What made Baxter evil?

[Yabuturtle]

It still confuses me. He was just going along with Shredder and didn't even know Shredder was a bad guy. He was just kind of going along with it. Of course Baxter was locked up but why in an asylum? One could say that when the authorities found out about his mouser robots they had him committed but why not in jail? Is it because he told them about the Turtles? The whole city knows the Turtles exist so it's not like they thought Baxter was crazy because Baxter told them about the Turtles. Unless maybe he pleaded insanity or went insane for being arrested.

Then he refers to Shredder as "master" but he never did before so why now?

[Meow]

Let me put it like this:

Many brilliant people are looking for something to hold on to, nevertheless what it is but still it is of emotional origin. Let it be respect, fame, being taken for who they are. While you are on the approach to do so you ignore a lot of disturbing things that usually would be on your radar if you were not on your pursuit. Out of your honest heart, your honest meaning, you get screwed over by those you believed in.

From this point on it is up to the affected one to decide, subconsciously decide mostly, where the next path leads to. Either your vision is cloaked up and your mind starts playing tricks on you for your own safety and you mistake those who really do good to you for your enemies or you come to your senses and - most probably - have a hard time overcoming what once and still troubles you.

That is Baxter Stockman - a brilliant individual with a low social skill but a brilliant mind and a dedicated heart. From my point of view someone not taken care of enough in his past, someone way too good to throw it all away.

[Yabuturtle]

But really I think it's strange he'd start working with Shredder and call him master unless his time being spent in the asylum over his mouser robots drove him a little mad. He had good intentions with the mousers and didn't intend to harm others. He didn't really know Shredder was bad and then later he's willing to serve his master

[Powder]

He was mentally/emotionally unstable, after a lifetime of being mistreated he went over the deep end.

[Yabuturtle]

I don't know if he was mistreated the entire time, but Baxter never intended to use the Mousers for evil and when the authorities found out he made the mousers that destroyed a couple buildings, he went into the insane asylum and I thought him spending time there for a crime he wasn't entirely responsible for might have made him deranged as he was willing to serve Shredder, became noticeably more deranged and sadistic.

[MsMarvelDuckie]

Baxter was nuts to begin with. He pulled a Renfield. Also, no one knew about the turtles when he first started working for Shredder- the city didnt find out about them until much later.

[Candy Kappa]

The plot said so.

[ABrown]

In the original cartoon, I never really felt like Baxter ranked very high on the evil scale. He was a little crazy, especially after getting turned into a fly, but not necessarily the most evil.

[Wesley]

I think it was Baxter ending up in an asylum that turned him evil in season 2. He probably went a bit mad due to spending time there. He didn't seem to be that bad, though, compared to other villains on the show. He seemed misunderstood most of the time.

[Yabuturtle]

Baxter felt he didn't deserve to be in an asylum when he tried to explain the story about the Turtles and he never wanted to use the mousers for evil and didn't know he was evil either. But after spending time in an asylum because of a crime he wasn't really responsible for ad hanging out with a bunch of other crazies, he probably went a little mad and was more willing to serve Shredder once Shredder freed him from the asylum.

He definitely became more deranged and vengeful after he became a fly as well as scatter brained. It's strange that he was almost killed twice and by the people he worked for. Shredder tried to kill him with foot soldiers when he thought Baxter knew too much although at the time Baxter didn't know Shredder was trying to kill him. And the second time was when Krang was trying to kill him because he felt Baxter failed a lot and was a waste of space.

I do find it strange that Shredder and Krang tolerated Bebop and Rocksteady's bumbling antics but not Baxter, who was really more competent overall and much more intelligent.