#ntmnt

[nickturts]

As usual when returning from a hiatus, today's new episode of NTMNT was a little bland in terms of extras. It was a solid episode in that it had a cool monster and explored a bit of April's non-human nature a little further, plus setting up Leonardo's recovery. I expect Leo's improvement to help the group make their decision to finally remember Master Splinter and head back to the city for another full scale kraang confrontation. Wouldn't it be cool if they arrived there only to find the kraang already locked in combat with the triceratons? Anyway, I'm looking forward to seeing their upcoming new wardrobe experiments, and hoping for a new set of variant action figures based on that look. The episode felt like it was almost trying to draw on the likes of Dragonslayer, especially with the dramatic orchestral style remix of the theme music during April and Leo's ride on the chimera. There was even a hint of Game of Thrones (or at least Beastmaster) with April seeing through the eyes of the creature. I mention possible references like that because the show usually borrows so liberally from classic sources like that, but this time there wasn't much that I noticed. There was a scene early on with Donnie testing April's psychic abilities on some make-shift neuro instruments, though, and it reminded me a bit of Ghostbusters. Oh! And the chimera itself struck me as conspicuously similar to "The Giant Claw". It's just so good to sit back and soak up a new episode with some frozen pizza. It didn't have to be a legendary episode. It did its job. I rate (season 3, episode 7) "Eyes of the Chimera"  as an easy 384 chicken-geniuses out of a possible 511 absent-ice-cream-kitties. Notable weirdness: April tried to eat Leo.

[nickturts]

Check out this Pixel Dan review of a new TMNT action figures carry case. The inside has graphics of the sewer den and dojo (the view of the tree). If you're anything like me, you'll want this.

[nickturts]

Once the second season of TMNT rolled around, I had decided I wouldn't write about it anymore. Not long after the first two episodes, I couldn't resist, so I started this Tumblr sub-blog and resumed what I had been doing on Google Plus. Here at least sometimes people actually read my attempts to say things about the show without spoiling it.

Below is a brief list of my favorite noteworthy events from the first two episodes of the second season... from my post about how I wasn't writing about TMNT anymore.

April's dad was mutated into Wingnut.

April got seriously mad about it!

It's still the turtles' own fault when mutations happen.

A squirrel climbed down that mentally ill homeless man's throat!

Then one climbed down Raphael's throat!

Michelangelo wore filthy underwear -- tighty-whities!

That's just in the first two episodes! This season has already established a new criterion standard by which all television should be measured in the future. If there's a TV show that doesn't have squirrels climbing down people's throats, that show's priorities need to be drastically reevaluated.

[nickturts]

When the season one finale of TMNT premiered on August 8, 2013, it ran with both parts 1 and 2 back-to-back which helped make it feel like a proper ceremony to mark the occasion.

Sometimes when the stakes are high, it's hard to pull off a real slam dunk. I think that was the case with the first season finale of Nickelodeon's Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: "Booyaka-Showdown". It pains me to sound negative, because it was satisfying in scale and intensity, but it just wasn't one of those inspired moments that I take for granted from this show. Keep in mind, though, I had a totally fantastic time watching this. It was an absolute blast and I haven't enjoyed TV so much on such a level of sheer joy in longer than I can even remember.

I wished for mousers, and there were mousers, though not in force.

omg! The tops of kraang heads split open and little jiggly things wriggle out! OMG!

[updated for clarity] When the kraang mothership was called "technodrome" it seriously gave me chills. The appearance of it was a bit dull, though.

Instead of really explaining anything about April, her mystery was carried right along -- again.

There was a moment when I was sure I knew what sacrifice Leo would be forced to make, but it turned out to be a much more trite and cliche' trope than I could have imagined.

Splinter actually had to exert himself against Shredder. That was cool.

Splinter also wore a tough looking hood on his robes, and he ran around on all fours like a rodent.

Kraang Prime turned out to reference [the original Krang. It was a nice surprise, but again the design fails to carry over some essential quality from its source of inspiration.]

I'm not sure how comfortable I am with Donatello's ascension to unrepentant lust, but ... it's ... a thing.

The action was extremely spectacular, but without the impact to really back it up, it fell just a bit flat for me. I'm not the kind of viewer who can thrive on empty action.

The most meaningful thing that happened was when April called out Splinter for his lack of involvement which has been a season-long point of interest.

The highlight for me might have been when the Shellraiser crashed the Kraang party and delivered a Metalhead payload, followed by the reveal of what actually happened.

Now since just about everyone in New York not only witnessed a full-scale kraang invasion, but were personally abducted, I wonder what it will mean when it comes to the turtles' public exposure. Is everything out in the open now?

[nickturts]

TMNT episode 113: I, Monster fell flat by my count. The grisly details are below, copied from my original Google Plus post on January 25, 2013.

Maybe I built it up too much for myself, but tonight's first new episode of Nickelodeon's Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles since the mid-season hiatus just didn't quite seem to ooze the technical mastery I was looking for. Never the less, it was fully entertaining and the plot was enthralling. The ultimate mega spoiler that you can't escape right now (WARNING) is that the Rat King is actually a certain kind of mutant, and his former human identity is Dr Falco -- the psycho psychic mad scientist from the "Monkey Brains" episode. There are things about this situation that I'm not crazy about. For starters, call me crazy but more than one mad scientist (outside of MST3K) seems a little crowded to me. I'm talking about Baxter Stockman, of course. Then again, he's more of a deranged inventor than a real scientist in this series. There is the potential for a very cool redeeming scenario to occur here. Think about it: Dr Falco / the Rat King controls a massive swarm of rats to do his bidding. Baxter Stockman, on the other hand, commands a similarly massive collective of robotic rat traps. See what I mean? There's a dichotomy at work here. Is it a coincidence, or a set-up? If we see these two clash in a future epic confrontation, any discomfort I currently suffer will be more than appeased. Anyway, watching the turtles confront their master was cool, but I would have been more satisfied if there had been a twist to this practically cliche' arrangement. In the end, Splinter overcame his mind-control by just somehow suddenly coming to his senses -- no doubt thanks to the highly refined mental focus of a ninja master. It felt like a cheap cop-out to me, and I was expecting the turtles to realize they just couldn't defeat Splinter and instead assault Rat King. Why wasn't that what happened, anyway? It seems so obvious that it still wouldn't have been clever enough to live up to this show's usual standard. Yeah, my officially official final word on this one is that it's the #3 weakest episode behind "Turtle Temper" and then "Baxter Stockman".

There must be an official TV Trope to cover this.

[nickturts]

If you haven't already seen this, you're seriously missing out. Be warned, it is THICK with spoilers about new characters and newly re-imagined classic characters. I can say I loved everything I saw, and I'm eager for season 3, but I'm also glad we still have the season 2 finale to look forward to!

List-free link:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KZfSic7Kuho