OT TMNT DVD's: Episodes Out of Order
 

So, I just recently placed an Amazon order for the Ultimate Visual History book (still waiting on it to come in though), and to pad out the order a bit more, I also finally got copies of Seasons Four through Six of the OT series (leaving only Season Seven for me to get and I'll have it all). I was already aware about some episodes being out of order from reading up on it a bit, and from some of the other DVD's I already had, but...man...that was just the tip of the iceberg.

I mean, some season sets having the first episode of the following season as their last episode, or skipping episodes out right and later putting them on a later set, those are both one thing. But what I've just figured out just from looking at Season Five alone is...something else entirely. Over it's three discs, it has the episodes on it's discs in this order - 105/116/107/109/113/108/111/118/112/117/122/114/120/119/115/121/123/124. A similar thing ends up to a lesser degree for the second disc of Season Six, with episodes appearing as this - 135/136/137/142/140/138/141/139.

My question is...how in the heck does something like that even happen? I mean, it's not like the series has the greatest continuity between episodes in the first place, so I suppose episodes being out of order really isn't too big of a deal for more casual fans, but still. For them to be in that bad of a cluster, it almost seems like someone would have had to organize them that way on purpose or something, which would be even more bizarre.

So yeah, has anything official ever been said about how in the heck they ended up in such a mess, especially on those two sets?

Those episodes aren't actually out of order, there's a difference between production order and their original airdates on TV. A similar problem was with Batman: TAS, which aired on TV in a completely different order than production order, hence the DVDs being different.

The only real out of order episodes is Lionsgate forgetting "Once upon a time Machine," and "Planet of the Turtleoids" and not including them until later DVDs.

The episodes in the OT are way out of order, there was a thread about this a few years ago but I couldn't find it, in it we were doing a community effort of fitting all the episodes but sadly it died a long time ago incomplete, mostly because it was only one person doing all the hard work :lol: but maybe if there's interest we could do this again.

Yeah for the most part the episode order doesn't matter too much but there are definitely episodes where certain weapons/objects/characters are in but aren't introduced until later for the first time, the reason people don't notice in the OT is because they're very small details but you can tell they were meant to take place before for the continuity geeks here.

Wait, really? If that's the case, then...why haven't episode guide listings online seemingly updated to fit the proper order as presented on DVD? I remember a similar instance at least happening once (perhaps twice) with the newer Nick series airing an episode that actually comes after another episode, and the DVD's corrected this order and Wiki for example had it's guide corrected to reflect this.

It just makes this all even more confusing.:tconfuse:

Episode Guide
 

Would this help? It's from the old ninjaturtles.com website.

https://web.archive.org/web/20120607...n/synopses.htm

Eh, for the most part I just watch whatever order the dvds are in. The only exceptions are that I move the European episodes (disks 7.1 & 7.2) from the beginning of season seven to ahead of the season four set. Also, I just throw in the three "bonus episodes" from the season season 10 disk after the season five set.

When I watched the episodes a few years ago, the only glaring out of order episode was the Dimension X Story, which is where the technodrome gets stuck in hardened lava..yet it had been stuck for many episodes already. This is because it was originally the first cbs sat morning episode of the season, but it was placed on DVD after many episodes which aired after it.
But for the most part, the continuity is so loose, it's hard to tell, so I doubt LionsGate put all that much concern into it.

Watch the bonus episodes on the season 10 disk "Planet of the Turtleoids" right after season 4 ends. Then the other bonus episode "Once Upon a Time Machine" after the season 5 premiere episode "The Turtles and the Hare" which is on the last episode on the season 4 set.

Then all of the European episodes on the season 7 box set should be watched after the season 4 episode where they win a vacation to Europe.

It's a confusing mess. But with this show, it's not really a big deal.

I produced this a while ago (link below). I did share it here on the forum, but nobody ever replied or said they used it/found it useful. Click the orange 1987 tab, and you'll see what I compiled. FYI, the list goes off the bottom, so you have to scroll down, in case you wonder why some are missing. Use the other tabs, too, you might find them useful.

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets...it?usp=sharing

Episore order thread is here http://forums.thetechnodrome.com/showthread.php?t=27141

Amazon Instant Video has all of the the episodes even the 3 missing from iTunes.

Interesting. I don't use Amazon Instant, only iTunes. I wonder why they are missing from iTunes and not Amazon? I would expect it has something to do with two of those three being missing from the DVD releases also, but if Amazon can manage it, why not iTunes?! Makes no sense.

Unfortunately this is quite inaccurate, Season 4 especially. I believe Splinter Vanishes should be last for that season as it's part of the syndicated season made first?

Rebel Without A Fin and Splinter Vanishes aired together. The only two episode block to not feature Shredder and Krang that season.

In Ireland, the episodes were put in better order with the Vacation in Europe eps being placed between "Unidentified Flying Leonardo" and "My Brother, the Bad Guy", but a few episodes were still put out of order like "Krangstein Lives".

Here is the thread I was talking about, someone bumped it recently. It only made it through a few episodes of S3 I think but it'd be nice to get this project on again so we can have the definitive episode order of the OT. the last few seasons shouldn't be a big problem, it's S3 and 4 that will be especially difficult.

Yeah it would be great to start that up again as long as the guy who started the thread has no objections to giving the thread over to someone else. I'm guessing a lot of notes will need to be taken for every episode like that guy did.

If it helps at all, I made this thread a long time ago, with my own thoughts on the S7 Vacation in Europe. Not definitive, and everyones' opinions are valid, but some food for thought nonetheless.
http://forums.thetechnodrome.com/showthread.php?t=44016

Thanks for all the input guys, I had no idea that the order of episodes was actually this deep of a topic! I guess for my own ease, since I'll likely be mainly watching the show while at work on the weekends, I'll probably just go ahead and watch via the order on the DVD's, outside of swapping the missing episodes on the last set in where they go, and probably watching the European Vacation episodes where they seem like they'd go as well.

Then let´s start it up again! I´m sure the OP doesn't mind, he has not posted here in years!

Yeah for the most part watching it in the normal order doesn't make much difference, we're talking about small details like a machine introduced in one episode but we saw it before in a previous one so that episode would take place before the other one but they're hard to spot so you don't even notice, sometimes its one line of dialog that makes an episode seem better placed before like when donatello tries to catch up with the module but burns his feet and says he'll never do it again and he doesn't thus taking place before the other two episodes that he doesn't try or whatever.

But yeah the only big continuity problem is the European Vacation episodes which clearly take place in the season where they win the European vacation and not in S7. Then again the European Vacation episodes in itself are full of continuity errors but that's another topic.