TMNT Saturday Morning Adventures Continued # 4

 By Mark Rodriguez

The adventure continues as the Turtles are still trying to figure out what item the Shredder stole when they were under the control of the Rat King. The Turtles just had an adventure in Turtlantis where they fought with Slash. What will happen next? Special thanks to Third Eye Comics on picking these issues up.

"Swapping Pads Part 1" opens with Krang trying to slice into the rock Shredder stole with a laser torch without making a dent. Krang asks Shredder how his ancestors managed to forge the other half of the rock into a sword. Shredder says they used magic. Krang says he has access to tools from another dimension and contacts General Traag. General Traag tells him they have a zero-matter scalpel, but zero matter doesn't interact well with the dimensional transporter. Krang doesn't care for the details and tells him to contact him when he's ready.

Elsewhere, Leonardo asks Professor McGuffin what would Shredder want with the rock, which they find out is a meteorite. The professor explains it was sent along from TCRI's Tokyo lab. They find out that the rock is made of an alien metal. It's so dense that they can't cut it or melt it, so they sent it to his lab to see if he has better luck. Donatello says he might have an idea of what Shredder wants with it and how to track it down. Raphael asks why McGuffin is wearing the Turtlantis armor they brought him. He says he doesn't have an anthropology department so he's just wearing it around the lab.

Back at the lair, Donatello figures out that if the meteorite is as dense as McGuffin said, Shredder would need Dimension X technology to reshape it. Michealangelo asks what if Shredder doesn't want to reshape it. Donatello asks what else would he do with it, and Michealangelo imagines Shredder using it as a basketball and going for a slam dunk. 

Donatello says he's been working on a sensor to detect Dimension X energy, so whenever Shredder opens a portal, they should be able to detect him. Leonardo says they still don't know what Shredder's plans are. Raphael says they'll figure it out since they always do. He also adds if they were lousy heroes, their merch would never sell.

Back to the bad guys, General Traag is ready to send the zero-matter scalpel but warns that it could still react unpredictably with the portal. Krang doesn't care and wants the tool now. Traag sends the tool but the portal seems to fizzle and nothing comes through. Krang asks where the tool is, and Traag says it interacted with something else between dimensions and it was redirected. He will send them the coordinates.

The zero-matter scalpel appears on a tree stump. Leatherhead happens to find it and says it looks like some kind of fancy gun. He aims it at the tree stump and it blows up. Leatherhead says he's going to have some real good times with this fancy gun.

Back at Donatello's lab, they pick up the signal of the dimensional portal. Michealangelo recognizes the location as being where the Punk Frogs live. He says they can check it out. Donatello says it might be too dangerous and they should go there themselves. Raphael says it could be nothing and Shredder will have a field day in their absence. Splinter suggests that two of them can go and two of them can watch the city. Leonardo asks if that will leave them at half strength. Splinter says that since the Punk Frogs are in the area, they can enlist their aid.

At the Florida swamps, the Badd Family are riding a boat as they're on the getaway after their latest caper. The boat runs into a trap and the family is sent into the river. The Punk Frogs appear, Genghis, Napoleon, Attila and Rasputin, having caught them for stealing the till from Shep's Country Store. One of the guys pulls out a gun but Napoleon whips it out of his hand. The frogs tie up the Badd Family and Genghis is about to call the cops but they get a message from the Turtlecom. Leonardo says they could use a favor. 

Two days later, Raphael and Donatello are in the Turtle Van heading towards the swamps. Raphael says he will complain to his manager since they shouldn't be adventuring any further south than Staten Island. Donatello says he had a portable version of the energy sensor, so they should find it in no time. They find Rasputin and Attila who show them to their boat. Raphael complains about the bugs Rasputin happily eats them, saying that's the point of living there.

Donatello, Raphael, Napoleon and Attila ride the boat and follow the signal. Raphael says even so, the odds of finding anything in the swamp will be a million to one. Just then the boat explodes, leaving the heroes in the river.

Leatherhead shows up, being happy to find something to shoot with, and now having found something to shoot at. He shoots at the heroes, telling them to jump like the frogs they are. Donatello wants to correct him and say that they're not all frogs. Raphael prefers to leap in and snatch the weapon away from Leatherhead. One of the blasts grazes the turtle's shell, and the others offer to help. 

Attila spins his flail, but Leatherhead grabs it and throws him back into the others. Donatello hits him across the back with his staff, telling him the device he's using is dangerous. Leatherhead whips his tail out and trips him up, calling himself dangerous. The mutant Cajun gator aims the weapon at Donatello but it stops working. He figures it's already broken and tosses it aside, deciding to take out Donatello the old fashioned way. Donatello flips out of the way before Leatherhead could smash him with his fists. Shredder is watching the fight from a tree. 

Raphael asks Rasputin if he has a boxing glove arrow or something. Rasputin says he could never get one to fly, but he does have a special arrow. The arrow lands a bit away from Leatherhead, and the gator says he missed. Attila says "he didn't" as the arrow explodes with a flash of blinding light. Raphael asks why he didn't tell them it was on delay and Napoleon says the arrow being soaked must have thrown things off. Donatello says it's alright as long as they get what they came for. Still blinded by the light, Donatello reaches around trying to find the zero-matter scalpel. Suddenly a grappling hook latches onto the tool as Shredder whips it back towards him. 

Leatherhead regains his eyesight and says the heroes are out of tricks. Raphael tells the others to go for the river and stay underwater as long as they can. He tosses his sai at a hornet's nest and it bonks Leatherhead on the head. The wasps chase after Leatherhead and Raphael says he thought he'd have thicker skin.

Later on, Raphael finds his sai but Donatello says he lost the signal. Rasputin asks how he knew the wasps would chase after Leatherhead and not them. Raphael says the hornets saw him, not them. Raphael tells Donatello they'll get another chance to get the gizmo, since this feels like a long-term subplot. Donatello says since the boat was smashed, it's going to be a long swim back to the Turtle Van, so they might as well get it over with. Raphael says all the fresh air is going to give him a complex. 

My Opinions- 

First off, of all the random cameos, I never thought I'd see the Badd Family ever again. These guys were from the episode 'Donatello's Badd Time', where they stole the Turtle Van and used it to commit crimes, and since Donatello was last using it, the others thought that he went bad. It was a short cameo, but now I wonder if we're going to see Don Turtelli and Pinky McFingers in future issues.

I like the overall concept of the Turtles and Frogs doing some sort of exchange, since it gives us a chance to see more of Rasputin and Attila. I think buying four similar looking turtles was one thing, but buying four similar looking frogs was drawing the line, so originally Genghis Frog was the only one to get an action figure. Later on, Napoleon got one too but the figure made him looked more like a horned toad. I'm thinking due to this, the last few episodes to feature the frogs featured more of Genghis and Napoleon since they got action figures to promote. 

It would be cool to take this opportunity to see more of the frogs' personalities, but I guess we run into that double-edged sword since this was based on the show. In the cartoon, all of the frogs had pretty much the same overly nice and polite personalities. On one side it would be nice to see the frogs evolve with some differing personalities, but if they did they'd be too different from the show. Either way it was nice to see more of them and to see this split Turtles and Frog team up.

Like before we get art that is super accurate from the show to the point you'd think they were just animation cels taken from some lost episode that never aired. Also like before, I wish they didn't waste pages on all the alternate covers to devote more time to the action. However, the Turtles running from Leatherhead and letting a hornet's nest take care of him is on par with the type of 'action' the cartoon would show. 

The Shredder gets to be more of a competent and sneaky foe, getting the zero-matter scalpel before the Turtles, Frogs and Leatherhead could notice. It helps when the plot isn't directly centered around you.

The only nitpicks I have is how Raphael's shell was only 'grazed' by a weapon that is supposed to be powerful enough to slice through alien metal that nothing on Earth can. I'm pretty sure just lightly touching the shell would have been enough to blow Raphael up. Also for Leatherhead, while they got his basic manner of speaking down, they forgot to throw in some 'by gumbo' and 'I ga-ron-tee' in there to make it more show accurate. I mean, you can't have Leatherhead in the comic without his catchphrases. You're telling me they did their homework to get the Badd Family in the comic but not enough to get one 'I ga-ron-tee' out of Leatherhead?

Next issue we'll see how Genghis and Napoleon fare in the big city as the Turtles face Baxter Stockman. Finally, the frogs face the giant mutant fly. Everything's bigger in the city.