El origen de las Tortugas Ninja (The Origin of the Ninja Turtles) is the inaugural issue of Las Tortugas Ninja. It is a completely redrawn version of "Heroes in a Half-Shell! Part 1", with a new ending.
Appearing in El origen de las Tortugas Ninja[]
Major characters[]
- Abril O'Neil (debut)
- Donatelo (debut) (mutates in flashback)
- Foot Soldiers (debut)
- Hamato Yoshi/Splinter (debut) (mutates in flashback)
- Leonardo (debut) (mutates in flashback)
- Miguel Ángel (debut) (mutates in flashback)
- Oroku Saki/Shredder (debut)
- Rafael (debut) (mutates in flashback)
- Rocoso (debut)
Minor characters[]
- Bebop (debut)
- Krang (debut)
- Grunt (debut)
- Robotic unicycles (debut)
- Scrag (debut)
- Seguridad Manhattan receptionist (debut)
Species[]
- Humans
- Mutant rat
- Mutant turtles
- Rhinoceros
- Robots
- Warthog
Locations[]
- Japan (flashback only)
- New York City
- Central Park Zoo
- Channel 6
- Seguridad Manhattan
- Ninja Reparadora de Calzado
- Ninja Pizza
- Sewers of New York City
- Tecno-guarida
Synopsis[]
Abril O'Neil, reporter for Canal 6/Channel 6, films a story on a series of robberies that seem to have been perpetrated by ninja. After the filming, her crew begins packing up to head out, when they are advanced upon by a gang of punks. Abril throws her camera at one of them and tries to escape into the sewers. She is followed and attacked, though, but is rescued by a quartet of mutant ninja turtles. Upon seeing her saviors, she faints.
Abril awakens in the Turtles' sewer lair, where she also sees their rat master, Splinter. Splinter offers to tell her of his and the Turtles' origin. At one point in Japan, Splinter was a human ninja named Hamato Yoshi. Unfortunately for Yoshi, he also had a mad rival by the name of Oroku Saki. When a visiting sensei came to their dōjō, Saki pinned Yoshi's kimono to a wall with a dagger, making him unable to bow to the visitor. This also had the added effect of making it appear as if Yoshi planned to assassinate the sensei when he pulled the dagger out. Yoshi was subsequently banished from the clan, and fled to America in shame.
Yoshi lived in the sewers, spending time with the rats. One day, a boy tripped and dropped a bowl of baby turtles into a grate, which fell directly on Yoshi. He took care of these turtles as well as the rats, until one day, a bizarre substance covered the turtles. Yoshi tried to clean them up, but they transformed into anthropomorphs. The substance, a mutagen, also transformed Yoshi into his current rat-man existence. Yoshi trained the turtles in ninjutsu and gave them names adapted from Renaissance artists - Donatelo, Rafael, Leonardo, and Miguel Ángel.
Abril wants to return to the surface after learning their origin, thinking that they were the ninja culprits behind the robberies, but is stopped by Donatelo. He says that the robberies could be ninja, but certainly were not the Turtles. He also is concerned that if she reports on the Turtles, they'd have scientists after them in an effort to dissect and study them. Leonardo suggests a solution that will benefit both parties: the Turtles will help Abril find who the ninja thieves really are, and she will have her story without needing to involve them at all.
Meanwhile, the punk gang returns to their boss, a helmeted ninja by the name of Shredder, who is secretly Yoshi's old enemy Oroku Saki. They explain the conundrum of their assault that prevented them from their task of intimidating Abril O'Neil.
After returning to the street, Abril gives the Turtles trenchcoats and fedoras so they can blend in better. Following a matchbook lead, they go to Ninja Pizza, a ninja-themed pizzeria. As the Turtles order, Abril goes snooping around and finds a security company called Seguridad Manhattan. She sees there are ninja inside, and goes to make a pay phone call, when she is nabbed by them.
The Turtles leave the pizzeria and look for Abril, noticing her purse hanging over the edge of a building's rooftop. They get to the top and fight the ninja at the top, which turn out to be robots. They rescue Abril and zipline over to the security building.
Shredder orders the building to be flooded in an effort to have the Turtles, or at least Abril, stopped. They escape just as the building overflows and the windows all shatter.
Abril and the Turtles return to the lair, where they show Splinter the uniform of the Foot robots that they fought. He recognizes it and tells them that Oroku Saki must be behind this.
Much later, Abril and the Turtles go to seek out Saki. They find some unnatural tunnels and report back to Splinter. Meanwhile, Shredder consults with Krang, a grotesque alien brain who supplied him with the mutagen.
Two robotic unicycles suddenly break through the pavement in Central Park Zoo, capturing a warthog and a rhinoceros. As the Turtles return to the tunnels with Splinter, Shredder approaches his gang and asks who wants to have the power to have revenge on the Turtles. Two of them, Rocoso and Bebop, are the first to volunteer. A robotic unicycle brings in the animals while Shredder prepares the mutagen.
The Turtles head to Channel 6 to talk to Abril, while Splinter continues in the tunnels alone. Splinter is attacked as he approaches the Shredder's hideout, a large tank-like dome with a single eye on top called the Tecno-guarida. Investigating the hole in Central Park where the unicycles breached with Abril, the Turtles drop down and land right on the Tecno-guarida. Rafael notices Splinter's walking stick on the ground and surmise that he's been captured. Miguel however, points out that he's just knocked out in a mound of dirt nearby, and they bring him to, taking him back with them to home. Shredder witnesses all this, vowing that next time it won't be so easy for them.
Trivia[]
- Channel 6 is named that on the building, but called Canal 6 by Abril.
- The matchbook reads "Pizza Ninja" but the building reads "Ninja Pizza".
- Despite the security company being renamed Seguridad Manhattan, their logo still shows "MS".
- Several coloring issues arise in the story, including the Turtles' headbands being swapped at points. Splinter also temporarily had a blue kimono in the midst of several panels where he has his normal purplish one.
- The ending of the issue is changed from the original story. The issue that was adapted to this version, "Heroes in a Half-Shell! Part 1", ended with the Turtles descending to through the hole in Central Park, leading to the next issue, where the Turtles have to breach the Technodrome to fight Bebop and Rocksteady and save Splinter. Here, after dropping down the hole, they merely find Splinter unconscious nearby and go home, with the following issue being completely different.