Quick Crappy Review: Mattel WWE Elite Fatal Fourway!*

We’re gonna do something a bit different today, I bought four WWE Elite figures in one day with some leftover birthday money (oh for a more grown-up name for that), all but one (Undertaker) was discounted and two of them are (fittingly for the characters) a little out of date (they’re from 4 waves ago) so we’re gonna say fuck it and review all four of them in one go, it’s an Elite in each corner, no disqualifications, quick crappy fatal four-way. So are you sitting comfortably? Then let’s get ready to rumble:

Our superstars are… from WWE Elite series 40: Ravishing Rick Rude and Irwin R Shyster, from WWE Elite series 41: Lita and from WWE Elite Wrestlemania 32: The Undertaker. WWE Elite are Mattel’s ‘mid-price’ range of WWE action figures that used to be their top of the line range until they introduced the Defining Moments range. All figures were released in roughly the last six months with Undertaker being the newest and Rude and IRS being the oldest.

First to the ring, because he doesn’t care about ‘ladies first’ when there’s tax evaders to prosecute is Irwin R Shyster, alias IRS. IRS was (and sometimes still is) played by Mike Rotunda, who also wrestled under his real name and is the father of Bo Dallas and Bray Wyatt (yeah, IRS fathered those two), when Rotunda came back to the WWF in 1991 after a stint in the NWA promotion (company) he was outfitted with one of the reviled ‘day job gimmicks’ the WWF loved in the early-to-mid 1990s, where instead of a personality a wrestler was given a profession, in this case a tax man. It was pretty silly but IRS got to work with The Million Dollar Man Ted DiBiase as his tag partner and had a feud with Razor Ramon so some good came of it. I personally am not Rotunda’s biggest fan though I enjoy Money Inc. (his and DiBiasse’s tag team) but IRS has become kind of iconic in a way for being an example of crap WWF in the 1990s, not quite as much as Isaac Yankem (DDS) or Repo Man maybe but still a big 'oh god the New Generation sucked' argument, and so I wanted him for my ‘perfect roaster’ but mostly I wanted this figure because I love/loved his Hasbro WWF figure from the early 1990s, which stomped on people and looked really, really, REALLY fucking angry about it. Actually IRS was one of the Hasbro WWF figures I didn’t think was a real wrestler (others included Berzerker, The Mountie and Repo Man – oh yes, that’s an idea, make an Elite Mountie!) for an embarrassingly long time but simply assumed he had been dreamed up for the toyline so he holds an additional significance in my little world, also he looks damn cool, fighting in a shirt and tie, that’s pretty hardcore really – he’s kind of like the WWF version of Colonel Courage (and if you get that reference, you’re as sad as me and I like you).

His Elite figure is a pretty good fit for his character – he looks cool, he stands out, he’s memorable but he’s really nothing special. Though genuine gripes are few and far between – there’s a bit of a big gap at his wrist joints and his double jointed knees look terrible when bent because he’s wearing suit trousers and that always happens when double joints like this are used on baggy clothing but otherwise not much. His belt and braces are an extra overlay piece and can ride up and certainly would during play, making them look weird, but for display this is fine and they push down as easy and they come up and stay there after being given a sharp look and waggling your figure at them. His likeness is decent, my one looks like he’s staring up at the lights (which is fitting) but I think this may be intentional in case you want him looking over or using his glasses, and he has a suitably arrogant and obnoxious facial expression. Like all Elite figures he’s well jointed to where it becomes a detriment to the figure, western toy companies still having not quite figured out how to integrate joints as well as their Japanese counterparts but instead just flinging loads at the toy to give an impression of value – something that usually works and often works on me, fuck you all. He’s the first WWE Elite figure I’ve reviewed with these two-way hip joints replacing ball joints because… I dunno, are they cheaper? Harder to break? Whatever they’re not a good substitute for ball joints at the hips but they do allow for a good range and are excellent if you want your characters to do the splits (and they’re wrestlers, of course you want them to do that), they just don’t allow the figures to articulate the way humans do, buuuuut he’s also boasting what I think are rocker joints at his ankles (they may be a different kind of joint, I can’t quite tell because of the trouser legs and because I get joint names mixed up sometimes, it makes drug taking a messy business) that do actually allow his ankles to work pretty much like a human’s does, they’re very appreciated and work very well. IRS comes with two accessories, which is pretty fucking amazing for WWE Elite (actually he seems to have quite a few new pieces, I’d wager his upper torso is new, plus his head, tie piece, braces and belt piece and probably his glasses too) a briefcase – which I don’t doubt has been used a gazillion times by Mattel already, I’m sure it’s come with every Money in the Bank figure ever made (god I hate the term ‘Money in the Bank’ it’s such a douchebaggy term, did Triple H comes up with it?) but hey, IRS needs a briefcase and it’ll do, I see Mattel’s point. It’s kind of hard to make him look like he’s holding it ‘naturally’, I think the limitations of the wrist joints might be to blame. Also included is his glasses, they are shit, they don’t fit on his head properly, it was very hard to get them out of the packaging without breaking them and they look crap when he wears them. So again, he’s good but nothing special.

Second to the ring is the lovely Lita. I was so excited about Lita getting a figure – Lita, played by Amy Christine Dumas, was/is counter-culture, badass and actually a good wrestler, rarities for women in the 1990s in WWF, she came into the promotion (company) in 1999 (from ECW) and is mostly known for working with the Hardy Boyz, feuding with Trish Stratus and the on-screen and off-screen love triangle she had with Edge and Matt Hardy and best forgotten for that time she did a miscarriage story which WWF has never and will never do well. Lita is awesome and her band is way better than Chris Jericho’s. This hasn’t been the most informative paragraph but I don’t care.

This isn't the best picture for comparison purposes (it's from later on
in her career and she doesn't have her red hair any more) but I wanted a
picture where she looked happy rather than sultry and that's surprisingly
hard to find. 

Sadly this is a Mattel WWE Divas figure and… they’re not very good at them a lot of the time, their amazing Paige and Miss Elizabeth figures are lofty heights to which they rarely climb and a lot of this is down to their likenesses (and in this case having a HUGE left hand, the fuck?). I think a part of the problem here is that her facial expression just isn’t saucy enough, Lita liked pulling a saucy expression and this toy is just…well…delighted, don’t they scan the faces of the wrestlers? I think I heard that, if that’s the case it might just be more what she looks like now (and it does look quite a lot like how she looked at her Hall of Fame induction), scanned or not it’s also one of those ‘from some angles’ likeness, side-on or at an angle it’s a decent attempt but straight on it’s not so hot, however it’s good enough (if it wasn’t I wouldn’t have bought have). Despite having been released after IRS she’s a step backwards, or perhaps to the side, in articulation below the waist: she has ball joints at the hips and no double joint at the knee, the upside of that though is that it doesn’t look crap when she kneels, the downside is that she can’t do the splits and if I was asked who I thought was more capable of doing such a thing: Mike Rotunda or Lita – I wouldn’t pick the bloke who was IRS. Articulation also shows up in my other complaints – her bicep and thigh joins ruin her design the moment you use them, breaking up her tattoo and the trousers seam, I bring it up only because thigh cuts are pointless when you have ball joints at the hips, oh and you could have achieved the same joint by using a different elbow articulation, but that would have meant more tooling costs and I think her trousers might have been expensive. Her accessories are clothes, because she’s a woman, ok I’m being facetious and I actually like these accessories, I’ve said from the stat of these posts that I want more swappable pieces for the figures and Lita has two so I’m pleased. Out of the package she’s just wearing her… I dunno what I’d call that, her black bikini top top thing, but you can give her her white vest top or her neon yellow see-thru top. The yellow top is fabric so I won’t be using it because I avoid fabric on action figures whenever possible but it attaches via Velcro and goes on ok enough, her white top - which I was delighted to see because It’s what I always think of her wearing when I think of her – is soft plastic and I had to look up online how to get her to wear it, she doesn’t come with instructions because no way are Mattel going to pay for that. HER HEAD DOES NOT COME OFF, I gingerly tried this to see if it did, mine made a sickening crack but happily didn’t break, you have to put the top loop up under the back of her hair, pull it over her head and then tuck it under the front of her hair, her hair’s pretty pliable (though still enough to hamper articulation pretty severely on the neck joint) and the top is pretty stretchy but I’d suggest it’s not something you want to do very often if you  want a white shirt that’s not stretched to buggery. On it looks pretty good (the bottom straps do up with a stud the same as the old Playmates Ninja Turtles belts, only a lot better than those belts), maybe a little too big but then you probably couldn’t replicate how tight Lita’s damn tops were without sculpting painting them onto the figure. All in all she’s pretty good but probably the weakest of the four figures here.

Third to make his entrance in the square circle, because with him the lady always comes first, is the man, the legend, the package, the moustache that is Ravishing Rick Rude. Played by, oh my god his name really IS Rick Rude, or rather Richard Rood, played by Richard Rood the character Rick Rude was basically just a very sexy man who would disrobe to thrill the ladies and insult the men, he was part of Bobby ‘The Brain’ Heenan’s heel stable (villainous group) in WWF during his glory days there (’87-’90) where he feuded with my man Jake The Snake. Rood fucked off to WCW for a while where he was part of the Dangerous Alliance before coming back for a very brief stint in WWF in 1997 where he was… Shawn Michaels’ bodyguard after the Montreal Screwjob, bit of a comedown from feuding with Jake Roberts, but he did co-found D-Generation-X (with Micahels, Triple H and Chyna)  - there’s a bit of trivia for ya - before fucking off back to WCW (ending up being the only person to be on both WCW Monday Nitro and WWF Monday Night Raw on the same night due to the latter being taped before he left, and the former being live after he signed with them – more trivia, yay trivia), Sadly Rood is the only member of our fatal four-way to no longer be with us, having died of heart failure on April 20, 1999, way too soon when you consider that most of his Hulkamania-era contemporaries were still wrestling in WCW at that time.   

I love Rick Rude, this figure is great and if I’m right about the scanning thing, absolute proof that Mattel should just sculpt their own likenesses, I’m not sure about the expression – he looks a little bit creeped which is odd because he’s the creep dammit – but it sure as shit looks just like him in all his White-Lionel-Richie-If-He-Was-A-70’s-Porn-Star glory (I thought mine had a paint issue, but it turned out to be Rich Tea Biscuit crumbs, I am a foul and disgusting person), other than his head he’s entirely built from reused parts I think, which is a shame in that it doesn’t allow his trademark physique to be recreated perfectly but I think I might be expecting too much there, they chose the right parts for the Sexiest Man Alive, all my Monster High girls are going to be swarming after this toy. His tights are excellent, not my first choice in terms of pattern but undoubtedly a great choice to represent the character: bright pink and with a woman’s lips on his arse, they’re not the best drawn but then neither were the real man’s tights. Articulation is the only downside again – the arms don’t have the range to put his hands behind his head and his crotch artic (he’s using ball joints there too, though he has double jointed knees like his series-mate IRS) is blocked by the buttocks so he just can’t thrust as much as I’d like, I respect this is not a complaint many will have. His accessory is his robe, because what is a Rick Rude figure if it can’t strip, it’s nice enough – looks a little cheap really, reminds me of the clothes you get with knock-off Barbie dolls you can exchange your tickets for in amusement arcades – but my fabric aversion and my general desire to have the ravishing one at his derobed best prevent me from using it for my shelf, still damn right he should have come with it and thank you Mattel for realising this.

His hat looks fucking huuuge in this
picture, I assure you it doesn't look that
big in-hand

 *lights go out* *bell gongs* *dry ice and smoke rises* finally welcome to the ring the Phenom, the Dead Man, the Undertaker!  I’m a bit of a fan. The Undertaker, played by Mike Calaway, debuted in WWF in 1991 and hasn’t left since, making him the longest running employee of the company, another cartoony gimmick in an era of them, the Undertaker was a supposedly a, well, an undertaker who may or may not be undead and is impervious to harm (up to a point) but somehow this didn’t fail like all the others, mostly because that’s fucking cool and Calaway has more presence than Christmas. ‘Taker has been both hero and villain, ranging from a hell’s angel to the lord of darkness, and has numerous feuds including those with Mankind, his on-screen brother Kane and Brock Lesnar and has been in some of the most well regarded WWF matches of all time alongside the likes of Shawn Michaels, Edge and the aforementioned Mankind and Lesnar, he’s also a big deal backstage, acting as a kind of unofficially official locker room sheriff. The less said about his ‘American Badass’ phase and that time he wrestled a giant man dressed like a caveman and an Al Qaida terrorist (not at the same time) the better.

This is Undertaker as he appeared at Wrestlemania 31 – despite appearing in a wave called WWE Elite Wrestlemania 32 but, well, boys toys often make no sense, the WWE rarely makes sense, put ‘em together and that sort of shit’s gonna happen. Sadly this means that he has short hair but that’s pretty much my only real complaint about the figure itself and that’s not really a complaint but a personal preference. Ok it’s not my only complaint but those complaints are complaints I make over and over again and I’m sure you’re all sick of them, his double jointed knees make him look awkward when the knees are bent because he’s wearing baggy trousers and he does not in any way need thigh swivels, but at least here it’s not so bad as it doesn’t disrupt the design of his trousers much at all. Other than that he’s pretty damn awesome, he comes out the box wearing his accessories – a leather coat that’s fabric and his trademark hat which is plastic, both have their issues but can navigated – like with Defining Moments Sting the coat is a little unwieldy but it not as bad as that figure’s and personally I don’t think it’s any more unwieldy than Undertaker’s actual jacket looks to be, obviously I’ve never worn his coat because he keeps spotting me before I can get to his wardrobe but y’know, from what I’ve seen on telly it doesn’t look too different, it’s also a lot more poseable than Sting’s is but it still could have done with some bendable wire in there for better control and some awesome posing. His hat is a little loose (and I keep putting it on the wrong way because I’m stupid) which can make putting it down low for maximum moodiness a little more difficult that it should be but it’s hardly worth mentioning, it’s also a much better fit here than on the last Undertaker figure where it made his head look tiny. Speaking of head (what does everyone want?!?...), his head sculpt is fantastic (and actually fits his hat this time) but…I have noticed, at certain angles, if you squint, that it does look a bit like the Big Bossman and as the Udnertaker once hung the Bossman on pay-per-view….well….let’s move on shall we? Under the coat they’ve bothered to give him all of his tattoos – and he has a lot – which could go a long way to explaining why this figure was a higher price than the regular Elite figures – though I think Wrestlemania sub-series figures always are – but I don’t mind paying extra for this level of detail. As I’m apparently keeping tabs on this, ‘Taker also uses the standard ball joints at the hips.

So who’s going to win our Fatal Four-Way? Well after IRS is stretchered out when Lita kicks him in the balls – his fancy leg joints allowing for her to do this perfectly – the Deadman just gets the pin on Rick Rude via the finisher of being able to replicate more iconic poses, specifically the pose I wanted him in on my shelf, when you have two figures at satisfying as these you have to get down to reasons like that to separate the two. All four though are decent, all have great and suitable accessories, though I can’t imagine releasing an Undertaker figure without the urn packed in, even if he had stopped using it by the timeframe the figure is supposed to represent, it just seems unnatural, but then I am talking about a wrestling zombie so…which is a point, for the new WWE Zombies line (I’m buying Paige, I don’t care how pathetic the concept is, I must have undead Paige) they’ve produced a Zombie Undertaker, does that mean he’s a double zombie? Anyway with that said, all I have to do is warn you to beware the Hower Power, cheers all.

Quick Crappy Review: Masters of the Universe Classic Darius*

Mattycollector, the online collector’s wing of Mattel and the people behind Masters of the Universe Classics, is a fucking mess at the moment;  they can’t seem to keep employees for longer than a few months and just about everything is being delayed. The usually defeatist fan base is even more negative about the future of Classics and ThunderCats Classics (which hasn’t even started yet) and I’ll be honest all the doom and gloom and how much sense it makes, the longer time between figures, missing my chance to get Anti-He-Man and my general lack of enthusiasm for what turned out to be the first five months of figures (nothing wrong with them, they’re just not characters/versions of characters I’m particularly mad about, I haven’t actually kept a single Club Grayskull figure so far and won’t be keeping Skeletor either I don’t think) have really eaten away at my ability to give a shit. I tried to get it up for a quick crappy review of Vultak but it didn’t happen. Thankfully that’s come to an end, there’s only one figure in the latter half of the year I’m planning to unload (Filmation Beast Man) and in fact we’re getting a whole bunch of characters that are highly anticipated here in AFBland, and this upswing in enthusiasm begins with Darius.

Quick Crappy Review: Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Dimension X Fugitoid & Out of the Shadows Kraang*

Shred-der I have a new toy out, why hasn’t that idiot dwitefry reviewed it yet?

Yeah still haven’t seen Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Out of the Shadows yet and here I am doing a quick crappy review of another toy from it. Both of today’s figures were birthday gifts and it was both delightful and saddening when you consider that I received the same characters on the same day, only about 25 years previous but due to their long tenure with the franchise I have a lot of affection for Fugitoid and Krang so managed to fight down the existential questions raised by that fact.

Seven Examples of Things I Waste My Money On (Yes, Again): Bootsale Report 4!*

Unbelievable it stopped fucking raining long enough for Sunday morning to be hot and sunny – y’know, like how June’s supposed to be – this meant that for once the weather was on the side of us boot sailors and although far from the giant size it can reach the bootsale was big, varied and very dusty and bloody hot, what it wasn’t was very busy though – perfect conditions except that nearly everyone selling decided to stay at home and or I dunno, do stuff with their fathers, it was father’s day after all – but my father lives miles away and I wasn’t seeing him so instead I spent three hours trawling through other people’s old shit now covered in an extra layer of dust and other people’s hand sweat, lovely!

The end result was actually pretty good (and cheap too, I spent less around £20) but sadly very lacking in action figures, which is the main reason I go to these places, well that and being exceptionally nosey. The good news is that this, another bloody Examples of Crap I Waste My Money On article, will be quite varied, the bad news is this is another bloody Examples of Crap I Waste My Money article, so are you sitting comfortably? Then I’ll begin (again):

Eight Examples of Crap I Waste Other People's Money On: Birthday 2016 Edition!*

I had another birthday, I tend to have approximately one a year , this one was a ‘big’ birthday, I was 30, I’m not dealing with this and frankly every time I have to acknowledge it it makes me die a little more inside but to fuckery with missing out on a chance for easy content so I’m gonna keep mentioning it, and keep wanting to jump in front of large moving vehicles, so long as I can milk it for blog posts. In this case a birthday means presents and in my case presents means a mix of things for children, things for people who never stopped being children and an array of things that would seem completely inexplicable to anyone who doesn’t know me on a personal level, and you know what that means right? That means another bloody Examples of Crap I Waste My Money on post. You’re so lucky.

Top 30 Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Stories Numbers 15 to 1*

On the 13^th of June I turned 30, I’m not dealing with this so instead I decided to both ignore and celebrate me lasting so long by writing a whole bunch of top 30 countdown lists.

< Part 1

15. Turtles in Space

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Season 1 Episodes 25-26, Season 2 Episodes 1- 5 (4Kids Entertainment, 2003)

Written by Greg Johnson, Michael Ryan, Eric Luke & Marty Isenberg

Wha’appen? The Turtles' search for their sensei Splinter leads them to the TCRI building. Their attack on it doesn’t go quite to plan, mostly because TCRI is a front for aliens called Utroms, they do have Splinter though. During the battle the TMNT accidentally set off a transmat, a teleporter they’re standing on, and end up teleported across the universe and wind up befriend Professor Honeycutt alias the Fuigtoid – who’s wanted by the humanoid Federation the dinosaur-men of the Triceraton Republic because he knows how to build a Teleportal, and both sides want it for its military advantage. 

Why? Given the sheer amount of adaptations in the 4Kids cartoon the law of averages was on the side of there being an episode/set of episodes on this list that adapted a story that wasn’t also on this list: that wound up being Turtles in Space. Why? Because it makes the comic book version completely redundant, it’s actually a very faithful adaptation but it also expands on the story greatly, spreading it over 7 episodes to give us more time, more time to see D’Hoonib, more time to develop characters like Mohzar, Blanque, Zanramon and even the Fugitoid, more time to get across the feeling of being trapped in the Triceraton games, more time with Triceraton culture and the addition of Traximus, he might just be Russel Crowe as a dinosaur but he’s awesome none the less – and does all of this without sacrificing pacing, the arc never feels too long to me, despite the fact that it’s over 2 hours all together. In summary this does everything the original comic does, and everything the original comic should have done and would have done.

14. Night of the Rogues

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Season 7, Episode 6 (Murakami-Wolf-Swenson, 1993)

Written by David Wise

Wha’appen? While Krang goes about the plot of the episode, Shredder finally has enough of Bebop and Rocksteady and decides to form a new group of underlings – recruiting The Rat King, Scumbug, Slash, Anthrax, Tempestra and Leatherhead and rebuilds Chrome Dome. With the Turtles Forced to retreat the Rogues Gallery use their heads and draw them out by attacking locations in New York, with no choice the TMNT respond, are captured and Splinter is forced to recruit his own ‘replacement team’ – Zach the Fifth Turtle, Casey Jones, April and Irma.

Why? Because everyone comes across really well, Shredder finally gives up using two morons and recruits proven quantities (well, in-universe, this is Scumbug and Anthrax’s first appearances in the show); Bebop & Rocksteady prove their superior qualities – brute strength and loyalty; the Rogues are shown as incredibly formidable making the Turtles fleeing actually seem the right decision – in fact only Chrome Dome is actually defeated in combat (by Master Splinter), the rest split when they realise they’re not getting paid – the Turtles go into a trap knowing it’s a trap but go anyway because it’s the right thing to do; Casey Jones attacks an 8-foot robot with a hockey stick; Master Splinter figures out how to defeat said robot despite being a three foot rat armed only with a walking stick and ninjitsu and backed up by three humans with no skill and a madman with sports equipment, none of which are very useful against 8-foot robots; fuck me even Zach’s useful – twice; April’s a useful source of information and, well Irma’s the least useful but she’s not annoying. Also all of the jokes succeed, Raphael is particularly enjoyable this episode which means a lot coming from me as I hate this version of Raphael.  The downsides are two: Townsend Coleman is voicing Shredder and he’s pretty awful at times (which is a shame because otherwise the voice acting’s great, even Zach’s less annoying than usual) and the human/mutant working together moral mean we don’t get to see local mutants like Muckman, Mutagen Man or Mondo Gekco in Splinter’s team⁹.   

13. Showdown

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Season 1, Episodes 25-26 (Nickelodeon Animation Studio, 2013)

Written by Joshua Sternin & J.R. Ventimilia

Wha’appen? The Kraang are ready for the invasion that is known as the Invasion of Earth, bringing the Technodrome forth from Dimension X to mutate the planet, but the Turtles are confident, after all they need April (basically as a stabilising agent) and they don’t have her, so they go to take down TCRI and succeed, but they’re too late and the Technodrome has arrived (and in this canon, can fly). To make matters worse almost as soon as they’re gone The Shredder, via a mind controlled Kirby O’Neil, has kidnapped April and successfully lured Splinter to his base of operations, and now Splinter is here, he has given Miss O’Neil over to his partners who are the partners that are known as The Kraang. So while Splinter and Shredder duel for the first time since the fire that irreparably changed both their lives the TMNT need to infiltrate a flying battle station, destroy said flying battle station, save April and fend off the giant Kraang Prime. Easy, right? 

Why? A good finale shouldn’t just tie up plot points from the season (and tease some for the next), it should be one big line of “Fuck Yeah!” moments, be they awesome acts of bravery or touching quiet moments of reflection or everything in between, they should make you say – in some context or another – fuck yeah, and preferably give at least one of these moments to each of the major characters, and most of all it should feel like a satisfying resolution. Showdown does all of this. While everyone does get a great moment (Raphael gets multiple, my favourite being his method of ‘distracting’ some Kraang, though kicking Kraang Prime in the face is also pretty awesome) the episode really belongs to Leonardo and Splinter, which is fine because this show has the best versions of both characters in the franchise’s history. Leo shows he’s willing to give his life to save his team – twice – and Splinter shows us how awesome he is and indeed how human he is, he has a fucking panic attack when he realises he’s going to have to face the Shredder (the episode also has April confront Splinter about why he never goes topside to help his sons, something that really needs to be brought up more than it is). To make things better this a finale solely based around the most iconic of Turtles villains – The Shredder and Krang (or Kraang Prime) – indulging in their most iconic plots – a duel with Splinter and getting the Technodrome out of somewhere to wreak havoc (with the additional bonus of the Technodrome ending up stuck at the bottom of somewhere), with a spattering of fan favourites like General Tragg, Metalhead, The Mousers and Karai, so I suppose the story is best if viewed through the eyes of someone who’s been with the franchise for a long time and knows a lot about it but it serves as a fantastic finale for the first season as well, and introduces the new kids to more iconography that we old bastards have known and loved for years - oh and Raph dances at the end, it is brilliant.      

12. Insane in the Membrane

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Season 4, Episode 19 (4Kids Entertainment, 2006)¹⁰

Written by Matthew Drdek

Wha’ppen? Against Agent Bishop’s advice, Baxter Stockman – now reduced to a brain a robot body – clones himself new body and via ‘cerebral transfer’ is flesh once more. But that flesh is dissolving and as his body degrades Stockman’s mind is going with it, hallucinating about his mother and finally going off the deep end, now resembling a zombie-cum-Frankenstein’s-monster he decides to make April O’Neil pay because his broken mind has deduced that she is responsible for his life going down the toilet.

Why? The sorta-infamous banned episode that Fox Kids wouldn’t let air because it was ‘too graphic’, and yeah it really is pretty graphic, and terrifying, but it’s also fantastic. 4Kids Baxter Stockman is easily the best Baxter Stockman, Laird’s embargo on using anyone who wasn’t original or from the Mirage comics lead to Baxter being used far more than he ever had been before and thus far more developed than he had been before, and while he was still a looser (with a macabre running gag of Shredder lopping off more and more of his body parts) he wasn’t a joke or a dork but a serious scientist and often a legitimate threat, this episode gives us a rather tragic look into one  of the franchises favourite butt-monkeys, at what it’s like to grow up to be a failure – to remember a time when you were going to be a success and remember the people who thought you great and destined for great things, in this case his mum (I can relate), it’s kinda weirdly powerful – and then there’s a long horror movie style chase and battle with a man who’s rotting and completely bonkers, always a good thing. A tragic and tense episode that proves that Stockman is a character worth respecting even if he never got any respect in-universe.

11. Get Shredder / Wrath of the Rat King

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Season 8, Episodes 1-2 (Murakami-Wolf-Swenson, 1994)

Written by Tony Love

Wha’ppen? Scrambling around after the loss of the Technodrome Krang, Shredder, Bebop & Rocksteady their plan to utilize the derelict Hall of Science at the abandoned World’s Fair is interrupted by the Turtles and Krang’s old weapons designer Berserko (who’s using the same building!) believing the TMNT are holding Krang (it’s Berserko) Shredder holds the Channel 6 building to ransom. With the Channel 6 building in rubble Burne Thompson starts a propaganda war against the Ninja Turtles causing them to doubt themselves, Shredder recruits The Rat King and Krang has The Rock Soldiers send him the Shockwave, a weapon he can’t use without a body but will still grant him incredible power. The turtles find faith in themselves by the end and put The Rat King in prison and the Shockwave in pieces but the Channel 6 building is gone, the Turtles are wanted criminals, Burne and Vernon have turned on them and April has been fired, and Shredder & Co are still out there.      

Why? The Red Skies have arrived, and that means a massive upswing in quality when it comes to writing, animation, logic and the threat posed by the villains. Shredder becomes the monster he should be, blowing up the Channel 6 building even though the Turtles bring Krang to him, just because they were late and the Rat King has all the presence of his Mirage counterpart (and is actually a far larger threat than that Rat King). This two-parter really feels like the last hurrah for the show, it isn’t – Shredder and Krang will be responsible for this season’s finale and they’ll be two more seasons (and Shredder & Krang will be return in those too) – but the inclusion of the Rat King and the Channel Six crew (who’ll both be gone by the time the finale of this season starts) and the larger roles of Bebop, Rocksteady and April (April isn’t even IN the finale this season I think) make it feel more like a finale than the actual finale and not just that, but a finale that’s also the story featuring these characters that we always deserved.

10. Return to New York

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles issues 19-21, Tales of the TMNT issue 70 (Mirage Studios, 1989 /2010)

Kevin Eastman, Peter Laird, Eric Talbot, Jim Lawson

Wha’appen? Frustrated and having defeated Leonardo in a physical fight over his plan, Raphael returns to New York to hunt The Foot and kill The Shredder, who seemingly returned from the dead and drove them out of the city. His rather fruitless quest takes an unforeseen but positive turn when he encounters Zog, an insane and hallucinating Triceraton driven mad by living in Earth’s atmosphere, and he knows where a Foot Clan base is. Pretending to his Commander Zoraph Rapahel is able to order him around, and when his brothers catch up with him they use him to locate and then launch a full scale attack on the Foot HQ, and once they’ve put down the Shredder Mutants and reached the man himself, heads will roll¹¹

Why? The story was already good enough to make my top 10 before they released Tales of the TMNT 70 to remove the only real complaint I had with Return to New York by showing us Raphael taking command of Zog. As to why it’s so good? Well it’s a Mirage story written by Eastman and Laird that has Triceratons, the Foot and The Shredder all in one violent (and actually pretty emotional) blockbuster; it has one of the best Leonardo/Raphael fights in the franchise, in fact until the TMNT CGI film came out I’d say it WAS the best and it has one of the best Turtle/Shredder fights in the franchise, so why is it number 10? Because it’s filled with great stuff with great art and great writing buuut there are stories I personally like more.

09. Krang War

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Volume 5 issues 17-20 (IDW Publishing 2013)

Kevin Eastman, Tom Waltz, Ben Bates

Wha’appen? With Rock Soldiers marching on their capital city, the Neutrino royal family dispatch their best soldiers – Dask, Zak and Kala – to retrieve the Fugitoid from Earth, just as April, Casey and four hidden TMNT are grilling him (in his human disguise as ‘Chet’) about unrelated matters. Of course the Turtles end up teleported to Dimension X and Planet Neutrino and of course they end up involved in an assault on Krang to rescue the kidnapped King and Queen, especially as Michaelangelo is now infatuated with Princess Tribble. So as Raphael and Zak lead a frontal assault and Doantello and Fugitoid work to come up with a contingency plan, Leonardo, Donatello, Tribble, Dask and Kala break into the old palace for an inevitable confrontation with General Krang.

Why? Because it is everything I wanted from a serious re-imagining of these concepts, in fact it is just about everything I would have done if given the chance (though I would have kept the Neutrino’s hepcat dialect I think) with the Neutrinos as resistance fighters and Krang as the massive physical threat (and a Utrom) actually, if you read Krang’s dialect in Pat Fraley’s voice you find they did a good job of keeping his character pretty much intact even while he’s being stone cold badass (though he’s less funny, but then everything is less funny in IDW). This leads to an excellent TMNT vs Krang & The Rock Soldiers battle with a fantastic confrontation with Krang himself (though sadly only with Leo and Mikey) which we just don’t see enough of. It’s not 110% perfect (Kala really doesn’t have a personality) but it’s so bloody tailored to me it’s in my top 10.  

08. Dinosaur Seen in Sewers! / Annihilation: Earth

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Season 3, Episodes 24-26 (Nickelodeon Animation Studio, 2015)

Written by Todd Casey and Brandon Auman

Wha’appen? When Slash and Dr Falco are beaten by a thought mythical ‘dino man’ Raphael is able to calm him by pretending to be his commander 'Zoraph' and seeing a chance for to have an attack dinosaur, takes it. Figuring out his insane ramblings – caused by being unable to breath properly in Earth’s atmosphere – Raphael deduces the Kraang are back and his dino-man is Zog from the Triceraton Empire, an enemy of the Kraang. Using Zog the TMNT are able to track the Kraang to their base in the Statue of Liberty and help Zog recover his gear and his mind – a terrible mistake, Zog is determined to send a message to his race to destroy Earth now it’s infested with Kraang and is willing to sacrifice his life to do it. The Turtles’ confidence that they’ve stopped an invasion of super strong dino men is ruined by the arrival of a Utom named Bishop, who tells them that the Triceratons are on their way with a black hole generator at the same time as Kraang Prime and Iago Kraang Sub-Prime resurrect the Technodrome. As Captain Mozar’s forces prepare to launch their machine the Turtles, Casey & April, Splinter The Mighty Mutanimals, Muckman, Mondo Gecko, The Shredder, The Foot, Fishface & Rahzer, Tiger Claw and Bebop & Rocksteady all stand against the invading dinosaurs but all still seems lost, and in his final moments Shredder decides to finally take his revenge, regardless of whether Splinter is making the last-minute dive to prevent the Earth from being destroyed or not. Oh and Fugitoid – and he’s voiced by The Tenth Doctor.

Why? Fun fact, my favourite TMNT villains are the Triceratons and from the moment I finished watching Annihilation: Earth Part 2 I knew that this arc had replaced Turtles in Space (4Kids version) as my favourite Triceraton story even though that’s only half because of the Triceratons. Dinosaur Seen in Sewer is all about the Triceraton element (well that and all the good jokes about the finale of Crognard), it adapts a favourite part of one of my favourite Turtles stories obviously but it also gives us something we never got to clearly see before, Zog (as an identified character) in full control of his senses and, well, he’s a villain because the Triceratons are villains, I actually made the actual squee noise when that happened. Annihilation: Earth (which is parts 2 & 3 of the story, I dunno why they named part 1 different) though has its appeal in the fact that even after multiple viewings I still can’t believe they’d do it, what is ‘it’? Pretty much everything – I can’t believe they make the Triceratons such a threat (sure they were threat before but they never destroyed our planet before), I can’t believe they killed off Kraang Prime and Kraang Sub-Prime, I can’t believe they’d allow Shredder to remain in character and do what we knew Shredder would always do if he had the chance – kill Splinter and everyone else be damned, I can’t believe they destroy the Earth and I can’t believe they got one of my favourite actors to voice Fugitoid! Pile on top of that all kinds of great ‘finale’ moments like a huge team-up, awesome entrances and the sacrifice of the Turtle Blimp (my favourite vehicle), the debut of this version of Bishop, and Casey Jones (who wasn’t in Showdown) and this has to be in the top 10. My complaints are twofold: they didn’t unleash Mutagen Man despite him being stored in their lair and they made Muckman look like a chump – I’ll buy Mondo Gecko getting his arse kicked (even if don’t like it) because he was set up as a pathetic fighter in Meet Mondo Gecko but Muckman was pretty formidable in The Noxious Avenger, it’s a shame is all, because I really like Muckman and I should think, no demand, that everyone who had his toy as a kid feels the same way.             

07. Fifteen Years Later…

Turtle Soup Volume 2 issue 4 (Mirage Studios, 1992)

A.C. Farley, Richmond Lewis

Wha’appen? On their way to battle The Foot the TMNT momentarily run into a city worker Raphael thinks he recognises, little do they know that this is Chet, the boy who bought them and lost them down the sewer and have, after 15 years of guilt and nightmares they’ve just given him peace

Why? This is four pages long but it makes me want to cry, but in a good way; Mirage was the only universe where the Turtles got to meet their original owner, albeit ignorant to the fact they’ve just run into their previous ‘dad’ and at the location where Splinter found them no less. It turns out Chet’s been having nightmares about the Turtles, seemingly sharing a basic psychic link (a result of the Mutagen maybe? Did he get a drop or two on him?) which is a bit of a convenience but it does stop him seeming unrealistically obsessed with four turtles he lost the day he bought them and seeing Chet ‘reunited’ with THE tank and then his turtles is just so wonderful. The story basically succeeds via what it doesn’t say and do as much as it does, letting you figure out what’s going on and becoming heart-warming but slightly sad at the same time, the TMNT never knew who they met, but Chet did.

06. Tale of the Yokai

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Season 3, Episode 20 (Nickelodeon Animation Studio, 2015)

Written by Brandn Auman

Wha’appen? After helping Renet stop Savante Romero in medieval England the TMNT are caught in a time storm and find themselves 15 years before their present, in Japan, in the days leading up to the fire that cost Homato Yoshi (Splinter) his wife and daughter and transformed Oroku Saki into The Shredder. 

Why? We’ve seen stories set before the death of Tang Sheng before (4Kids did one, for instance) but none as good as this and none who fleshed out the Pre-Shredder Saki, the Pre-Splinter Yoshi and pre-bled to death Tang Sheng so well as this. We get a Homato Yoshi who isn’t perfect and pure, we get a Shredder that’s almost sympathetic and a Tang Sheng who’s actually a character and we get the Turtles interacting with all of them – I’m not sure we’ve ever seen the TMNT interact with Tang Sheng before this. If I’ve mentioned Splinter’s late wife a lot so far this it's just that she’s one of the major reasons I like this episode so much, Sheng is SO important to a lot of TMNT backstories but she’s never really much more than a prop for Saki and Yoshi to feud over and for Splinter to avenge but here she’s an actual person with flaws and inner conflict and a personality and everything and she’s really attractive, watching this makes me understand why both men would fight over her, she’s great. The Turtles pretty much run through the standard time travel plot points – change, can’t change, try and keep things unchanged, end up keeping things the same – but this is all new to them and the shock and emotion they display feels very genuine and just seeing them interact with these people who they’ve heard about so much but never actually met (in any incarnation? They’ve interacted with de-mutated Splinter before but have they ever met them in the past?), these three people have defined the course of their lives since they mutated after all.

05. Everyone Versus Bebop & Rocksteady

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Volume 5 issues 39-40 (IDW Publishing, 2014)

Kevin Eastman, Bobby Curnow Tom Waltz, Mateus Santolouco

Wha’appen? With Donatello avoiding his brothers due to sub-plots, Splinter, Leonardo, Michaelangelo and Raphael meet up with Old Hob and his fledgling Mighty Mutanimals (Slash, Mondo Gecko, Pigeon Pete and Herman the Hermit Crab) because of sub-plots. All goes to plan until Pete arrives with his two potential recruits – Bebop and Rocksteady. Despite the reveal, Old Hob at least tries to recruit them until he finds out they’re half human, deals with this by shooting them and thus the battle begins.

Why? Because it’s a two-issue battle with Bebop & Rocksteady and not just any Bebop & Rocksteady but IDW’s Bebop & Rocksteady, easily the best versions of the characters. The huge and completely awesome battle that follows, that also draws in Nobody (Angel in this universe) and Alopex, has everyone who isn’t a mutant pig or rhino unleashing everything in their arsenal while said pig and rhino crack jokes and don’t even break a sweat, in fact the only time the two aren’t downright jovial is when Rocksteady’s concerned about contracting rabies from Alopex because he hates needles and what we’re left with is both the best Bebop & Rocksteady story and the best advert for the two characters – want a reason why people like these two so much that isn’t based solely on nostalgia? Read this two-parter; they are put over perfectly, they’re very funny, daft as arseholes and damn near unstoppable, wonderfully it’s Splinter and Mondo Gecko that deal the most damage to them during the fight, the two smallest and physically weakest characters, by electrocuting them with power lines, but even plugging them into a city doesn’t stop them, Herman has to drop a building on the bastards to keep them down long enough for the characters to escape, hell the final way they beat these two (many arcs later) was by having them take each other down. This is pure fun and pure awesome, the only downside is Santolouco because I hate the way he draws the Turtles’ heads, they look like squashed Baby All-Gone or something.

04. Return of the Shredder

Leonardo issue 1, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles issue 10-11 (Mirage Studios, 1986)

Kevin Eastman, Peter Laird, Mike Dooney (with Steve Bissette and Ryan Brown)

Wha’appen? Christmas Eve, as the Turtles, April and Splinter prepare the tree and turkey, Leonardo is ambushed by the Foot while out exercising and beaten half to death by them and a returned Shredder, a man who supposed to be dead. Thrown through the skylight of April O’Neil’s store Second Time Around Leonardo heralds the return of the Turtles most recognisable enemy as the ambush continues throughout the flat and the junk shop below, luckily the Turtles and friends have a Deux Ex Machina, or should I say a Deux Ex Goongala – Casey Jones is here to save the day?

Why? Eastman and Laird did a pretty good job aping their inspiration/object of parody Frank Miller’s skill for fight scenes right from the start but they perfected it with the first two parts of this arc, as such there’s not a great deal of dialogue going on in this story, especially the first part (there is some, and nearly all of it fine and dandy) but it’s all the better for it, why would ninjas be bantering when they’re trying to kill each other? Instead we start the story with a perfectly laid out and ‘timed’ battle with Leonardo coming across as perhaps the most competent he has ever looked and when you figure that he’s easily the most competent ninja on the team and is always shown to be so that’s some accolade, we then get the big fun fight, perhaps the fight that most people think of when they think ‘Ninja Turtles’ – puns, banter but good action – as the three remaining Turtles and Casey Jones battle through Second Time Around, my favourite being ‘Mr Foot meet Mr Fist’, so we get two kinds of fight and they’re both great, superbly ‘choreographed' and brilliantly (and moodily) illustrated by Eastman, Laird and their friend Zip-a-Tone. To wrap things up we get a lovely focus issue on April O’Neil that doesn’t involve her being kidnapped, instead she just deals with what’s happened and narrates the fall-out as the Turtles recover in Northampton¹². This top 10 is kind of shaping up to being a list of ‘The best X story’ from the franchise – we’ve had the best Krang story, the best Bebop & Rocksteady story, the best Triceraton story and then in this case we have the best Leonardo story, the best Foot story and the best April story.

03. Terracide

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Adventures Volume 2 issue 55-57 (Archie Comics, 1994)

Stephen Murphy (as Dean Clarrain), Chris Allan (with John' D'Agostino, Eric Talbot & Brian Thomas)

Wha’appen? The Mighty Mutanimals are dead – Mondo Gecko, Man-Ray, Leatherhead, Jagwar, Dreadmon, Wingnut and Screwloose have been gunned down by Null’s Gang of Four¹³, the Future Turtles’ Raphael and Donatello have arrived too late and Null has changed the past, now he intends to go one further, killing the present TMNT, Splinter and Ninjara and then destroying time, why? Because he’s Satan and that’s what Satan likes to do. Allied with Maligna and her insect aliens and Null having turned Candy Fine (Mondo Gecko’s girlfriend) into his new concubine it’s Raphael, Leonardo, Donatello¹⁴, the two Future Turtles, Splinter, Ninjara and Slash (the last Mutanimal standing) versus four robots with dead bodies grafted to them, an invading alien race and the devil himself.

Why? Holy shit, Archie TMNT’s darkest story and its biggest triumph, let’s just restate the set up shall we – 8 anthropomorphic animals versus four heavily armed robots, an alien race and THE DEVIL – the stakes are high, I believe anyone can die and unlike a modern crossover event I believe they just might be major characters – again Leatherhead is dead, the whole Mutanimals are dead – why would they worry about killing Slash, Ninjara, Maligna or even one of the TMNT themselves? The only person we know isn’t going to die (permanently) is Null, the only character we want brutally murdered. It’s rare that killing characters actually works to say ‘shit just got real’ instead of saying ‘we want a clear-out’ ‘no-one of consequence will die’ or ‘you don’t really think this means anything do you?’ – The Mutant Massacre, Terracide and Earth-3’s death in Crisis on Infinite Earths are the first three that come to mind (and those three were all done for ‘clear-out’ reasons!), which means that Terracide is keeping pretty good company  if nothing else.  

Moving past the deaths the story has two great villains behind it, both having their last hurrah and though both end a little anticlimactically (Null escapes though again he’s the devil, or some kind of personification of evil or greed or all of the Captain Planet villains combined or something). That said the villains are beyond a credible threat, they have killed Mondo Gecko, Leatherhead and Wingnut & Screwloose as an opening salvo, if Null says he can destroy time just because he wants to, I believe he can do it and there’s no doubt about how evil he is after he SHOWS A YOUNG WOMAN HER FRIENDS AND LOVER BURNING IN HELL (they’re not really in hell) just to knock her out and then turns her into a sex slave, and Maligna has an army of bug men – and watching the heroes slaughter their way through them is as shocking as it is awesome – she may not be evil personified but she’s well backed up. The tension in the story is high, there are brutal and pretty intense fight scenes, just read the damn thing , you might want to read the last part of Megadeth (issue 54) first but the story and art on Megadeth is piss poor so maybe not¹⁵.

02. I, Monster

Tales of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles issue 4 (Mirage Studios, 1988)

Jim Lawson, Ryan Brown

Wha’appen? While recuperating in Northampton the Turtles and Casey investigate a supposedly haunted factory, but they’re being hunted too, by a ‘monster’ in the form of The Rat King, who ties up Michaelangelo and tries to feed him to his rats, and that’s just the beginning.

Why? This issue is all about atmosphere, and by god it’s tense and by god it’s creepy and by god the Rat King is insane, if you don’t think a comic character can be scary imagine actually being around the Rat King of this story, then imagine being tied up and unable to move, it’d be like being kidnapped by the most unnerving drunk homeless person you’ve ever bumped into and convinced yourself didn’t creep you out because you’re not that sort of person and the uncanny valley doesn’t affect the would-be politically correct, who also smells like swamp. Again when I write ‘Ninja Turtles versus rats’ you may not think that’s too unnerving, now imagine being attacked by rats and you don’t have a gun or even a fire extinguisher or hose just sticks and swords and your bare hands and feet *shudders*. It is sad that The Rat King doesn’t get to physically engage with the Turtles (and is seemingly dispatched with one throwing star) but that somehow adds to the ghostly quality to him which the ambiguous ending just makes better/worse, the mysterious and haunting nature of this story being a major part of its appeal. Oh and this is the best Rat King story.

01. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: The Movie

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (New Line Cinema, 1990)

Directed by Steve Baron, Screenplay by Todd W. Langen & Bobby Herbeck

Wha’appen? A crime wave is sweeping New York City and April O’Neil is covering it and getting up police chief Stern’s nose by doing so, it seems this crime wave may be perpetrated by… ninjas? Stern isn’t the only person April’s pissing off, when the Foot Clan confront her, she is saved by the TMNT, as the crime wave gets worse, as April’s boss’ son becomes involved with the Foot (who are recruiting youths), as Raphael meets Casey Jones, as Splinter is taken by the Foot Clan, April becomes more and more involved in the world of mutant ninja turtles, leading to her junk shop being burned down and having to flee the city after Raphael is badly beaten in an ambush and they’re helped escape by Casey.

Why? Simply put it’s the perfect mix of TMNT – it has the atmosphere and serious tone of the comic books, as well as the comic book characterisations of Casey Jones, Raphael and The Shredder mixed with the elements of the first cartoon series (no Bebop and Rocksteady sadly but they probably would have hurt the film more than helped it) including Michelangelo’s characterisation, it adapts TMNT #1 & Raphael #1 so well it made putting them on this list redundant, it introduces one of The Shredder’s best lieutenants in the franchise with Tatsu¹⁶ and it’s real; all real, no CGI, just Jim Henson’s workshop doing what they do best. It includes everything you need in a Turtles story – a Raph/Leo argument (a fight would have been better perhaps), huge battles with the Foot, a confrontation with the Shredder, the Shredder/Splinter conflict and a confrontation arising from it (which is explained in this one Michael Bay TMNT film! If you explain it it will actually have weight and oh look Splinter doesn’t have a top knot because this film quite rightly deduces we can tell a Japanese man without him needing one), Casey motherfucking Jones, running away to Northampton (without the seemingly requisite filler, thus this is easily the best ‘exile in Northampton’ because it’s short and powerful rather than long and filled with time wasting bullshit like poachers and alien princesses and sexually harassing bigfoot and turducken Chimeras that April can mentally connect with and aaaargh!), it’s all in here complete with decent acting and fight choreography that only becomes better the more you think that the stunt men doing it are wearing fly-eye masks or giant rubber latex turtle suits. I love every minute of this film, I even quite like Danny Pennington (though I like Keno better) the only complaint I have is that they switched Burne Thompson for Charles Pennington, I get adding Danny, he helps move the plot forward and even serves as a bit of an audience identification character now that April was such a recognised part of TMNT she couldn’t serve that purpose properly at the time, but why change April’s boss (and the channel she works for) for no reason? 

And that's it, hopefully you have been enraged enough to post why I am completely wrong and X is far better than X and that you all went and read Terracide, and personally I have always liked 'cowabunga'. 

9 though Mondo Gekco and half the Punk Frogs, plus Tokka and Rahzer, did return in a later episode this season ‘Dirk Savage, Mutant Hunter’ which only just missed out on being on this list, I’m sure it’s devastated.  

10 as this episode was banned from airing in the US, this is the air date for the UK (how times have changed, once upon a time it was us censoring TMNT), it’s first airing on American telly was in 2015. 

11 yes I AM proud of that

12 beginning one of the longest running traditions in Turtles – the Turtles must fuck off and dick around in a farmhouse for a while, the movie, 4Kids, IDW, Nicktoons, they’ve all done it.

13 Murphy and Ryan Brown had a deal in place to develop a Mighty Mutanimals television show (with corresponding merchandise) but the deal fell through while the Mutanimals’ ongoing series was cancelled, apparently this is why they decided to kill them all off, this may have given Archie TMNT its most shocking moment but that’s a bit petty don’t you think?

14 Michelangelo – who had been temporarily blinded in a previous arc – had been picked up by the coast guard after their plane was brought down by the Gang of Four.

15 just to keep up the trend of monitoring Murphy’s possibly involuntarily Captain Planeting, we do get a few panels in part 3 with the characters being horrified at the concept of deforestation (Which is what killed Slash’s planet and why he likes palm trees so much in this universe), I think he honestly can’t help himself, unsubtle preachiness just comes out. 

16 as much as I like Hun, I would have far preferred to have had Tatsu in 4Kids as Shredder’s human subordinate. 

I made a funny!