Things Change

	Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Season 1; February 8, 2003 - November 1, 2003; List of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles episodes
	Episodes: Things Change; A Better Mousetrap; Attack of the Mousers; Meet Casey Jones; Nano; Darkness on the Edge of Town; The Way of Invisibility; Fallen Angel; Garbageman; The Shredder Strikes, Part 1; The Shredder Strikes, Part 2; The Unconvincing Turtle Titan; Notes from the Underground, Part 1; Notes from the Underground, Part 2; Notes from the Underground, Part 3; The King; The Shredder Strikes Back, Part 1; The Shredder Strikes Back, Part 2; Tales of Leo; The Monster Hunter; Return to New York, Part 1; Return to New York, Part 2; Return to New York, Part 3; Lone Raph and Cub; The Search for Splinter, Part 1; The Search for Splinter, Part 2; Season 1 – Season 2 – Season 3 – Season 4 – Ninja Tribunal – Fast Forward - Back to the Sewer

“Things Change”
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (2003) episode
Season Code:	S01E01
Episode:	1
Original airdate	February 8, 2003
Written by	Michael Ryan
Supervising Producer	Lloyd Goldfine
Producers:	Gary Richardson
	Frederick U. Fierst
	Al Kahn
	Norman Grossfeld
	Thomas Kenney
Directed by	Chuck Patton
Story Editor:	Lloyd Goldfine
Episode chronology
–	"A Better Mousetrap"

This is for the 2003 TV series episode. For the comic see Things Change (Dreamwave).

"Things Change" is the first episode of the 2003 TV series. It first aired on February 8th, 2003. It had 1.39 million views as of 2007 on the 4kids website.

Synopsis[]

When mysterious robots attack the Turtles' lair in the sewer, they lose contact with their master, Splinter, and decide to go topside to meet up with him. However, the quartet run afoul of a group of street thugs known as the Purple Dragons and a swarm of ninjas.

Appearing in Things Change[]

Major characters[]

Leonardo (Michael Sinterniklaas) (debut)
Donatello (Sam Riegel) (debut)
Raphael (Frank Frankson) (debut)
Michelangelo (Wayne Grayson) (debut)
Splinter (Darren Dunstan) (debut)
Purple Dragons (debut)
- John/Lead Thug (debut) (death)
- Spike (debut)
- Sunny (debut)
- Two Ton (debut)

Minor characters[]

Foot Ninja (debut)
Oroku Saki (Scottie Ray) (debut)
Police
- Cop #1 (Ted Lewis) (debut)
- Cop #2 (Eric Stuart) (debut)

Species[]

Objects and vehicles[]

Armored truck (Battle Shell pre-mods) (debut)
Bō
Katana
Mousers (debut)
Nunchaku
Sai
Shell Cell (debut)
Shuriken

Locations[]

First lair (debut)
Sewer tunnels (debut)
City streets and rooftops (debut)
Purple Dragon warehouse (debut)
Saki's rooftop palace (debut)
Y'Lyntian outpost lair (debut)

Episode[]

Voice-over introduction[]

Leonardo: My name is Leonardo. And right now, my brothers and I are in a mess of trouble. Our backs are up against the wall in some trash strewn alley, cornered by the toughest street gang on the East Side.

Purple Dragon Member #1: "Look at the freaks."

Two Ton: "What's with the dweeby costumes?"

Purple Dragon Member #3: "This ain't Halloween."

John: "You're going down, freaks. Nobody messes with the Purple Dragons, especially wearing stupid turtle costumes."

Leonardo: "He's wrong. We're not wearing costumes."

Plot[]

This series opens with the Turtles enduring another one of Splinter's training sessions in their lair, in which Leonardo is the only one to succeed. Raphael and Leonardo nearly get into a skirmish, but Splinter interrupts and gives his sons a lecture on the nature of ninjutsu and what they must learn.

Then the lair starts to shake and crumble. Suddenly, a horde of small robots burst through a wall, chewing their way through solid concrete and brick. A battle ensues between the mechanical menaces and the Turtles, who smash them to bits. Just after the Turtles and Splinter have defeated their robotic foes, the wall that the Mousers entered through collapses.

Leonardo is initially fearful that Splinter has been killed by the rubble, but Donatello successfully contacts Splinter via Shell-Cell. The fallen wall has only separated them, and all are unhurt. They agree to rendezvous in another part of the sewer system, but on their way, the Turtles find that another wall has collapsed, effectively cutting them off. To get to the rendezvous point, the TMNT are forced to go above ground, and in doing so, they stumble upon a robbery taking place by the Purple Dragons street gang. During the course of this side adventure, Raph is unintentionally locked inside the Dragons' armored truck. The rest of the guys can only watch and follow as Raphael gets hauled off, along with the stolen loot - forcing them to go after their brother.

Meanwhile, Splinter is attacked a second time by the Mousers, this time at the rendezvous area. He ends up falling into a different level of the sewers, and finds a mysterious glowing doorway.

By taking rooftop shortcuts, the other three turtles are able to see where the truck stops to unload. Michelangelo drops down, dispatches a thug named Two Ton, and Don frees Raph by disabling the truck's electronic lock. But, just as they are about to make their exit, the Turtles are cornered by a large number of Purple Dragons—who waste no time in mocking the appearance of the "freaks". The Turtles easily defeat the Purple Dragons and send them running away, but soon after their victory over the street thugs, numerous numerous ninjas show up, surround our heroes, and face them in combat. The Turtles fare well against these mysterious ninjas at first, but they begin to get outmatched after awhile, mainly due to the sheer number of ninjas that keep coming. Therefore, the mutants decide to "borrow" the Purple Dragons' armored truck and get the shell out of there...

After ditching the truck (and leaving the stolen money with the police) in an abandoned sewer tunnel, the Turtles finally meet with Splinter, who has a discovery to share with them. The Sensei has stumbled across an old abandoned chamber in the sewer system, and has decided that this will be their new home and headquarters. After inspecting the cavernous space, the turtles couldn’t agree more, and we leave them as they are beginning to make things tidy for living.

Meanwhile, inside an unknown dojo, John, the leader of the Purple Dragons, is apologizing to his mysterious "boss", and swears to him that he won't fail again. The "boss" acknowledges this and says that John won't fail him again... ever, before approaching John and mercilessly killing him (off-screen). Outside the dojo, we hear John scream, and the "boss" laughing maniacally. It also turns out the dojo's on top of a tower of some sort, and the tower has a large red "Foot" logo in the middle of it. What is this all about? That will be revealed in due time...

Leo,Raph,Don and Mikey 3 — Raph and Leo argue

Notes and errors[]

Despite accurately describing the Turtles by their species (albeit thinking that they were costumes), the Purple Dragon leader in this episode calls them "frogs" when pleading for mercy before his "boss".

Trivia[]

This episode can be featured in the Game Boy Advance Video.
This is the first appearance of the Turtles on television since the Saban Entertainment 1997-1998 series, Ninja Turtles: The Next Mutation.
The introduction to the episode begins with a voice-over by Leonardo where the Turtles are cornered in an alley by the Purple Dragons. This sequence is identical to the opening of the first issue of the Mirage comic book, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles #1.
- The first episode of the 1987 TV series also had the Turtles fighting a street gang who took orders from the Shredder.
The Turtles' original lair also looks similar to the lair in the first issue of the Mirage comic book.
The two cops in this episode are modeled after series creators Kevin Eastman and Peter Laird.
This is the first episode where Mikey attempts to say his 1987 counterpart's famous catchphrase "Cowabunga!", but is stopped by Raph before he can finish.
This episode is ranked #2 on the TMNT Top Ten.