The Dark Turtles attack the heroes at Cody's penthouse, but Dark Leo's brothers don't want to follow his plan. With the fight spiraling out of their control, Dark Leo makes a rash decision and saves Cody at his own expense. As the other Dark Turtles flee, the heroes decide to take Dark Leo in and heal his wounds.
This episode provides examples of
- A Day in the Limelight: This is the first and only episode to feature the Dark Turtles (or at least one of them) as a main character rather than a villain.
- Big Eater: During a meal, Dark Leo gorges himself on everything in sight. Justified because The Teaser shows how rare it is for him to actually eat."Where I live, you fight for food—eat what you can when your can, or you starve."
- Book Ends: The episode begins with the Dark Turtles fighting over a piece of food, a chicken leg. The episode ends when Darius throws them another piece of food, a steak, for them to fight over, only for Dark Leo, highlighting he may change for the better, to split it apart and let his brothers have it.
- Bullying the Dragon:
- To prove that he was doing better, Raph starts taunting Dark Leo. The latter gets so mad that he destroys some equipment, which almost crushes the former and is barely saved by Dark Leo himself.
- Averted by Darius. While each of the Dark Turtles are a bigger physical threat than he is, he can barks orders at them without fear because of hypnotic suggestions that prevent them from attacking him. Being backed up by a powerful battlesuit doesn't hurt, either. Dark Raph learns this the hard way.
- Character Development: It's implied that Dark Leo turned into an Anti-Villain by the end.
- Easily Forgiven: Subverted. Even though most of the Turtles acknowledge Dark Leo saved Cody and are appreciative, they still intended to turn him over to the proper authorities after he healed up.
- The Farmer and the Viper: The main plot of the episode revolves around this. Played with however, since although Dark Leo does go back to his brothers and turn his back on the Turtles, it's shown at the end that his time with the Turtles has affected him, and even changed him a little for the good.
- To drive this point home, Leo tells his counterpart "The Scorpion and The Frog" parable.
- Good Feels Good: Discovered by Leonardo's dark clone.
- Good Is Dumb: Dark Leo's impression of the Turtles while watching a pratfall-filled training exercise. He also finds the idea of looking out for your family and friends to be stupid."I can't believe we got beat by these losers!"
- Good Is Not Soft: Dark Leo chastises the heroes for being too weak to finish him off. Splinter reminds him that it takes no strength to destroy, but it does to heal and create. The overall episode also demonstrates that the heroes' goodness allows them to function effectively in battle.Mikey: Lookin' out for one another is pretty much what we do.
- Heroic Sacrifice: Dark Leo puts himself between Cody and his brother's laser, thus saving Cody from getting killed. Of course it's revealed that he did this to get on the original turtles' good side.
- Incoming Ham: "KNOCK KNOCK! WANNA PLAY?!"
- Jerkass Has a Point:
- Raph isn’t wrong when he assumes Dark Leo was trying to get them to lower their guard around him.
- Darius notes the Dark Turtles waste more time fighting each other than their common enemies.
- Nature Versus Nurture: Don invokes it when the group decides to treat Dark Leo as a person and not a monster.
- No One Gets Left Behind:
- Subverted when the other Dark Turtles bail after Dark Leo is blasted and passes out, though we later learn this was all part of the plan.
- After the plan's a proven bust, Dark Don waits to take off until Dark Raph gets back in the ship (albeit while calling him a moron).
- "Not So Different" Remark: Donnie determines that, for all the visual differences, there are barely half a dozen minor DNA differences between Leo and Dark Leo.
- Oh, Crap!: Dark Leo's brothers are quite stunned when he shares food with them.
- Pet the Dog:
- Subverted. At the end, Darius Dun gives the Dark Turtles another piece of steak to fight over even though they failed to destroy the real Turtles for him. In the same breath he openly hopes that they choke on it, showing he's only giving them the food just to ensure that they don't starve before they can serve him again.
- Speaking of that scene, it's played straight when Dark Leo decides to split the meat among his brothers rather than eat it for himself.
- Properly Paranoid: Raph voices his distrust towards Dark Leo throughout the episode. Despite the others trying to be hospitable to him, he was right all along.
- The Psycho Rangers: The Dark Turtles, as always. This episode also deconstructs it in a couple scenes. While the Turtles sometimes argue, they still have tight bonds and always look out for each other. All the Dark Turtles have are the negative qualities, so they have little regard for each other. Therefore, they can't function as an effective team and keep getting beaten.
- Quirky Miniboss Squad: The Dark Turtles.
- "Ray of Hope" Ending: Dark Leo demonstrating that he learned some lessons from his time with the Turtles, after all.
- "The Reason You Suck" Speech: During his fight with Leo, Dark Leo recalls what Darius once told the Dark Turtles:"Idiots! Worthless biological trash!"
- Save the Villain: Rather than let him die a slow death, the Turtles bring Dark Leo in the apartment to recover.
- Screw This, I'm Outta Here: After Dark Leo gets hit with the laser, Dark Raph and Mikey panic and run away.
- Secret Test of Character: Leo left the shield control within Dark Leo's grasp to see what he'd do.
- Shut Up, Kirk!: When Leo is offering his clone one last chance to not go through with his plan, Dark Leo says this line. "I already know what I am! I AM A SCORPION!"
- Surprisingly Realistic Outcome: It takes time for Dark Leo to physically recover from a nasty energy blast.
- Time Skip: A week passes between the group discussing what to do with an unconscious Dark Leo and him waking up in the infirmary.
- Took a Level in Kindness: Even though Dark Leo intended on using the Turtles' trust to destroy them, he uses their lesson in sharing and applies it to his own brothers."It's called sharing. Try it sometime. You might be surprised what happens."
- Undying Loyalty: It's implied that Dark Leo is the only Dark Turtle that's genuinely loyal to Darius. He's the only one standing in attention when Darius addresses the group, he looks rather disappointed when Darius calls out their inability to work together, and he doesn't object when chewed out for the plan's failure.
- What You Are in the Dark: When he thinks he's alone with the security controls, Dark Leo actually hesitates to turn them off. He soon does it, but only after Leo approaches him.
- Wide-Eyed Idealist: Leo genuinely believes that most people will be the best they can be if given the chance. He still tries to reason with Dark Leo even after he's betrayed them.
- Would Hurt a Child: The plan was for Dark Leo to get injured saving Cody so that he would be taken in and get to shut down building security. Of course, Dark Don was still perfectly okay with killing Cody if he could.
