The other one is much later in the show's run, in "Dirk Savage: Mutant Hunter", when we learn that Shredder continued to experiment on innocent people, over a period of years, to the point where there were so many mutants running around town that a politician could run on an anti-mutant campaign platform.
Do you remember exact dialogue on that? I watched that episode recently and the only thing I remember was that Tokka & Rahzar were stated to be the result of the Shredder experimenting on Zoo Animals, which I assume to be a reference to the Groundchuck and Dirtbag episodes.
As for the other mutants like the Giraffe lady and mutant bird, I assumed they weren't Shredder experiments but just people or animals that got hit by carelessly placed mutagen during the show's shenanigans rather than deliberate experiments.
Also I feel Baxter Stockman's harsh treatment from Shredder and Krang may have been because he was something of an outsider; being coerced into working for them and once trying to betray the Shredder. Rocksteady and Bebop's gangs were thugs that had been working for them to begin with, so I feel they'd get better treatment.
Upon reflection (and going back and watching the opening of the Dirk Savage ep again) I think you're right: the intent seems to be that the events in the zoo during the Turtleoids special have led to the creation of subsequent mutants over a period of a few years. I'm many months removed from watching the show at this point, so I was basing that on what I wrote at the time and my already potentially fuzzy recollections.
Regarding Shredder and the gang (and by extension, Krang/Baxter) I think where you stand on Shredder's willingness to undo their mutations probably depends on how evil you interpret him to be...
This Shredder is presented as a credible ninja master and criminal mastermind, and is the one who mutated the gang members...
This Shredder is considerably less capable, to put it mildly, and if we're being honest more in-line with how he's presented for the bulk of the series. Outside of his feud with Splinter and the Turtles, his desire for world domination seems to be entirely rooted in his own vanity and self-aggrandizement.
His villainy/competence isn't a binary thing IMO, I think it can be charted on a spectrum depending on the era of the show and who's writing, but as a trend it keeps nudging into ineffectual goofball gradually up to the beginning of season eight, when it dramatically swings back in the opposite direction.
On that basis, I think the likelihood of Shredder undoing the mutations of the gang and letting them go depends on which point in the show it actually happens. If we're assuming it's in the window between S1 and S2 then maybe not, but after the S2 opener the way he's presented changes considerably and he seems to be borderline subservient to Krang rather than the two of them being in a fifty-fifty partnership. At that point I could see him just releasing the gang on the basis that he has enough to deal with, and doesn't need them hanging around.
In regards to Krang (and his attempted vaporizing of Baxter), I've long been of the opinion that as an alien warlord he likely places little value on human life, but I kind of like the idea that the presence of Shredder, Rocksteady & Bebop in the Technodrome softens him a bit and prevents him from being a total monster, in part because their incompetence invariably scuppers all of his plans and stops him doing any significant harm in the end. It's notable that he ordered Baxter's execution while Shredder, Rocksteady and Bebop were all on Earth, and there was no-one around to reason with him; I don't know if I'd go so far as to say they serve as his conscience, but, y'know... something like that!
Hi there!! I’m such a big fan of your reviews, you did a great job with them!! 😄
My biggest questions would be;
Who’s your favorite turtle? And if you had to choose just five episodes from the series, which ones would be your all time favorites? 😁
Thank you!! Have a great day!!
Thank you so much for the kind words! For the record, I'm Team Donnie, always a big fan of the inventor/scientist archetype. (Also my favourite colour is purple, so he gets an extra point right there.)
I feel like when it comes to picking the top five episodes the natural inclination is just to pick the first five, and with good reason; nothing that came after S1 had as much time, care or money afforded to it. So just to make things interesting, I'm going to set everything from season one aside and pick five more episodes that I think also deserve to be celebrated.
5. THE DIMENSION X STORY
The Turtles having to fight their way into the Technodrome (and back out again) somehow never fully lost its allure. This one and "Shredder's Mom" both rank highly in my estimation, and while this is the less visually impressive of the two I think it wins out for how willing it is to mix things up, sending the Channel 6 regulars to Dimension X while two of the Turtles remain behind. Wild, far flung adventures that tap into the more sci-fi aspects of TMNT, and the cherry on top is that this is easily Vernon's best episode - it turns out he's more interesting as April's rival when he's doing well and she has to work to regain the upper hand.
4. THE NINJA SWORD OF NOWHERE
This one gets few points for innovation - Shredder and his crew jostling with the Turtles for control of some ancient magical artifact or high-tech invention is standard stuff for season three, and in this case, it's a dimension-hopping ninja sword. But rarely, if ever, has it been done this well. Splinter and Shredder battling in dimensional limbo is great, and the animation team handling this one really went above and beyond. Ninja Sword of Nowhere almost feels like it should have been held up as a textbook example of what a Turtles episode circa 1989/90 should be, a reference point that could be shown to writers or animators for what the show should be trying to acheive.
3. SPLINTER VANISHES
The intended 100th episode, even if it didn't turn out that way, and one that I remember feeling like a big deal while watching it as a kid that still held up upon revisiting it as an adult. I always know it's a really good ep when writing the entry for it takes hours as I agonise over it, trying to make sure I articulate everything I want to get across to the best of my ability, and I remember dwelling on this one for a looong time, thinking about how the story compels the Turtles - and us - to consider what happens when the adventures end, when it's time to grow up and move on. Probably the most emotionally resonant episode of TMNT '87, and even though Splinter does not come across well by the end of it, the journeys we go on with each of the Turtles as they explore their post-hero lives easily outweigh that. The fact that "Splinter Vanishes" accomplishes all of this and is a non-Shredder episode - when let's face it, they're more often than not filler shows - makes it all the more remarkable.
2. SHREDDER TRIUMPHANT!
I have mixed feelings about the show continuing into the Red Sky era because this episode, the season seven finale, felt like it had brought TMNT '87 to its natural end point. I love how it plays upon the sense that the Turtles (and the viewers) have that they've seen and done this all a million times before, and it quickly becomes apparent that this time things are different, that finally Shredder and Krang are competent and have learned from all their previous losses, setting the stage for one final showdown. All the main characters - the Turtles, Splinter, the Technodrome regulars and the Channel 6 crew - get their chance to shine and show how they've grown over the course of the show's run. A milestone episode for sure.
1. TURTLES ON TRIAL
I think for me this is still The One, the single episode outside of the first season that I'd consider peak TMNT. It's also the first episode I remember seeing on TV, which I think set me up to have entirely unrealistic expectations about how good Turtles would be; fortunately the rest of the run was still a good time even if we never quite got here again.
I like to see my heroes really have to go through the wringer, to have everything thrown at them and somehow just about make it out victorious, and so the environment we see the Turtles forced to contend with here, a city full of people who have been conditioned to be actively hostile towards them, while they're also dealing with the usual Shredder/Krang stuff, makes for compelling television. Yes, Clayton Kellerman and "On Trial" are a perfect encapsuation of the media landscape at the time - which still feels relevant today - but on top of that this is a gorgeous episode with some terrific battles between the Turtles and Shredder's bunch. It's simply the bee's knees. (Or should that be the turtle's knees?)
Whilst I actually like the Red Sky seasons (though feel they aren't perfect), do you think its interesting that Titanus and Carter don't appear to be animal mutants? I wonder if that's due to a change in the show's tone or unintentional?
PS: Let me know if sending too many asks is overwhelming and I'll slow down.
My initial impulse is to assume that would have stemmed from trying to reshape the show to more closely resemble X-Men, but honestly I think by that point they had long since lost any grasp on what the in-universe rules were supposed to be around mutation, and any fantastical comic book hero and villain types that seemed like they might work were considered fair game. (There were probably always weird nerdy kids like me watching who were continually frustrated every time the show contradicted its own rules, but I imagine our numbers had dwindled considerably by 1994.)
Regarding asks: I might not get around to answering them all immediately, but I'll do my best! I'll have to try and be a little more succinct and curb my tendency to write essays or I'll never get through these, LOL.
ABOVE: The Turtles make a promotional appearance in the UK, circa 1990. These puffy versions of the green teens showed up on TV and in the press often during Turtlemania, and resemble the characters as they were depicted on licensed Hero Turtles items during that era.
I’m old enough at this point to feel comfortable in saying that life is full of periods of awkward re-adjustment, where the world moves around you and it can take a while to find your bearings. You go to school for years and it feels like it’ll never end, then one day you’re just... done. A day job that perhaps you feel like you’ll be doing until you reach old age and keel over abruptly ends for whatever reason, and suddenly your routine is gone, leaving you wondering what to do with yourself.
Years ago, on a whim, I made the decision to re-watch the 1987 Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles cartoon from the beginning and live-tweet about it over on the birdsite. Things were stop-start in the beginning, but at some point during the pandemic the project began gathering momentum. The threads got longer, my need to point out every weird little thing that happens in any given Turtles episode outgrowing the format of a Twitter thread. And so, almost exactly two years ago, Turtlethon made the jump to Tumblr, and in short order the format for each entry began to take shape: a beat-for-beat walk through a single episode of TMNT, complete with screengrabs and the occasional video clip, and an analysis of why that particular adventure does (or doesn’t) land, typically 2,000 words in length, longer still if it’s really good – or exceptionally bad.
In time, we settled into a routine: two new entries would appear every week, on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Sticking with that turned out to be an undertaking that I vastly underestimated the scope of early on, and there were times where the obligation to write about, screencap, edit and post about Turtles became exhausting, but I didn’t want this to be a project I abandoned halfway through. It was of the utmost importance to me to persevere, to get to the end no matter what.
Now that day has been and gone. We watched Splinter hurriedly declare the Turtles to be his equals, the credits rolled, and honestly it was all underwhelming. Upon further reflection, there’s no doubt there was more story to be told – there's no way Mung angrily telling Dregg he’d gone mad was the intended payoff to him getting pushed around all season – and presumably that’s something we would’ve seen followed up on had the show returned in 1997. But that’s not the world we live in, and so instead, we have to assess Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles as it is: the 192 (or 193) adventures that were broadcast, which we can now observe as one overarching body of work. And I guess now all that’s left to ask is... what even was TMNT ‘87? Beyond the obvious and most cynical analysis – that it was initially an effort to promote a line of action figures, before becoming the heart of the Turtles business empire in its own right – what, if anything, was the series about? What was it trying to communicate to those of us who grew up watching it?
Peel away that initial "toy cartoon" layer of interpretation, and the next observation is perhaps only slightly less world-weary: it’s about communicating the idea that the Turtles are cool, to create adventures that will be compelling to kids, ensure they keep coming back and hopefully convince them to explore the other facets of the franchise too. Early on, the show was successful in these respects commercially, but from a creative standpoint it took a while to find its feet. Through the first three years the Turtles were first and foremost a unit, rarely getting to venture beyond their respective descriptions in the theme song. Leonardo leads, Donatello does machines, Raphael is... not exactly rude but certainly quippy, and Michaelangelo is indeed a party dude, whose pizza fixation sometimes appears to reach “this guy genuinely has a problem” territory. (It’s remarkable how integral pizza is to the first seven seasons of the show, only for it to be abandoned completely in the Red Sky era: I’m sure there must have been a strict “NO PIZZA” edict handed down from S8 onward that explains why the series ended on an ill-fitting popcorn gag instead.) One of the common themes explored in the Turtlethon entries for the golden era episodes is that Shredder, Krang, Rocksteady & Bebop make the show work comedically in the early goings, in part because they’re allowed to be flawed and vulnerable: meanwhile the Turtles are constrained by that need to be super cool dudes, the world’s most fearsome fighting team.
With the success of the show assured around season four, we finally begin to see a willingness to explore who the Turtles are beyond those base traits conveyed in the theme song. I’d argue that in this incarnation of the series, Leonardo is the member of the group whose personality adheres closest to what the team were when originally conceived for the Mirage comic: he’s a ninja first and foremost, even memorably declaring his intent to finish off Shredder in the first season. Season three’s “Take Me to Your Leader” explores how the burden of leadership weighs upon him but it’s the following year where he’s fully rounded out, the pros and cons of his overbearing strictness explored in “Leonardo Lightens Up”, while his competitive nature turns compulsive in “Leonardo Versus Tempestra”. More than anything, his role is to serve as an anchor, ensuring TMNT stays somewhere in the neighbourhood of being an action-adventure cartoon and doesn’t float off into complete tomfoolery.
Raphael is the inverse of Leonardo, encompassing everything that makes the Fred Wolf TMNT what it is – for better or worse. He’s the goofball, the one typically given the task of breaking the fourth wall, and if anything is actively pushing against what Leo is here to achieve. With his incessant zingers, Raph is the embodiment of everything that purists who resent the show for not being a faithful recreation of the Mirage comic dislike about it, a situation exacerbated by the fact that the 1987 cartoon version of the character is such an outlier, eschewing the angry, brooding depiction of him seen almost everywhere else. This idea that there’s something inauthentic about Fred Wolf Raph is so pervasive that modern media and merchandise based around the MWS show often skews towards making him “the angry one” instead of the wise guy. It’s an unfortunate bit of revisionist history that loses sight of the fact that 1987 Raph is wildly popular, perhaps now more than ever. The fans who like him really like his witty retorts, outings such as his memorable romance with Mona Lisa, and the entertaining performances from Rob Paulsen that brought him to life. His value is in keeping things light, and in doing so he differentiates TMNT from the earnest action cartoons that preceded it.
Okay, but if Raph is the fun one, where does that leave Michaelangelo? I’d argue that his depiction as the team’s “party dude” is merely window-dressing, a means to convey what makes him marketable but which doesn’t really get at what makes him tick, in part because as alluded to above, in the early days of the show none of this stuff had been thought out. Anyone watching seasons one, two and much of season three would be forgiven for seeing him as one-dimensional, the cowabunga guy. Pizza, pizza, pizza. Dude, dude, dude. These aspects of him can be... grating, to be certain, when watching the series as an adult. Eventually we start to occasionally see beyond this. There’s a sense that Mikey is the youngest member of the team, even if there’s nothing in the show itself directly confirming this: by extension he’s the most innocent, sensitive, and personable member of the group, the one who’d be most likely to befriend you and invite you into the Lair if you were to encounter him, rather than viewing you as a threat. Michaelangelo is both the most “human” Turtle and the one who displays the greatest longing to live as a human, something seen in episodes such as season three’s “The Gang’s All Here” and the following year’s “Poor Little Rich Turtle”. When it comes down to it, Mikey’s character is easy-going but more importantly, he’s kind. There’s an irony in him being the one whose weapons had to be excised from the show entirely, though if anything I think that only gave him a little renegade appeal over and above even the other Turtles.
Donatello has always been my favourite Turtle, and not just for aesthetic reasons as “the purple one”: coming in from Ghostbusters as many of us did back in the day, I think it’s natural that if you were on Team Egon, you were likely to be Team Donnie, too. He's the most creative Turtle and arguably the most introspective, two qualities that also make me gravitate towards him. Putting my biases aside, he’s by far the most necessary member of the team for the series to work: his intelligence and ingenuity seem to almost always play into the climax of any episode as the Turtles scramble to stop whatever enormous threat is facing the city, and without him it’s inarguable that Leo, Mikey and Raph would have been majorly screwed countless times over the course of the show’s run. Around the mid-point of the series his accomplishments seem to go to his head, and his abilities make him vastly overpowered relative to the other Turtles. Despite this, Donnie remains the big purple cog that keeps TMNT ticking.
The show upholds its four main characters above everything, even in situations where this becomes detrimental, and this goes hand in hand with a focus on immediacy: what anyone else is doing isn’t a concern unless it will impact the Turtles somehow, and nothing that’s happened to anyone in the past matters unless if affects the team in the present moment. There’s an unspoken anxiety at work in TMNT that runs throughout the series, apparent even at its height: a fear that if the Turtles aren’t front and centre, chasing the macguffin of the day, then young viewers will grow bored and switch off.
These considerations are apparent in the series from the outset, affecting even the origin of the Turtles themselves, who in this continuity go from pet turtles to their established forms in the space of seconds: they’re not allowed to grow into their teenage selves over the course of years for the same reason that only the most barebones information is conveyed to us about the Hamato Yoshi / Oroku Saki feud that led to their creation. This show isn’t about getting caught up in the details, it’s about the Turtles existing in the present moment.
Yoshi and Saki’s ongoing rivalry is one of the most fascinating aspects of the entire series, and yet one barely explored because the show only cares about the elements of it directly relevant to the Turtles. At some unspecified point in the past Saki framed Yoshi and took control of the Foot Clan because... he was just naturally power-hungry and evil, I guess (later we learned that his mother was also villainous, so there might be something to that). There’s a huge chunk of the timeline which takes place after this of which we know little, covering Yoshi presumably stowing away on a boat and beginning a new life as a penniless refugee living in the sewers of New York. By all rights the story should end here, with Saki having vanquished his enemy and now ruling over his own turf as the head of a criminal organisation in Japan, but his inability to let go keeps things rolling: at some point he follows Yoshi to America, sets up an elaborate network to spy on him, and in a botched attempt to kill his enemy inadvertently mutates the four heroes who will ultimately be his undoing: Leonardo, Michaelangelo, Donatello and Raphael.
Oh, and along the way Saki happened to run into a disembodied alien warlord brain from Dimension X who had himself been on Earth for an unspecified amount of time, the two bad guys forming an alliance to achieve world domination. None of these events unfold on-screen as the Turtles weren’t involved: instead, Shredder and Krang arrive fully formed, how they met and the circumstances that led to them working together are deemed unimportant. Similarly, Splinter is a wise old man whose exact age is unclear, capable of applying mystical ninja abilities that vary depending on what the plot of the day requires.
Given how scant the details of Splinter and Shredder’s feud were, it should perhaps come as no surprise that in the end, it was never resolved in any satisfactory fashion. By the end of the series Shredder and Krang were banished to another dimension by the Turtles for the umpteenth time, but the power struggle between Splinter and Shreds over the leadership of the Foot Clan that kicked all of this off doesn’t receive any closure; to make matters worse the final three appearances of Shredder and Krang tease the idea of them becoming... well maybe not good guys, but at the very least neutral figures having been overshadowed in the evil stakes by Dregg. I think by season ten, the viewers would have been ready for that: to have Shredder and Krang perform a heroic act to stop Dregg that definitively concludes their run on the show as villains, then let them ride off into the sunset. If we’re to assume there were plans for a twelfth season, there’s no reason that Karai or another villain new to the series couldn’t take their place.
I’m going to skip over writing about Bebop and Rocksteady here as this post is long enough as it is, and I covered their contribution to the series in the entry for “Turtle Trek”. The only thing I would add is that if anyone was truly deserving of that elusive redemption arc and/or a happy ending, it was them: this is one of the areas where the Archie TMNT comic got it right, the idea of them living peacefully on the animal-friendly Eden Worlds providing an opportunity to for the duo to move on.
April is perhaps the most important character in the show other than the Turtles: there are plenty of episodes in the first seven years of TMNT that don’t feature Splinter, Shredder or Krang but none prior to “The Legend of Koji” that don’t incorporate her into the adventure in some capacity. She's interesting to view through a feminist lens: for a character who first appeared on TV in 1987 in a cartoon primarily marketed towards boys, not only is she integral to the proceedings but from the outset she’s her own person, a (somewhat) established career woman who just happens to cross paths with the Turtles and strike up a friendship with them. Because of that need to keep the focus on the green teens we never get to see her grow much beyond this – she likes the Turtles, she likes getting to cover anything that will make for a Great Story™, but that’s as far as it goes. There are a few rare occasions where the show will toy with having a male guest character serve as a potential love interest for her, but it’s not central to what she’s about. First and foremost, April cares about journalism and about sticking up for her friends, the Turtles, and for a cartoon from 35 years ago it’s kind of refreshing that’s she’s allowed to maintain that focus.
Irma’s introduction to the series feels as if it was intended to play up April’s qualities by bringing in someone who in many ways is her opposite: there’s little indicator that Irma cares about her job or is any good at it in the early goings, and while April only makes occasional references to finding a partner throughout the series, Irma is obsessed. Her desire to find a man to sweep her off her feet in some paperback romance novel scenario is a constant theme throughout the first four years of the show, and I get the sense that part of the intended gag is that all of this would come easily to April if she wanted it, but for Irma – frequently inferred by the show to be frumpy or plain – such things remain perpetually out of reach.
When it comes to Turtles discourse there sometimes seems to be borderline hostility towards Irma, perhaps in part because she’s driven by a desire for those old traditions, but I think largely based on people focusing on her appearances in those first three seasons (the only ones people tend to pay attention to, especially outside of the fandom) and viewing her on a surface level: April, so the thinking goes, is glamorous and exciting, Irma is merely her gawky sidekick. I’ve consistently gone to bat for her throughout Turtlethon’s run precisely because The Struggle is Real: Irma exists, living and growing as a flawed human being alongside the successful, infallible April and her friends, the ever-valiant Turtles. She messes up, she fails, she frequently ends up being on the receiving end of pure bad luck but through it all she keeps going, persevering in the background while the focus remains on April and the Turtles. As the show continues, we start to see her maturation, both in terms of taking on different roles within Channel 6 and the downplaying of her man-hungry antics. By the end of season seven there’s a sense that Irma has grown into a fully capable person and shed her insecurities, culminating in her brief reinvention as an action heroine and her defeat of Krang(!) in “Shredder Triumphant!”
There’s an argument to be made that season seven should have been the end point of the series, or at least that years eight through ten ought to be viewed as merely a possible continuation, a look into how things could have continued rather than something set in stone. The truth is that aside from maybe Shredder, the core cast is served poorly by the Red Sky era: the Turtles come across as miserable throughout, April seems adrift after moving on from Channel 6, ultimately losing prominence following Carter’s introduction to the show, Bebop and Rocksteady are robbed of any semblance of personality and Irma only makes two appearances in season eight before being unceremoniously dropped entirely. I’ll freely admit that by the end of season nine, watching each episode for Turtlethon was becoming a deflating experience: by that point the spark was gone from the show, and seeing what it had become just felt sad. Happily, things improved a bit in S10, but I can’t shake the feeling that Shredder, Krang and The Boys riding off in the pick-up truck at the conclusion of season seven would have been the right time for the Turtles to bow out.
TMNT ‘87 was looked down upon from the outset by readers of the Mirage comic who saw it as sacrilege, a mockery of everything the source material was about, and once newer animated iterations came along that adhered more closely to Eastman & Laird’s vision the perception of the MWS version took an even greater hit. Ironically there are a bunch of disgruntled guys around my age – Xennials and the youngest Gen Xers – who will now swear blind that the ‘87 Turtles are the one true faith, and that any deviation from the way the team were depicted then is a disgrace. Click on any TMNT post on Instagram, especially the ones pertaining to Mutant Mayhem, and you’ll find these dudes in the comments pissing and moaning about how much better things were in their day, when the Turtles were real tough guys and manly men, which is an oddly rose-tinted perspective of a show where a significant portion of fights were won with a cream pie or pizza to the face. That’s the thing: at its heart, Turtles is a fun adventure show, one that over its run draws heavily upon martial arts tropes, sci-fi macguffin chases, aliens, monsters, dimension hopping and occasionally time travel: these concepts are all part of the DNA of the superhero comic book, and in that respect, the show is absolutely in the spirit of the Mirage comics which were themselves conceived as both a parody and a loving tribute to that artform.
That’s it. That’s what the point of the original Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles show is: it’s a fun adventure cartoon that might not aesthetically resemble the Mirage comics, but it has an innate understanding of how to adapt the underlying concepts of those stories into a series that connects with its target audience.
One of my intended aims for Turtlethon, in pulling apart and analysing every episode of TMNT, has been to dispel two commonly held stances about the show that I see online all the time:
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (1987) was never good.
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (1987) was only good for the first five episodes, everything after that was terrible.
People who take the first stance are harder to reach. Some of them are from that group of Mirage readers who were around back in the day and still hold a grudge, but the majority of those who hold this opinion have a wider disdain for eighties cartoons in general. They dismiss the contributions of everyone who worked on these series entirely because they were all “thinly veiled toy commercials”: to them TMNT and every other show from that era are nothing but sound and fury, signifying nothing. I hope in my analysis I’ve shown how far this is from the truth: even the clunkiest episodes of Turtles occasionally have moments where the animators go above and beyond to create impressive sequences, and when the show was at the height of its popularity during seasons three and four these teams created a lot of television on a modest budget within a short timeframe. On the writing side, over the course of the series Turtles incorporates themes into its stories of environmentalism (including climate change and conservation), how sensationalist media and wealthy individuals in positions of power can cultivate hate movements against marginalised groups, and gentrification, to name just a couple of topics off the top of my head; an entire side season was also dedicated to having the Turtles travel around Europe to be exposed to its arts, history and culture. These efforts are a drop in the ocean compared to what the Archie Comics version of TMNT was doing during this period but are respectable, nonetheless.
The second position – that the show goes off the rails after “Shredder & Splintered” - is something you’ll hear from viewers who have perhaps purchased the first few seasons or the entire series on DVD and have started watching it, but they’re not engaged with the source material. If you’re only half-watching the show, if it’s background noise while you perform other tasks, then the visual drop-off from “Return of the Shredder” onward combined with the drudgery of the Eye of Sarnath arc might make you wonder if there’s any point in venturing further. Undoubtedly there are stretches of the series that tested even my patience: the ungainly syndicated adventures in season four, the bizarre, sometimes directionless Vacation in Europe arc, and pretty much all of season nine. There’s still great stuff in there, however: the second half of season two is far stronger than the first, season three is full of classics such as “Turtles on Trial”, “The Ninja Sword of Nowhere” and the concluding Big Trilogy, and seasons four through six have phemomenal adventures and character spotlight episode scattered throughout. Season seven – the proper season seven, not the vacation episodes – might be the strongest stretch of adventures in the entire series as TMNT regains its focus and attempts to mature in step with its original audience. There’s so much good stuff in Turtles if you stick with it, and I can’t see how anyone could watch the series in its entirety and come away thinking only season one has value unless your criteria for what makes a good cartoon comes down purely to looking cool and some vague aura of edginess.
ABOVE: A June 1990 TV Guide cover in which Ariel from The Little Mermaid mingles with Bart Simpson, Donnie, Leo and Raph. Yes, Bart is missing his ear, but also WHY DO THE TURTLES HAVE THREE TOES WHAT THE HELL
I hope that if you’ve never actually sat down and watched the 1987 version of TMNT from beginning to end that maybe the breakdowns of each adventure I’ve cobbled together for this blog will inspire you to do so, and that if you’ve seen the show before they’ll allow you to rewatch it with additional insight. More than anything, the goal of Turtlethon has been to point out why Turtles works, while also acknowledging the times when it doesn’t. It’s lost to history now, but there was a vanishingly brief window of time – pretty much just the entire calendar year of 1990 – where the ascendancy of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles in pop culture occurred in parallel to the rise of The Simpsons. The two series were linked by their indie comics origins and their anti-establishment appeal, however Simpsons was able to reinvent itself after the hype around Bart died down as one of the greatest TV series of all time by continuing to up its game and making Homer the central figure of the show. TMNT was never in a position to make that leap, hampered as it was by budgetary restraints, parental backlash and being more overtly targeted towards children, but as a body of work it still has value, and its longevity speaks to how strongly it resonated with viewers around the world. It is, in a word, tubuloso.
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When Turtlethon was in its early stages, I gave some consideration to what series I might like to deep-dive afterwards. I reference Transformers all the time on this blog and it’s without a doubt my First Fandom, so there’s a natural inclination for me to want to go back and examine the 98 episodes of that show. Between that and TMNT, Ghostbusters was my second major fixation, and there’s a lot of The Real Ghostbusters to explore too.
The natural extension of our journey is to move on to Ninja Turtles: The Next Mutation, but I honestly doubt it would be fun for me to write or for you to read. I dunno, maybe you want to see me rip it to shreds, but I'm unsure how much financial compensation I’d need to make up for the psychic damage that would inevitably be incurred. (The tip jar is there, if you’re so inclined; let’s just say that Yale could use an international airport.) Moving on to the 2003 version of TMNT would be much more fun, but also a tremendous undertaking that - for now - I don't want to approach. After years of writing about the Turtles, I’m exhausted. I’m also acutely aware that while Turtlethon has been beneficial for me in many ways as a writer – it's allowed me to refine my skills, to learn how to create and maintain a regular schedule, and made me a more effective editor, even if you’d never know it from the length of my posts – the time I’ve devoted to writing about the Turtles would have been better spent working on my own comic series, Corinne Morgan, Corbie, which has been on hiatus throughout the life of this blog.
[SIDE NOTE: If you want to see me put my money where my mouth is, and if I’ve learned anything through analysing Turtles, read Corbie when the new edition of issue #1 comes out in a few weeks. Its influences are more rooted in the Archie version of TMNT than the MWS series, but if you like cute, light-hearted and socially conscious superhero adventures then I think you’ll soon become a dedicated flocker.]
I’ve undoubtedly been teetering on the edge of burnout lately, and my workload has been further encumbered by the technical changes implemented by Tumblr that negatively affected the last two seasons’ worth of Turtlethon entries. Behind the scenes, I’ve gradually been making moves to port the blog in its entirety to a stand-alone website where all 193 entries can be enjoyed in the original format. The thinking is that this will allow me to also write about anything else that takes my interest, post my art and generally keep you up to date on the status of all my assorted ongoing projects. With that in mind, I’d like to introduce you to Portertronic, which is now live. The Turtlethon entries for the first two seasons of TMNT have been posted there already, with the rest of the series to follow in the weeks and months ahead.
This isn’t the end, for Turtlethon or for this account: you’ll still see new TMNT posts from me here, as I have a laundry list of one-off bits and pieces related to the series I still want to explore. The plan is that new content moving forward will be made available first to Patreon and Ko-Fi supporters, then appear on Portertronic, and eventually get posted here too. To kick things off, there’s a pair of upcoming Turtles-related CDs I’ll be looking at as part of a crossover event to introduce Excess Volume, a sub-blog that will cover pop music of the 1980s and early 1990s. I’m not going away, just getting off the treadmill I’ve been on for the last couple of years, and trying to refocus on writing shorter bursts of material while I return to working primarily on Corbie.
Turtlethon has always had a modest following – there are only so many people in the world who are interested in reading long-form analysis of a decades-old cartoon – but going into it I had zero expectations that anyone would connect with it at all. I’ve never lost sight of the fact that in real life, if a classroom’s worth of people were willing to listen to me talk at length about the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles twice a week that would be incredibly edifying, and over time the readership grew to roughly double that. It probably should have been a YouTube channel from the beginning, but the thought of continually being struck down by DMCAs from Lionsgate ensured that was a non-starter, and perhaps that would have defeated the purpose. I like to draw, and I like to write – obviously! That you’ve indulged me in doing the latter and gushing about the Turtles for the last few years means a lot, and I hope you’ll join me – either through Corbie, over on Portertronic or here on Turtlethon – for the adventures still to come.
Season 7, Episode 22
First US Airdate: November 27, 1993
Baxter Stockman plots to turn the city’s residents into mutant insects.
The seventh season of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles heads into its final stretch with “Revenge of the Fly”. This episode aired back-to-back with "Escape from the Planet of the Turtleoids" and is credited to series regular David Wise.
We open with the Turtles watching a report by Vernon, who interviews an un-named scientist at a research lab. The professor reveals that he has been able to distil the genetic characteristics of various insects down to their essences, which are kept in a series of test tubes; with these liquids it should theoretically be possible to create a variety of new bugs for specific purposes. Vernon quizzes the professor as to what would happen if the formulas were to fall into the wrong hands, and manages to give away the specific location of the lab – right down to the room number – while the broadcast is going out on live TV. Knowing how this kind of thing always plays out, the Turtles decide to monitor the facility, anticipating that Shredder and Krang will eventually show up.
***
FLY PAPERS: A BAXTER STOCKMAN INTERLUDE
With the exception of “Night of the Rogues”, I don’t know if there’s ever been an episode of TMNT that ties back to as many prior adventures as this one, so it might be a good idea for us to do a quick recap of relevant past events that will play into this story. Waaaaay back in season one, “A Thing About Rats” introduced Baxter Stockman as a down-on-his-luck scientist who had the misfortune to cross paths with Shredder, aiding in the creation of an army of his own “Mouser” pest extermination robots which were turned against the Turtles, Splinter and April. After this plan was foiled, Baxter wound up being captured by the authorities and – presumably because of his insistence that his undoing was due to the existence of the then-unknown Ninja Turtles – he was confined to an insane asylum. In the aftermath of these events, Shredder would go on to attempt to revert the Turtles back to their original pet forms using a retromutagen ray gun, only for Splinter to intervene and destroy it.
Season two’s opener, “Return of the Shredder”, saw Shreds break Baxter out of the asylum, and for the first half of the season Stockman would serve as the masked villain’s right-hand man. After a series of embarrassing defeats at the hands of the Turtles, “Enter: The Fly” had Shredder request that Bebop and Rocksteady, then residing in the Technodrome in Dimension X, be sent to Earth. To maintain the dimensional balance Shredder would hurl Baxter through the portal. Krang had no use for Baxter and ordered that he be placed in a vaporising chamber, but the presence of a fly during the procedure led to the scientist instead being transformed into a half-man, half-fly, who would return to Earth and swear revenge on both Shredder and the Turtles. At the conclusion of this episode, Baxter found himself suspended in a temporal limbo, permanently out-of-step with the rest of the world and only able to watch events unfold around him as a ghost-like figure.
Season three’s “Return of the Fly” brought Baxter back fully into our dimension, leading to him being manipulated again by Shredder. Later that year, “Bye Bye, Fly” would see the mutant discover an underground temple that was ultimately revealed to be an alien spaceship. Further encounters with the Turtles and Shredder followed in this adventure, during which Baxter would arm himself with a mutating ray stored aboard the ship that could turn his enemies into a variety of different animals. Later, Baxter would escape in the ship only for it to fall apart, leaving him trapped between dimensions, about to be eaten by a giant spider.
Baxter would survive – somehow! - and in season four’s “Son of Return of the Fly II” used a dimensional rift to return to Earth. Now accompanied by his friend, the alien computer’s spaceship (known as “Z”), the increasingly addle-brained fly created chaos at Channel 6 and was briefly able to capture the Turtles. A scuffle at the station headquarters between Shredder and Baxter would culminate in the destruction of Z’s computer form, leaving him a mere circuit board that wound up trapped with Baxter between Earth and Dimension X.
Things would take an unexpected and disappointing turn in season five’s “Landlord of the Flies”. Somehow Baxter was back on Earth, with no explanation given; “Z” was also nowhere to be found. Following an adventure in which Stockman controlled an army of flies that brought to city to its knees, he was sent by Donatello back into dimensional limbo, the last time he had been seen up to this point. It’s arguably easier to consider “Landord” non-canon, given that it doesn’t line up with any of the prior Baxter appearances or what will happen in today’s adventure. (It was also a cruddy episode all-round, and thus easily discarded in the great scheme of things.)
Now that we’re up to speed, let’s return to today’s adventure, already in progress: several of the events detailed above will play into those that are about to unfold, albeit often in ways that raise more questions than answers.
***
For whatever reason, Shredder has decided that now is the time to repair the retromutagen ray from season one. To that end, he has Bebop and Rocksteady recover a Nutronium crystal, the final component he needs to make it operational again. All of this would be fine, but... the ray as it appears here looks nothing like it did when we last saw it. Instead, it’s drawn to look identical to Baxter’s mutating ray from “Bye Bye, Fly”, the one that didn’t undo existing mutations but rather shifted the target from one form to another; it even still has the dial with pictures of different animals on it. An egregious goof, to be sure. Let’s press on.
At “Genetic Research” - that’s what the sign says – a night watchman stands guard as the Turtles look on from nearby. Baxter is namechecked by the team during their conversation, leading to Raph mentioning that “thanks to Krang he’s stuck in some kinda... dimensional limbo”. Wait, what? The last time we saw Baxter it was Donatello that sent him to another dimension; I guess we can take this as confirmation that “Landlord of the Flies” has been scratched from the record, as the only thing this seems to match up with is the portal to the Technodrome being shut down while Baxter was in the middle of passing between dimensions in “Son of Return of the Fly II”.
As Shredder makes the final adjustments to his ray gun, Krang is attempting to restore contact with Dimension X. With his equipment faltering, the portal instead focuses on a different realm, the one where Baxter was trapped. The fly passes back through the portal, arriving in the Technodrome clutching the circuit board that is the last remnant of his buddy, “Z”.
Baxter evades a group of Foot Soldiers then hurls himself at Krang, picking the alien brain and his bubble walker up before flying to the roof and dropping him back down to the floor. Shredder intervenes, only to be tossed into a wall. Following Z’s instructions, Baxter connects the alien computer’s circuit board to the Technodrome’s systems. Now in control of the undersea fortress, Z has the Foot Soldiers round up Shredder, Krang and The Boys, locking them in a storage facility. Having picked up on Vernon’s earlier broadcast, Z informs Baxter of the experiments taking place at the research facility and begins plotting to use these developments to achieve world domination. A handheld computer allows Z to continue aiding Baxter remotely.
I neglected to mention this in prior Turtlethon entries but over the course of the last few episodes, as the focus of the series has returned to the Technodrome, the traditional transport modules have been phased out in favour of a new amphibious version. One of these vehicles appears briefly here, emerging from the water and rolling into the city. Meanwhile the Turtles abandon monitoring the research facility when April requests help, having found herself on a rooftop while covering news of a fire. The blaze has since spread, putting her in danger, and so the team rush to her aid. Moments after their departure the module rolls up; from it emerges Baxter, whose appearance causes the guard to faint. The fly smashes through the windows of the lab, barging in and stealing the test tubes containing the genetic materials.
At EMF (it’s unbelievable!), April finds herself cornered by the worsening fire until Michaelangelo, descending from the Turtle Blimp, swoops in to save her at the last second. Later, a fireman shows the Turtles and April the “Super Slosher 2000”, an advanced water cannon used to quickly put out blazes. April is informed of a break-in at the lab by Burne, and leaves with the Turtles in her van; Baxter is already long gone from the facility, and steals the Super Slosher to use as a delivery mechanism for the stolen genetic materials. Testing it out, he takes aim at the firemen, who become giant mutant termites as the first act concludes.
Returning from commercials, Baxter watches as the termite men begin devouring the wooden exterior of an old building. Meanwhile, the Turtles and April talk to the professor at the lab regarding the break-in, and note the tell-tale signs that this is Baxter’s doing. While the team find it hard to believe that Stockman would be capable of doing much with the formulas given his diminished mental state, his supercomputer friend Z is another story altogether, and so our heroes rush off to intervene.
At a fairground, Baxter opens fire with the Super Slosher, turning everyone in attendance into mutant insects. He laments that despite all of this going as planned, he feels something is still missing; Z then suggests that the Turtles should be the next target in his quest for revenge, and that attacking their allies at Channel 6 would be an effective way to lure the green teens out of hiding. The mutant fly leaves, forgetting to take Z’s handheld computer form with him.
In the Technodrome, Krang posits that his fortress was built “too well”, providing no means of escape. Shredder suggests that mixing the chemicals present in the storage facility could allow them to create an explosion and blow down the door. Meanwhile the Turtles arrive at the fairground and restrain the mutant insects. Donatello finds the handheld computer, but Z refuses to reveal what’s going on, shutting down his system instead. As a means of pressuring him into revealing what’s going on, Donnie threatens to dump “fifty megs of random data” into his logic circuits. (This might not sound like a lot now, but keep in mind that in 1993 it might have been the size of your home PC’s entire hard drive.) Z reluctantly explains that Baxter was able to acquire some of Krang’s mutagen and is using it into conjunction with the stolen lab materials to turn everyone into mutant bugs.
The Turtles and April learn that Baxter is now at Channel 6, and hurry over to the station offices to confront him. Inside they find a giant honeycomb, an indicator of things to come. Burne soon emerges, having been turned into a half-man, half-bee. Before the Turtles can react, Irma – now a moth lady – joins her boss in attacking, the pair working together to drag Leonardo and Michaelangelo away. Meanwhile Krang’s makeshift chemical bomb proves entirely ineffective in blowing down the door, and so the Technodrome Crew find themselves having to go back to the drawing board.
Baxter has taken over broadcasts at Channel 6. He goes on the air, promising his viewers that if they aren’t already mutants, they will be soon, and espouses the benefits of living as an insect. Elsewhere in the building, Donnie and Raph look to rescue Leo and Mikey, but instead find themselves trapped in the web of a mutant spider Vernon as act two reaches its conclusion.
Act three opens with April cutting her friends free from the web. Donnie and Raph point out to Vernon that spiders eat flies, not turtles, and encourage him to spin an enormous web outside of the building so that Baxter can be captured. Back in the Technodrome, Krang suggests using his bubble walker to force the door open, and so the bad guys get to work on their next escape plan.
Baxter confronts a captive Leonardo and Michaelangelo in the station offices, promising to get even with the Turtles, despite conceding that he can’t remember exactly why he wants revenge to begin with. Donnie and Raph intervene, freeing their friends, but further threats emerge as Baxter turns April into a wasp. (Compared to her genuinely creepy transformation in “The Cat Woman from Channel 6”, this is handled in a haphazard and shoddy fashion; in one shot she has wings and antennae, in the next her entire body has changed, and I can’t help but wonder if this was a result of laziness or someone considering showing the full metamorphosis to be too frightening.) Insistent on not fighting her friends, wasp April instead joins the Turtles in chasing Baxter out of the building. There, the mutant fly finds himself trapped in the web created by Vernon, the Super Slosher destroyed in the process.
Much to Vernon’s frustration, Baxter is saved from being devoured, with Raphael noting “that is not how we get rid of villains on this show.” Meanwhile April continues trying to resist attacking the Turtles. Donatello suggests to the team that the only way of restoring everyone to normal is to get Shredder’s retromutagen ray, and so our heroes have Baxter take them to the transport module.
Bebop and Rocksteady attempt to use the hydraulic limbs of the bubble walker to pry the door open, but without success. Meanwhile the Turtles arrive in the Technodrome, but are tricked by Z into entering a room full of Foot Soldiers, still under his control. The robots free Baxter, only to be quickly defeated by our heroes.
As the Turtles rush to shut down the Technodrome’s main computer, Baxter seeks the retromutagen ray, intent on returning himself to his human form. Z attempts to deter the Turtles with a group of wheeled machines, but his systems are ultimately taken offline thanks to a well-placed strike from Donatello’s bo. With Z no longer in control, the doors of the storage facility unexpectedly open, making Shredder suspicious. He grabs the retromutagen ray as the Turtles arrive to confront him and begins opening fire. Briefly, it seems that the Turtles are set to be reverted to their original forms, but Baxter swoops in, grabbing the ray out of Shredder’s hand. He leaps through the portal, followed by the Turtles, who recognise retrieving the gun is the only way April and everyone else can be made human once more.
Seeing an opportunity to be rid of the Turtles forever, Shredder shuts down the portal. Caught between dimensions, the Turtles realise that only a few seconds remain before their route back to the Technodrome vanishes from existence. The team leap back in, restraining Shredder in another of the complex’s storage facilities.
Evidently some time must have passed before the concluding scene takes place, with Raphael noting that “everyone in the city is back to normal” as the Channel 6 regulars are restored to their regular forms. Leonardo uses his sword to destroy the retromutagen ray, ending once and for all the threat that it could be used to revert the Turtles nto regular pets. None of the station employees remember their time as insects, but Vernon still has a latent appetite for flies and chases one through the building, echoing his lingering desire for cheese following his time as a rodent in “Were-Rats from Channel 6”.
All things considered, this is a lacklustre way for Baxter to go out. The final moments of the story tease the idea that he could be returned to his normal form, and doing so would have granted both him and us a nice bit of closure, particularly if we assume there was no intention to use him again moving forward. Perhaps David Wise wanted to keep his options open for stories in future seasons, but to have Baxter’s arc end in this fashion – never even acknowledged once the Turtles re-emerge from the portal, becoming an afterthought in his own episode – strikes me as an unsatisfying conclusion to one of the show’s few ongoing storylines. I suppose in theory it’s possible that he was able to restore himself to his human form during his largely unseen scuffle with the Turtles, but even if that were the case, his prospects while trapped between dimensions – particularly now that he no longer has (the presumably destroyed) Z as an ally – seem bleak.
Within the wider workings of season seven, “Revenge of the Fly” feels representative of how things are going. From “Night of the Dark Turtle” through to "White Belt, Black Heart" we had a stretch of some of the strongest episodes in the show’s history, as the more juvenile tone that had become synonymous with this incarnation of the Turtles gave way to an ever-so-slightly more mature, focused series, if only out of necessity. Things began to falter with “Night of the Rogues” - a huge story that required more broadcast time to work that it received – and each of the subsequent episodes has suffered from similar problems. I’m beginning to get the impression that saving Turtles this far into its run is a monumental task, one hampered by broadcast regulations, dwindling budgets and executive meddling, and it’ll take more than a few strong scripts to do it. (If that reads as a bleak analysis, keep in mind that we’re only five episodes away from a dramatic tonal shift that will alter the direction of the series for the remainder of its run.)
NEXT TIME: I know we already had an Atlantis-themed Turtles episode, and it wasn’t even that long ago, but we’re going back to the well again! See you next time for "Atlantis Awakes".
Season 7, Episode 24
First US Airdate: December 4, 1993
A wealthy businessman starts an anti-mutant campaign that places the Turtles in danger.
Season seven of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles nears its conclusion with "Dirk Savage: Mutant Hunter!" As with most of the episodes during this stretch of the show, David Wise is credited as writer here.
The Turtles are investigating a series of appearances by a pair of mysterious creatures and are seen examining their footprints. Donatello remarks that since Shredder’s use of mutagen in the zoo “years ago”, new mutants have continued to appear in the city. This seems to be a call-back to the events of “Planet of the Turtleoids” that led to the creation of Groundchuck and Dirtbag. As that was in season five it’s true that for us as viewers it was a while back, but I believe this is the first time we’ve ever had in-universe confirmation that the events of the series have taken place over a period of several years.
Our heroes are alerted to a commotion at the nearby Crystal Palace Mall. Inside, a mutant wolf and turtle are terrorising shoppers. This duo will be familiar to anyone who’s seen the second live-action TMNT movie as Rahzar and Tokka respectively, though their characterisation here differs greatly from their movie appearances: rather than being BABIES – or, if you prefer, “stupid infants” - Rahzar is surprisingly eloquent while Tokkka sounds like... Beavis? I’m gonna go with Beavis. The Turtles valiantly take on these two new mutants but are outmatched, with both Leonardo and Michaelangelo going through the windows of one of the mall’s restaurants.
An interesting facet of Rahzar’s portrayal here is that from the outset it’s established he cares deeply for Tokka and considers him to be his only friend. Upon seeing Raphael and Donatello fight Tokka, Rahzar becomes furious, smashing the mall’s supporting pillar. Having left the complex in ruins, the two mutants escape; the Turtles emerge from the crumbling shopping centre but find their new enemies are long gone.
Later, in the Lair, the Turtles watch a broadcast on Channel 6. AJ Howard, an “eccentric billionaire”, is allowed to go into an anti-mutant diatribe in which he blames the many half-human, half-animals who have appeared in the city not only for the recent destruction of the mall, but for hurting the local economy and driving out business. He goes on to mention that the completion of his new skyscraper, the Howard Building, has been postponed until the mutant issue is dealt with. Beyond that, he has launched a full-on anti-mutant campaign, including promotional “down with mutants” wristbands. Announcing the next phase of his program, he introduces Dirk Savage, a burly and heavily armed man with an eyepatch who he declares is a “professional mutant hunter”.
Savage boasts about his intention to track down “every last one of you freaks”, a vow that understandably rattles the Turtles. The broadcast ends with AJ Howard encouraging citizens to request Savage’s services by way of a special hotline, 555-NO MUTANTS.
The Turtles head to Channel 6 and request April and Irma’s help in learning about Dirk Savage. April isn’t able to find much beyond him being “a professional soldier of fortune... he’s fought for governments all over the world!” Irma provides further details about Savage’s allegiances, noting that he typically fights against “rebels, misfits and other outcasts”. While at the station offices our heroes receive an incoming Turtlecom transmission from Napoleon of the Punk Frogs, who has just arrived in town with Genghis. It only takes a matter of seconds before Genghis manages to get his foot caught in a laser trap. From the bushes emerges Dirk Savage, who swiftly captures both frogs and carries them away.
Our heroes head to the spot where the Punk Frogs were captured, and determine this was indeed Savage’s doing: in a nod to the weariness that viewers may have been feeling after seven seasons of new supporting characters being introduced, Raphael notes that there are “eight zillion mutants in this series and [Savage] captures two of the good ones!” With no clear plan on what to do next, the team head back to the Lair to request Splinter’s advice.
Savage is seen transporting the Punk Frogs in his personalised truck to a special facility, where several mutants can be seen imprisoned in energy cages. The mutant hunter checks in with AJ Howard, who reminds him that the Turtles are still free: Savage assures his boss that capturing them is his top priority.
Splinter tells the Turtles that he senses Dirk Savage may be the key to solving their problem, and that they should focus on convincing him to change his ways by showing him his hatred for mutants is the result of ignorance. Later, while wandering the sewers, the Turtles discuss these words of wisdom. Donatello and Raphael are unconvinced by the idea that Savage can be reasoned with. Michaelangelo is then pulled into the air and captured in an enormous electromagnet, which Donnie helpfully explains has him “by the buckles of his bandoliers!” Before the team can free him, Dirk Savage appears, a gun in each hand and set to capture his enemies, as act one wraps up.
Act two opens with Savage angering the Turtles by calling them “mutant scum”. He attempts to capture all four members of the team, but after restraining Leonardo is pounced upon by Raphael and has a stream of water sprayed on him by Donatello from a nearby pipe. Ultimately the mutant hunter retreats, taking the tied-up Leo and Mikey with him. As he loads the two Turtles into the back of his truck, he makes a point of relieving them of their Turtlecoms, crushing the devices with his bare hands. Donnie and Raph head to the Turtle Van to give chase, but are alerted to further developments from April, who asks that they return to the station as Irma has made a major discovery.
Savage presents Michaelangelo and Leonardo to AJ Howard. The two Turtles are understandably furious and refuse to comply, but the billionaire forces them to don “compliance cuffs” - arm restraints that compel anyone wearing them to do his bidding. Napoleon, Genghis and the other assembled mutants can only look on as Leo and Mikey are brought to their knees. Meanwhile, Irma reveals her discovery to the Turtles: that Howard used to own a genetics lab which was suddenly closed, coinciding with the wealthy businessman’s disappearance for more than a year. (We can only take Irma’s word for this, as the report which appears on-screen contains no relevant information and seems to just be letters of the alphabet in sequence.)
While April and Irma are helping the Turtles, Vernon goes on-air with an editorial segment. Professing his allegiance to AJ Howard, he rails against the “nasty creatures” supposedly taking over the streets, before revealing that more than half of the city’s residents now wear the billionaire’s anti-mutant bracelets. Raphael is keen to give Vernon a piece of his mind, but is convinced to direct his energy elsewhere, as Donatello intends to infiltrate the mutant holding facility. Meanwhile, April and Irma will investigate the site of Howard’s in-construction skyscraper.
Donnie and Raph visit Mondo Gecko, making his first appearance since his debut two years earlier. As per the conclusion of that adventure he appears to still be residing in the sewers as a neighbour of sorts to the Turtles. Upon learning of the activities of Howard and Savage, Mondo agrees to assist, angered by the capture of his good friend Michaelangelo.
Savage places a table of food in an alley, luring Tokka and Rahzar into the open. This turns out to only be partially successful, as he’s able to capture the snapping turtle but not his partner. After escaping, Rahzar can only watch from a nearby rooftop as Tokka is loaded into the back of Savage’s vehicle and transported away; enraged by the loss of his buddy, he vows revenge before howling at the moon. On his way back to the mutant detainment facility Savage also encounters and captures Mondo Gecko. This time Donnie and Raph are ready, and follow the mutant hunter in the Turtle Van.
As April and Irma arrive at the Howard Building, which is covered in an enormous sheet and surrounded by guards, Donnie and Raph watch Savage unload his mutants at the facility. After he leaves again our heroes use a vent to gain entry to the mutant detainment building. Inside, they watch – along with the captive Leo and Mikey, as well as the other jailed mutants – as AJ Howard places his special cuffs on Mondo Gecko and Tokka. After an off-hand remark from Mondo about how the billionaire will never be able to kill destroy the city’s entire population of mutants, Howard reveals that isn’t his intent, and that his captured prey will serve as his own personal army. The assembled mutants are shocked as Howard removes his rubbery face mask to show his true form: that of a half-man, half-slug.
The impact of Howard’s revelation is watered down considerably by the fact that when we return for the concluding act, he’s seen pulling off his mask again, this time spouting new dialogue as he does so about being not only a mutant, but the greatest one of all. He further explains that it was an accident in his genetics lab that led to his current form (hence his year-long disappearance alluded to by Irma earlier). Donnie and Raph emerge to confront Howard, but through his compliance bracelets the slug turns the jailed mutants against them, forcing the two Turtles to retreat to their van. With his true intentions now known, Howard declares that he needs to implement the next phase of his plan immediately and marches off with his new mutant army.
Donatello is beginning to warm up to the idea suggested by Splinter earlier about Dirk Savage acting as a potential ally. From a phone booth, he calls the hunter’s hotline and leaves a message indicating that two mutant turtles have been spotted. Meanwhile April and Irma watch as Howard relays a message to the guards surrounding his building, informing them that as the mutant issue has been dealt with, they can stand down. With the coast clear, the two ladies sneak inside, finding what initially appears to be a relatively innocuous building.
Savage takes the bait, arriving at a fish market to find Donatello and Raphael. Before he can capture them Rahzar intervenes, still livid at the capture of his friend. The Turtles battle the mutant wolf, ultimately using one of Savage’s own restraining weapons to deal with their foe. It’s only after being saved by Donnie and Raph – and subsequently lectured by them about how not all mutants are bad – that Savage learns he was working for a villainous slug-man the entire time.
AJ Howard guides his army to his new skyscraper, revealing that its true name is not the Howard Building but rather the Mutant Building, a towering statue of his true form mounted on its roof. As he pulls away the sheets at ground level, April and Irma have made it to the top, and head inside to find a control room. Donnie and Raph are informed of this discovery and head off with Savage to confront the bad guys.
Michaelangelo and Leonardo are taken to the top floor by Howard with the other mutants, and due to the compliance cuffs are forced against their will to capture April and Irma. Both ladies are made by Howard to wear his “Down with Mutants” cuffs: far from being a mere propaganda tool, the slug reveals these are miniature versions of the restraints worn by his army. Soon, he announces, they’ll be used to bring everyone in the city wearing them under his control. Across town at Channel 6, Vernon is seen gushing about the bracelets to a surprisingly wary Burne Thompson. As the bracelets are powered up April’s rival is seen marching out of the room, his boss furious at the idea of him taking orders from anyone else.
Dirk Savage is also wearing one of Howard’s anti-mutant bracelets, which activates as he flies the Turtle Blimp, accompanied by Donnie and Raph. Despite this setback the team manage to open fire upon Howard’s statue, and the resulting destruction of the control room breaks the control of the bracelets over the humans who had been wearing them. Howard still has sway over the mutants, but only temporarily – it doesn’t take long for Savage to snatch the control unit out of the hands of his old boss and destroy it.
A further complication arises as the building begins to shake. Howard reveals that the explosion which destroyed the control room must have overloaded the building’s power generators. Donatello drops a dizzying number of ropes from the Turtle Blimp, allowing everyone to fly away safely before the entire skyscraper blows up.
Later, Savage makes a brief apology for the way he’s treated the assembled mutants, pledging to try and understand them in the future and offering his help if needed. Michaelangelo suggests this is almost a happy ending, but something is still missing: the Punk Frogs then step in, offering to buy the Turtles a jumbo pizza, and this is enough for Mikey to now be entirely satisfied.
Michaelangelo might be content with this conclusion, but I’m considerably less impressed. For the most part “Dirk Savage: Mutant Hunter!” is an exceptional episode even by the standards of what has been a surprisingly strong season. While the series was set up around the premise that the wider world would be hostile to the Turtles – in this continuity that was established from the outset as the reason Splinter trained them to be ninjas, a means of defending themselves rather than to kill Shredder – only season three’s “Turtles on Trial” explored this idea in depth. In the years that followed, the Turtles became real-world celebrities who spent more time selling cereal, raising awareness of public transportation and going on tour as musicians than they did being depicted as underdogs struggling in a world that didn’t understand them. Arguably this fed back into the series, as the team have spent years wandering around mostly without disguises, meeting little resistance from the residents of the city and often being treated as celebrated heroes. It’s only here – in the seventh season of the show, as the need for the Turtles to serve as real-world pitchmen and role models for hire fades away, that we begin to see a re-alignment take place, freeing the team to become ninjas who reside in the shadows once more. To that end, here we return to the idea of a media-driven narrative turning opinion against the Turtles. These themes felt worryingly prescient when I wrote about them in the Turtlethon entry for “On Trial” a few years back and viewed through the lens of this episode seem just as relevant to our real-world political and cultural climate now. The difference is that while the season three approach to this story resulted in an effective story with an ending that felt all too plausible, this one manages to stumble right before making it over the finish line.
I don’t know what it is about season seven: for some reason the overarching theme for this year seems to have been terrific stories that invariably wind up with half-baked, unsatisfying conclusions. (Baxter’s final appearance is the most obvious example of this.) Whereas Clayton Kellerman’s insistence on continuing to profit by directing hate at the Turtles even after being saved by them felt all too real, here Dirk Savage’s willingness to cast aside his hatred of mutants so readily comes across as entirely inauthentic. Far worse than this, though, is AJ Howard’s fate being omitted from the end of the show completely. Did he feel any remorse for treating the mutants the way he did? Was his perspective changed after being saved from the exploding buildings by the Turtles, or would he simply vow to get revenge? We’ll never know, and it’s one of the great missed opportunities that this villain – part Ross Perot with his pie charts and presumably paid TV broadcasts, part Richard Nixon in voice and general demeanour – didn't get used again. I could easily envision an alternative direction for seasons eight through ten where it’s Howard who becomes the main villain of the series as Shredder and Krang fade into the background, a cartoon counterpart to Null from the Archie TMNT Adventures continuity whose influence and power make life much harder for the Turtles.
Comparisons to “On Trial” notwithstanding, there’s no shortage of other things going on here that are genuinely interesting. The revelation that Shredder’s schemes led to the creation of a variety of unseen mutants is intriguing, but even here there’s a sense that much more could have come of this: we see several mutants in this adventure who are all original designs, but they could so easily have been existing characters from the Archie comics or the toy line. It’s not hard to imagine the likes of Scratch, Panda Khan or Halfcourt receiving cameos here, or even Ace Duck finally getting some proper screen time. At least we get guest appearances from Tokka and Rahzar, albeit years after their debut in The Secret of the Ooze. This is more relevant to Turtlethon entries for the live-action movies – which I still intend to do before this project is over – but the inclusion of this duo in the cartoon after so long feels particularly odd given that they were effectively an unsuccessful attempt to outdo its own Rocksteady and Bebop. Perhaps Playmates were keen to have Tokka and Rahzar incorporated into the show, as both did have a couple of action figures at retail during this period.
Without a doubt this episode is going on the Required Viewing list, but with the caveat that as good as it is, it had the potential to be something far greater than what we ultimately received. We say goodbye to the remaining Punk Frogs and Mondo Gecko here for the last time, with the conclusion of season seven and the classic era of TMNT looming on the horizon. Before then our attention must turn back to the Technodrome Crew for the subject of the next entry, “Invasion of the Krangazoids”.
Season 7, Episode 14
First US Airdate: October 30, 1993
Donatello adopts a new, aggresive persona following an accident.
“Night of the Dark Turtle” first aired in the US as the second half of a double bill alongside “Elementary, My Dear Turtle”, the concluding episode of the Vacation in Europe arc. David Wise returns as the writer of this story.
In the Lair, Michaelangelo walks into the living room to find the other Turtles watching a broadcast, where April appears to be running away from an enormous dinosaur. This turns out to be part of a report on the new animatronic dinosaurs that have been unveiled at the city’s Natural History Museum. Mikey suggests that he’d have wasted no time in fighting the dinosaur if April had been in actual danger, leading to Donatello countering that his reliance on inventions is a smarter approach. The other Turtles are dismissive of this idea, but Donnie doubles down, insistent that he could take on Shredder himself if he had to. The conversation is brought to an abrupt halt by his early warning system, which picks up unusual vibrations underground. Convinced this might be connected to Shredder, the Turtles rush off to investigate.
Across town at a government research laboratory, we see Shredder’s Scheme of the Day unfold, as he pressures a scientist into handing over the Micro Blaster, a device resembling a AA-size battery which he declares is a super-powerful weapon. Bebop and Rocksteady almost immediately manage to destroy the gizmo, while the reluctant inventor escapes in the commotion. Shredder sends The Boys after him, and after being pressured by Krang, decides to try and fix the weapon himself.
Having spent some time searching in vain, the Turtles trace the source of the vibrations to the government facility, and inside find Shredder – flanked by a group of Foot Soldiers – repairing the weapon. In the ensuing battle, Donatello goes toe-to-toe with Shreds, leading to a chain reaction of events where the Micro Blaster rolls away as nearby machines begin to malfunction. Shredder hurls Donnie into a bay of scientific equipment, leading the Turtle to be electrocuted. With the fight having drawn the attention of a pair of security guards, both Shredder and the Turtles make their respective exits.
Above Earth, a group of spaceships are seen approaching. Voices are heard discussing how easy the planet will be to conquer, one of them addressing someone by the name of “Captain Zorax”.
Donatello comes around while being tended to in the Lair, his voice and persona much more hard-edged than usual. He immediately grabs Leonardo and begins venting his frustrations at being pulled away before he could finish Shredder, adamant that he “nearly had him”. He attempts to leave but is restrained by the other Turtles, who encourage him to cool off. Splinter then intervenes, ordering his pupil to clear his mind of his “vicious thoughts”. This only serves to make Donatello angrier: in a heated tirade, he points out that it was Shredder’s fault Splinter was turned into a rat, and that Shredder is “responsible for everything evil that ever happens!” (A slight exaggeration, as anyone who had to endure the endless parade of mediocre villains present in seasons four through six could attest).
After being blocked from leaving the Lair for a second time by the other Turtles, Donatello appears to concede that it would be better for him to stay home and recuperate. In truth, he retreats to his workshop, where he pulls off his bandana, declaring that he’s “sick of these stupid masks!” Echoing Batman’s origin story, he adds that “criminals are a superstitious and cowardly lot”, and as such he requires a new disguise to strike fear into their hearts. Instead of a bat, he finds inspiration in a pile of comic books that he had angrily knocked onto the floor upon his arrival, taking special interest in one titled “Midknight Avenger” (mistakenly rendered in one shot as “Midknigt Avenger”, which takes the edge of what had up to that point been a dramatic and effective scene).
Later, Shredder skulks around the government research lab, but finds that the number of security guards has been increased following his previous visit, and determines he’ll need to change his approach. Back in the Lair, the Turtles find Donatello has placed a group of pillows under his bedsheets to trick them. I don’t know why he bothered as he hasn’t left yet, emerging to shock his team-mates with his new persona: the heavily Batman-inspired “Dark Turtle”. After being confronted again, he uses a Turtle bomb device to fill the Lair with smoke and storms off to confront Shredder.
Act two begins with the other Turtles heading up to the surface and confronting Donatello, trying to convince him that taking on Shredder by himself is dangerous. The Dark Turtle uses a grappling hook to evade his former team-mates, leaving them floored as he escapes. (Leonardo remarks that Donatello has “gone totally bats”, but is warned by Michaelangelo to watch his language, lest they get into trademark infringement territory.) The attempts by the team to reason with their old comrade are cut short by Splinter, who informs them that they’re needed urgently in the Lair.
In a hideout at the docks, Shredder is seen negotiating with a mobster called Wolf Jackson to gain assistance in raiding the research facility. Meanwhile the group of spaceships seen approaching Earth earlier have now arrived, landing in the middle of a busy city street. From them emerges Captain Zorax of the Triceratons, a group of alien dinosaur warriors. Zorax declares that he’s claiming the planet for his Empire.
Splinter draws the attention of the Turtles to the readout on Donatello’s early warning alarm system, indicating an incident unfolding in the midtown area. Despite Raphael’s insistence that the machine may be as screwy as its inventor, the group rush off to investigate. Meanwhile, the Dark Turtle is seen capturing a mugger, hoisting him on a sawn-off streetlight to pressure him into revealing the current whereabouts of the Shredder. After learning that the masked villain is working with Wolf Jackson’s men, the Dark Turtle leaves the mugger pinned to the wall.
Shredder and the group of mobsters work together to lure the security guards at the government lab into being captured. Meanwhile the Triceratons are rounding up citizens when the Turtles arrive to confront them. Zorax tells the team that he doesn’t normally like battling his fellow reptiles but is prepared to make an exception for the green teens, as his men open fire with their laser weapons.
Bebop and Rocksteady have been wandering the city off-screen throughout this story in search of the scientist who created the Micro Blaster, and now find themselves confronted by the Dark Turtle. The Boys initially mock the masked hero, but find themselves tied up and pressed in regards to the whereabouts of Wolf Jackson. After Bebop unwittingly reveals that the mobster operates out of a hideout on the wharf, the Dark Turtle leaves Shredder’s underlings tied up in much the same way as he did with the mugger earlier.
In an exciting fight sequence – albeit one that I suspect has been edited down to bring it in line with CBS broadcast restrictions – the Turtles find themselves outmatched by the Triceratons, who point out that they’ve conquered half the galaxy, and it’ll take more than our three heroes to stop them. Meanwhile the Dark Turtle barges into Wolf Jackson’s hideout, dragging him outside and threatening to drop him into the water surrounding the pier if he refuses to reveal the whereabouts of Shredder. Jackson coughs up the details, and winds up taking the plunge anyway.
The Turtles re-emerge in their van ready to counter-attack, but find the Triceratons have implemented the next stage of their plan, having created a stargate, a giant wormhole that Earth will be pulled through until it arrives among the Triceraton homeworlds, where it’ll be asset-stripped. Raphael suggests that things can’t get much worse, but Mikey counters that he shouldn’t be so sure as there’s still one more act to go.
Figuring that they’ll need the assistance of Donatello in sabotaging the stargate, the Turtles shoot down the proposal from the Triceratons to work together as “fellow reptiles”, escaping in their van. Meanwhile the Dark Turtle finally makes good on his promise to confront Shredder at the research facility. Like Rocksteady and Bebop, the masked villain doesn’t take this threat seriously at first, but after dealing with an array of different gadgets and weapons, he too is captured. The Turtles arrive in time to find Shredder being dangled over a railing by the Dark Turtle, and wind up saving their old enemy, breaking his fall and preventing him from being dropped onto a mobile generator. Michaelangelo attempts to restrain the Dark Turtle, but the would-be superhero winds up falling onto the generator instead. Bebop and Rocksteady emerge to rescue their boss, the three villains making their exit.
As per the rules of TV amnesia the second bump has restored Donatello to normal, and he learns from the other Turtles about the current situation with the Triceratons. After Leonardo points out that Zorax repeatedly showed reluctance to battle his fellow reptiles, Donnie suggests they pay a visit to the Natural History Museum.
Only three minutes remain until Earth is pulled through the stargate when the Triceratons are confronted by a group of enormous dinosaurs, who smash the machines holding residents of the city hostage. In truth, the dinos are being operated by the Turtles, and while the ruse initially works, Zorax reluctantly gives the order to open fire on his fellow reptiles to prevent the entire mission from failing. Adopting his Dark Turtle disguise again, Donatello confronts the Triceratons, declaring himself to be the ruler of Earth. As a demonstration of his might, he uses the Micro Blaster to decimate a nearby tank and the stargate generator. Terrified by the sight of this, the Triceratons rush to their ships and retreat into space.
Later, in the Lair, the other Turtles talk amongst themselves about how impressive Donatello was in his exploits, with Raphael remarking that as the Dark Turtle, Donnie was “so crazed he made Casey Jones look like a wallflower”. The group overhear Donatello aggressively wondering where “that Shredder” is in his workshop, and fear he’s returned to his superhero persona; in reality, he’s simply looking for his automatic cheese shredder, as he has a craving for pizza.
As we start our exploration of what might be considered the legitimate portion of season seven, I think it’s worth taking a moment to reflect on the changing fortunes of TMNT, and how this is affecting the direction of the series. If 1990 represented the height of Turtlemania, 1991 the end of the boom period and 1992 a year of managing the decline, then 1993 must represent the point where the Turtles are now well and truly in trouble. Almost six full years have passed since the broadcast of the first episode of the series, an eternity in kid-vid terms, and much of the audience from the early days is now growing up or simply losing interest. Between seasons six and seven the third live-action Turtles movie arrived in cinemas, widely considered to be at best a major disappointment and at worst a box office bomb, and to my mind it’s difficult not to see this as both an indicator of waning interest in TMNT as well as a failure large enough to damage the reputation of the Turtles moving forward.
From my own personal experience, time has muddled my memories of watching what might be termed “Late-Stage Turtles”, but my recollection is that in 1992 UK viewers watching on Sky One wound up getting seasons five, six and the European vacation portion of season seven almost back-to-back. It was... a lot, and I finally found myself burned out. I could have sworn that this was one of the last episodes I saw, and that we got at least the first few proper season seven episodes immediately after the European vacation arc at the tail-end of 1992, but that doesn’t seem to line up; certainly the episodes as presented on DVD all have 1993 copyrights, so that seems implausible. It’s possible I’m mixing this up with “Leonardo is Missing”, a similar Turtles-meet-dinosaurs episode that would have been in broadcast rotation during this period.
What I do know for sure is that I parted ways with the Turtles soon after the European Vacation episodes wrapped up in late 1992. It wasn’t an “I don’t like this show anymore” thing, but more a logistics issue: when satellite transmissions on BSB’s old Marcopolo DMAC system ended on January 1, 1993, we didn’t have access to Sky One in the family living room anymore. (I could still watch Sky upstairs, but it was far less convenient.) In September of 1993 Sky’s channels became subscription-only, putting a paywall between me and any future episodes of TMNT; it wasn’t until late 1994 that I’d see the Turtles on Sky again, the show by then demoted to weekend airings only and looking far different than it had the last time I’d seen it, season eight then fully in effect. It’s funny in retrospect that I had hung in there right up to the beginning of this season before starting to mentally tune out, unaware that only a scant few shows remained before the series headed in a dramatic new direction.
Though it might not be immediately obvious, the beginnings of that new direction can be found in “Night of the Dark Turtle”. It’s clear that David Wise has been tasked with righting this now rapidly sinking ship and has immediately set about subtly altering the tone of the series, upping the action and science fiction elements and perhaps drawing upon the Mirage comics for further inspiration, as well as bringing in some of the earliest TMNT comic book foes in the Triceratons, a surprise inclusion this late in the show’s run. Donatello’s genuine anger – if only due to his accident – at everything Shredder has done would have been unthinkable in seasons two through six, and it’s hard as a viewer to disagree with him even if his approach may be questionable. The Dark Turtle’s more aggressive tactics when fighting crime are scuppered by those Saturday morning rules and regulations meaning he can’t inflict any actual punishment; at best he can drop Wolf Jackson in the water, the implication being that Donatello would normally just let the mobster be. Nevertheless, there’s a sense that the show is finally shedding its goofier tendencies, if only out of necessity, and that perhaps the days of cream pie fights as conflict resolution are behind us for good.
Of the remaining episodes in this season, all but two will be penned by David Wise. His next contribution will see the Turtles deal with an entirely different kind of alien in “The Starchild”.
Season 7, Episode 8
First US Airdate: October 9, 1993
Shredder captures the mystical sword Excalibur and threatens to destroy the fabric of time.
“Shredder’s New Sword” is the eighth episode of the “Vacation in Europe” side-season of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Series regulars Francis Moss and Ted Pedersen are the credited writers for this adventure.
Today the Turtles are in London, England, and make an overnight visit along with Splinter to the British Museum. Leonardo views a painting of King Arthur wielding the sword Excalibur, alongside Queen Guinevere and the Knights of the Round Table. Raphael and Michaelangelo join Leo in being mesmerised by the artwork, until Donatello steps in to point out that this legend is a work of fiction.
In the Technodrome, Krang fiddles with a detector machine that can track any element on Earth. A rare one, Diridium, has turned up in England, the supplies of which would be enough to allow him to power up his fortress. Zooming in on an old castle, he views a pair of tombs, one of which contains King Arthur and Excalibur. Determining that the sword itself must be the source of the Diridium, Shredder sets off with Bebop and Rocksteady to claim the sword.
Back in London, we join the Turtles in the sewers, as Michaelangelo has sourced some punk rocker costumes for the team that surely would have looked dated in 1980, and downright bizarre by the time the events of this episode were taking place in the early nineties. Splinter declines to try on his disguise, opting to stay behind as the London sewers are “full of history”. (From here it just looks like they’re full of trash.)
You know how this works by now: wherever the Turtles travel in Europe, April is never far behind. Today she wanders with Irma through the streets of London, complete with a red phone box and a single dowdy old car that both look about as current as Mikey’s punk outfits. April immediately spots the Turtles, doing an inexplicable finger-wagging animation before noting rockers with green skin tend to stand out. It probably helps that they’re the only other people wandering around in a city which then had a population of 6.75 million.
Irma explains that Burne sent her with April to cover the upcoming benefit event for the Prince’s Trust, which will be held at the Royal Albert Hall. The Crown Jewels will be on display there, and April invites the Turtles to join them in attending, on the condition that they get some better costumes.
Shredder is accompanied by Rocksteady and Bebop as he makes his way into the castle identified by Krang, claiming Excalibur for himself. Declaring himself “King Shredder the First”, he uses the sword’s magical powers to shatter a boulder before making his henchmen knights under the titles of “Sir Bebop” and “Sir Rocksteady”.
The Turtles arrive at the charity event in their trench-coat disguises, but some unexpected attendees gatecrash the event: King Shredder and his knights, driving a car up the steps and through the doors of the Royal Albert Hall. Shreds claims a crown on display for himself as Rocksteady and Bebop restrain a group of London “bobbies” by dropping a chandelier on them.
The Turtles step in, but are easily defeated by the power of Excalibur. Clearing out the remaining crown jewels, the three villains escape in their car. Our heroes give chase, with Leonardo hurling his katanas to puncture the car’s tyres. Shredder and his men are forced to escape on foot, fleeing to a park where Excalibur brings a pair of stone lions to life. The cats corner the green teens as the first act reaches its conclusion.
Act two opens with the Turtles in peril until a bearded wizard brandishing a magic wand intervenes, using his powers to shatter both lions. Before the team can process what just happened, the wizard vanishes again. With no clue as to what’s going on, the Turtles decide to return to the museum to engage in further research. While there, they spot a painting of the same individual they encountered, said to be Merlin, who stuns the team by coming to life in front of them. After having the situation explained to him, the doddering magician agrees to help the Turtles return Excalibur to its rightful place.
Merlin is perplexed as he wanders through the streets of London with the Turtles – now minus their disguises. The familiar sight of a group of TVs in a store window, all of them displaying the same pre-recorded news report by April, are staggering to the wizard, and his confusion is even greater when the real April appears in front of him. The group then watch a further news broadcast, in which an English announcer covers both the theft of the Crown Jewels and the appearances of historical figures around the city - “it’s as if the past were intruding itself upon the present!” - before moving on to cover the cricket results. Donatello speculates that the use of Excalibur is causing a time shift that will worsen if it continues, until the entire world ends up being pulled into a temporal black hole.
Irma arrives on a horse-drawn carriage, explaining that it was a sports car when the rental company supplied it, but transformed midway through the journey. Prior to this change, she learned on the car radio that Shredder is in the process of robbing the Bank of England. Advising the ladies to return to their hotel, the Turtles and Merlin head off to intervene.
Shredder and The Boys are seen emerging from the “Bank of London” rather than the Bank of England on cool motorbikes that look more like something from Skeleton Warriors than what we typically see in TMNT. Determining that the final thing he needs to be a king is a queen, Shreds happens to ride past the horse carriage containing the only two women in town and grabs April, electing her to rule alongside him. The Turtles and Merlin witness this, and conclude Shredder is likely to head to the Tower of London next, given that the King of England used to reside there.
At the tower, Shredder has April and Irma tied up and crows to Rocksteady and Bebop about his newfound power, dismissing Krang as now being insignificant compared to him. He demonstrates this by generating a pair of giant knights, who he sends after the Turtles when they arrive to confront him. Merlin attempts to counter-attack but his powers can only generate a small pet cat due to his rustiness; as a result both he and the Turtles soon find themselves tied up, boulders affixed to them as Bebop and Rocksteady shove them into what I assume is supposed to be the Thames River.
As the third act opens, Leonardo spots a sunken ship at the bottom of the river, and floats near it to snap his ropes before freeing the others. After the group swim to safety, Merlin suggests that they may be able to find a way to strike back in Camelot, where his book of spells is kept, but they’ll need to act quickly: if Shredder retains Excalibur for an entire day and night, nothing will be able to stop him.
The Turtles and Merlin travel to Camelot, watching as the castle begins to rebuild itself. Shredder is one step ahead, now wearing the crown stolen earlier and clutching the spellbook in addition to Excalibur. The masked villain appears to be unstoppable until King Arthur appears, accompanied by Guinevere. Declaring that Shredder is an illegitimate king, he requests the assistance of a “champion”, leading Michaelangelo to nominate himself along with the other Turtles: “I’m a champion surfer, Leonardo here’s a champion ninja, Donatello’s a champion brain, and Raphael’s a champion... wise guy!”
A contest soon unfolds, with Arthur selecting Donatello and Michaelangelo to battle on his behalf. Shredder is keen to put forward his giant black knights, but Arthur insists that Rocksteady and Bebop compete instead. In the first contest, Bebop clashes with Donatello atop a log over one the castle’s moat, with an alligator swimming around beneath them. In a confusing bit of animation, Donnie appears to strike the log beneath them, knocking both into the water; after he ejects the gator into the air using the log, it lands on top of an escaping Bebop, chasing him away. Arthur goes on to declare Donnie the winner of the first duel.
For the second round, Rocksteady – instructed by Shredder in advance to cheat – engages in a jousting/surfing contest against Mikey. The mutant rhino is quick to pull a laser blaster on his opponent, but his opponent uses his spear to flip his opponent’s platform into the air. “Sir Michaelangelo” is deemed the winner of round two by Arthur.
All of this turns out to have been a huge waste of time as, despite having decisively lost both rounds, Shredder’s response to being asked to hand over the sword is effectively “nuh-uh”. He goes on to engage in a brief swordfight with Leonardo, in which the Turtle’s blade is almost immediately destroyed by Excalibur. Raphael intervenes, knocking the weapon out of Shredder’s hand and allowing Arthur to reclaim it. Reunited with Rocksteady and Bebop, Shreds begs Krang to open a portal and allow them to retreat, promising to do anything – from cleaning the alien brain’s quarters, to giving both of their mutant henchmen a bath. Having sufficiently twisted the knife, Krang provides the trio with the ability to return to the Technodrome.
King Arthur knights the Turtles, declaring that they will always serve as members of his Round Table. He disappears into the mist, along with Guinevere, Merlin and the reconstructed Camelot. With the normal flow of time restored, it appears as if all of this was a dream, though a bandage on Raphael’s arm confirms that these events really did happen. A tuckered-out Michaelangelo has managed to doze off after all of today’s excitement.
“Shredder’s New Sword” is an inconsistent offering, with multiple themes and concepts jammed into its twenty-two-minutes, none of them being pulled off entirely successfully. The show has always struggled to make its depictions of New York (later just “The City”) feel authentic, as we’ve seen in so many episodes where the Turtle Van will be driving around barren, deserted versions of locales like Times Square, and much the same is true here in the depiction of London. Some of the backgrounds and locales feel surprisingly authentic in terms of detail, yet the sense remains that time and budget requirements are robbing us of the chance to really see the Turtles interacting with the sights and people of the modern London of the 1990s; at some points it feels more like they’re wandering around some lifeless husk of a little English town in the seventies during the dead of night. We saw much the same when the Turtles visited Paris and Dublin, the emphasis on the historical significance of these locales overshadowing the fact that these are nevertheless modern cities: it comes off as almost condescending, honestly.
The potential for the Turtles to spend more time exploring London is scuppered further by the arrival of Merlin, and the third act in particular takes place almost entirely outside Camelot instead. We can take some solace in the fact that the team will return for the concluding episode of this arc, “Elementary, My Dear Turtle”, so there’s still time to make up for this; before then we still have a few episodes left to cover, as next time the Turtles will arrive in Greece to encounter “The Lost Queen of Atlantis”.
