The Many MANY Intros Of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles> It Came From Japan

We’ll see how long THIS remains up. I just had to RE-re-do the first CBS intro. For crying out loud, Paramount, it’s easier to get Japan to allow us to promote their shows than it is this one. The moment they announce…eh, I already went over this. Let’s get back track…IF I’M ALLOWED TO, NICKELODEON!

So if it’s still up there, this is the Japanese intro to the original Ninja Turtle cartoon. I don’t know if they changed the lyrics or just translated them. The music is the same, but now April has a line I guess. The show was big around the world and it’s not surprising that the home of ninjutsu took a shine to it. So much so that when the series ended they took it upon themselves to do a two episode Original Video Animation (what Japan calls direct-to-video but I don’t call it an OVA the otakus who didn’t learn reproductive terms freak out) duo of adventures based on the Super Turtles, or rather Supermutants.

Created to refresh the toyline and give Playmates early access to the 90s, The “Supermutants” were jacked up versions of the Turtles and Shredder and his goons. They never made it to the US show, as the “red sky” seasons just gave us unstable mutations that turned the heroes into monstrous forms whenever the plot could best mess with them. That subplot was never resolved before the series ended.

Mutant Turtles: Legend Of The Supermutants (or ミュータント　タートルズ　超人伝説編, Myūtanto Tātoruzu Chōjin Densetsuhen; lit. “Mutant Turtles: Superman Legend” if you’re that nitpicky person that made me copy/paste all that from the Turtles wiki) is a show with an…interesting plot. I can’t do it justice in this article so I encourage you to check into it. The short version is that the Turtles find a shrine built on Earth by the Neutrinos…which raises a whole bunch of questions like “why would a race of happy punk pacifist teenagers from a war-loving dimension who talk like the 1950s just started over there build a temple on Earth?”, but I digress. In the temple they find a fairy named Kris Mu who gives them powerful Mutastones that not only turns them into the Super Turtles but allows them to temporarily combine into one being, the Saint Turtle, for I think 60 seconds. Meanwhile Shredder, BeBop, and Rocksteady get their hands on Dark Mutastones thanks to an evil fairy named Dark Mu (why not) that turns them into various creature-based armor. I think everyone gets more armor in the second episode to promote one of the other Playmates refresh attempts that didn’t make the show. Seriously, look this thing up some time. I’m just here to talk intros and we’re overdue to start on this one.

If you want to know why Shredder’s normal armor looks different while the other characters still match their Fred Wolf designs…you won’t get any answers from the show. Readers of my past intro review articles, whether it’s a Many Intros or My Favorite/Not-So-Favorite Intros post, already know how little I care for animated intros that just use clips from the show. It’s often necessary for the live-action shows (though Japan is usually pretty good at creating original scenes for their live-action intros even if they use some clips) but for a cartoon it really isn’t. You only use it once unless you change it each season, which we’ll see in later installments of this series, but it just feels lazy even if the real reason is probably budgetary. These are direct-to-video episodes exclusive to Japan.

It does convey from what little I remember of it the more frantic nature of the show. Everyone must have had the coffee and chocolate pizzas force fed into them because it’s a lot. As for the lyrics I don’t know if the Turtle wiki has the translation of the full song or just the “TV” parts but here’s their translation of “Power Up Turtles”.

Mutant Turtles: The Legend of the Super Mutant
Into darkness
Mutant Turtles: The Legend of the Super Mutant
Into darkness

Even if we get consumed by it,
We don’t panic.
Courage that knows no limits
And a fighting spirit that surpasses the legends
Overflow in our shells.

I will give this intro credit. If you remember back in the Transformers version of this series a lot of theme songs barely acknowledged the Transformers. This one knows what show it’s about.

Go go Turtles!
With a transformation that amplifies their power
Go go Turtles!
Scatter away the villainous gang

Referring to the Mutastones I imagine. Also, “Mutastones” is apparently in my spell check. Weird.

We’re turtles
Fighting turtles
We’re not sluggish turtles

Punch one and two
Kick that wham-bams
Mutants who were born to defend the peace of Earth

Go go Turtles!
With stunning transformation
Go go Turtles!
Reverse dangerous situations

We’re turtles
Fighting turtles
Turtles that shine

When our hearts become one
A miraculous merging is possible

And the merging could refer to their merged Saint Turtle form, the one that’s a white turtle with wings and a sword. So as lyrics go the intro is fine. The visuals are kind of a mess though. We’ll see more Japanese intros to come but this is the only production I’m aware of that came from Japan, not counting Toei being the season 1 animation studio, and it somehow found a way to make the Fred Wolf Productions incarnation even weirder…and they weren’t even a part of it.

I can’t wait to get into my favorite of the Ninja Turtles shows. That’s going to take multiple parts to go over. Sadly we have another show to talk about in the meantime. You know, the only live-action one on our list. Sigh. Yep, let’s get the next mutilation over with.