Sunday, September 28, 2014

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles - The Invasion


The Second Season finale of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles is rather bleak for our heroes in a half-shell. Perfecting the Mutagen, agreeing to a partnership with the Shredder (Kevin Michael Richardson) and his Foot Clan, and using Irma (Kate Micucci) to discover the secret location of the Turtles' home deep inside the New York sewers, the Kraang's invasion of the city begins as the aliens start transforming New York into another Dimension X.

There's plenty of heroism and sacrifice to go around as both Splinter (Hoon Lee) and Leonardo (Jason Biggs) sacrifice themselves to allow April (Mae Whitman), Casey (Josh Peck), and the rest of the Turtles to escape. As Leo battles Kraang, a never-ending supply of Foot Soldiers, and eventually Shredder himself, Splinter fights off Kraang Subprime (Gilbert Gottfried) before finally facing down his nemesis Oroku Saki.

Not going down without a fight, Donatello (Rob Paulsen) enlists April, Raphael (Sean Astin), and Michelangelo (Greg Cipes) to pilot his newest invention and take down Kraang Prime (Roseanne Barr). Sadly, things don't go quite according to plan. The fall of the city and Leonardo's defeat sets up the Turtles' exile in Northampton storyline previously covered in the comics.

The reveal of Irma being a Kraang spy, while surprising, doesn't make much sense unless the Kraang replaced the young woman fairly recently in the show's run. The finale also has more than a little deja vu feel to Season One's finale (also about the Kraang invasion of New York). That said, the episode is darker in tone than expected and leaves several lingering plot threads for the Season Three premiere to deal with including Karai apparently in control of her mutation but not in the mood to be discuss her situation any time soon.

No comments: