NickToons TMNT Episode 4- New Friend, Old Enemy

 By Mark Rodriguez with thoughts from Johnny Rodriguez

Originally written on October 9, 2012. Keep in mind, these were our thoughts as they were back in 2012 when the show was new and was written shortly after seeing the episodes after their initial broadcast. At the time we had zero way or knowing what to expect.

The episode begins somewhere in the city as a ninja master is sparring with The Foot. Shredder suddenly arrives and the man assures him that he has made an army of ninjas in the city. Shredder tells him that his old enemy Hamato Yoshi is still alive, and is training ninjas of his own. The man swears to find them, but Shredder insists that he works with a street thug named Xever that knows the city’s underworld. The man doesn’t get along with Xever, but Shredder doesn’t give a damn. They MUST work together under his orders to destroy Hamato Yoshi.

The Turtles are jumping across rooftops, having a contest of who does the most impressive flips. Mikey finds a cat and soon sees its owner in a nearby apartment. Mikey is eager to return the kitty to its rightful owner but the other Turtles think he’s crazy for exposing himself to a human. Mikey is sure the owner will appreciate having his kitty returned to him and will become a new friend…. But the guy just freaks out and the cat attacks him. There’s little time for Mike to get bummed out as suddenly they are attacked by the ninja master and the Foot.

Of the Turtles, Leo is the happiest to finally be fighting with humans instead of robots, aliens or weed monsters. During the fight, the ninja master wonders what the Turtles are. Police sirens make the ninjas run away, and the Turtles are surprised that there are other ninjas in the city. Back to the sewers, Leo tells Splinter that the ninjas weren’t fighting fair. Splinter knocks Leo down with his staff and pins him down, proving the point that in a fight one doesn’t fight fair, they fight to win.

Mikey still wants a human friend, and April suggests he uses the internet. After searching through My-Face… Mikey finds the famous martial artist Chris Bradford, who happens to be in town. Mike ‘friends’ him, and surprisingly enough, he replies right away. Mikey then decides to head out to hang with him.

Mikey meets up with Chris Bradford, who proceeds to attack him right away. After Mike explains that they met online, Chris decides to go along with it and invites him to his place.  Later that night, the Turtles study the rooftop in which they were attacked by the Foot, Mikey keeps bragging to everyone about Chris. Since no one cares, he heads off to meet up with him again.

Chris teaches Mikey his famous secret kata, the Death Dragon to gain his trust. Even though it was supposed to be a secret move, Mikey can’t help but brag and show it to his brothers. Mikey gets a message from Chris and heads out to hang with him. Splinter walks into the room to see the Turtles practicing the Death Dragon Kata and is shocked since this is one of Shredder’s moves. Realizing that Mikey is in trouble, they head out to save him. Sure enough, Mikey is attacked by the ninja master and the Foot, and surprised to see that he was Chris all along. Mikey is captured and tied up. Xever wants to kill Mikey, but Chris says they need him alive for the trap.

The Turtles sneak in and rescue their brother. However, that was part of the plan, as Chris, Xever and the Foot follow the Turtles down the sewers hoping to find out where they live. The Turtles saw this coming and slowly capture the Foot Ninja one by one while hiding in the shadows. Soon Chris and Xever discover they’re alone, and the Turtles emerge from the sewer water, ready to take them down. After an epic fight in which Xever showed off some Brazilian fighting skills, Mikey defeats Chris with his own Death Dragon Kata. The Turtles open up the drain pipes and blast them down the drain with sewer water. Maybe it wasn’t a fair fight, but they did win.

Even though the Turtles have won for now, Splinter is afraid that this is only the beginning since Shredder not only knows about him, but he knows about the Turtles as well. Meanwhile, Raph has a little talk with Mike to make him feel better after Chris’ betrayal. Mikey gets ‘revenge’ on Chris Bradford by going to his My-Face and ‘Unfriending’ him.

My Thoughts- 

 This was an interesting episode as the show never ceases to surprise me with the way they introduce characters. Just like the last episode had the Turtles try to get a cellphone video from a rude fat guy, this episode introduces the Foot Ninja by having Mikey befriend Shredder’s Chuck Norris look-alike right-hand man on a wannabe Facebook. You can’t make this stuff up.

There are a lot of high points to this episode, including all the awesome fighting. The fight scene in which the Turtles fought Chris and Xever was pretty sweet, and it’s always good to see the Foot Ninja as well. Splinter’s way of teaching Leo how real fights don’t have to be fair was cool, and hey, Raph has a soft spot and cheers Mikey up when he’s down. 

Now the complaints and nitpicks. Although it’s too soon to say, right off the bat Chris starts the episode by calling Yoshi ‘Splinter’, even though they don’t know he’s a mutant rat yet. We have yet to see if this was a mistake… or if Yoshi already had the nickname Splinter when he lived in Japan. Even though this is Shredder’s first strike against his enemies and the introduction of the Foot Ninja, this was clearly a Mike episode. I do like Mikey… but he still seems too dumb and annoying. Bragging like crazy over being friends with Chris reeks too much of 2K3 Mikey in the way he used to annoy the hell out of his brothers. We didn’t need to see Mikey not knowing how to spell ‘wrong’ and naming his toes…. The whole line of ‘I have to do human friend stuff… you know how it is… oh wait, you don’t…’ was kinda douchey though…. but I have to admit… I did laugh when he thought the ninja master was ‘that guy with the cat’ from earlier.

April’s appearance in the sewer lair was super random. We haven’t seen how she met Splinter yet and already she’s chillin in the lair. And for that matter… why is she chillin in the lair when her father has been kidnapped by alien robots??? He could be dead or mutated for all she knows, but watching this episode alone, you’d never know that. Now I know you can say ‘well this isn’t a Kraang episode, this is a Shredder episode’ or ‘The Kraang don’t have to be in every episode’.. BUT the main problem of them going out to find and rescue April’s father remains. Instead of playing around on the rooftops without a care in the world, they could have said they were looking for The Kraang when they were suddenly jumped by the Foot. The whole Kraang thing just seems completely forgotten about in this episode.

And finally…. How INCREDIBLY CONVENIENT for Mikey to just happen to friend Shredder’s right-hand man of all people on ‘My-Face’. Talk about good luck falling on Chris’ lap since he was sent to capture those very Ninja Turtles. I’m surprised no one made a big deal about Mikey just heading out to meet some random human he met online. It’s not like he’s a mutant turtle that must keep his existence secret from the world so he doesn’t end up being captured and dissected in a lab or something.

As for the Foot.. while Chris and Xever kick some ass (and hey, props to Chris wearing armor that pays homage to Mirage Shredder), but the regular Foot Ninjas are chumps. They did get some hits in, but for the most part they’re useless in battle. I know the Foot are always throwaway cannon-fodder in other incarnations, but they usually put up more of a fight in their first appearance, and here they basically went down without breaking a sweat.

Either way, for what it is, it was still an entertaining episode and it good to see some sweet ninja action. And the whole scene of them emerging from the sewer water… and capturing the Foot Ninja one by one… it was like a mix between Batman bad-assery and hardcore Ninja awesomeness. That whole scene made the episode.

Johnny's Thoughts-

Johnny- This is another action packed ep of TMNT, and having Chris Bradford as Shredder’s right hand man makes this an interesting ep. The only thing I didn’t like about this particular episode is how they really made Mike too dumb and naive….but I guess that’s how he gonna be in this series. And just for some extra info, Chris Bradford is voiced by Clancy Brown, who also voices Lex Luthor in the Superman animated series and the Justice League series.