“Leatherhead: Terror of the Swamp” | |||||||
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Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (1987) episode | |||||||
Season Code: | 03 | ||||||
Episode: | 30 | ||||||
Original airdate | November 3, 1989 | ||||||
Written by | Michael Reaves | ||||||
Producers: | |||||||
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"Leatherhead: Terror of the Swamp" is an episode of the 1987 Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles TV series.
Appearing in Leatherhead: Terror of the Swamp[]
Major characters[]
- Leonardo (Cam Clarke)
- Donatello (Greg Berg)
- Raphael (Rob Paulsen)
- Michelangelo (Townsend Coleman)
- Splinter (Peter Renaday)
- April O'Neil (Renae Jacobs)
- Shredder (Dorian Harewood)
- Baby Shredder (Pat Fraley)
- Krang (Pat Fraley)
- Bebop (Greg Berg)
- Rocksteady (Cam Clarke)
- Leatherhead (Jim Cummings) (debut)
- Punk Frogs
- Napoleon Bonafrog (Pat Fraley)
- Genghis Frog (Jim Cummings)
- Attila the Frog (Townsend Coleman)
- Rasputin the Mad Frog (Nicholas Omana)
- Irma (Jennifer Darling)
Minor characters[]
- Louisiana tourist (Peter Renaday)
- Louisiana tourist boy (Jennifer Darling)
Species[]
- Human
- Mutant alligator
- Mutant frog
- Mutant rat
- Mutant rhinoceros
- Mutant turtle
- Mutant warthog
Objects and vehicles[]
Locations[]
- Florida Everglades
- Technodrome
- Turtle Lair
Plot[]
Raphael is surprised (and momentarily frightened) by the other three Turtles while looking at an old photo album. As Leonardo flips through it, he sees a picture of their friends, the Punk Frogs.
Meanwhile, in the Florida swamp, a gator hunter and his son are searching for an alligator called Leatherhead, "the biggest gator that ever got born." Leatherhead attacks the two and successfully drives them from his swamp. When he gets to shore, Leatherhead mutates into an enormous humanoid creature.
Leatherhead chases down the Punk Frogs, easily defeating their various weapons before capturing them and making them his personal slaves. While he's sleeping, Rasputin calls the Turtles for help. Fortunately April, and Irma are in Florida on vacation, so the Turtles can stay with them for the duration of their rescue attempt.
Meanwhile in the Technodrome, Krang sees Leatherhead and is deeply impressed what his size and strength, especially since he was able to enslave the Frogs, Krang tells Shredder, Bebop, and Rocksteady to fetch Leatherhead, because he believes that Leatherhead will easily deal with the Turtles.
As soon as they arrive in the swamp (with April), the Turtles are captured in one of Leatherhead's nets. But one of the Frogs cuts them down, which allows them to pin Leatherhead down and then hoist him into a tree. Donatello concludes that he was probably mutated by some of the mutagen released into the swamp before.
Meanwhile, Shredder, Rocksteady and Bebop arrive in the swamp, and immediately enrage a hive of bees. They spot the Turtles, Frogs and a tied-up Leatherhead, and begin tracking them through the swamp.
Leatherhead successfully tricks the Turtles, Frogs and April into stepping into quicksand, but is pulled in headfirst by them. Shredder and his mutants rescue Leatherhead, and leave the others to die in the quicksand. Fortunately, Napoleon uses his bullwhip to drag them out of the quicksand.
As they clean themselves off, Michelangelo spots a beautiful little pond and leaps in, which causes him to start glowing. Donatello suspects that it has some diluted mutagen in it, but the only effect seems to be Michelangelo experiencing a massive energy boost. He concludes that it's turned the spring into a Fountain of Youth, but dissuades April from trying it herself.
Shredder sees a spring and tries to drink from it, but Leatherhead interrupts, declaring "it be full of voodoo magic." What it's really full of is mutagen, and Shredder starts thinking of how to transport it back to Krang.
Shredder and the three villainous mutants show up and begin fighting. During the battle, Shredder falls into the Fountain of Youth and dramatically de-ages into a tiny baby. But Donatello accidentally breaks a local dam, which floods the area, washing Bebop, Rocksteady and Krang down their module hole. Leatherhead leaves, vowing revenge.
On the Technodrome, Shredder begs Krang to help him, and screams threats at Bebop and Rocksteady. But Krang just laughs his head off at this turn of events.
As the Frogs and Turtles say their goodbyes, Michelangelo gets caught in one of Leatherhead's leftover snares.
See also[]
- Leatherhead: Terror of the Swamp/Animations
- Leatherhead: Terror of the Swamp/Gallery
- Leatherhead: Terror of the Swamp/Transcript
Notes and errors[]
- The back part of the interior of Leonardo's Turtlecom is colored the same as the rest of the device when the Punk Frogs contact him.
- When Bebop and Rocksteady fire their stun lasers their fingers aren't seen making contact with their triggers.
- As the smoke from Rasputin's arrow had cleared in image of Shredder's discarded clothes and armor could be seen next to Leatherhead's foot but Shredder was actually in the fountain of youth at the time with his clothing still intact.
- When the Turtles, April and the Frogs were looking at the baby Shredder, gaps were seen on the strapping on Donatello's Bō staff.
- Shredder is strangely orange in parts of this story.
- When Michelangelo jumps out of the fountain of youth, Leonardo speaks in Raphael's voice.
- When Donatello says "well, yeah, that's where the frogs live," he has Leonardo's colors.
- Rasputin fires an arrow with a compressed net at Leatherhead, but instead of the net erupting from the arrow tip, it just sort of floats up to touch the arrow in mid-air.
- Leatherhead says that "us gators live for hundreds of years." Alligators actually only live for 30 to 50 years, in rare cases 70.
- When April yanks Leatherhead into the quicksand, he was tied up and his upper part of the body sunk in the quicksand. Then when Shredder, Bebop and Rocksteady arrive and pull Leatherhead free from the quicksand, Leatherhead is no longer tied up.
Trivia[]
- Dorian Harewood voices Shredder instead of James Avery, and Greg Berg voices Donatello instead of Barry Gordon.
- Prior to his mutation, Leatherhead doesn't actually touch either of the humans in the boat, but still mutates into a humanoid anyway. This leaves a question as to how and when he came into contact with humans (with some potentially gruesome implications, given his reputation).
- April mentions that she's 28 years old.
- It's the first time that April appears in a bikini and Irma in a swimsuit.
- On the back cover of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Volume 5, the title card has been renamed Leatherhead.
Home media releases[]
VHS[]
- Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Turtles vs. Leatherhead
- The Biggest Ever Teenage Mutant Hero Turtles Video
DVD[]
- Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Volume 5
- Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Season 3
- Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: The Complete Classic Series Collection