Stitch Puritans is a website dedicated to the preservation of Stitch as he was meant to be: before Stitch! The Movie, Lilo & Stitch: the Series, and Leroy & Stitch. While the name of the website may suggest a religious quality to our affection for Stitch, we are not actually a cult or if you will, a "Church of Stitch." ("The work of the almighty Experiment 626 has been completed! Praise Jumba!") We are simply fans of Stitch as he was portrayed in Lilo & Stitch.
Nowadays, nearly everyone knows who Stitch is. In fact, if you didn't know who Stitch was, you'd probably get weird looks from everyone around you. Stitch is the little alien everyone has come to know and love, the star of four movies and even a television series. However, his portrayal has changed drastically (and for the worse) over the course of his career.
Since the release of Lilo & Stitch in 2002, Stitch has undergone a dramatic transformation. In the original movie, Stitch was given a mischievous, trouble-making personality. He was reckless, acted on instinct, and was always ready for action. Now, unfortunately, with the TV series and the movies before and after it, Stitch is very different. His attitude has been changed severely. He now acts very childishly, doing many things he definitely would NOT have done normally. He acts on mimicry, following those around him, and since that usually means Lilo, he ends up being immature most of the time. Granted, this is Disney we're talking about, and therefore needs to be relatively kid-friendly most of the time, but his changes have severely cut his target audience from nearly anyone and narrowed it down to mostly young children.
Not only did he change in personality, but his very appearance in the television series was degraded significantly. It's easy to see a distinct difference in his appearance between the original movie and in Stitch! The Movie. Once again, there is a valid reason for it: the budget used for a movie is much too high to run two sequels and a TV series on. But there is still this sense that the animators could have at least tried harder to make it more accurate.
Many people don't know this, but Stitch was not thought up on the spot when someone at the Walt Disney Studios said "Hey, let's make a movie of an alien and a little Hawaiian girl." Stitch's origins can be tracked back many years, to when Chris Sanders, the creator and voice of Stitch, created him in 1985, while he was in high school. That shows that Stitch was over 25 years in the making. Here's a concept drawing of Stitch (c.o. Wikipedia) by Chris that was drawn back in 1985. As you can see, he'd already undergone a complete change in appearance before his debut, but that change was probably for the better.
Taking the information in the above paragraph into account, it can be assumed that Stitch was an extremely important character to Chris, having stayed in his mind for over fifteen years of his life. Chris also took the role of co-director for Lilo & Stitch, giving him almost complete control of the events of the movie. This allowed him to let the world see Stitch the way he saw him in his mind's eye, and the way he had designed him.
However, just as Disney has done in years past with nearly every other "first movie," sequels were created. And unfortunately, Chris didn't keep his job as director for the sequels. Luckily, he stayed to voice Stitch (because really, can anybody replace Chris?), but he no longer had control over the show as he did in the original. At that point, all power of Chris's dream was now at the mercy of a company with one goal in mind: to make as much money as possible.
Now, with the popularity of the TV series, most people see Stitch as he is there, and they simply accept it. Here at Stitch Puritans, we do NOT accept it. We strive to preserve Stitch the way he was meant to be, the way Chris Sanders designed him, and the way he should have stayed! And we ask that every person that sees this page may look deep inside themselves and find it in their hearts that they honestly find the facts of this website as true.
So if you watch the TV series, just think to yourself, "Was this really how Stitch was meant to be? Or is this just part of a monopoly held by the Walt Disney Company in an attempt to gain more money?" You may argue and say, "Oh come on, it's still Stitch, right? Besides, there were a few good episodes." Yes, it's still Stitch you're watching, and yes, it has its memorable moments, but is the series as a whole really how Chris wanted Stitch to be shown? Decide for yourself, but I think you know the right answer.