'Tales of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles' Guest Stars Revealed

 

Tales of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles is just a few weeks away, continuing the adventures of the heroes in a half shell introduced in last year’s hit film Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem, which unfortunately came away empty-handed at the Kids Choice Awards. It’s long been known that Brady Noon, Nicolas Cantù, Micah Abbey, Shamon Brown Jr., and Ayo Edebiri would be reprising their roles as Raphael, Leonardo, Donatello, Michelangelo and April O’Neil, but it’s only been since the second trailer released that anyone else in the cast has been confirmed. This has picked up significantly since the second trailer, revealing some characters, with only Alanna Ubach’s version of Bishop having the complete package of voice, character, and appearance. Now, the show is confirming returns of mutants from the movie, familiar ones new to the iterations, and voices for previously-shown new characters. And we have some idea of what’s going on with them in the series.

To kick things off, we have Rose Byrne, Natasia Demetriou, and Post Malone returning as Leatherhead, Wingnut, and Ray Fillet, mutants who are usually in the turtles’ rogues gallery but in this version defected from Superfly’s gang in the movie and at the end moved into the sewers to live with Splinter and the Turtles. The giant Australian crocodile Leatherhead is struggling to make the transition post-defection and truly fit in as both a mutant and an Australian in New York. She loves the Turtles and her fellow Mutanimals and is always ready to “throw a shrimp on the barbie and go on a walkabout”. Wingnut is the mechanical genius bat Mutanimal who find a kindred spirit in Donatello, with common interests in anime, comics, and their favorite sci-fi reptiles easily making for all day conversation. She’s not loving life in the sewers however, terrified of the dark, claustrophobic and slightly paranoid from “too much doomscrolling”. Even with all that, she’s still always willing to help. And Ray, well, he continues to be the laid back one, loving being a mutant just as much as singing his name.

We also get our first look at Rod, the rich but lazy superfan of the Turtles voiced by Pete Davidson, looking like a slobby man in his mid-20s. Christopher Mintz-Plasse will be the voice of this iteration of Pigeon Pete, one of the Mighty Mutanimals whose most prominent previous adaptation appearance was recurring on the 2012-2017 series. According to the bio in the press release, Pete is a native New York City pigeon that got splashed by some bleach, chemicals, a bit of dirt and Mikey’s blood! Still freshly mutated, he’s got his own adjustments to make. He’s erratic and quite the excited flailer, but he’s a deeper being than just the coos and poos, just give him time (and a jolt) to spread his wings and find his voice.

It’s also revealed that Goldfinger, Lee the Eel and Mustang Sally are part of their own antagonistic faction of mutants called the East River Three, a group of inhabitants of New York's East River mutated by a machine, though it’s unclear if it was Superfly’s, even after reading the press release. These aquatic mutants have not had the best interactions with humans. Goldfin is voiced by Timothy Olyphant, and is a two-foot-tall mutant goldfish who dresses as a fisherman. He loves all things shiny, especially gold and money. Despite his small stature, he’s fast, with razor-sharp fins and absolute ruthlessness. Lee the Eel is voiced by Jillian Bell, has mouth full of fangs and is considered “absolutely terrifying”. As an eel she has her bioelectricity but is loyal and knows her part. She’s pretty positive but doesn’t do well with sarcasm or being the butt of the joke, especially if the punchline is her name. Mustang Sally, voiced by Danny Trejo is everything you knew a cartoon would do with a male seahorse, especially with legs. Expecting, he just wants to go home so his hundreds of babies can have a better life. Nothing and no one is going to get in the way of that.

The returns of Genghis Frog and Scumbug have also been confirmed, but voices were not. The series is also introducing the Sea Enemies Elixiar, Roamin, Fast Freddie and Celina Barnacle, whose voices have not been revealed. Notably, despite all of this cast news, the whereabouts of Splinter himself are still completely unknown, meaning we still don’t know whether Jackie Chan will reprise the role. However, confirmation of other reprised roles can give off confidence in such being the case. Tales of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles’s 12-episode first season premieres on Friday, August 9 on Paramount+ in the United States and Canada, and next day, Saturday, August 10, in the United Kingdom and Australia. It is executive produced by Chris Yost and Alan Wan. Production is overseen for Nickelodeon by Claudia Spinelli, the company’s Senior Vice President of TV Series Animation, and Nikki Price, the Director of Development and Executive in Charge of Production. A new teaser with the cast list has been released. It also features Metalhead and audible lines from Rod.

Sources: ComicBook, Paramount Press Express