Michelangelo must fight his brothers when they fall under the control of a parasite wasp.
This episode provides examples of:
- Artistic License – Biology: After stinging Leonardo, the wasp flips over and dies. In Real Life wasps can sting repeatedly, and don't die afterwards like bees do, and even they don't die right away. Also the scene where the egg hatches and three fully formed adult wasps pop out, skipped over the larval and pupal stages.
- There's also the fact that the sting of parasitic wasps doesn't actually brainwash animals to watch over its egg. Rather, a parasitic wasp's sting lays said egg inside the animal's body and the larval wasp eats its way out.
- Black Eyes of Evil: All the turtles except Michelangelo get them after they are infected.
- Bottle Episode: This episode mostly takes place in the lair of the Turtles, the only scenes outside it being the Kraang lab that created the mutant wasp.
- Brainwashed and Crazy: The turtles but Mikey become infected by the wasp and become its servants. Well, Mikey does get infected, but he amazingly manages to keep his mind long enough to brew the cure for his brothers.
- Determinator: After being given instructions by Donatello, Michelangelo is bitten by him because Donatello got infected. Michelangelo then completes these instructions (one of which involves heating up the cure for ten minutes, then running it in a centrifuge for five more) without falling to the Mind Control the Wasp used on his brothers, which was transferred via bite.
- Dramatization: There is a species of parasitic wasps in real life that use other living organisms to watch the larvae. There is more Body Horror than the one presented here.
- Dwindling Party: The Turtles are infected and brainwashed one by one until only Mikey is left. He is eventually infected as well, but manages to successfully use Donatello's notes to make a cure before he succumbs to the infection.
- Improvised Weapon: Mikey tries hitting the baby wasps with his skateboard, not that it really does much.
- Monster Is a Mommy: The wasp is revealed to have been female after it's died, Leo discovering a lone egg it laid. Things get worse when it turns out that the wasp's venom brainwashes prey into looking after its offspring and they can infect others... so they won't resist in offering themselves as food to its brood once they hatch.
- No Name Given: The Mutant Wasp is never named throughout the episode, surprisingly. Even Mikey doesn't give it a moniker, but that might be because he's scared out of his wits.
- Out-of-Character Moment: Leonardo becomes aggressive and obsessively protective of the wasp's egg after getting stung. Raphael lampshades this by saying "Unmotivated bouts of anger are my thing". It quickly turns into O.O.C. Is Serious Business when the wasp venom takes over Leo's mind and he actively attacks and infects Raphael & Donatello. In the end, the turtles are all shocked when Michelangelo successfully cures them, and destroys the three newly hatched mutant wasps.
- Percussive Prevention: Donatello tells Michelangelo to knock him out if he starts to turn after being bitten. When he does, Mikey does it reluctantly.
- Pretend to Be Brainwashed: After Mikey finishes the cure and cures himself he pretends to be brainwashed like his brothers in order to get close enough to them and inject them with the cure too.Donnie: You finished the antibody yourself?
Leo: And you were just pretending to be one of us?
Mikey: YEP!
Raph: But, that's... smart. - Puppeteer Parasite: The mutant wasp does this with Leo, Raph, and Don, and its offspring presumably would have done so with the city. She failed to control Mikey however,
- Ungrateful Bastard: Despite acknowledging the fact that Mikey saved the day, Leo calls Mikey out for using his comic book as toilet paper because apparently, Leo values his comic book more than his life.
- Useful Book: In an attempt to make Leo stop guarding the egg before revealing he is under the control of the wasp, Mikey attempts to use a comic book of his as toilet paper. When Leo finds that out later by the time he's freed from its control, he is really pissed off.
- Voice of the Legion: Leonardo gets a really creepy one, complete with a Resistance Is Futile speech. Donatello in a particularly funny Deadpan Snarker moment says "Sorry to burst your possessed bubble, Leo."
