On the 13th 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!
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