The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles cartoon television series are legendary. Over the last 40 years, five animated television series with different stories and continuity have occurred. There are other series, like the anime series Mutant Turtles: Choujin Densetsu-he and the live-action The Next Mutation. Those shows will not be featured in this post.
Moreover, each Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles cartoon series has had a different audience.
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Cartoon (1987)
The first TMNT cartoon series was Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, from 1987 to 1996. This series was light-hearted and is the only one where the turtles were all referred to by their full names and not nicknames like in the other shows that followed. The 87 turtles would appear in Turtles Forever and the 2012 series.
2003 Series
Next, we have the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles series from 2003 to 2009. This second TMNT cartoon was the first to have a darker tone and dealt with mature topics, such as Leo suffering from PTSD. In the final season, Back to the Sewer, the character designs were altered to reflect the 2007 TMNT film.
2012 Series
Our third TMNT cartoon is the 2012 series. The show, which ended in 2017, would run for five seasons and be the first to include anime-style emotion during certain aspects of episodes, like characters becoming embarrassed, etc. Like the 2003 show, the series delved into some pretty dark stuff. It also adapted the City at War arc, which the 03 series did. However, the beheading of Shredder had to be censored so it would still get its PG rating. The series also introduced the idea of giving each turtle their own physical characteristics, making it easier to tell them apart whenever they had their masks off.
Rise Of The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Cartoon
Series four is Rise of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, which ran for two seasons and had a Netflix movie. The series had many changes, such as a reversal of roles for Raph and Leo. Raph was switched from being the second-oldest to the eldest, and Leo was placed as the second-oldest. The turtles were also made to be different turtle species; Casey Jones was gender-swapped to be female (Cassandra) until it was revealed that she had a son named Casey in the future (as seen in the film). April is also made African-American rather than Caucasian, a first for TMNT Television.
Tales Of The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (2024)
The next TMNT cartoon is not yet out, as it was just greenlit. Tales of the TMNT is a spin-off of the Mutant Mayhem film with a possible release date of 2024.
