What if more Ninja Turtles existed among the four (now five)?

[neatoman]

Originally Posted by Coola Yagami

In other words, the Super Sentai kids barely had any personalities (I assume other than being do-gooders with a strong sense of justice) because they were just gonna change em the following year anyway? Wow.

Not exactly, they do have clearly defined personalities (usually) but they tend to be kind of broad archetypes. In that sense they're not too different from how the Turtles are depicted in the cartoons. It's just that the shows will only run for about 50 episodes, give or take a few depending on ratings and development of the next show. This means that whatever character development happens will happen within a set limit, they will change as people but they're not going to become that much more complex than what you see in the first 20-ish episodes.

Considering the target audience are kids that might only two or three seasons (if even that), keeping the same storyline going with the same characters for decades wouldn't be worth it. It's difficult to imagine some kid binging 2000+ episodes to get caught up. This probably also why so few cartoons ever last longer than three seasons, kids don't have dedication to keep watching and the longer a show goes on, the harder it'll be to find new audience members.

[IndigoErth]

Not to butt in, but...

Originally Posted by CylonsKlingonsDaleksOhMy

It would hinge on what role in the family she serves, and what her personality and skillset are.

Originally Posted by Leo656

You can maybe create a fifth Turtle who's also MORE than "just the token female". But "The Token Female" is still what she'd always be by default, because "She DOES Have To Be Female, though". She just MIGHT also be other things, too.

Which again (if they'd avoid focusing too much on trying to jump ahead and stay with the here and now), is why I like the idea of Lita because she's just a little kid, so she'd mostly be out of the way (minus the ways kids get in the way) and she brings a different element to it and something to the TMNT's lives that they'd probably never really imagine actually having. If a 5th was a must, I think the dynamic of having the guys become a bunch of surrogate uncles is a nice angle.

[Leo656]

Meh. It's an idea.

It's not one I'd personally ever sign off on, on account of I absolutely hate kids, and don't want them involved in anything at all. I became an adult specifically so I wouldn't have to deal with them anymore!

Otherwise, though... eh, it's an idea.

[Powder]

Originally Posted by ninja-zero

Even turtle types if ever.

Rise did it. Leo is a red eared slider, Raph's a snapping turtle, Mikey's a box turtle, & Donnie is a softshelled turtle. The resemblance to these species aren't too strong necessarily but with a few unique visual traits of each, they're fun designs, I think. I'd be open to it being done again but whether or not it works largely comes down to the style. Don't think it'd look so great in live action.

Otherwise, the TMNT have always canonically been red eared sliders.