TMNT: The Nickelodeon References You Missed In Mutant Mayhem

Contains spoilers for "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem"

While "Mutant Mayhem" has Paramount Pictures as a distributor, Nickelodeon Movies is one of the production companies. As such, many of the more recent "TMNT" adaptations have been Nickelodeon properties, starting with the 2012 series that ran for five seasons. Nickelodeon also made the "Rise of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles" series and the Netflix film of the same name. So it shouldn't come as a surprise to see the iconic Nickelodeon logo at the beginning of the turtles' latest outing, "Mutant Mayhem."

The newest flick is packed with pop culture references, with the four brothers talking about everything from "Avengers: Endgame" to "Attack on Titan." But the film also pays tribute to the kids' channel with a couple of references to classic Nickelodeon shows. For starters, during the flashback sequence of Splinter (Jackie Chan) taking the turtles to Times Square, someone wearing a SpongeBob SquarePants costume sees them. "Hey Arnold!" also gets a namedrop as the turtles throw ninja stars at a watermelon held by Mikey (Shamon Brown Jr). The others joke about how Mikey's head looks like a watermelon, comparing it to Stewie from "Family Guy" and Arnold, who famously has a football head. 

Nickelodeon has provided several iterations of "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles" over the last decade, but "Mutant Mayhem" is kicking off something special. Although the film was just released, Paramount has already greenlit a sequel and a TV show to fill in the blanks between the two movies. There's much to be excited about for the future of "TMNT," but Nickelodeon also understands the value of mining the past.

A few weeks before "Mutant Mayhem" hit theaters, Variety reported that Nickelodeon had acquired worldwide rights to the original 1987 Fred Wolf series. The show ran from 1987 to 1996 for a total of 193 episodes, and with Nickelodeon now owning the show, it can appear on any channels owned and operated by the company, including YouTube, O&O, and Pluto TV linear channels. This also allows them to appear on Nickelodeon-branded channels and digital platforms across the globe. 

The announcement was made at San Diego Comic-Con with a panel featuring "Mutant Mayhem" director Jeff Rowe and "TMNT" co-creator Kevin Eastman. It was fresh news, as Eastman told the crowd, "We just found out today — this is breaking news — Nickelodeon and Paramount have secured the rights to broadcast the original cartoon series." With more stories set in the world of "Mutant Mayhem" and the original "TMNT" series on the way, it's a good time to be a Ninja Turtle fan.