A special story in the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles comics world is too hurtful to be translated into a movie.

The remake and restart of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles are mature. Although they were created for comics by Kevin Eastman and Peter Laird, the most memorable ones are usually the animation and live-action translations of TV and movies. These adaptations may be interesting, but they often do not reach the level of violence outlined in the comics.

The IDW series currently co-produced with Eastman and Laird finds the perfect balance between the stupidity of cartoons and the cruelty of comics, especially in the spectacular story arc "City Fall." It will be the perfect Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movie, but unfortunately, it is too painful to appear on the big (or small) screen.

The arc begins in Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Issue 22 (by Kevin Eastman, Bobby Kono, Tom Walz and Mateus Santoroco), Raphael and Kathy Jones is ambushed and kidnapped by a ninja. The tortoise almost immediately escaped from the truck he was loading, but all this proved to be part of Shredder's plan. He used Casey as a hostage to lead the turtles to the dock, and when they planned an attack in the shadows, he stabbed Casey in the ribs. This plunged Raphael into a frantic scream, threatening to kill every member of the Foot Clan in sight. After the dust settled, Leonardo was captured, but Casey was in critical condition. The turtles retreated without leadership, hoping to save Casey's life.

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Old Hob is a cat face mutant, a new member of the IDW comics, and has been a recurring villain since issue 1. But in "City Fall," things become so terrible that Hopper and Sprint are willing to put their past aside. Fearing the rise of Shredder's forces, Hob conspired to establish a mutant army and recruited Splinter to steal mutagens from the lab that originally held sea turtles in Phase 26. Sprint desperately wanted to get back the brainwashed Leonardo, even though he reluctantly agreed to it. Although it is easy to understand what makes Splinter illegal, it may be a little too dubious morally for modern superhero movie viewers or children's TV.

Leonardo’s kidnapping may be the most traumatic element in the story. Shredder didn't just want the leader of the turtles to stand in the way, he also wanted Leo to become a General Foot Clan. In issue 23, Shredder uses the talents of Kitsune (a mysterious deformed fox) to distort Leonardo's thoughts, resulting in terrible hallucinations. Splinter turned into a bunch of weird zombie rats, and Shredder poked at the tortoise's morals until he became a killing machine. Past TMNT stories often featured Raphael hugging his dark side (he actually put on a shredder coat in the Image comics), but watching Leonardo do the dirty work of the foot tribe is completely different Things. At the end of "City Fall", he recovered from the trance, but he never fully recovered from this experience. When Sprint reached out to comfort him, Leonardo was still nervous and asked not to touch him.

Another element that is a bit too dark for other media is "City Fall"'s gritty portrayal of street crime. The underworld is not a unilateral anti-turtle action, but a series of complex factions, wanting many different things for different reasons. The conflict in the story does not come from Shredder challenging the law, but from challenging the balance of the previously established criminal underworld. This increased turbulence will lead to more chaos. The police are Foot Clan's payroll, so the turtles are indeed the city's only weapon against the Shredder forces. While searching for Leo in issue 26, Raph was so tired of police corruption that before Michelangelo intervened, he threatened to beat a police officer with his "business purpose".

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One of the most obvious things that prevents "City Fall" from being the next Nickelodeon sponsored movie is that the characters actually use their weapons. Most of the arc revolves around Shredder's battle with Savate, another ninja clan who lives in the city. Savate delivered the severed hand as a war message in issue 25. However, this may not be their smartest move, because it eventually made their leader beheaded in front of all rival gangs in New York after two periods.

Due to betrayal, conspiracy, and higher stakes than ever before, "City Fall" operates on so many levels. It has many relaxing moments—for example, Mickey uses the power of a candy bar to become friends with Slash—but it focuses on bringing lasting trauma to the family and affecting them in the rest of the series. This is what TMNT fans have wanted for a long time, a truly dark chapter in their lives, but it may never appear anywhere outside of the comic page. It may not be the most exciting story in the myth of Ninja Turtles, but its unique combination of action and suspense makes it almost impossible to let go.

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