The first trailer for Michael Bay's Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles launched almost a month ago, but one character was conspicuously absent: Master Splinter.
Well, luckily the rat sensei does not appear to have been left out of the movie, as the new "Brothers" TV ad for TMNT depicts Splinter, if only for a split second and from behind. But there's definitely no denying those whiskers.
Now the question becomes, how does Splinter work into this version of the Turtles' origin story? It was sort of revealed during the first trailer that April O'Neil's (Megan Fox) dad and William Fichtner's character (who will eventually be Shredder) created the Turtles, so does that mean that Splinter will be April's father in this iteration?
There doesn't appear to be a listing for Mr. O'Neil (who's been alive and dead in different Turtles comics, films and shows) in the cast list, and since Splinter is the character that "created" the Turtles in every other part of TMNT lore, you've got to wonder. Maybe in this iteration, the mutation went wrong when creating the Turtles and Mr. O'Neil was turned into a giant rat? Who knows.
It's also possible that the new movie will stick to the usual story of Splinter being either the rat of Hamato Yoshi or Yoshi himself, but considering this is Michael Bay we're talking about, I'd bet that that won't be the case. I mean, the guy did allegedly want to turn the Turtles into aliens at one point.
At any rate, we won't have to wait too long to find out. TMNT is out on August 8.
