TMNT #36 - Reviews and Discussion

[Mutant Ninja Anole]

Originally Posted by ProphetofGanja

Oroku Saki is Takeshi Tatsuo reincarnated.

It's possible that in this version of the Turtles' universe, everyone is reincarnated, similar to Buddhist beliefs. The Turtles and Splinter are unique though because they are aware of their previous lives (due to the influence of the mutagen/psychotropic serum).

Even if all the other characters are reincarnations, I don't think it would necessarily have much significance on the overall story

It's also worth noting that Takeshi Tatsuo being reincarnated as the son of the man who killed him was no coincidence, though I can't remember if that was deliberately done by Kitsune or Takeshi himself or something else. It may turn out the ooze has mystical properties of sorts, if it could keep Saki's soul from leaving his body when he died and make him immortal, perhaps it played a role in bringing back the souls of Yoshi and his sons.

Side note: Soul traveling in the IDW universe has actually been spoken about before. During the Krang War arc, the Fugitoid stated that when bodies are broken down to particles and teleported across space, the soul somehow finds its host body even in another part of the galaxy. And of course the Fugitoid himself is a case of a person's soul being trapped in another body.

But yeah, I don't think we can assume all mutants, or even non-sentient animal mutants are reincarnations. My guess is that Tang Shen, the Rat King, or even Kitsune might have played a role in it as well, with varying, perhaps hard to understand motives.