The Wasteland Warrior

As much as I’ve really enjoyed this latest interpretation of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, there has been one major issue from the get go. Although the bulk of episodes have been easy to follow with weekly releases, others have suffered from being moved around the schedule. The latest example of this may in fact be the most egregious, as Nickelodeon has chosen to move new episodes of TMNT to their Nicktoons channel.

According to the @TMNT and @Nickandmore Twitter account, the next batch of episodes will air on Nicktoons this Friday, September 22nd. Nickelodeon has decided to release the next three episode arc as one 90-minute special featuring Raphael in a post-apocalyptic setting. This story appears to be an obvious reference to Mad Max, featuring episode titles such as “Carmageddon” and “The Wasteland Warrior.”

This sounds like a pretty awesome event, but it’s curious that Nickelodeon would choose to release it on their Nicktoons channel with so little notice. They aren’t really giving the fans a lot of time to figure out where and when they can watch the show. If you’ve become accustomed to seeing the turtles on Sunday mornings, a Friday release on another channel is going to be very unexpected.

According to some sources, Nicktoons will be the new official home of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles until the series ends. We haven’t confirmed this, but the nature of Nickelodeon’s scheduling conflicts indicates that you should be prepared for just about anything. @Nickandmore reports that the first two episodes of the monster arc will air on Wednesday, September 27th. If this information is accurate, one has to question how Nickelodeon can even call this a schedule.

These mutants look like they’re ready for Valhalla! Image Source: Nickelodeon.

Considering the success of Nickelodeon’s Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, it is baffling to see the series get this treatment during its last season. At the very least, I’m sure we can all appreciate the fact that our heroes in a half-shell will be returning very soon. If this new schedule is accurate, we can expect the Bebop & Rocksteady episodes to finish out the season. Thanks to this odd choice of scheduling, you can actually watch these episodes right now on DVD.

Whatever happens, it’s important to remember that we’ve reached the end of Nickelodeon’s Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. We’ll do our best to keep you informed about schedule changes so that you can watch these episodes as they air. Here’s hoping that Rise of the TMNT will have a much more organized timetable than its predecessor.