Cowabunga Shredhead

Plot
Michelangelo has been having problems with being a pizza glutton. He ate all the pizzas that he was supposed to serve for dinner. Because he did this before, Splinter says that he must learn a form of inner self-control, which involves him saying "I crave pizza no more" repeatedly. After it is done, Michelangelo no longer wants pizza and hears in his mind "I crave pizza no more" whenever he comes near one.

Meanwhile, Shredder is working on a plan to destroy the Turtles by creating a holographic clone of Michelangelo to infiltrate the Turtles' Lair. Something goes wrong with the mainframe when Bebop puts the disk with Michelangelo's psychological profile in backwards, resulting in lasers shooting. One of the lasers hits Shredder, and he groggily stumbles off.

In the sewers, the other three Turtles are impressed by Splinter's self-control method on Michelangelo and figure they can finally cook some pizzas. Suddenly Shredder appears, having bought some pizzas. The Turtles are shocked to see Shredder, much less him thinking of the Turtles as friends. It is realized that by his mannerisms and behavior that the Shredder somehow thinks he is Michelangelo! Splinter then uses a hypnotic method on Shredder to get him to see why he is behaving in such a manner, and says the word "Shredder" to get him to gain his appropriate personality of Saki. The right-minded Shredder suddenly lashes out at Splinter and the Turtles, albeit confused what he is doing in their residence. Aware of the danger, Splinter hypnotizes him into taking Michelangelo's persona once again to prevent a fight, by using the word "Michelangelo". Splinter warns the Turtles that any mention of the word "Shredder" will cause him to revert to his Shredder persona, so such word should be avoided.

Meanwhile, Michelangelo has been feeling left out, and goes by himself to his favorite restaurant, Vinnie's Pizza. Remembering Splinter's hypnosis in his mine of "I craze pizza no more", he feels no need to eat pizza and instead orders a soft drink. Bebop and Rocksteady have been stalking Michelangelo, and manage to capture him after a fight.

Meanwhile, Donatello discovers a computer disk that fell out of Shredder's pocket and decides to take it to Channel 6 News to use April's computer system to access the information on the diskette. Once there, they surmise that Shredder plans to clone Michelangelo, and Shredder, who thinks he is Michelangelo, is none too happy about that. Raphael asks Shedder/Michelangelo where he might go if he wanted to sulk—the answer: Vinny's Pizza.

But Leonardo, Raphael, and Shredder/Michelangelo arrive just moments after the real Michelangelo is abducted by Rocksteady and Bebop. While they search the kitchen, Shredder/Michelangelo stuffs his face with pizza and sees some cheese clinging to a cheese shredder. When he gloats to himself that there is some loose cheese on the "shredder", it causes his true persona to return. Shredder is confused, but not so confused that he does not realize that he is alone with the Turtles. Leonardo and Raphael enter the kitchen unaware that Shredder has reverted to his true mindset; to which he knocks the two turtles into a gigantic pizza and says they are on their way to the oven.

Back at Shredder's hideout, while he returns to find Michelangelo gagged and tied to a chair as Rocksteady and Bebop dance in delight, Donatello and April have learned Shredder and Krang's master plan - and it involves the President of the United States. They try to contact Leonardo and Raphael, via the TurtleCom, but there is no answer. Meanwhile, Shredder discovers that his "master plan" computer disk is missing and races back to Vinny's Pizza by demanding to know what they did to his disk. Raphael saves himself by replying "Sure thing, Michaelangelo", causing Shredder to once again think he is Michaelangelo and wondering why his fellow Turtles are in the pizza? Shredder frees the two turtles by eating the cheese.

At the Channel Six News Building, the Turtles realize that they must find the holographic synthesizer and destroy it, along with finding the real Michelangelo. Donatello has a plan that might accomplish both. They head back to Vinny's Pizza and recreate the scene just as Shredder/Michelangelo had encountered Leonardo and Raphael moments before they were "saved" by Shredder, where Leonardo says that Donatello needs to make the cheese loose so he and Raphael can free themselves from it, and so that "you know who" will not be thrown off track as he believes no time has passed. Shredder in his "surfer Turtle" persona thinks this is a dotty idea to be in a pizza and have himself point a gun at them, to which Leonardo says they are only preparing a sting for Shredder, which causes Shredder to regain his true persona and demand the computer disk. They give it to him and "beat feet" before he has a chance to capture them. They then follow him back to his hideout, where he discovers that his disk has been reprogrammed and he is surrounded by dozens of holographic Michelangelos. This gives the turtles time to rescue their brother, as they untie and ungag him.

Shredder ejects the disk and all of the holographic Turtles disappear only to be replaced by the real Turtles. In their attempt to destroy the Holographic Synthesizer, Shredder has them encased in a force field - but they outsmart him when they call him Michelangelo and he reverts to a "Turtle" and destroys his own machine when he sees his "amigos" in trouble. Before the machine blows, Shredder is zapped by the machine once again, and is, once again, reverted to Shredder but, by now, Rocksteady and Bebop believe that he really is a Turtle in disguise and they take him back to Krang and the Technodrome.

In celebration of their victory, the turtles have Pizza. Michaelangelo declines, saying "I crave pizza no more". Feeling Michaelangelo has learned his lesson about overeating, Splinter redoes the willpower technique to allow Michaelangelo to crave pizza once again. Michaelangelo celebrates by eating multiple slices, to which the other Turtles remark no clones are needed with the way Mike eats!

Character voices

 * Leonardo (Cam Clarke)
 * Michelangelo (Townsend Coleman)
 * Raphael (Rob Paulsen)
 * Donatello (Barry Gordon)
 * Splinter (Peter Renaday)
 * April O'Neil (Renae Jacobs)
 * Shredder (James Avery)
 * Bebop (Barry Gordon)
 * Rocksteady (Cam Clarke)
 * Krang (Townsend Coleman)
 * Vinnie (Barry Gordon)

Locations

 * Turtle's Lair
 * Technodrome
 * Shredder's hideout
 * Channel 6
 * Vinnie's Pizzeria

Vehicles

 * Transport Module
 * TurtleVan
 * Cheapskate

VHS

 * Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Cowabunga, Shredhead

DVD

 * Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Volume 4
 * Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Season 3
 * Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: The Complete Classic Series Collection
 * Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Cowabunga Classics

Errors

 * When Bebop and Rocksteady dance around Michelangelo, they switch positions.
 * Just before Leonardo and Raphael are about to enter the giant pizza oven, Leonardo speaks in Raphael's voice.
 * Michelangelo is seen with his nunchuks when he walks out of the lair, but his nunchuks are not seen on his shell when he's captured by Rocksteady and Bebop.
 * Michelangelo has a sock in his mouth, but later, he's gagged with a cloth.
 * Michelangelo's ankles are tied, but later, when a cloth covers his mouth, his ankles are untied.
 * When the Turtles (except Michelangelo) pop out of the trash cans after Shredder leaves the pizza kitchen, Leonardo is seen with Michelangelo's colors.
 * When Splinter hypnotizes Shredder to his regular self, Donatello and Michelangelo grab him, but a shot later, they are replaced by a duplicate Leonardo and Raphael.
 * When Donatello and Michelangelo grab Shredder after Splinter hypnotizes him back, Michelangelo is seen with Leonardo's "L".
 * When the Turtles (except Michelangelo) approach Shredder's hideout after following him, Raphael is seen with Michelangelo's colors.