Interesting tidbits in the Lego TMNT backup strips (SPOILERS)
 

If you've been picking up the New Animated Adventures series from IDW as of late, you'll notice that there's a backup mini-story that's semi-retelling Mirage issue 1 with a kid-friendly angle and using Lego figures for characters (which oddly means 2012 style characters in a Mirage setting).

The issue that released today, #12, had the Splinter and Turtles' origin in it.

So what way did they take this tale? Amazingly, yes, they actually used Oroku Nagi! Not only that, Yoshi is the only one of that love triangle to have been confirmed to have been killed.

Now I get that this is adapted for the wee ones, but given that Splinter says "my master was no more" I am completely surprised that they went with an unconfirmed status for Nagi:

"Nagi disappeared after that night. By fighting another clan member, Yoshi had dishonored himself..."

"Nagi's family, especially his younger brother Saki, were heartbroken over Nagi's disappearance..."

Yeah, he could have died and Yoshi could have disposed of the body in a way that Splinter and the Foot had never learned of it. But check this out:

"I later learned that his wife, Tang Shen, had escaped harm, and had returned to her family safely."

Holy s**t! Tang Shen LIVED!? This is definitely something I don't think I would have seen in millions of years, just like the reuse of Oroku Nagi!

It's a silly little backup strip to promote Lego, but it actually has done two things I never though I'd see in an incarnation of the series in all of my years.

What say you, Dromers?

A version where Shen lives... Awesome.

Lego strips aren't canon, but I wonder who wrote them.

They've obviously created their own canon, now. They've spun their own continuity. I mean if 4Kids can consider Papercrafts their own universe, surely these Lego comics are.

It's credited as having been "adapted" by Rachel Lareau. Only thing I can find that she's done before is another Lego comic, "Hero Factory".

Great another cog in the vast TMNT multiverse. :D

I feel like this was just a method of retelling the origin while tip-toeing around the concept of death and murder. There's nothing wrong with making a version of TMNT's origin that is accessible to all ages sort of like the 80's show did it. I'm pretty sure Saki & Yoshi's feud was over a prank that got Yoshi kicked out of the dojo am I right?

Not much as a prank, but a framed murder attempt on the at the time Grand Master of the Foot Clan.

Wow. That's taking some creative liberties alright.

But Splinter straight up says that Yoshi was "no more". The only way it could be more clear is if he actually used the d word.