Nine films, six series, and a secret most franchises would kill for: TMNT doesn’t have a continuity problem, because it canonized its own multiverse on screen. In 2009, Turtles Forever put the 1987 toons, the 2003 toons and the original black-and-white comic turtles in one story — and named the comic world “Turtle Prime,” the reality all others reflect. So that’s exactly how we mapped it.
Every screen incarnation is its own universe orbiting Turtle Prime — the 1984 Mirage comic (dashed card below: it’s the root, not a watchable entry). The orange dashed chips on each universe mark its on-screen crossover links — this is the rare franchise where the connections between realities are canon, not fan theory.
All 15 entries — in release order
Four decades of reinvention in the order it happened. Notice the rhythm: roughly every seven years, the turtles molt — new medium, new tone, new universe — and the previous version becomes somebody’s cherished childhood.
The four brothers — the constants across every universe
Universes change; the family doesn’t. Every incarnation re-weighs the same four personalities — and the most interesting differences (who leads, whose show it secretly is, which Splinter used to be human) are where each universe shows you its soul.
The crossovers — where the universes shake hands
TMNT crosses over more than any franchise its size — with itself, mostly, but it once teamed up with the Power Rangers on network television and fought Batman in an official movie. All of these actually exist.
The Pizza Index — an honest measurement
Time for the franchise’s most important disclosure: the original comic turtles barely ate pizza. The obsession was invented by the 1987 cartoon to give the toys a catchphrase — and it colonized the brand so completely that it now feels ancient. The index below rates each universe’s pizza-centrality on our rigorous editorial scale.
Where to start — pick your sewer entrance
Fifteen entries across eight universes — nobody starts with all of it. Every door below opens one clean universe.
Beyond the screen — the parody that ate the world
The deepest cut in all of TMNT: it began as a $1,200 joke about Daredevil — and forty years later its comics are still where the boldest turtle stories happen, including the dark-future hit currently being turned into a film.