Dregg of the Earth

	Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles 1995 Season; 1995 ; List of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles episodes
	Episodes: "The Unknown Ninja"; "Dregg of the Earth"; "The Wrath of Medusa"; "The New Mutation"; "The Showdown"; "Split-Second"; "Carter, the Enforcer"; "Doomquest"; 1987 Season – 1988 Season – 1989 Season – 1990 Season – 1991 Season – 1992 Season – 1992-1993 Vacation in Europe sideseason – 1993 Season – 1994 Season – 1995 Season – 1996 Season

“Dregg of the Earth”
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (1987) episode
	; Title screen
Season Code:	09
Episode:	02
Original airdate	September 23, 1995
Written by	Story by Mark Edens and written by David Wise
Producers:
Episode chronology
"The Unknown Ninja"	"The Wrath of Medusa"

Dregg of the Earth is a the second episode of season 9 of the 1987 TV series. It originally aired at CBS on September 23, 1995.

Appearing in Dregg of the Earth[]

Major characters[]

Minor characters[]

Splinter (Peter Renaday)

Species[]

Objects and vehicles[]

Dreggnaught
Minicam
Motorcycle
Proton accelerator
Turtlecom

Locations[]

Plot[]

The TechnoGang invade a laboratory to steal a proton accelerator, but are interrupted by the Turtles and Carter. Though Leonardo emphasizes the importance of teamwork, Carter rushes out on his own and forces the Turtles to intervene early. The TechnoGang successfully escape with the proton accelerator, despite the attempts of the mutated Carter (who isn't recognized by the Turtles) to stop them. The building is destroyed, and the Turtles barely escape with their lives.

After Carter shows up, the Turtles berate him for wrecking their tactical plan. Angry, he storms off on his motorcycle. On the Dreggnaught, Dregg is repairing his molecular converter with the proton accelerator, allowing him to purify polluted water instantly.

In the lair, Donatello is anxious because the mutagen is acting strangely, when April tips them off that Dregg has just descended on the city, and is about to meet with the ruling body of the city. The alien presents himself as a savior who will protect Earth from greed and war, and demonstrates his goodwill with the molecular converter. The Turtles are disgusted by the crowd's immediate blind acceptance of Dregg's lies.

The city rewards Dregg with a new skyscraper that is rechristened Dregg Tower (with his ship at the very top), and the Turtles head out to find out what he's secretly cooking up. They end up running afoul of security robots, blasters and the neural net, and are driven back out into the streets.

Carter, meanwhile, calls Dregg and demands to talk to him, claiming that he's joining the winning side. Instead he walks into an ambush by the TechnoGang, and discovers that beating his way past them is part of a test by Dregg. Dregg demands that Carter draw the Turtles to him so he can kill them once and for all. To do this, Carter calls the Turtles and offers to get them inside Dregg's tower.

Of course, it turns out to be an ambush by Hi-Tech and the TechnoGang, and the Turtles are quickly captured due to Carter's treacherous actions. April arrives just in time to see the Turtles carted away in a spaceship, and manages to sneak on board just before it flies into Dregg Tower.

With the Turtles captive, Dregg tries to talk them into joining him because they are outcasts from society, and will never be accepted by humans. When they refuse, he activates the neural net in hopes of frying them alive. As Leonardo and Raphael try to reach levers to release themselves, their hands suddenly becomes a lighter shade of green, increase in size, and grow claws. Carter bursts into the room and frees them in the nick of time, saying that it was his plan all the time. Leonardo reluctantly agrees to go along with his plan, but that in future he must be a team player.

April contacts them from the basement, where she's come across a massive arsenal of weapons. Donatello and Carter arm the weapons just as Dregg and his minions show up, and a fight breaks out. Carter mutates again, revealing his double identity to the Turtles.

Upon hearing that a blast from a weapon could set off all the others, the Turtles start taunting Dregg in order to get him to set off his own weapons. A fire breaks out and the systems start overloading, but the Turtles are forced to leave April's minicam - and the evidence of his villainy - behind as they flee.

Back at the lair, Carter talks to them about his mutation, and Donatello says that the mutagen has been even more unstable than they thought - and that Splinter might be in peril as well. But Splinter simply affirms that they will face the uncertainty of the future together.

Notes and errors[]

When April informs the Turtles via Turtlecom that Lord Dregg has announced his arrival to the authorities, her hair moves slightly out of the Turtlecom's screen.
Michelangelo has Raphael's colors, or is colored with a darker shade of orange (making it very similar to red) for most of the scene where the turtles fight Lord Dregg's security bots beneath Dregg Tower, most notably when Michelangelo is rolling on the floor to distract the security bots.
When the Turtles plan to lure Lord Dregg near the missiles, Donatello's left shoulder flashes brown for a couple of frames.

Home media releases[]

DVD[]

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: The Complete Season 9
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: The Complete Classic Series Collection