Agent John Bishop

Agent John Bishop works to protect the earth from alien invasion. He was introduced in Season 3’s Space Invaders/Worlds Collide multi-parter, where he kidnapped the Turtles and tried to dissect them in an attempt to learn the secrets behind their mutation. Since then, he has played a part in most of the series’ primary storylines, as both an enemy and ally to the Turtles.

Origins
A U.S. soldier during the early 19th century, John Bishop's life was changed forever when, for unknown reasons, he was abducted by Gray Aliens while fighting in the Battle of New Orleans. After being experimented on, he escapes back to/is returned to (the series is unclear on this point, leaving both possibilities open) the battlefield. What exactly the experiments entailed is unknown, although it is speculated that they are at least partly responsible for Bishop's longevity and enhanced strength. Marked by the experience, he has since dedicated his life to staving off alien invasion.

Little is known about the following one hundred and ninety years of Bishop's life, except that he was present for the U.S. Army’s victory over the first alien invasion in United States territory and the subsequent creation of the black-ops Earth Protection Force during the Grant administration. He was also responsible for the Roswell incident of 1947, in reality caused by the a covert takedown of a flying saucer belonging to the Greys. (These could be the same Greys who experimented on Bishop, since the surviving alien they dragged out seems to recognized Bishop.) In more recent decades, he acted as Best Man to Finn, a Navy sailor who later on was turned into a mutant under unknown circumstances.

2003 TV series
During the 2003 Ninja Turtles series, Bishop acts as the head of the Earth Protection Force, a black-ops team formed to protect Earth from extraterrestrial threats. He applies an "any means necessary" approach to his mission, and currently aims to accumulate alien technology and to build an army of super-soldiers.

Cunning, cruel and manipulative, there is precious little that Bishop will not do to obtain what he wants. During the Triceraton Invasion, he made a deal with the Federation, offering the Fugitoid, along with his knowledge of the world-destroying Teleportal, in exchange for weapons and technology, as well as a guarantee that Earth will be left untouched by other aliens. He also captured the Turtles and took samples of their DNA, as well as reveal that he had captured Leatherhead, whom he experimented on and unleashed his primal instincts. He was going to collect more DNA when the timely save a Splinter, Casey Jones and April O'Neil stormed his lab. When he reached another one of his bases, Honeycutt's message was interrupting his work and he ordered the transmission to be severed.

Bishop set up a convenient trap for Karai, who was trying to steal an alien microchip and then called Oroku Saki to demand that he hand over all of the Triceraton tech he had been salvaging under the cover of rebuilding New York, threatening to kill Karai should he not respond in forty-five minutes. But Saki sent Hun to save Karai, who follows Bishop all over town. Bishop then decided to take down the brute once and for all, only for the Turtles to interfere, as he is the only person they hate more than Hun. Even fighting against the odds, Bishop resolved to abandon the train he was on and revealed to the Turtles of his taking of their DNA, which sped his work by decades.

Bishop then began an elaborate plan to capture Splinter, whose DNA was more complex. He intended to copy that advance DNAto create an army of super solders (all in the image of him) born of enhanced DNA acquired from genetic manipulation, alien autopsies, and DNA stolen from the turtles. His first creation was the Slayer, a cyborg meant to hunt down aliens anywhere, who didn't care if people got hurt in the process. But the Turtles and Honeycutt stormed the lab and managed to seal the Slayer in a tank. While fighting against Splinter, Bishop was sent slamming against a hook but he apparently survived and escaped the flooding facility while no one was looking.

At Oroku Saki's "good-bye party", Bishop had a contact on the inside -- Dr. Baxter Stockman, who had grown tired of the Shredder's punishments. He learned that Saki had been constructing a ship to return to the stars. Bishop had his men blow the main launch tunnel, forcing Saki to go through the doors of the party going on beneath. Bishop had any surveillance station launch missiles at the ship, determined not to allow the ship to escape. The ship was destroyed, which was a relief to Stockman, as Bishop says it's the beginning of a "beneficial partnership".

Unfortunately, the E.P.F. was under fire from the President of the United States for attacking the Saki estate. The President warns Bishop should there be anymore failures, he would cut the E.P.F.'s funding. Immediately after, Bishop learns that Finn had been stolen by the Purple Dragons and was determined to retrieve the mutant at all costs. He chased Finn to his wife's house, remarking that he still remembers but loses the mutant, presuming him to be dead. This further failure, the bureaucrats were going to shut them down.

Bishop staged an alien invasion for him to stop, “proving” his organization’s worth and assuring his funding. With one ship in the sky, remote controlled faux aliens and a number of holograms, they made it seem like Earth was being invaded again. Bishop "saved" the President, as well as placing the Turtles as most wanted on alien hit list. Unfortunately, the alien residue accidentally came in contact with local wifelife and mutated them into a savage, near-sentient form. Bishop had to focus the E.P.F.'s resources on containing the outbreak but there was no end to it.

Bishop demanded that Stockman clean up his mess, as he was trying to create his own body. But it proved to be a failure an after a series of hallucinations, Stockman seemingly died in Hudson river, but Bishop simply resurrected him, claiming that he was far too important to his work.

The Turtles (excluding Don who was infected) demanded they give a cure. Bishop agreed, having Stockman work with Leatherhead, while he had them retrieve the Heart of Tengu, which he heard from a mysterious contact that it was an archive of alien technologies. Once they got it to him, he had Area 51 self-destruct to cover its existence ( though they all left before that) and had the cure spread all over New York. But when they use lasers to try to crack the Heart, it shattered, as the contact cut off communications.

Lost Season
Stockman recovered a number of nanobots from a Triceraton wreck at Coney Island, which they presumed to be a new alien technology, not knowing it is a government project. Stockman places a microchip on one of the nanobots, activating them to serve Bishop's commands. Unfortunately, they found out that the nanos were intelligent and that its original programming was fighting with Stockmans and gathered all advanced technologies as it escaped. Bishop then understood why the Shredder kept "relieving" Stockman of body parts.

Bishop was part of the final attack on the Tengu Shredder.

Fast Forward
One of the few characters known to have survived the intervening 100 years between the series' present day and 2105, Bishop is a recurring character in TMNT: Fast Forward.

Bishop is re-introduced in the episode "Bishop to Knight", where the Turtles discover that Bishop has survived the intervening one hundred years, and that he has radically altered his approach to Earth defense. Now the very popular President of the{{Pan-Galactic Alliance]](described as a intergalactic version of the United Nations but a intergalactic version of the United States of America in reality, which Bishop helped form) he now uses diplomacy to maintain inter-planetary peace. Now a public figure and allegedly incapable of directly taking part in missions (although this seems to be contradicted in latter episodes), Bishop recruited the Turtles to covertly stop famed mercenary Torbin Zixx from completing a sabotage mission on Earth.

Later on, the episode "Head of State" reveals the reasons behind Bishop's change of heart. Roughly fifty years prior to 2105, he and Baxter Stockman, both still working for the E.P.F., finally realized Bishop's ambition of a super-soldier army in the form of what Stockman named "Organic Mousers": biped creatures able to withstand heavy damage and controlled by sound. It is also during this time that a lab accident seemingly kills Stockman; Bishop himself would have died if not for the actions of one of the E.P.F.'s alien test subjects, who saved his life.

Surprised than an alien which had been tortured and experimented upon by the E.P.F. still had enough mercy in it to save him, Bishop's viewpoint on aliens slowly changed, leading to the creation of the Pan-Galactic Alliance. It is this change of heart that saves him when he is kidnapped by the still-living Baxter Stockman, who, seething at Bishop's abandonment fifty years ago and still incapable of building himself a new body, wished to take Bishop's body as his own; Stockman, convinced by Leonardo that the world Bishop helped create was one where even he could live a normal life, abandons his plan.

Immediately afterward, as the abandoned E.P.F. base where Stockman had taken Bishop is destroyed by Stockman's organic mousers, Stockman is once again placed in mortal peril. This time, however, Bishop does not hesitate, and manages to save his friend's life.

Finally, Bishop appears in the episode "Day of Awakening", where he informs the Turtles about Sh'Okanabo's takeover of the lunar settlement Moonbase Bishop, recruits them in his attempt to stop the alien, and provides them with the weaponry that eventually kills him.

Back to the Sewer
Bishop appears in "Wedding Bells and Bytes", watching Casey and April's wedding from a monitor.

Powers and Abilities
Bishop is an accomplished martial artist, able to hold his own even when fighting all four of the Turtles simultaneously, as well as Hun, Karai. Making Shredder's Elite Guard look like amateurs and Splinter he could beat 4 out the five shredders and probily beat himoto yoshi an using a mostly-defensive fighting style, much like real Ninjutsu. He also possesses super-human endurance, as evidenced in Bishop's Gambit, when he was impaled on a hook, yet suffered no permanent damage. He has survived throughout the centuries thanks in part to a succession of a one or two clone bodies. Whether this is the only reason for his continued survival is, as of yet, unknown.

Bishop appeared in 24 episodes:


 * 1) Space Invaders, Part 2
 * 2) Space Invaders, Part 3
 * 3) Worlds Collide, Part 1
 * 4) Worlds Collide, Part 2
 * 5) Worlds Collide, Part 3
 * 6) Hun on the Run
 * 7) Bishop's Gambit
 * 8) Exodus, Part 1
 * 9) Exodus, Part 2
 * 10) Dragon's Brew
 * 11) Bad Day
 * 12) Aliens Among Us
 * 13) Outbreak
 * 14) Insane in the Membrane
 * 15) Adventures in Turtle Sitting
 * 16) Good Genes, Part 1
 * 17) Good Genes, Part 2
 * 18) Membership Drive
 * 19) Enter the Dragons, Part 1
 * 20) Enter the Dragons, Part 2
 * 21) Bishop to Knight
 * 22) Head of State
 * 23) The Day of Awakening
 * 24) Wedding Bells and Bytes