What Is The Eye of Sarnath?

[MikeandRaph87]

We get an arc of four episodes of the Turtles witnessing an alien crash in Central Park and he mentions that they must find three fragments of his ship referred to the eye of Sarnath. First off is it eye or eyes? So the alien dies and the Turtles are charged with finding the fragments with the locator the alien gave them. He says its three fragments of his ship. It sounds like his ship split into three pieces. Did I hear/read that wrong? So ultimately the three fragments are uncovered and the tracker causes the three crystals wielded back together to explode. In the Archie Adventure comics it starts off like the show and it abruptly stops following course. Was it always Steve Murphy's intention to not finish the story and pick up on the apparently forgotten plot dozens of issues later? We learn that the eyes of Sarnath were crystal eyes of an alien being called Sarnarath. Do we learn why the alien who crash landed had his eyes? Shredder had one fragment, the Turtles kept the second, and the third was never recovered and forgotten about, correct? Is this third fragment supposed to play into Forever War?

So in the 1987 cartoon what is the eye of sarnath and what is it in the TMNT Adventures comic? Just trying to put two and two together and dust off old knowledge as I reread TMNT Adventures and watch select episodes during lockdown. I know this question crosses both the 1987 cartoon and Archie comic so I placed it here.

[Icebot]

I haven’t read TMNT adventures about the Eye of Sarnath but maybe I can help about the 87 cartoon.

The first fragment had the power to make plant monsters and shrink the turtles , the second one makes a computer control every machine in the city (with a strong enough power source). I don’t think it was explained what the third fragment does alone but putting all 3 together was attached to Shredders helmet and that turns any object into anything he wants except on gold. I’m not sure why the alien said 3 pieces of his ship, maybe he meant the eye.

The tracking device that exploded with the eye is not the same as the alien gave them. It ran out of batteries and the turtles had no idea how to get those kind of batteries so Donatello ended up replacing the tracker.

[Leo656]

Pretty sure that after issue #6 or so of TMNTA, I don't remember the number, whenever they stopped being 1:1 adaptations of episodes, literally nothing from the cartoon show still applied to the book's canon because for the rest of the series there were nothing but constant contradictions between them. So I wouldn't even bother trying to reconcile the two Eye Of Sarnath stories with each other, they're two entirely different things as far as I'm concerned. Anything from the cartoon "doesn't count" for TMNTA, even though the first few issues literally were nothing but episodes drawn on paper. Trying to merge them into any sort of singular, cohesive universe only causes migraines.

[frank_one]

The name Sarnath is also a reference to a short story by Lovecraft (The Doom that Came to Sarnath).

[Leo656]

That's an excellent point, good one brother.

[dragonside]

now that i read this... the second michael bay movie should have really gone with the eye of sarnath, that would be have been way more fun

[FredWolfLeonardo]

now that i read this... the second michael bay movie should have really gone with the eye of sarnath, that would be have been way more fun

The existing concept from the film is pretty similar tbh (the search for three fragments scattered in different locations).

[MikeandRaph87]

The name Sarnath is also a reference to a short story by Lovecraft (The Doom that Came to Sarnath).

I am not familiar with that. Aside from the name is there any other aspects borrowed?

As for the cartoon, it states the ships is split into three when it crashed onto Earth and it appears the alien means the ships is the eye of sarnarth. That always threw me because it was a set of three crystals? That fragmented upon impact.

[sdp]

The two eye of sarnath's sagas are not fresh in my mind at all so sadly I can't answer all your specific questions, however I used to be obsessed with it and I don't think there are many contradictions in the OT, it's all just in those few episodes.

The archie series as mentioned only adapted the episodes of the show but eventually it was decided they'd do their own things and they didn't care that they had already adapted the first episode of the eye of sarnath and went their own way. Personally I would've just adapted the whole saga in one more issue in a way and even make it their own but instead it is just abruptly stopped and they go their own way leaving this unresolved. Much later for some reason they decided to continue the story but they changed it totally which was cool but it still made no sense why they waited all this time to bring it back, I don't even remember the story being great. But I give them props for at least going back to it since it was poor writing to just ignore it completely.

[frank_one]

I am not familiar with that. Aside from the name is there any other aspects borrowed?As far as I can remember about that short story, I would say no.

[Original TMNT Cartoon Fan]

The name Sarnath is also a reference to a short story by Lovecraft (The Doom that Came to Sarnath).

Sarnath is also a Buddhist pilgrimate site in Uttar Pradesh, India

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarnath

[Galactus]

It's highly unlikely Marty Pasko or any of the writers of the old show really thought through the mythology of the eyes and it's not like Kirby's warp crystal which inspired them was ever given an origin either.

If I recall correctly the three eyes were actually on the outside of the unnamed alien's ship and when it exploded we saw saw them scatter in different directions. It seemed they were crystals that allowed whoever wielded them control over organic and inorganic objects. When joined together it seemed to able to turn objects apart from gold into whatever the wielded imagines (shades of Kirby's crystal). Maybe since they were attached to the ship they were what powered the ship, being able to manipulate size, power computers would be useful for interstellar travel and the ship may have even been organic in nature hence being able to control plants would be useful. The ability to manifest imaginary things seems to be a bit much for a simple interstellar travel but maybe that's an unintended side effect of joining them together.

As for the Archie version of the story they only adapted The Incredible Shrinking Turtles after that the book started their own original stories that had nothing to do with the cartoon series. It was actually a suprise late on in the series they revisited the Eye of Sarnsth story as up until that point it didn't seem they'd carried any of the show's continuity into theirs. Murphy gave the Eyes the backstory of being the literal eyes of an artificial life form. Sarnath was part of a race of artificial life forms built to serve the Mergia. When they revolted and won their freedom Sarnath's master couldn't accept they were now equals and stole his eyes. Why The Mergia gave their slaves eyes that were objects of such immense power we'll never know.

The hunt for the three sections of the 'arc capacitor' in Out Of The Shadows is most definitely inspired by the Eye of Sarnath saga. Baxter's computer was named ONMNS which is a clear reference to Mean Machines. I always thought this was dumb, I remember reading they wanted the turtles to somewhere else in the movie as well as Brazil which makes sense - three objects three locations (New York, Brazil and...well Knowing Bay it would have China, wouldn't it?) but if they couldn't afford it and/or have time for a global hunt they should have scrapped it. It was always ultra convenient that the Foot already had one segment of the device but didn't know what it was bad even more convenient that the second segment was in NY. They should have had one macguffi not hunt for in Brazil and instead of faffing around in the Museum we could have had a proper Foot battle or some character building, like it would have been nice to know why the various turtles felt like they did about the purple ooze.

While the Eye of Sarnath episodes are okay they've never ranked as the series best. I doubt you'd find any of them on many a fans Top 10 which shows that even when Platinum Dunes was doing their research they never really understood the appeal of TMNT if they thought this is what fans really wanted them to draw their inspiration from.

[Leo656]

even when Platinum Dunes was doing their research they never really understood the appeal of TMNT if they thought this is what fans really wanted them to draw their inspiration from.

Truer words.

At best, they did exactly as much "research" as Bryan Singer does when he makes comic book movies:
- Look at a bunch of comic book covers for visual inspiration but never actually read one, or even open the book at all.
- Watch one episode of an old cartoon show.
- Skim Wikipedia for 5 minutes.
- Make up any old bullsh*t.
- Sell it to rubes who don't know any better.

[Galactus]

I remember seeing a Making Of thing on YouTube for Out Of The Shadows and one of the producers (after all these years I can never tell which is which) excitedly saying that Baxter's computer was called OMNS and he had the same proud look on his face that a dog gets when he brings a dead bird home in his mouth thinking his owners will love it.

More than once with the 2014 movie they said they skimmed through things but didn't do too much research as they were doing their own thing. It's clear they did look slightly more into the Fred Wolf show for the sequel but that is useless unless you understand what exactly people liked about the show or the franchise in general it doesn't really mean anything. As I said the individual Eye of Sarnath episodes are decent enough but I doubt any fan was clamouring for the return of OMNS or a story were the turtles hunt down things in threes. Also if the whole turtles turning into humans was inspired by The Gang's All Here they picked out an episode that most fans seem to dislike (although I've never had much against it other than the implied aspect that the turtles would lose their ninjutsu abilities if they were human)

[Leo656]

I remember seeing a Making Of thing on YouTube for Out Of The Shadows and one of the producers (after all these years I can never tell which is which) excitedly saying that Baxter's computer was called OMNS and he had the same proud look on his face that a dog gets when he brings a dead bird home in his mouth thinking his owners will love it.


That sounds perfect and perfectly apt. :lol:

Really takes me back to the shilling, pre-release. "Everything you fans want! Pizza! Cowabunga! Baxter Stockwell!" :lol:

I want none of those things, bitch, take your crap movie and go to bed. :trazz:

[Original TMNT Cartoon Fan]

China, wouldn't it?)

Japan would have been better.

[snake]

I remember seeing a Making Of thing on YouTube for Out Of The Shadows and one of the producers (after all these years I can never tell which is which) excitedly saying that Baxter's computer was called OMNS and he had the same proud look on his face that a dog gets when he brings a dead bird home in his mouth thinking his owners will love it.

Holy sh*t, lol. That's so PD it's not even funny.

[Galactus]

That sounds perfect and perfectly apt. :lol:

Really takes me back to the shilling, pre-release. "Everything you fans want! Pizza! Cowabunga! Baxter Stockwell!" :lol:

I want none of those things, bitch, take your crap movie and go to bed. :trazz:

Oh come on how can say that about Baxter Stockwell and the Terrordome. I've waited 30 years to see on the big screen Baxter Stockwell and the Terrordome.