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thecomicsnexus · 6 years

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Turtle Soup

Turtle Soup #1. September, 1987. By Bernie Shuman, Danny Shuman, Steve Bissette, Frank Bella, Stan Sakai, Eric Talbot, Jim Miller, C. A. Stormon, Francis Mao and John Downling.

"Turtle Dreams" by Steve Bissette.

In April’s apartment, Splinter meditates, contemplating the evils of the night. Suddenly, the Turtles smash through the window, exhausted from battle and carrying a grim package: the grievously injured Michaelangelo. Splinter inspects the wound and finds that Mikey’s plastron has been split in twain and the gash nearly reaching his internal organs. Splinter quickly binds the wound with herbs and bandages and urges his sons to sleep, only to find that they’ve already passed out.

Each Turtle is plagued with unspeakable nightmares. Raphael leaps at a giant gaping maw head-on, only to be swallowed whole. Leonardo chops his way through a horde of nightmarish monstrosities, only to eventually become overwhelmed by their numbers. Donatello takes flight against his enemies on a winged dinosaur, but the monsters of the night tear both his steed and him down.

Michaelangelo is worst off, as he is fighting for his very life within the dreamscape. Mikey finds himself cut completely in two, revealing his still-beating heart. “The Mate of the Night”, a decomposing haggish monstrosity, reaches down, plucks out his heart and devours it.

In the waking world, Splinter sees his sleeping children struggling. Returning to his meditation, Splinter seeks to psychically rescue them from their nightmares.

The Turtles then find themselves in a linked dream. They are all babies again, paling around on a beach. They are approached by their momma turtle, who leads them down to the depths below the waves. There, they sleep peacefully, curled up with their mother.

Back in reality, the Turtles sleep soundly at Splinter’s feet, having been saved from their mental anguish.

"Pesticide" by Frank Bella.

As Leonardo walks down the street, expounding on how most turtles like to hide in their shells, he sees his brothers besieged by giant cockroaches. Revealing that he prefers to face trouble, Leo draws his blades and charges into action. As he does so, he contemplates, “I knew New York had a roach problem, but jeez!”

"Turtle Soup and Rabbit Stew" by Stan Sakai.

Leonardo falls through a portal, crossing time and space, before popping up in the world of Miyamoto Usagi. He assumes it has something to do with after-effects of meeting Renet in #8, and soon encounters a group of aggressive samurai. Nearby, Usagi gets into a fight with a bunch of ninja. After defeating their respective enemies, Leonardo and Usagi are just about to attack each other, when Leonardo disappears, and comes back into April's apartment.

"The Howl" by Eric Talbot.

Raphael is patrolling the city when he comes across a big dog, which turns out to be more of a werewolf. After a short fight, a mysterious man enters and takes the werewolf with him, thanking Raphael for finding it.

"Showdown" by Jim Miller and C.A. Stormon.

As the Turtles and the Varmints (Lucky the aviator rabbit, a detective hamster and a samurai duck) both round the same corner, Leonardo and Lucky smack headfirst into each other. Neither leader is willing to admit fault and both demand satisfaction for the slight. Both groups fight, but prove equally matched in battle. Leonardo comes up with a solution of his own; he’ll act as ref while his brothers and the Varmints compete in a rooftop relay race.

Mike and the hamster are first off the line and scale the nearest building via the fire escape. They leap off the first roof and onto the second, but come in too fast and crash into the next members of the relay.

The samurai duck and Raphael recover at the same time and each take swinging lines over to the third building. Unfortunately, their lines get tangled and both slam face-first into a brick wall.

Eventually, they tag Lucky and Donatello, who race across the roof and leap down into the alley where the finish line awaits. They smash into craters in the concrete. Leonardo declares the race a tie, but the detective hamster insists that Lucky was first.

The samurai duck says he has an ancient Japanese tiebreaker and produces the Jewel of Solutions from Ti-Quack. The jewel zaps them with an “aura-monster” that puts both groups into a deep trance. By the time the jewel finishes working its magic, both groups have completely forgotten about the encounter and wander off their separate ways.

"Apparition" by Francis Mao.

Midnight in an alley on South 5th Avenue, and the Turtles are all badgering Don as to what exactly they’re doing there. Don relates his story one last time…

Just after 11 o’clock, Don was heading to the grocery store for April when he bumped into a distressed young man on the run. Only briefly shocked at meeting a giant turtle, the young man had more important things on his mind and hid both himself and Don from a car full of gang thugs that were hunting him. The man introduced himself as Sal Pitela. A local gang, the Daggerlords, had invaded his apartment and taken his wife and children hostage. Sal managed to escape but he feared what might happen to his family if he didn’t get help. He asked Don to meet him outside his apartment on South 5th Avenue at midnight while he tried to get help from the police.

Well, it’s midnight and Sal is a no-show. The Turtles begin discussing what to do when they hear a woman’s scream coming from Sal’s place. They decide to intervene, while Don stays behind and waits for Sal. As his brothers invade the apartment and begin knocking gang-banger heads, Don is approached by the shadowy figure of Sal, appearing from a darkened alleyway. Sal tells Don that he didn’t make it to the police and that it’s up to him to save his family. Don joins his brothers and dispatches with all the thugs.

Mrs. Pitela (thinking the Turtles are wearing weird gang costumes) thanks her saviors, though Don reveals that it was Sal, outside, who was the real hero. Mrs. Pitela conveys shocking and tragic news that it couldn’t have been Sal that Don had talked to a moment ago, as the gang had shot him earlier when he was trying to escape and carted his corpse back to their apartment. Don and the Turtles investigate the bedroom and Don IDs the dead body on the bed as Sal Pitela.

As the cops clean up and the Turtles disappear, Don ponders what exactly it was that he saw in the alley…

"You're in the Army Now" by Bernie Shuman and Danny Shuman.

Lounging around April’s apartment, Leo and Don figure they’re due for a vacation. April suggests they visit her uncle in Trenton and they jump at the chance. Unfortunately, they arrive at the bus depot late and have to chase down their ride. They soon find that they’ve hopped onto the wrong bus, as they’re dropped off at Fort Dix; an army boot camp facility!

Leo and Don try to explain the mix-up to Sgt. Heartbreak, but he figures them for a couple of goldbricks trying to weasel out of their enlistment. He sends them to get their haircuts, uniforms and medical exams and the Turtles reluctantly comply.

4am the next morning, boot camp begins in earnest and Leo and Don are put through the works: 4-mile marches, 20-mile hikes, tear gas chamber, obstacle course, etc. Having trained in ninjutsu their whole lives, they find Heartbreak’s regimen a breeze, but feel he’s being too hard on some of the smaller recruits. Next up is one-on-one with the pugil sticks and Heartbreak challenges any private to take him on. Seeing a chance to get some payback, Don accepts and quickly knocks Heartbreak off his feet. Rather than get upset, however, Heartbreak is impressed. When Lt. Jones calls him in to warn him of a terrorist threat to their post ammo dump, Heartbreak suggests putting his two best recruits, privates “Atello” and “Nardo”, on guard duty.

Leo and Don stand a lonely vigil outside the ammo dump late into the night and, as predicted, a van full of terrorists open fire. The Turtles take cover as the terrorists break into the ammo dump and begin looting the goodies. Don has a bright idea and the Turtles commandeer a nearby tank. Don rolls over the terrorists’ escape van then he and Leo take the villains out with hand-to-hand combat. Heartbreak arrives on the scene and sees that “Nardo” and “Atello” have everything under control. He is so thrilled, he decides to put them up for citation.

Later, April receives a letter from Leo and Don explaining their predicament. Mikey and Raph join her on a trip to Fort Dix to straighten things out. The General gladly offers Leo and Don honorable discharges and the Turtles leave Fort Dix with April and their brothers. Jokingly, Raph and Mike suggest they take their next vacation at Parris Island.

"Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles" by John Dowling.

Down in the sewer lair, Raphael callously bursts through a portrait his brothers are painting. As they yell at him, he says that he’s off for Hollywood. Catching a ride on the bumper of a car, he arrives at JFK and snakes aboard an airplane via the landing gear.

A week later, the Turtles lament Raph’s absence during a poker game. Raph, meanwhile, is living it up on the beaches of Hollywood, surrounded by several naïve blondes. He tells them that he is a Testudon alien that has come to Earth to save humanity from the Prodigian shape-changers. In fact, he’s making a movie about it right now in order to warn the world of the alien threat! Raph’s agent, Monty, then swings by and picks him up for a ride to the studio. Monty shows Raph a piece of concept art for the Prodigian villains (shapely alien women) which the art department created to his precise specifications. As Monty and Raph drive off, the two blondes transform into Prodigian alien women. They are disturbed that a Testudon is on Earth and even more disturbed that he suspects their invasion. They decide to accelerate their plans.

During the ride, Raph recalls how when he first arrived in Hollywood, he couldn’t get a job because mutants were passé. He then saw a photo of an anthropomorphic turtle in a newspaper, labeled an “alien”, and decided to use that as a basis for his invasion cover (which landed him a gig with Monty).

Monty and Raph arrive at the studio and find a horde of Prodigians battling a horde of Testudons on the set. Monty tells Raph that the invasion has begun before they could make their movie, while Raph is just shocked that his whole phony story was true. Raph pulls Monty from the path of a Prodigian laser tank and both pile into Monty’s car. Raph drives the car full-speed into the tank, exploding both vehicles (and killing Monty). Still on fire, Raph battles the remaining Prodigians and takes them all down.

The fight over and the Prodigians captured, the Captain of the Testudons thanks Raphael and escorts him back to their spaceship. The Captain explains that the Testudons and the Prodigians have been waging war for all of recorded history. The Prodigians were exiled to Earth in the form of a penal colony, but when the Testudon’s registered anthropomorphic terrapin life similar to their own on the planet, they came back to remove the Prodigians before they could take over. Raph asks how he could have known the whole story when he pitched his script to Monty and the Captain says something about residual psychic energy.

Suddenly, the producer starts shaking his fist at the spaceship, demanding reimbursement for the damage done to his studio. The Testudons then flee and drop Raph off in New York on their way home. They invite Raph to come live with them on their homeworld, but Raph declines.

From Turtlepedia

From this set of stories the two I will remember are “You’re in the army now” and “Apparition”, as they are unique enough to bring new artists. And also because those were the ones I enjoyed the most. The other stories are original and have a unique style as well, but the stories didn’t appeal to me.

I give the issue a score of 7.

#turtle soup #tmnt #teenage mutant ninja turtles #modern age #comics #review #1987

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calliecat93 · 6 years

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Callie Reviews: TMNT 2012 Season One (Part One)

Ever since 1984, the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles franchise has gone form a cult-status indie comic to a massive mass market. There have been various comics, movies, video games, merchandise, and of course cartoons. And it’s easy to see why. TMNT’s concept, a group of mutated teen turtles fighting evil in New York, is both incredibly bizarre and incredibly appealing to a mass audience. You have action, science fiction, martial arts, and of course plenty of mutant ideas to make toys out of. The fact that this Fall will be releasing the fourth animated TMNT series and that a new movie series is in production shows that even over 30 years later, this is a franchise that is far from losing it’s power.

As a kid, I of course knew that Turtles as a thing and I even watch parts of 2k3. But I was never really a fan until the day I stumbled upon the 2012 show. I fell in love with it and, since it started when I was just starting this blog, it was a huge focus for me for several years. I have since moved on and while I’m going to check out the 2018 show, I don’t think I’m going to be as crazy as I was with this show (but never say never). Back in 2012, I was someone who... lets say ignored the flaws and defended the show far too passive aggressively to the point that looking at my older stuff makes me want to blow up by blog.

Nowadays, while some of my opinions hold true (like the ‘Donnie is a stalker’ accusations are still bullshit), I am more willing to admit the shows problems, especially now that I can take the show in fully. I also like to believe that I’ve become a better reviewer since I was 19 years old, plus it had been far too long since I went back over the show form the very beginning. So does the show still hold up? Will 25 year old Callie feel differently than 19 year old Callie did? Well we’re about to find out. This is the TMNT 2012 Season One Review!

The Premiere (Episodes 1-2)

Our story begins with a training sequence that introduces us to the titular Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Leonardo, Raphael, Donatello, and Michelangelo. Along with some minor character establishment, like Mikey being the funny one and Raph the violent one, the biggest thing here is one of the shows strengths: the choreography. It’s best exhibited in Leo and Raph’s duel. The movements are very fluid and well-paced. It’s fast, but not too fast, it’s enough to move things along but still let you take in all the impacts. It’s very well done. Raph ends up winning and we are introduce to the boys mentor and father, Master Splinter. Aka, the best written character int he show, but we’ll get to that later.

After the opening theme, we cut to the boys 15th Mutation Day where we get our backstory. Borrowing from the 80′s show origin, Splinter was once a young man named Hamato Yoshi. He had just bought four pet turtles when he stumbled across a shady dealing. Being a ninja master, he was able to fight back, but he ended up getting splattered with a strange green substance. This turned him into a rat, as one brushed his ankle while the baby Turtles become anthropomorphic. Yoshi, taking on the name Splinter, fled to the sewers and raised the four turtles as his own as well as taught them ninjutsu. It’s a simple, but still solid telling of the origin that pays tribute to previous origins, leaves some mystery about the substance and who was dealing it, and is told with use of comic-style panels reminiscent of the original comics.

The Turtles, having lived in the sewers since their mutation, are hoping to convince Splinter to let them finally go to the surface. After some begging, Splinter reluctantly agrees. We then cut to Leo watching a Star Trek: The Animated Series parody where we learn of his desire to become a great hero and leader. This is interesting for several reasons. One, it establishes that Leo isn’t the leader of the group yet, a departure form normal as he’s normally put into that role automatically. And second, ti does a great job at character establishment. In previous versions, Leo is often seen as the boring, overly leader type. Not a bad character mind you, but he lacks the quirkiness that the tough Raph, genius Donnie, and wild child Mikey present. Here? Leo is shown to be an idealistic, naive, but good-intention kid who aspires to be a great hero like he sees on TV as well as give shim some dorky characteristics, like quoting cheesy one-liners to sound more heroic. It helps make him more relateable, funny, and sets up a character arc for when he does inevitably become the leader. Very well done.

The boys finally go to the surface, and are in awe of what they see. They even discover their trademark favorite food, pizza. Given that they only ever ate worms and algae until this point, it makes their love of it all the more understandable. But not all goes well as they soon witness a group of business men kidnapping a red-haired teenager and her father. They attempt to help, but end up only beating each other up and the bad guys get away with their captives. Mikey ends up beating up one and discovers... a brain with tentacles... yipe... he tries to tell the other three, but they don’t believe him. A common trend in the show.

Upon returning home, the boys try to blame each other for the failure before Splinter accepts it for not giving them proper training as a team. While he considers keeping them down below for another year, Donnie convinces him to let them go help the girl due to seeing how terrified she was and how they failed to help her... and because of the crush he developed in a record five seconds. Splinter agrees, but first assigns Leo as the official leader, much to the ire of Raph. They’re eventually able to find the kidnappers vehicle and wreck it, capturing the driver named Snake and they discover a vat of a glowing green substance. A vat that they recognize as the same one that caused their original mutation.

Snake, after Raph threatens to mutate him, leads the boys to the facility where the captives are... and uses the boys bickering as a chance to escape. Leo uses this to trick the crook into thinking that they’re going to plow his van into the place as he conducts a plan to sneak in. All while Roah is an asshole who refuses to listen and outright undermines Leo’s orders. Yeah, Raph is a real jerk during this season. FYI. When Leo shows hesitance about his plan, Splinter tells him of his final confrontation against his rival Oroku Saki, aka The Shredder. It ended in his wife being killed, his house burning down, and his infant daughter nowhere to be found. Well, that won’t be important in any way, shape, or form later! The point being that he lost everything, but gained the boys, easing Leo’s worries about how much is riding on the plan.

So yeah the boys crash the van, Snake gets mutated, the boys break in, fight some guards, and Mikey proves that he isn’t crazy about the aliens.. and then trips an alarm. Smooth Mikey, smooth. They find the captives, that being this version of April O’Neil and her scientist father. Now in most versions, April is an adult woman. Here? She is aged down and is around sixteen years old. We’ll talk more about that later. The bad guys, aka The Kraang, take the captives away and as the boys give chase,t hey are confronted by the mutant Snake... who is a weed monster. Hey, that’s breaking supervillain rules writers! If you have an evil sounding name, that’s what you turn into! Donnie is sent to rescue the O’Neil’s as the other three face Snakeweed... Mikey’s idea, not mine.

The boys eventually defeat Snake via Leo’s direction and mass electrocution while Donnie is able to rescue April, but her father is taken away. April plans to find him however, no matter what it takes with the boys promising to help in whatever way they can. Once home, Leo finds out the complex reasoning for why he was named the leader over everyone else... because he asked. Ming-boggling, right? Well there is actually another reason, but we’ll talk about this in S4. The boys also made the news as their shruriken got found, but come on, what could one tiny news story do that would be bad? Well... being seen by your master’s worst enemy and re-igniting his lust for vengeance might count! Woopsie!

Overall, a solid two parter. It establishes the characters well, has fun fight scenes, the animation is a little dated now but still pretty good, the dialogue is funny, and it does a good job setting up future plotlines while fulfilling it’s own plot. It started 2k12 off on the right foot and was still enjoyable over five years since it’s initial premiere.

The Beginning (Episodes 3-8)

The episodes following the premiere create a steady flow of creating the status quo. You have episodes like Turtle Temper, Metalhead, and Monkey Brains (kinda) that have the boys dealing with the Kraang’s Plan of the Week as they continue their mutagen experiments. It helps with character development and some minor plot progression, such as Raph learning how dangerous his anger can be and Donnie learning to rely on his instincts rather than on his mind 100% of the time. Some are going to want me to comment on the shipping stuff, But I’m gonna save that for later. The biggest issue with these episodes, aside from Monkey Brains, is the Kraang. They are not interesting as villains at all. As great a VA as Nolan North is, the Kraang’s way of talking just gets... annoying. It doesn't help that the threat ultimately becomes either an accidental mutant or Donnie’s robot... well okay a Kraang possessed the later, but it shows that those are more interesting villains than the Kraang themselves and they exist mroe to just have an excuse for a plot. It’s really irking after awhile.

As far as plot goes, it’s mostly your usual ‘Monster of the Week’ stuff. But it has some small things that have a larger impact later. For one, in Monkey Brains, April begins to tap into what looks like some strong emphatic abilities. More on this next season. But due to this, Splinter decides to take April on as a student and train her to be a kunoichi (a female ninja). This will be the largest part of her character for the remainder of the series. April herself... is not utilized as well as she could have been in these early episodes. She’s described as the boys guide to the outside world, and she does serve that in some respects. For example, introducing Mikey to social media in New Friend, Old Enemy to let him make friends without exposing his mutant identity. And in Never Say Xever she takes them to a blind man’s shop so that they can actually experience life topside for once. The issue is we never see April establish bonds with the boys or Splinter after her introduction. In New Friend, Old Enemy she just acts like she’s been friends with the guys for awhile and after showing Mikey the net, doesn’t appear or is even mentioned in the episode again. She disappears after her importance in Metalhead as well, but she is given mroe to work with there at least. I glossed over this when I was watching the show and April does get mroe time with the guys, her relationship with Splinter being one of my favorites. Still, they didn’t do a lot with having April become part of the group or really act on her role as their ‘guide’ and I feel they just wanted to ignore it to get to the other stuff. Which is just a bummer.

So you’re probably wondering about Shredder stuff, right? Well thankfully the Foot Episodes are also the most plot relevant episodes. It starts with New Friend, Old Enemy where Shredder arrives in New York and assigns one of his lieutenants, a famous martial artist named Chris Bradford, to find out about Splinter. The Foot end up encountering the Turtles, with Bradford later using this to manipulate Mikey after accidentally becoming online friends with him. He captures him and use shim as bait to lure out the other three and then follow them to where Splinter is hiding. It fails with the boys using their knowledge of the sewers to literally wash Bradford and his partner, Xever, away. Along with the dangers of meeting people you don’t really know on social media, the episode presents a very unique lesson. In a fight for your life, screw fairness, You fight by any means necessary to stay alive, including fighting dirty. Most shows emphasize on being fair, but this one actually acknowledges that if your life is on the line, you do what it takes to get out alive. It’s a unique message for a kids show and one that I really appreciate.

Next is Never Say Xever where Xever gets to lead the charge. After the boys track down the two and get beat up, Xever receives inlet from the Purple Dragons, who int his version are pretty much a trio of teen thugs. The Turtles fought them off earlier at the shop April took them to, with Leo sparing the leader as an act of mercy. Something that Raph takes umbridge with... as he does with most anything that Leo does in the first half of the series. It’s no surprise that Leo and Raph butt heads, as they do in most series, and it follows their respective arcs. Leo having to deal with being leader as well as realizing that it’s much more pressuring and unforgiving than he thought, while Raph act son his jealousy that Leo got the position even though he’s the better fighter and therefore questioning Leo’s orders or outright just being an asshole for no good reason. But after the shop owner is kidnapped to lure the Turtles out, Leo’s act of mercy ends up saving them as the lead Dragon repays the favor by throwing him back his discarded sword. Which Leo uses to break a water tower to wash the bad guys away again. Angered, The Shredder decides to handle the Turtles himself.

The episodes do a good job in establishing a solid status quo. Bad guy does a thing, one character has their B-Plot to deal with, there’s a clash, the plots intertwine, bad guy gets defeated, and the lesson of the day is learned. A simple routine, but it works here. Plus we get plenty of character establishment and moments which makes you care about them. For example even though Raph is a massive jerk, the end of New Friend, Old Enemy has his comfort Mikey after the deceit and have him see that he’s a good kid who simply got duped as anyone else would. With this being after Raph mocked him wanting to make friends throughout the episode, it helped show that he does have a caring side. Leo frequently has issues with being a leader, such as dealing with Raph and moments like in ITHNiBS where the guys outright refuse to listen to him when he tries to remind them that they’re grounded. Even Splinter has a lot of moments, being a stern but fair parental figure and wise mentor, but is also snarky as Hell. We also see hints to how much the past has affected him, like after April agrees to undergo kunoichi training and leaves the dojo, there’s just a brief moment where he looks down with a forlorn expression. As though wishing that he was telling this to his own MIA daughter. It’s so subtle, but it speaks volumes about his emotional state.

The characters are ultimately what makes these episodes works and what I would say is the strongest part of the series. You are likely going to relate to or like someone from this show and their progression. But now that we have a fully formed status quo, it’s time to shake it up a little bit and have the Turtles experience their first hard dose of reality.

The Escalation (Epsidoes 9-13)

Episode 9 begins as a typical ‘Mutant of the Week’ plot with the guys trying to catch a pigeon mutant that was after April. But when they do, they discover that he was simply trying to deliver a message... from her father. The message warns her to get out of the city due to a mutagen bomb, but she refuses to leave without him. As such,t he Turtles... somehow... find where Mr. O’Neil is and try to save him. While they get him out of the cell and get the location of the bomb, Mr. O’Neil sacrifices himself when the Kraang outnumber them so that the boys can protect April. All while poor April can only watch, helpless to do anything. Ouch...

The Turtles can only go to where the bomb is to disarm it, but things get further complicated when Bradford and Xever attack, wanting payback from before. Fortunately Donnie disarms the bomb and the four corner the two, but Bradford refuse sot go down quietly and stabs the bomb, but all it does is mutate himself and Xever. But ti also washes them away.... again. I should also point out that this point,t he Turtles have gotten incredibly over-confident since they’ve beaten every bad guy so far, feeling unstoppable. So then... Shredder arrives. Yep. And he kicks their shells HARD. Liek he holds no punches, he easily over-powers all four of them and almost stabs Leo int he head. The only reason that they escape is Shredder getting distracted by his now mutated lieutenants. But the boys retreat, badly beaten up and completely demoralized.

The next episode focuses on the fallout. The four are mostly feeling better, but their fears are being escalated by, of all people, Splinter. This is due to the boys nearly getting killed by his long-time rival re-igniting his own trauma and having nightmares over losing them, causing him to again keep them in the sewers and be far more harsh with his training. The only one doing moderately well is April, who gets intel about the Foot planning to destroy the sewers. The Turtles try to stop it, but get pounded by Bradford, who is now a giant dog mutant named Dogpound. This forces April to get the inlet herself, but she gets caught an captured by the Foot. This further brings Leo down, but to his surprise Raph actually encourages him to pull himself together and lead the team. The Turtles manage to both save April and stop the Foot from destroying the sewers with Splinter apologizing for allowing his fears to affect both himself and his sons. Overall, a solid pair of episodes that bring the boys down a bit, finally has all the plots meet somewhere, and deliver a strong message about not letting fear control you or the others around you.

After a filler episode where the only importance is Shredder forcibly recruiting Stockman to his forces, we get some more Kraang stuff with Episode 12. Where we actually show them being dangerous. Shocker, right?! It also introduces us to long-time supporting character within the franchise Leatherhead. Here he is an alligator mutant who the Kraang experimented on and it causes him to have violent fits of rage if he so much as hears the word ‘Kraang’. The Turtles end up saving him when the Kraang try to re-capture him, but find his angry bursts, well... dangerous. But Mikey is able to befriend him and it becomes more clear that LH is actually a rather intelligent, good-hearted mutant who has been put through Hell. He gets run off by Splinter though when one of his trauma-induced bursts causes him to attack the boys, forcing the rat master to intervene. Mikey, and by proxy the other three, give chase to an old subway car where LH reveals how the Kraang took him to their home, Dimension X, and experimented on him. He escaped and also took their Power Cell, cutting them off form Dimension X, in hopes of saving humanity from them. The Kraang want it back and act like a zombie swarm as they break through the car. LH fights them off, leaving the Power Cell in the Turtles care.

While Episode 11 sucks (to put it simply Leo and Raph are overbearing assholes while Donnie and Mikey are just made to be as weak as possible), the other three do a good job at making the villains more solid threats. Shredder was built up as intimidating and powerful, and boy did he deliver. The Turtles face their first major loss and have to deal with the fallout, Leo especially dealing with his first real failure as a leader. Even the Kraang come off as a scarier hivemind and we get mroe stuff on them, like Dimension X and their plans to mutate the Earth. Add that with a strong supporting character like Leatherhead, who is understandably traumatized but is an intelligent being who is trying to prevent others form suffering like him. and it helps make some strong episodes.

The first half of the season concludes with the 13th episodes... that aired as the 14th for some reason. But I’m going in order of my DVD’s and this was after Episode 12, so it’s what I’m going with. It both concludes a lot and opens up a lot for the future. The episode I am talking about is, of course New Girl in Town.

TBC in Part Two....

#tmnt #2k12 #tmnt 2012 #callie reviews

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brightlotusmoon · 7 years

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CN talk of size, weight, clothing, past anorexia.

. .

OMG. So, we went to one those dollar plus stores, and there was a table of skinny jeans. I naturally chose a size up because they didn’t have my regular size anyway. And those bigger jeans, a size up, passed my neck wrap test perfectly. I got blue and dark blue, they were $20 each.

Went home and tried them on. They fit like thick leggings. No waist gap at all, it was like gloves. Felt like satin, sliding over the thickest part of my thighs. The inseam was a couple inches long and it bunched at the ankle but it was comfortable. Remember, I am four-ten. The 7/8 size even had enough room so I could push out my belly, which is another important test, to see how well the waist could stretch.

Curious, I looked at the tag and saw that they were mostly ramie, with cotton, polyester, spandex. Ramie is a freaking amazing material, I forgot it was used in pants! Cool. In a couple months I plan on going back and getting a couple more pairs, maybe two sizes up just in case.

Earlier at Rugged Warehouse, I looked at boys and men’s jeans. The 30 was the only one that fit for my hips but the waist gap was clown like. There were no boys jeans large enough. I tried a 16 and my thighs laughed. My hips are 36-37, my waist 24-26. Couldn’t women’s pants just be numbers like that? Are my numbers so odd? Numbers confuse me.

You know, it makes me think about Vanity Sizing and obsession over being small and slim, being able to humblebrag when your trouser and dress size is, like, two or four.

I am only four feet ten and one quarter inches. In my early twenties, I used to be obsessive about being the skinniest because I was so damn short. I once wore an infant tee that fit under my bust. I was anorexic and emaciated, but I was thinner than everyone, my weight was in the double digits and I was proud, I was tiny, I was what society and industry desired. Right? My college friends tried to make me eat caloric foods. I loved mozzarella sticks. My friends were afraid and worried, giving me tuna and cheese and steak. My face was hollow, my ribs easy to touch. I smiled in the mirror and wore children’s clothes.

At my own wedding, photos showed a glowing snow white dress hanging on a pale snow white bride who seemed hollow, and I barely touched the catered food. Months passed and my new groom cooked extravagant balanced meals that I ate with joy. For my job in a law firm Library I walked and moved every day and ate high calorie food. My coworkers gave me snacks and asked how I felt. When I gained enough weight to break 100 lbs, texting my friends, friends of friends would murmur “oh, look at your friend, who is she, she is beautiful, she is stunning, she glows, we must know who she is.” My friends smiled proudly.

I had filled out, no longer hollow, I was moonlight poured into round curved flesh, flourished and nurtured.

For some time in the past couple of years, I was at a “healthful” weight, or a weight that was balanced to fit me. In the past couple of months I lost fat and revealed muscle and I’m not used to it. I look at inches lost in my buttocks and waist and my mind will always be skewed and messed up by anorexia. In my younger years I would have cheered and felt beautiful, ideal culturally right, good enough to be Admired, look everyone look how small I am.

But these skinny jeans, a size bigger, make me happy and delighted. They bring me a joy better than the kind I had in my mid twenties when getting thinner mattered, when numbers mattered. My hips will never shrink to the measurements of Victoria Secret models. My hips are the hips of my Mediterranean and Russian-Asian ancestor women, strong and hearty. I am not a size two anymore and I don’t care. I’m not an actress or model who must fit into a sample size. Even if I were, it wouldn’t matter. I was and am an artists’ model, they love hips. I’ve worked for my mother, who teaches art anatomy drawing courses and I’m one of her best fluid models, my poses convey motion and power, and my curved form is fun to sketch. Mom paints me from memory, even when I was anorexic she filled me out gently.

Anyway I got off track. Maybe I got a little condescending. It’s fine, though. I’m older than I was and I’ve learned more. (“In modern Western usage, the word condescension, condescending, has a strictly negative connotation due to an egalitarian conception of relationships. In the past, the word could be used in a positive sense when a person of higher status was willing to introduce a high degree of mutuality into their relationships with people of lower status.”) A Tumblr anonymous pm called me that regarding my TMNT rants, condescending, and I felt thankful. I am occasionally wise with knowledge. Check out my sage mountain, yo. 28 years. Of course I want to introduce a degree of mutuality.

Aaaanyways. Uh. Wooow. Okay. The, uh, the skinny jeans found at the Dollar And More store next to the HMart. The ones made out of Ramie.

(Brand names are Bamboo for the light blue, Tush Push for the dark blue. They are basically the same except for the sequins. I like the Bamboo better, just a little. I need to take a selfie or have husband Adam take a photo. Srsly, no waist gap, not even for this lady with hyperlordosis. I feel like I won something.)

I think the whole point is that I am okay with the me that I am. I only just realized I am gendervague femme demigirl after all, which probably played a part. I think I’ll get my eyebrows waxed finally, but I’m not wearing a dress without pants. And I’ll never wear heels unless they’re boots. See this is why I love the TMNT. They’re only half human. They don’t need to worry about girly and manly things. Mikey looks amazing in a dress, does Donnie. I don’t know if they can fit in skinny jeans but they would rock them, think about the muscles. I finally have visible muscles. Physical therapy for cerebral palsy does me well.

This is literally a ranty ramble right now. *laugh*

#mylife #photo #clothing #anorexia #life story #ramblings #i don't even know #my past #self #whatever #blogging #body positive #body image #mikey would have cooked for me #demiboy mikey #cerebral palsy #the agony of women's pants shopping #the ninja turtles are only half human

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