Splinter's human origin is now used in more incarnations than his rat origin
 

Anyone notice this?

Splinter being Hamato Yoshi:

- Original cartoon
- Archie TMNT comics
- Nick TMNT cartoon
- IDW comics

Splinter being the pet rat of Yoshi:

Mirage comics
Movie universe
4kids cartoon


The incarnations where he's Hamato Yoshi now outnumber his original Mirage origin. How do you feel?

As a fan of any incarnation where Hamato Yoshi becomes Splinter I find this very interesting.

i like both versions but i have to feel that rat first splinter is way more unbelievable. you could say that is part of the charm, and i would not disagree, but a part of me feels like a rat learning martial arts from its cage BEFORE even
being mutated seems over the top.

it's also underwhelming when shredder finds out who splinter really is! "it's... you! the pet rat of my mortal enemy! NOW YOU PAY!" -- i mean come on :P :P it just does not have the same effect!

human first splinter has potential for much greater drama.

my favorite origin is still the OT origin because splinter is a former ninja now homeless in NYC who rasies the TMNT from *baby turtles* -- see, this is the part that bothers me more than splinter's origin, the fact that in some versions of TMNT the turtles mutate straight into teenagers (even in the OT they do this!) i have problems with this for a lot of reasons :/

i guess my favorite origin would be a combination of both OT and the first movie. I think splinter should be human first, but the turtles should mutate into babies... or at least children -- and then splinter has plenty of years to train them.

if they mutate straight into 15yos how does that give splinter and the 4 turtles time to bond and train? :/ (yes, I know the IDW series gets around this... though that is another topic!)

I prefer the rat origin myself. It just seems to work better for me.

Though I would suggest that the IDW version is a mixture of both. Because he was human but reincarnated and mutated from rat form.

I like both origins, though I like Splinter's OT origin a bit more.

yes the IDW origin merges a lot of the great ideas. it is probably the best origin if you like the idea of reincarnation. personally I find it too great a departure from the established canon.

Technically, that's not true.

Splinter is a mutated rat in:
- Mirage comics;
- Image comics;
- The first three movies;
- The Next Mutation series;
- 4kids series;
- Dreamwave comics;
- TMNT movie;
- (arguably) IDW comics.
Even if you respectively count Mirage/Image, the four movies, and 4kids/Dreamwave as the same continuities (ignoring some inconsistencies), they still aren't outnumbered. :P

I do agree that a human mutated into a rat makes more sense than a mutated rat as a ninja master. But I still prefer the Splinter as a rat approach, for various reasons.
Firstly, I think it makes the family bond more interesting and realistic. Splinter and the Turtles are already different species, but at least they are all mutated animals and so understand each other better than the humans from the outside world.
Also, an animal who raises and teaches the human ways to other animals is more original and less condescending (from an animal point of view).

Moreover, I don't think Splinter is very realistic as a human. I think that a human mutated into an animal should want to re-establish connections with his fellow humans. Instead, the continuities where Splinter is a human are the same ones where Splinter is less active and more secluded. The Turtles seem to be the only ones with the need to make human friends and to blend into the human world.

Er, correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm pretty sure that in the OT the Turtles mutate directly into teenagers.
I even remember Raphael telling April that they spent half their lives in a glass ball in the first episode.

My wording was obtuse above. But i did reference that fact.

still he *had* them from babies, or nearly so. they couldn't have been that old when they left the pet shop. they lived with splinter for some time before the mutation.

I still prefer the TMNT live-action turtles origin :D The 4kids show was also highly influenced by that version of the origin

Agreeing with Loudo, you're forgetting Next Mutation, and it's kind of loaded to put IDW squarely in either category.

Yes, he's Hamato Yoshi (if you believe his reincarnation story), but it avoids most of the pitfalls of other Yoshi-is-Splinter origins by also making him a normal, mutated rat who only starts to remember its former life when experimented upon. What are those pitfalls? Mostly the idea that a human turned into a rat-man and forced into the sewers would be at all okay with those developments.

Overall, I don't really care which origin is used, as long as it's used well. Historically, I feel the rat origin has been more successful. You have to get over the initial silliness of Splinter being a hyper-intelligent rodent, but that's a fair trade for the constant silliness of a once-human Splinter calmly accepting his lot in life.

The problem with the human origin is that it makes Splinter's mutation a burden, rather than the blessing it is in the rat origin. If you're not prepared to have your story deal heavily with the consequences of that, it's not a road you should go down in the first place.

(Nick seems to be handling it a little better though. Making Yoshi a man who had recently lost his wife and daughter, and who regrets his previous actions, makes his zen-like approach to his new life a lot more believable.)

Then we might as well count OT/Archie as the same continuities as well, reducing the human origin to three. Even if IDW Splinter is clearly a human origin, it would still be tied at three with regards to blending the other continuities that Loudo pointed out, which would make it a draw.

Since I experienced the OT Splinter first, I'm always partial to that origin, and now that both Nick and IDW both pretty much agree on a human mutation, it feels "in" at the moment to feel the average person thinks that Splinter was originally a human. Let's not forget the first NES game where Splinter turns human when you defeat Shredder.

I've said this enough times in other topics, but I much more strongly prefer Splinter being a rat from the get-go, although I applaud the efforts of IDW for merging the two origins, even if I don't care for the reincarnation deal itself. I never would have seen that coming, had I not known about it before reading it.

For all the"unrealistic" flak the rat origin gets, I think that the human origin is much more puzzling, especially since I feel the Mirage properties of the ooze make a heck of a lot more sense. As for the hyper-intelligent rat part... c'mon, this is comic book logic. Extraordinarily intelligent animals happen.

i think having smart animals from the get-go makes their mutation less special, so no, I will never like the idea of splinter practicing his master's moves from his cage. i respect that others like it, and since it is the mirage origin it has very deep roots in the series and i can't dismiss it. if every version of the origin used that depiction, i would be perfectly fine with it, but since we have all these divergences in the story, i prefer the human version.

I prefer Splinter starting out as a human, so this is fiiiine with me.

First of all, Image is part of Mirage continuity so it doesn't count as a new version of Splinter.

Second of all, Dreamwave never went on long enough to be its own universe. It had 4 episode adaptions and two filler stories that could easily fit into the 4kids universe in Season 1.

Third of all, Movie 4 and Next Mutation were loose continuations of the Movie universe so they are not new Splinters either.

So I don't know why people need to make this more complicated than it has to be.

I'm fine with either, but I think I like him being a human first more, as it just seems a little less goofy (remember the awkward rat doing katas bit in the first movie? Yeah...) and is a little more believable, or something.

Not to mention a rat's lifespan is about 2-3 years, not nearly long enough to master ninjitsu.

Not to be pedantic, but if you're going to count TMNT Adventures and the 1987 cartoon as two different continuities, you can't lump Next Mutation, the first three movies, and arguably TMNT (2007) together willy-nilly.

They all share common background elements, but none of their separate creative teams have ever confirmed they branch off from one another, as opposed to TMNTA, which expressly began as a 1:1 adaptation of the show. Next Mutation in particular contradicts the movies more than Adventures ever does its Fred-Wolf origins.

So, yeah. I'm being totally pedantic.

The difference is even thought the Archie universe shared the Season 1 storyline, it then became its own thing with different origins for charaçers who appeared in both like Leatherhead, Mondo Gecko, etc. They also retconned the Turtles as having a childhood and more of Yoshi's background that the show didn't do.

Next Mutation and Movie 4 started out as if we already knew the characters, no origin was given. I am not saying they take place with each other, I view Next Mutation as one alternate timeline that happened after Movie 3 while the 2007 movie is another split in the timeline.

Jester brought up the Archie series could be a split timeline with the show when Armaggon used his timeslip generator to go back in time and alter the events of Season 2. It's fascinating to think about.

Just as Next Mutation, if it even shares a background with the movies, must have deviated before even the events of the first movie could have taken place.

Shredder's alive, there's no April, no Casey, no events from the movies are referenced, etc.

It's as different, if not more so, than Adventures is from the Fred-Wolf show.

And we know next to nothing about the 2007 movie, except that its creative team have said they had in mind that it might or might not continue from the previous films.

It's exactly the same relationship Adventures has to Fred-Wolf; a shared origin, then quickly branching off from there. Only these entries are even less explicit about that shared origin.

But we never got an origin for Splinter in Next Mutation. We just assume its the rat origin because of the movie background influence. As for the lack of April and Casey there were always rumors they were going to appear if the show got a second season. I always assumed they already knew April/Casey in the series.

Besides Next Mutation is a poor series anyway, we don't need to make sense of what was essentially a trainwreck.

This thread just reminded me of the first time I saw the original movie. Right after Raphael's initial meetup with Casey we see him go home and get lectured by Splinter about his temper. The very moment Splinter said "My Master Yoshi's first rule..." I was all like "Wait a minute. Hamato Yoshi had a Master Yoshi?!"

The rat origin gives Splinter a revenge motive to kill Shredder for killing his master.

The human origin makes Splinter and Shredder rivals, but this way its more personal.

The Image series is just like the archie series

sure it has similar beginnings (one being the mirage beginning, the other adapting the first few episodes) but it ended up being it's own story

so you either count Image a serperate series or count Archie series as an untold side of the fred wolf

simple as that

the same thing is said about Next Mutation, Shredder is alive, so it is not in continuity from the movies... The Next Mutation universe may branch off from the movie universe, but it is still it's own universe... it's just like the Multi-verse of Digimon, how Adveture branches off from one of the manga, since Taichi is loosely based on Kentarou, but yet it's its own story


And IDW shouldn't be counted as either

One, he is not "technically Hamato Yoshi" instead it is his soul... That is why the Triangle is: Heart, Body, and Soul. 2. His body is physically a rat, a mutated rat, not a mutated human... no trace of human dna in him, but he is 100% a rat

so as of now, only four universes have Splinter as a human

Fred Wolf
Nick
Archie and Anime (Which both Branches off from the Fred Wolf cartoon)

Is this a joke? When Image started it was written as a direct sequel to Volume 2, with both Kevin and Peter approving of it. It was a direct continuation of the Mirage universe and why there is no "Mirage Volume 3."

Only after did PL decide he wanted Vol. 4 to start off fresh with no mutilations. And then we got the Image conclusion anyway.

Next Mutation is crap, so nobody cares anyway

Remeber, when they said that it was a sequel, there was no plans at the time for Volume four to come out...

and since Volume four pretty much re-conned everthing volume 3 started, it made the whole story as if it never happened...

again... It BRANCHED off into it's own universe... be it intentional or not at the time, that is the out come as of now


"A Multiverse or multi-verse is an infinite number of universes in which all possible events occur."

and that is all there is to it

This is the same arguement of "Same as it never was" sure it was a possible future in the beginning, but now, it's in it's own universe (Turtles Forever)

And TMNT is in it's own universe now, even though it was suppose to be canon to the past three movies, thanks to Turtles Forever

despite what one may think... Canon means more than Fanons and Head-canons... if you think anyother way, people will just laugh at your stupidity

Vol. 4 didn't retcon Image though. It took place a few years after Image ended in the timeline. Nothing that happened in Image contradicts Vol. 4 or vice versa.

wasn't that Image ended on a cliff hanger? so it has the ending of Samurai Jack, where Jack is forever stuck in the future and Akuu rules everything

That was the reason why that fan comic was made before to give it closure

It ended on an open note. The last issue was a decent ender for years. The conclusion explained how they healed and tied up a few loose ends with the Foot.

The Image series is arguable. The last 2 issues do tie it back in to volume 4, but since they're not strictly official, technically speaking it ended on a cliffhanger that just plain doesn't jive with volume 4. But most people do accept the last 2 issues as official, so... There we are.

I agree that IDW is, like with almost everything it does, an amalgamation of both Splinter origins.

i agree. the rat in the cage gaining so many skills that he eventually even becomes able to train students always seemed weird to me and made only really sense in the original logic of the ot, the tmnt being just a one shot comic parody of classic superhero comics. because there any crazyness is awesome. but as the mirage series became a longer comic with history this always seemed to be a bit too goofy for me.
also, why should splinter love his dead owner so strongly that he feels urge for revenge? when his owner was actually the one who held him for years inside a cage?
splinter being originally hamato yoshi made more sense to me. i found it weird in the ot series that he would chose to live in the sewers of new york though. so the new nick version deals that a bit better. i just dislike that one mutants now to what was the last surrounding. it felt more right when it had to do with what one had to deal with the most time of life (yoshi living in harmony with rats for years). but at least it makes sense for splinter to hide in the sewers after being transformed into a monstrous creature. i think it is strange though that he didn't begin to have interest himself into fighting the kraang after the turtles find their mutagen. where's his initiative? why is he just staying at home?
so to me the nick version has the most potential, but i fear that a cartooney show will always handle big story arcs in a more dull way than the mirage comic would have.

i don't come along well with the idw reincarnaton concept. it doesn't work for me at all :ohwell:

erm, just looking at leonardo's right hand, the foot clan's organization or raphael's eye... i always understood that in peter laird's sense image was dismissed. some fans made a (pretty good) fan fiction that can fill the gaps. but i would not accept this as a canon. just a great "what if".

s**t, i wished laird would finally start to finish volume 4 instead of doing whatever he does now. he got me hyped too much to let me down now :tsad:

Archie
 

Some characters (Leatherhead, Mondo Gecko) have different origins in Archie and the 1987 show, so it's not the same universe.

If it was knewn already from the start how Archie would become, they would probably use a new origin story.

For some people, the soul is what makes you human.

The conclusion came from storylines directly from the main writers of the Image series.

The human to rat mutation makes more sense logically. However, I like the fact that there is no human form/equivalent.

Splinter as a rat transformed to human, is his own person - completely separate to Hamato Yoshi (even though he does adopt many of his qualities). Human to rat transformation IS Yoshi.

By eliminating the rat to human mythos, you have effectively removed a character - THE Splinter.

Just my two cents.

As I was growing up, my very first interaction with the TMNT was the first live action movie. It was engraved in my mind and remains my favorite incarnation of the Turtles. And the themes of family resounded a lot more in that film than in the OT. Splinter seemed more like a boss than a father in the OT, at least from what I saw. Perhaps someone could enlighten me about the subject. However, seeing Splinter being first as Hamato Yoshi has always seemed off to me, even though I loved the OT. So, even though it doesn't make much sense, I prefer it that way. (I justify my mind saying that Splinter was a very special rat)

However, even though it goes against my beliefs, I kinda dig the approach the new comics took on the matter.

oh I understand this... but more I was going on the physical body side of things, not the soul thing

...

as for which version of Splinter, I prefer the rat, Why? It's classic.

now on to how a rat knows martial arts...

I always pictured it that it was Splinter just watching Yoshi doing those moves, not mimicking them

Then as he mutated into a rat, and thought of how to keep him and the turtles safe, he recalled upon what he remembered. To fill in the gap of what Splinter doesn't know of Ninjutsu, he used animal instinct to make up for what he doesn't know (such as turning Fight to Flight to stay in the shadows or defend oneself). This would also explain the turtle's "brawling" like style from the first issue of the comics

but that is just how I see it

Either incarnation works, but I like how they're handling it in the new cartoon because it gives Splinter more depth as a character, and that's something I really like.

My very first introduction to Splinter and the Turtles was through the first movie, so it's pretty much impossible for me to shake from my head the origin storyline that was presented there. I greatly prefer Splinter as being mutated from an actual pet rat, and as I didn't take to the show growing up and simply watched the movies over and over again, I was pretty weirded out when I first learned he was actually mutated from Yoshi. Even now that I've grown used to the idea, it still bothers me, mostly because I feel like it severs that bond Splinter has with the Turtles as a family. As a human (especially one with another family), I have a difficult time seeing how he could really come to love the Turtles as his true sons as opposed to pets or pupils. But as a rat who found four helpless baby turtles, it just makes more sense to me that he would have a genuine sense of fatherly protectiveness over them that only grew as they all aged.