a very normal blog

This episode is SUCH A GOOD keystone for characterization in the show. I'd say even more so than the first episode.

Leo and Raph's dynamic obviously takes center stage but it's for GOOD REASON. And it sets up a lot of what we see in the rest of the episodes.

Everyone on the team, including himself, views Leo as the face man. He's the one that goes to talk to bellhop, trusting his brothers to capture the bugs.

But then the plan doesn't work, getting bullhop mutated and them stuck. Raph immediately blames Leo for the plan falling through, leading to an argument.

When they meet big mama, Leo is the only one who thinks she's maybe not just a well intended bleeding heart. Something he is once again criticized for. He tries to reason with them, tries to convince them to mayyyyybe not hand over a bunch of mutagen to an unknown adult, and is ultimately out voted. The entire time hearing jabs at his expense.

So things hit the fan, and he doesn't stick around for it. It's not like he abandoned them. He just ran out of time to be reasonable and had to come up with something to get them all out of there.

And when he does? Raph's still peeved. Like, he's not fully mad, but he thinks he could've come up with something better if Leo hadn't ran away.

And Raph decides the best thing to do next is get the bugs back. Once again out voted, Leo works on getting this done as quietly and quickly as possible.

And then he gets thrown off the roof.

Because Raph didn't listen to him when he said Baron Draxum wasn't joking.

A lot of the disagreements between them really boil down to two things:

Leo is great at thinking things through. He's good at reading people and laying low if he knows it'll get him somewhere. None of the turtles recognize this as a useful skill, not even himself. He defers to his brothers on pretty much everything, even if he doesn't agree, because at the end of the day he's just the guy who deals with people.

Raph is hard-headed. He cares about his brothers and wants to do what's best for everyone, but he's not great at changing his mind. He's great as a leader in battle, able to take charge and tell his team where to hit them so it hurts. But when faced with opposition, he's very "my way or the highway".

This dynamic stays at play for the rest of the series, and while I know the movie wasn't the original ending they intended they were able to pay it off really well. Leo being thrust into leadership he doesn't feel ready for, seeming to do everything in his power to come off as incompetent as possible, and Raph trying to brute force his plans. (In the movie his is objectively correct but it doesn't change how he responds to his brother messing it up.)