presenting the American as the Butt Monkey is very uncommon -or was then, now is more common- and many people in other countries probably felt that the change was refreshing and for some people, accurate (not that I want to say Americans are dumb, though is probably the stereotype especially in the case of a teenager), for many people in other parts of the world the typical American teen would indeed act like Wheeler; unaware of other's peoples problems, ignorant of other cultures and basing his knowledge on Television.

* In 101 Mutations, why did Dr.Blight have a puppy mill operation when she is more interested in scientific progression than anything? Puppy mills are sources of money, and I don't think breeding dogs in mass numbers will get too much progression in research. She also has other ways to get money that seem to suit her preferences more than watching dogs being born among their own feces and urine. It's more like a Hoggish Greedly plot.

* Speaking of Mr.Greedly, why is he the most commonly seen villain? If he's a slovenly, porcine tycoon who is a leader in dirty industry and resources, why does he do things like hosting monster truck races, or rounding up horses for slaughter, or even driving motorboats in manatee habitats?

*** Huh, Greedly going green, but not going good. His son and Grandfather probably wouldn't be happy if he did anything truly wrong, and he really does care about his family, so he'd probably listen to them and turn a new leaf, for good. Darn!

*** The real answer is probably that Ed Asner (the voice actor for Greedly) was the least-famous and successful of the major villain actors (including Martin Sheen & Meg Ryan), and was thus the most likely to have a free schedule all the time. The others were doing major films while Ed was usually just doing voice work.
*** To give credit where credit is due, Asner was pretty big for a while. He was just mostly retired by the time Captain Planet rolled around.
* I remember an episode when a kid stole the Fire Ring from Wheeler, and became a superhero. His name? Superboy. That's not only already taken, but it has nothing to do with his powers. Why not Firelord, Flame Master, Captain Heat or the Scorcher?
** The show is under the same parent company as DC, they could get away with it.
*** Correction: That episode was made in 1990 at DIC. Turner didn't buy Creator/HannaBarbera until 1991. Turner didn't merge with Warner Bros. (owner of DC) until 1996. Turner had no connection to Superman at that time.
** Out of universe explanation: it was a ShoutOut.
** In universe explanation: Said kid is a big fan of Franchise/{{Superman}} (or of Superboy).
*** You're mistaken. I just rewatched the episode and his name is Super''kid'', which is a comic he's already a fan of.
* Doesn't Captain Planet himself go against the message of the show? ''"THE POWER IS YOURS!!!''.........to sit back and do nothing while the man does all the work for you."
** ...There really is no good explanation for that, but it does show what teamwork really means. Sitting back and watching your friends do all the work.

* Why does the WesternAnimation/{{Captain Planet|and the Planeteers}} version of UsefulNotes/AdolfHitler not look like the real Hitler?

* Are the scriptwriters morons? I rewatched "The Littlest Planeteer" today. Wheeler got his right hand injured. For some reason this means he can't use his ring. It's not a bad injury either. It's a ''first-degree burn''. [[FridgeLogic Couldn't he have just switched hands]]?

* I can't find it no matter how hard I look, but I distinctly remember an internet attempt somewhere at creating a DarkerAndEdgier version of the show that was very messed up, but was... [[YourMileageMayVery arguably good.]] Captain Planet is a primordial force of destruction, the heroes are actually eco-terrorists in service of a vengeful, human hating Gaia, and each receives his or her power by dying in a way that relates to his element. If I remember correctly Linka is a young eastern European prostitute who dies from tuberculosis, Kwame is a child soldier in Africa who is killed in battle and buried in a mass grave under dust and dirt, and Ma-Ti is outcast by the people of his village for being androgynous (I couldn't make this up if I tried) and dies alone in the jungle. I don't remember many other details.

* Something that was kinda lampshaded by Linkara during his review of one of the comics that I must point out. If Kwame has complete power over earth, then he is [[PhysicalGod EFFECTIVELY GOD OF THE ENTIRE PLANET!!!!!]] Seriously, he can manipulate entire continents if he really wants to, but instead he can't even realize to simply pull up a pair of rock hands to grab the terrorists surrounding him and the [[FiveManBand Planeteers.]] Heck ALL of the Planeteers are pretty much loaded with the potential for being utter badasses if they considered the sheer scale of what they can do: Linka could have Tornadoes pop up wherever she wants, Gi could control the water in people's bodies and make them do her bidding, Wheeler could bring up a firestorm (a large fire that effectively fuels itself, and is nigh unstoppable), and Ma-Ti of all people could MindRape people into submission.
** Their powers are implied to have limits. Kwame can only move so much earth at once, Wheeler can only summon a limited amount of fire, etc. Captain Planet has each of the powers to a considerably greater extent. But something of this nature did happen when Zarm tricked them into wearing his fists instead of their rings, making them far more powerful.
** The power limitation thing makes sense. The part where I agree with Linkara is that they rarely got especially creative with their power. Kwame might not be a nascent earth god, for example, but he's still potentially more powerful than he lets on or realizes.
** Some actual, potential FridgeBrilliance - imagine the environmental damage Kwame would do if he started moving continents around. The Planeteers might genuinely have a level-cap on their powers so that they don't accidentally ripple-effect the world into pieces.
* The villains of Captain planet all represent or personification traits, mindsets, or actions that hurt the environment or people. Hoggish Greedly represents resource abuse and greed, Looten Plunder represents unethical or illegal corporate actions and screwy capitalism, Dr.Blight represents overuse of technology and unethical scientific research and actions, Duke Nukem represents ozone damage and the dangers of nuclear power and radiation, Verminous Scumm represents crime, urban decay, and disease and epidemics, and Zarm represents fascism, war, hatred, and bigotry. So what does Sly Sludge represent?

* On one episode Sly Sludge has a garbage disposal business where he gets rid of the trash by dumping it in a volcano. It seems like a good idea to me! What's the harm?

** Just for clarification, Wheeler's fire isn't fully fuel-less. He can probably release heat, light and sparks from his ring, but whenever he uses the ring, it's mostly to set something else on fire-- and that something else is the fuel, conceivably a flammable material, and when this something else burns, it ''does'' produce gases. In that sense, you couldn't burn trash or such with Wheeler's ring, because it would release exactly the same amount of [=CO2=] regular incineration releases in real life. I seem to remember him generating small fire tornadoes out of his ring a couple of times, without gas emissions most likely, but what are the practical applications of fuel-less fire? It could be used to produce energy, but Wheeler would have to stand there and emit it permanently, and he is only one person, hardly enough to produce enough energy to run a decent household. Perhaps warm up a room for a night, but not give the house electricity for an extended period of time.

*** Gi definitely has flaws and personality...hell, she is the planeteer closest to KILLING somebody.
** [[OppositesAttract Wow, I wish there was a trope for that]].
* I gotta put this one up. A recently deleted comment said how Gi thinks regulations (which include forced sex-selective abortions)as a good thing. That's a bit extremist, but the real thing that bugs me is that she thinks dolphins are the greatest thing ever. Yeah, the animals that gang rape and kill for the lulz.
** Okay dolphins have just officially reached MemeticRapist level. Most animals kill and rape for the lulz, [[HumansAreBastards humans included]]. Dolphins aren't all ''constantly'' raping and killing things, they can be quite friendly and heroic at times. they are '''Not''' AlwaysChaoticEvil

** Presumably because he was street smart and understood inner city issues. He might not be the most environmentally aware person but in the AIDS and gangs and drugs episode he actually understands what going on ("Nobody made him take the drugs, he did that himself" or "They don't see a future for themselves, territory is all they feel they have.") while the other Planeteers are shown to be unable to comprehend the situation at all.

** So the only person who could understand inner-city gang life, drugs, and AIDS is the white-bread and not the dude from Africa or the other dude from Latin America?
*** Yes. Remember, this is Turner Earth... the only problems in Africa or Latin America are caused by white people. On Turner Earth, Africa consists of stretches of beautiful, non-dangerous savanna inhabited by vegan, meditating tribespeople, with maybe two crime-free cities. A majority black nation, having social problems (other than those caused by white people)? What are you, racist?
** Did you even watch the show? At all? Wheeler is the only protagonist who lived in any place other than a tiny village or a research lab for most of his life. This is made quite clear in the first episode, where the other planeteers are enjoying their lives and helping out animals and nature in their lush natural homes during the day while Wheeler fights a thug in a dark, borderline cyberpunkish New York.
* I remember an episode where the gang and a fully formed CP where framed and arrested. The gang busted out, while CP basically said "Nope! I'm going to stay in jail till you guys prove our innocence!" Um...why? The Captain is an elemental spirit created by a Goddess. How can the US Law do anything to him? If he was so uptight about the law, why didn't he have the gang stay while he went and saved the day?

** It was explained more cleanly in that they were all in jail, and it was Hoggish Greedley who had the Planeteers released by dropping the charges against them, but specifically not against Captain Planet (not certain if that's legally possible),[[BatmanGambit to both make him look better and keep the planeteers powerless]] (no powers with Captain Planet summoned and Planet himself stuck in jail).
* To go with my above Headscratcher, why does no one make a big deal about the existence of Gaia and Captain Planet!? They are Gods! But everyone just sees them and thinks "Cool! Lets go green!" Whaa-?

* Captain Planet's puns. MY GOD, THE PUNS.

* So many people complain that the characters could sell their eco-friendly tech but...its stated early on it is 'future tech', so my compliant is that if its future tech this means it was to be invented eventually (hence the use of not selling it, time paradox and all) but exactly HOW FAR into the future we talking??? A hundred, thousand, or million years?

** It's his surname, actually.
*** That isn't much better, but I've heard worst last names.
* Why did the planeteers bother summoning the Big Blue Mullet all the time? Sure, he's powerful (variably), but he can be taken out with a bag of dirty diapers. The Planeteers' rings grant them control over the elements that is never completely defined. They always acted like they were utterly boned if they were separated and couldn't summon, but they were far from helpless. Surely they could realize that they are more than capable of taking out the poorly conceived schemes of stereotypical industrialists on their own every once in a while. They never even attempted to use their rings to their full potential. What's the point of giving the kids powers if they never use them right and completely lose them just to make somebody else fight for them?

** They were trying to say hate was as effective as pollution. Unfortunately, they also showed racists in one episode having zero effect on Cap (one of the Western styled episodes) and so it really didn't work. What Cap was reacting to was kind of unclear because of this.

** Or better yet, just "Europe"? Why say "Eastern Europe" If there are no Planeteers from Western Europe? By the way, Russia isn't a continent. just a very, very big country.

* Refresh my memory-what exactly was Verminous Skumm again? Was he some sort of rat that became sentient when it was mutated by toxic chemicals, a man who became mutated into a rat by toxic chemicals, or what?

** To recall correctly, it was a beaded necklace. Given during the Mardi Gras festivities. Linka most likely was aware of what was traditionally expected from her under such circumstances.
* Why wasn't there a Planeteer from Australia? The dynamic of the four Western elements plus heart is better aesthetically, but they couldn't BS a sixth element like lightning or something?
** Especially since Americans were ''obsessed'' with Australia during the eighties. He would have been the Breakout Character!
** Probably for the sake of diversity, by means of a quasi-FiveTokenBand. The majority of the Australian population is white and/or of European Descent, with a minority of Africans, Asians and people of Aboriginal origin. Choosing any one of those would imply repeating an already depicted minority, and there were already two white characters. It wasn't about the geography, it was about the demographics. Of course, they could've chosen a non-aboriginal mestizo character for South America, and then gone with an aboriginal Australian, but the call of the Amazon tribe was too strong to resist. Ma-Ti needed to talk to animals, after all...
** Pretty sure Australian Aborigines and South American natives are two different races (at the very least).
** Besides, there are only 5 Aristotelian elements.
*** And Heart wasn't one of them -- the fifth Aristotelian element is Aether, which makes up stars and planets and doesn't represent life. A better comparison would be the Wiccan elements of air, earth, fire, water, and ''spirit''. The Chinese and Japanese systems comprise five elements, too.
* There's a joke that there should've been two other Planeteers to make sure all the continents were covered: An Aussie with the power of Electricity (who, of course, just happened to be a young clone of Paul Hogan), and a talking penguin with the power of Ice (yes, it's stupid; but Stupid = Funny, right?)
** Would that Penguin be TheScrappy, or would Ma-Ti and his monkey still retain the honor?
** [[EverythingsBetterWithPenguins What do you think?]]
** Better yet, just get a sheep from Australia or New Zealand. With the power of Wool. Or, y'know, just pick a sheep up from [[Creator/GeorgeOrwell Animal Farm]] so it can be [[Main/DirtyCommunists Linka's pet]].

** Because nobody cares about Australia...
** Awwww... sadface for those who live in Downunder! At least let the Planeteers have a Kangaroo TeamPet.
*** Besides, we all know the sixth element is [[Franchise/TheElderScrolls Flesh]]!
** Unfortunately, ice is frozen water, so it's already under the dominion of the Water Ring.
*** That would make sense but the [[https://captainplanet.fandom.com/wiki/Water_Ring Water Ring]] for some doesn't work on ice.

** Would Australia have counted as "Oceania"?
*** Australia is how the continent is called in the Anglo-Saxon world, Oceania is the name of the continent in the Latin and the Slavic world, is a similar thing to the America continent terminology polemic.

** To recall correctly, the rat guy (the villain who dressed up like a Libyan terrorist) was a radical, crazed anarchist, creating chaos simply because he wanted to see the world burn. Nolan's Joker, pretty much.

** Not sure about the rest of them, but the entire point of Looten Plunder's character was that he got rich by running clear-cutting operations, poaching endangered species, and so forth.
*** Yes, but he wasn't exactly consistent - he'd do things like set things on fire or hire an army of special operatives to steal all the world's resources, things that are actually very counter-productive to making money.
** Likewise, Doctor Blight was supposed to be using her Main/MorallyAmbiguousDoctorate to do amoral research for varied companies (cosmetics, pharmaceuticals, aerospace).
*** But again, a lot of the time her motives would stay unexplained and she'd just be causing oil spills and forest fires for the heck of it.
*** Gaia stated overtly at some point that Doctor Blight was actually insane, and wanted to use global warming to destroy all human life. At least she had a reason for being irrational.
*** There's no memory of them saying. The show had next to zero continuity from episode to episode anyway.
** Money was usually the motive. Not to fully remember any names, but there was also: a scientist manipulated by Greedly who used dolphins to loot a sunken Nazi warship, exposing them to dangerous chemicals in the process; a wild horse [=smuggler/poacher/whatever-that-would-be-called=]; rhino poachers who were after the ivory; exotic pet smugglers; several who attacked Gaia directly; and several times they just had to help people in general (homeless, school gangs, overpopulated third-world countries...)

** It's a series from the 1990s aimed at children. The baddies pollute because they're [[Main/CardCarryingVillain jerks]].
*** As Ben Croshaw said in his Resident Evil Umbrella Chronicles review: "Do you remember what the villains from Captain Planet were like? How they'd steal an oil tanker and deliberately run smack into a beach to teach all the sea lions a lesson in complacency? Do you remember wondering why they didn't just sell the oil at huge profit and not have to get beaten up by a big blue man in little red pants? Well that's basically the Umbrella Corporation."

** Hogglish Greedy seemed to be more a lower-grade Looten Plunder, an amoral entrepreneur with a tendency to mess with the environment. Which makes you wonder about when he realized there was money in eco-friendly ventures, performed a FaceHeelTurn... would be become an equally amoral Eco-entrepreneur?

*** Actually that sounds a lot like BP ...hmmm the recent change back to Gulf anyone? They did the 'careless pollution and still made money' pretty walk in RealLife if you ask any employee of theirs.
*** BP's "careless pollution" is a ''massive'' exaggeration. Just because someone claiming to be a BP employee says it doesn't make it true. And even if it was, they still aren't as bad as the likes of Hoggish, Looten, Blight, or the other Captain Planet villains who have absolutely no motivation beyond "dump lots of pollution and somehow make money off it, maybe".
*** Big corporations polluting the environment and damaging the eco-systems are uncommon in the first world, yes, for a series of reasons, but they are still very much alive in the third world (and probably it was even worst in the 90s) and if you check the news you will see that environmental activists have been murder in places like Honduras and Congo, so sadly it's still a problem in some parts of the world. No wonder that the show was very popular outside the US probably due to ValuesDissonance.

* Zarm, wants revenge on Gaia, he is not ForTheEvulz.
* Main/WhatKindOfLamePowerIsHeartAnyway?

*** Weird since in the comic he actually got some forest animals to fight with him(including a wolf and a bear). The problem is that he is morally conflicted(in the comic example he asked the animals if they wanted to fight instead of just commanding them) not that he can't use his powers aggressively.

** Useful doesn't always mean explosions. Ma-Ti got most of the Main/AllUpToYou episodes due to the heart ring's telepathy, which also bailed everyone out even if it was ''their'' [[Main/ADayInTheLimelight episode]]. Plus, part of the power seemed to be immunity to the Main/IdiotBall...

** At least it wasn't given to a girl.
*** No, just a minority.
** Are you sure you're talking about Captain Planet? He wasn't a minority, unless you count 4/5ths of the main characters as 'minorities'.
*** I'm pretty sure he WAS a minority- some kinda Asian, right?
*** He's ''Latino''.
*** He was from South America. Gi was from Asia. Linka was from the former Soviet Union. Kwame was from Africa. How do you define 'minority' if Ma-Ti is a minority, but the others are not? 4/5ths of the main characters were non-white-American.
*** Wasn't he a South American Indian? Always thought so. After all, there are many, many people in Latin America who are a mix of Spanish and native ancestry; and that is what his appearance might suggest.
*** None of them are minorities of any kind, there all from the majority group of their respective cultures.
*** Technically, since both Wheeler and Linka were both white, they were the majority and the others were minorities by default. Of course, Linka was a [[DirtyCommunists Dirty Communist.]]
*** Well, ''technically'', seeing as it's a global effort, Gi, from Asia, would be the majority, and everyone else would be the minorities.
*** Didn't they all live on that island? That would include Gaia and with her, it would have put Wheeler/Linka and Kwame/Gaia as majorities and Gi and Ma-Ti as minorities.
*** Since Gaia was the "Spirit of the Earth", could she really be considered to have a racial identity? Don't forget that aside from Whoopi Goldberg, she was also voiced by Margot Kidder.
*** If the others had been from the US maybe, but "whites" aren't a majority on the planet.
*** If Ma-Ti was a pure Kayapo Indian, he was a minority even in his country where they are less than 0,00005% of the total population. In Brazil the majority are Mestizos/Pardos, a mix of white, African and Indian in various proportions. Indeed as the other ones were majorities in their own countries, Ma-Ti was the only minority of the team.
*** Wait, [[Main/ViewerGenderConfusion Ma-Ti was a guy]]!?
*** Indeed. He was twelve, far and away the youngest of the five. Compare Gi, who was old enough to possess a credit card and drive a car.
*** And his voice actor was a 20 year old man.

*** To recall correctly: Wheeler was the child of two extremely poor Americans living in a version of New York City that looked post-apocalyptic, Kwame was from a family of rural farmers in central Africa, Gi's parents were (perhaps) Korean or Chinese Marine Biologists, Linka is the daughter of coal miners in rural Russia, and Ma-Ti was from an isolated South American Indian tribe (and his tribe's shaman was training him to be the successor before he got called away). Interesting that Gi was the only one from a family background middle class or higher - her toy's bio actually notes that she was able to start college at 14. But yea, none of these kids should have really even known what Double Dare was, especially since cable TV would have been too expensive for Wheeler's family to afford at the time and he used to run away from home all the time, anyways. Writing this out makes me realize that these characters had a lot of [[Main/TheyWastedAPerfectlyGoodPlot potential that was wasted.]]

*** Yeah, it was four rings... one single ring to cover the electromagnetic force, plus one for gravitation and one each for the strong and weak nuclear interactions. [note to first/third replies: ''[[Main/SmallReferencePools this is a physics joke]]''. Move on.]

*** Well, that is HITLER, near-synonymous with the evils of humanity today. Thought it was cool.
*** Doesn't Godwin's Law give me the right to delete all further replies to this topic?
*** No no no, only if Hitler is off-topic. Since Hitler was actually in the show, it hasn't Godwinned yet. There's a process that must be followed!
*** GODWIN'S LAW DOES NOT WORK THAT WAY! GOODNIGHT!
*** [[GodwinsLaw Except for the part where it totally does?]]
*** Godwin's Law says that the likely hood of the analogy increases over time (which has happend) and that after it does the topic will quickly go off topic and end. The analogy here is on topic so that is not a problem and the law does not say you SHOULD end the topic, only predicting the outcome. So no, it does not work that way.

*** That never happened in the cartoon - he went down * constantly* . And seriously, how good is your pollution fighting superhero if you can take him out by dumping the massive amount of pollution on him that he needs to be fighting in the first place? It sounds like the Marvel writers were at least trying to make that weakness workable. The show writers never did. Captain Planet's powers were not well defined. Oh, and seriously? Why the assumption that the only people who hate this show hate the environment? That's a straw-man if there ever was one.
*** [[Main/SmallReferencePools There was a Marvel comic?]] Also, that doesn't change the fact that the creators of Captain Planet made his only weakness ''the exact thing he was created to fight!'' Being anti-bad-writing is not equivalent to being anti-environmental.

** Obviously, he ''can't'' just live on his own outside the rings. the rings are needed ''because'' he can't exist permanently. Why? That's like asking why saying "Wingardium Leviosa" causes objects to float. That's just the way the magic works.

* Nothing against the Russians, but has anyone else noticed that Wheeler, the sole American who could've been the voice of reason, is relegated to Main/ButtMonkey status, while one of the strongest characters on the team (who frequently sets said American straight) is a ''Communist''? My Dad summarized the show quite nicely: "Socialist propaganda".
** [[Main/EagleLand Isn't it obvious?]]

* Shouldn't most of the eco-villains be serving life in prison for the crazy stuff they pulled? Why are people hiring these creeps? No amount of money should keep their butts out of prison. They committed terrorism, vandalism, kidnapping, and murder.

* Related to that, did the writers make up Wheeler's backstory as they went along, or did they just ignore it as they saw fit? For instance, in "A Twist of Fate", Wheeler has to learn how hard homeless people have it, yet in "A Mine is a Terrible Thing to Waste", he reveals that he ''was'' homeless for a while growing up.

** This was stated in that episode. Captain Planet didn't want to bust out because he already had his name tarnished enough simply by landing in jail. He could easily bust out easily with his powers, but he would be setting a bad example in addition to breaking the law, and a LawfulGood guy like him really can't try and pull that stuff even if he's framed.

* The reason Gaia doesn't use her Earth goddess powers to end pollution is because she wants humanity to learn how to do it. Okay, but why doesn't she help stop the eco-villains who are clearly taking their polluting UpToEleven just for the fun of it and are way more dangerous than the rest of humanity?

** Probably for the sake of diversity, by means of a quasi-FiveTokenBand. The majority of the Australian population is white and/or of European Descent, with a minority of Africans, Asians and people of Aboriginal origin. Choosing any one of those would imply repeating an already depicted minority, and there were already two white characters. It wasn't about the geography, it was about the demographics. Of course, they could've chosen a non-aboriginal mestizo character for South America, and then gone with an aboriginal Australian, but the call of the Amazon tribe was too strong to resist. Ma-ti needed to talk to animals, after all...

** Would that Penguin be TheScrappy, or would Maa-ti and his monkey still retain the honor?

*** Since he always says that when he's done fighting pollution, the catchphrase may have had a more literal meaning; he was returning the rings' elemental control to the wielders. Less an inspiring thing to say and more along the lines of "I'm done with it, so...!"

*** I always assumed Captain Planet was supposed to represent our ability to escalate issues. Yes, in the show it was a lot more concrete, they would find themselves put in a situation like "Oh look! [[ArtisticLicenseNuclearPhysics The nuclear reactor is about to blow up!]] We puny humans cannot possibly hope to contain this on our own! We ''need'' Captain Planet!", which of course does not happen in real life. Also, these situations were much more of an immediate threat than environmental issues generally are in real life: people would get sick ''now'', animals would die ''now'', the land would be left barren ''now.'' In real life, however, it's also very unlikely that five teenagers will take down issues of that much impact on their own. They can work on the small things-- cleaning beaches and organizing recycling rallies and convincing other people to live green. When it comes to things like fighting corrupt corporate conglomerates or the abuse of technology, however, there isn't much they can do by themselves, unless they decide to go eco-terrorist, design bombs in their spare time and then plant them on these conglomerates' [=HQs=]-- which is not something the show (or anyone) should advocate. In real life, people who are aware of these transgressions usually look for support, signatures, sponsors, go to the authorities, go to the legal system, you name it, in order to take on these massive corporations and actually win. Yes, a lot of the time it seems like the characters just sit back and let Captain Planet do the hard work, but the idea is that the rest of the episode is there to show you that these characters actually learn a lesson and resolve to behave better in the future when it comes to the environment. Captain Planet was supposed to be a metaphor for the idea that humanity is stronger as a whole. They have to give the kids an avatar to look up to, and superheros are especially effective in calling kids' attention. Erin Brockovich would probably not be very effective to keep the show's intended demographic entertained.

** Every kids show team needs a moron that the others can explain things to so that the kids watching can also be educated.

** Simple, he's chilling in the Earth's core, drinking Mojitos and watching Each and Every work that has {{Pun}}s on it's page.

* In "Trouble On The Half Shell", why don't the JASON Project scientists do anything to help? They can see what the robot's cameras are showing just as well as the boy piloting it can, why don't they give control back to one of the engineers who presumably has more experience piloting it? I mean, if a research robot is the only thing that can help the Planeteers defeat vilains, I want a trained person piloting it, not some random kid at a science center.

* What don't the villain have origin stories? It would be nice to see how Skumm came to be.
* Why would anyone make deals with the villains? Their names scream "I'm the villain". That's like me getting married to a woman name Goldie Golddigger or trusting a guy name Sleazy McFraud.

* I was wondering about Zarm's "Power Gauntlets", after the Planeteers rejected them, why didn't Zarm just get his own bunch of "Planeteers" to wear them and battle Gaia's? hes all for competition.

* Even though Wheeler comes from a working class background, why do the writers constantly treat him like he comes from a place of privilege? Even if he's white American dude, he's was homeless before he was summoned by Gaia.

*** It's going against the trends of the time. A CyclicTrope can be [[WeirdAlEffect funny like that]].