In the universe of Eastman and Laird's Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, the Foot Clan was founded in Feudal Japan by two men named Sato and Oshi. In Volume 1 Issue 47, the Turtles and Time Mistress Renet traveled to a time prior to the Foot's creation. There, Raphael met Sato and Oshi, and, not realising who they are, he taught them about Ninjutsu. After the Turtles returned to the present, Sato and Oshi decided to follow the ways of the ninja.
The Foot Clan are the most feared clan of warriors and assassins in Japan. Both Hamato Yoshi and Oroku Nagi were members, until one day, Nagi attacked Yoshi's love Tang Shen and Yoshi killed Nagi. Dishonored, Yoshi and Shen fled to New York City, while Nagi's younger brother Oroku Saki was adopted by the clan and was trained to become a fierce ninja. When he was ready, Saki was sent to America to head the New York branch of the Clan. Under his leadership, it took only a year for it to become a powerful and fearsome group.
After Shredder's death, the American Foot fell apart, and the Foot Soldiers began fighting against Shredder's elite guard. Karai, a clan leader from Japan, came here to stop the clan war. She enlisted the Turtles' help in this, in exchange for promising that no Foot shall ever try to avenge the Shredder again. This peace treaty is still in effect in Volume 4 of the comic.
1987 series and TMNT Adventures
Symbol of the Foot Clan in the 1987 cartoon.
The 1987 series and the spin-off TMNT Adventures comics share a similar continuity, and thus the same version of the Foot Clan. The Foot is an ancient ninjutsu clan, founded in Japan in 1583. The Shredder, followed by the Turtles and Splinter, went back and forth in time to try to kill the creator of the Foot Clan. In 1583, Shredder's ancestor Oroku Sancho led a small group of samurai, and Shredder offered to help him find magical artifacts that would give him power and wealth beyond his wildest dreams. Meanwhile, Splinter's ancestor Hamato Koji had been sent to find the same artifacts and did find them with the help of his descendant and the Turtles. One of the artifacts released a dragon, which headed for nearby villages; Splinter and Koji went to stop it while the Turtles went to fight Shredder. Sancho's men captured the Turtles and were about to execute them when Koji arrived, riding the dragon, which he had tamed. Seeing this, Sancho fled in fear, and Koji offered to lead Sancho's men and teach them the ninjutsu art of Shibana-Sama, founding the Foot Clan, so named for the footprint of the dragon in which he stood as he made his speech.[2] (However, according to "Blast from the Past", the Foot was founded by the noble warrior Shibana-Sama).
In 1960s Japan, both Oroku Saki and Hamato Yoshi were part of the Clan. Saki framed Yoshi for trying to murder a visiting sensei and had him exiled to New York City, thus clearing the way to take over the Foot Clan. He then proceeded to turn the Foot Clan into an army of criminals. Over the years, Saki, who became known as The Shredder, moved to the US, allied himself with the alien warlord Krang, and replaced the human Foot Ninja with robotic Foot Soldiers. However, these robots are no match for the Ninja Turtles, who destroy them at every encounter.
In the cartoon, The Shredder once considered making more intelligent Foot Soldiers, capable of learning and taking decisions by themselves. However, the idea was quickly abandoned when the first intelligent prototype, named Alpha 1, rebelled against The Shredder.
The Foot Clan's logo is a drawing of a right foot, and the Foot Soldiers wear purple and black uniforms featuring the logo on their foreheads. The Foot logo can also be seen on the Technodrome.
The Archie TMNT Adventures comics features more advanced Foot Soldiers in addition to the basic model. In the comics, The Shredder also built a giant Foot Soldier, who fought against the Warrior Dragon in New York City. The robot was destroyed when it crashed into the Statue of Liberty.
The Foot robot concept allowed the Turtles to destroy the Foot soldiers without any moral thoughts, allowing Leonardo and Raphael to use their weapons more offensively. Meanwhile, the series could keep its younger audience and remain a "family show". This principle also benefited the video games.
IDW Publishing
In the IDW Publishing adaption, the Foot Clan existed since the time of feudal Japan where it was founded by a ronin by the name of Takeshi Tatsuo who had been betrayed by his master. The sorceress Kitsune helped Tatsuo, to recover from the severe wounds he had suffered in the assassination attempt. The name of the clan was created by the bloody footprint of Tatsuo whose leg was completely healed by Kitsune ministrations.
When Tatsuo was betrayed by his clan are learning that he made a pact with a magician, his mind was born again in the son of his murderer Oroku Saki, the uprooting of the reawakening of his old memories powered over the communities and with Kitsune's counsel the Foot was revived in modern times.
In more recent times, the clan under the leadership of Oroku Saki (who was now operating as Shredder) tried to expand its supremacy in New York City. Its Foot Ninja were therefore often sent to amass any science that could help the Foot and also to find new test subjects. In this way, it led to the creation of the mutant arctic fox Alopex.
In this endeavor, the Foot Clan also came into contact with the extradimensional warlord General Krang who also wanted to create a mutant army to meet his objectives. An attack by the Foot Clan in the laboratory of Krang's ally Baxter Stockman led by a combination of circumstances to the creation of the Turtles and their father Splinter (who in a previous life had himself belonged to the Foot Clan).
Besides Shredder, Kitsune, and a substantial number of Foot Ninjas, other members of the Foot Clan include Karai (who was a descendant of Oroku Saki and the daughter of Oroku Yori), Masato, Dr. Miller, Alopex (a mutated Arctic Fox), Rocksteady, Bebop, Koya (Shredder's pet brown falcon who was later mutated), and Bludgeon (a mutant hammerhead shark).
At the time when Mutant Town was established following a mutagen bomb going off the day when Baxter Stockman became the Mayor of New York City, Old Hob was meeting with Oroku Karai to sell her some mutants in order to strengthen the Foot Clan. She was able to purchase Tokka and Rahzar. A possible future in issue #113 depicts an event in 2032 where the Foot Clan goes to war with the Splinter Clan.
Movies
1990–2007
In the first and second movies, the Foot Clan is a group of ninja thieves founded by the Shredder in Japan, but later stationed in New York. The Shredder had taken what Foot Soldiers he had from Japan, and began taking kids from the streets upon moving to New York and training them in Ninjutsu himself. His second-in-command is another Ninjutsu master called Tatsu. In the films, the Foot use the kanjiOni (鬼), which translates to "demon" or "ogre", as their symbol, worn in their hachimaki or on their backs.
In the second film, Tatsu tried to take command. He relinquished his claim when the Shredder returned. The clan then kidnapped Professor Jordon Perry of TGRI and forced him to use a mutagen so the Foot Clan could create two mutant warriors to fight the turtles. This results in a common snapping turtle and a gray wolf taken from the zoo being mutated into Tokka and Rahzar.
In the fourth film, the Foot is now under leadership of Karai, who has taken control after the Shredder's demise. They have grown in numbers and skill, and offer their services as mercenaries in the film. They are hired by Max Winters to track down and bring in the 13 monsters arriving in New York City.
2014 film
In the 2014 live-action film (which is a reboot of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles film series), the Foot Clan are no longer considered an international ninja cult, but rather a modern American terrorist organization. Besides Shredder and Karai, the film also introduced Eric Sacks who is Shredder's student, Dr. O'Neil's former lab partner, and the CEO of Sacks Industries. Instead of black unitard-clad masked ninjitsu warriors, they are portrayed as fully armed men that wear black military-like uniforms and often wore kabuki style masks to conceal one's identity.
In Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Out of the Shadows, the Foot Ninjas make their appearance, under leadership of Baxter Stockman to free Shredder. After Krang met with Shredder and told him about the device that would bring the Technodrome to Earth, Shredder and Karai recruited escaped prisoners Rocksteady and Bebop to aid them in obtaining the pieces.
Ninja Turtles: The Next Mutation
In the 1997-1998 Ninja Turtles: The Next Mutation series, the Foot Clan is a street gang, similar to the movies. After Venus defeated The Shredder, Leonardo told the kids that the Foot is a lie, and the clan was disbanded.
2003 series
The Foot Clan logo as seen in the 2003 animated series.
In the 2003 series, the Foot Clan is more similar to its original comic version. The Foot Clan are a group of warriors and assassins that Shredder created 700 years ago in Japan. The Shredder, who in this series is a long-lived Utrom named Ch'rell, has led the Clan since its creation and has turned it into a fearsome and secret group present across the world. The Foot emblem is a red, trident-like dragon's footprint (hence the name of the clan), an inverted version of the "Three-Toed Sign of the Dragon", the symbol of the five warriors who had defeated the original demon known as the Shredder in 300 AD. Thanks to Shredder's knowledge of Utrom technology, the Clan has weapons and equipment centuries ahead of human technology. They once created Foot Mechs in Rogue in the House which were based on Master Splinter, the President, the Prime Minister, and some others.
2012 series
In the 2012 series, the Foot Clan's origins are expanded on in the second season of the series. The clan was founded in Japan by a master martial artist named Koga Takuza, who used the swords of his fallen foes to forge a helmet stronger than steel, dubbing it the Kuro Kabuto. The Kabuto helmet is a symbol of the leader of the Foot Clan, passed down to the various rulers in the Foot's history. The Foot Clan would end up in a lengthy war against the Hamato Clan, which reached a boiling point when Oroku Saki was raised alongside Hamato Yoshi. Though the two were raised as brothers, Saki discovered his true heritage as being an orphaned Foot Clan member, and when his love Tang Shen wed Yoshi, he inadvertently killed Shen leaving Yoshi to supposedly perish while saving his infant daughter Hamato Miwa. In this series, the Foot Clan is a global ninjutsu clan an crime syndicate answering only to the Shredder, though others run the various factions of the Foot Clan across the globe.
2018 series
In Rise of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, the Foot Clan were initially peaceful and lived in the feudal Japan, but came under attack and were nearly wiped out, their leader Oroku Saki sought help from an Oni who provided him with a mystic armor that allowed him to defeat their attackers, but the armor corrupted Saki and turned him to the Shredder who led the Foot down to an evil path. Its known members in the present are the Foot Lieutenant and the Foot Brute. They can make origami ninjas out of paper and have the power of teleportation through hidden gateways. They seek to revive their master and are collecting the pieces of his armor in the shape of ancient artifacts.
Batman vs. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles
The Foot Clan appear in the film Batman vs. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (which is based on the IDW crossover). Sato and Oshi (see above) are mentioned as founders of the Foot Clan. The Foot Clan collaborated with the League of Assassins in a plot that involved using a stolen Wayne Enterprises cloud seeder to spread a compound containing a mixture of mutagen and Joker venom on Gotham City. A select number of Foot Ninjas were mutated into mutant animals where two of them were mutated into a mutant pigeon and a mutant Tyrannosaurus.
Video games
Unlike the 1987 cartoon series on which they were based, the TMNT videogames introduced Foot Soldiers with uniforms of several different colors. These colors represent the type of weapons they are carrying.
In Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Shredder's Revenge, the Foot Clan is steadily rebuilt by Shredder after their alleged destruction in Turtles in Time. They are placed under the control of various members of the Shredder Elite, though due to Shredder not giving away information about the fact the other members are supposed work together, they become embroiled in a gang war. Their presence is unknown after the events of the game.
Members
Shredder - The leader of the Foot Clan and the arch-villain of the Ninja Turtles in most versions his real name is Oroku Saki a villainous ninjitsu master and often have a personal connection to Hamato Yoshi and Splinter in the Turtles origins and their most recurring foe in the franchise.
Karai - A female high-ranking member of the Foot originally someone on equal level of authority with Shredder in later versions she would become his right-hand and often his relative who usually has a rivalry with Leonardo.
Tatsu - Shredder's right-hand man in the live action movies.
Purple Dragons - A street gang led by Hun who are affiliated with the Foot in a few versions.
Hun - The leader of the Purple Dragons who sometimes works for the Shredder in some versions and is the arch-enemy of Casey Jones.
Hamato Yoshi - He was a former member of the Foot Clan in most versions.
Shredder Clones - Clones of the Shredder whose origins vary in different media appearances.
Claw Shredder - A clone of Shredder with monstrous crustacean-like claws.
Mini Shredder - A miniature clone of Shredder.
Shiva Shredder - A towering four-armed clone of Shredder.
Foot Ninja - The Foot Ninja serves as the basic soldiers for the Foot.
Foot Elite - The elite Foot Ninjas trained by the Shredder.
Foot Mystics - The Foot Mystics first appeared in the 2003 series. Another version of them appeared in the comics.
Foot Bots - Foot Bots are robotic soldiers for the Foot.
Mirage era members
Cha Ocho - A member of the Foot Clan.
Hiroshi - A Foot med-tech.
Izumi -
Lin - A female member of the Foot Clan.
Mamoru - A Foot Mystic.
Mashima - A Foot Mystic.
Oroku Nagi - The older brother of Shredder.
Oshi -
Pimiko - The daughter of Shredder.
Sato -
Sid Jones - The cousin of Casey Jones.
Tomai -
Yanada -
The Mistress - Tang Shen's sister and Shredder's former concubine.
1990s film members
Danny Pennington - Charles Pennington's teenage son who joined the Foot Clan. He later defected to the Turtles' side during the final battle.
Freddy - A Foot Clan member in the second movie who poses as April O'Neil's camera operator.
2003 members
Khan (voiced by Sean Schemmel) - A Foot Clan member that worked for Cyber-Shredder.
Dr. Chaplin (voiced by Zachary Mastoon) - A young scientist who worked for the Foot Clan and was a fan of Baxter Stockman. He develops a crush on Karai. After the conclusion of the Ninja Tribunal story arc, they start a relationship with each other.
Kitsune - A member of the Pantheon and the youngest of the group who assisted Shredder in the founding the Foot Clan. She seeks to revive her father and untie the pantheon which would wipe out humanity in the process and wanted Shredder to be his host. Despite this, Kitsune and Shredder were lovers and sincerely felt affection towards one another.
Jennika - A young Foot assassin who is later turned into a mutant turtle and joins the Turtles as their fifth member.
Toshiro - An elderly mentor of the Foot Clan who is often consulted by Karai for his wisdom and serenity.
Koya - A female mutant brown falcon that was mutated from Shredder's pet brown falcon.
Masato - A former leader of the Foot Clan and the sensei of Hamato Yoshi.
Natsu - Natsu is young woman who was a part of the Yakuza, but now serves Karai.
Ocho - Ocho is a Yokai mole transformed by Kitsune who was guarding a sword until Karai retrieves it and thus becoming her servant.
Oroku Maji - The father of Oroku Saki.
Patrick Miller - A professor and expert on the Foot Clan. He was later killed by a Foot assassin sent by Karai.
Sarsparilla - A mutant armadillo seen in the possible future of 2032 during the Foot Clan's war with the Splinter Clan.
Takeshi Tatsuo - The founder of the Foot Clan and past life of the Shredder.
Koga Takuzu - The founder of the Foot Clan who forged the Kuro Kabuto helmet made from the armor pieces that he claimed from his defeated opponents.
Oroku Keiji - The father of Oroku Saki. He was killed by Hamato Yuta.
Chris Bradford (voiced by Clancy Brown) - An American celebrity martial arts master and action star. Unknown to the broad public, he is one of Shredder's disciples. Chris is mutated twice in the series: in the first instance, Chris was mutated into a mutant akita named Dogpound as a result of Chris being bitten by Shredder's pet akita Hachinko. In the second instance, he was mutated into this show's version of Rahzar. He continued to serve the Shredder until his death at the hands of Leatherhead towards the end of the fourth season. Rahzar was resurrected by the demon Kavaxas in the fifth season, only to be revealed to be serving as Kavaxas's puppet. Rahzar fell into the Netherworld during Kavaxas's attack on the mortal realm, never to return. Bradford was also the producer and star of the TV cartoon series Chris Bradford's 2 Ruff Krew.
Xever Montes (voiced by Christian Lanz) - An Afro-Brazilian street urchin who was freed from prison by Shredder after being caught stealing an item that belonged to Shredder and got recruited into the Foot Clan. He is often partnered with Bradford, despite the two of them never getting along. He later gets mutated into a mutant snakehead called Fishface, after touching one while visiting a fish shop in search of the Turtles. Initially unable to walk and capable of breathing only underwater, he was soon provided with a pair of mechanic legs as well as a breathing device built by Baxter Stockman and became a crime lord under the alias Mr. X. In season 5, in the midst of Shredder being revived, Fishface decides it's too much for him and returns to a simpler life of crime, getting out of the turtles way. He is never seen again.
Shinigami (voiced by Gwendoline Yeo) - A young witch who is allied with Karai's branch of the Foot Clan and a new ally of the Ninja Turtles who made her debut in season 4 and 5.
Tiger Claw (voiced by Eric Bauza) - As a boy, Takeshi was mutated into a mutant Bengal tiger after stumbling into one of the Kraang's portals. He later became an assassin hired by Shredder to aid him in his affairs. In the past, he lost a battle by losing his tail to her own sister named Alopex, who was mutated into an arctic fox and then his right arm in season 4. In season 5, he formed an underground and gathered his Foot Cultist to obtain the Demodragon Scroll to finally summon the demon Kavaxas and raise the Shredder from the dead. Succeeding, Claw was betrayed and joins the Turtles to defeat Shredder and Kavaxas, declaring a truce after the incident and it would be the last time he would be seen in the series.
2014 film members
Eric Sacks (portrayed by William Fichtner) - The CEO of Sacks Industries who was adopted at a young age by Shredder.
2018 series members
Foot Lieutenant (voiced by Rob Paulsen) - A tall and thin member of the Foot Clan serves as the Foot Clan's lieutenant.
Foot Brute (voiced by Maurice LaMarche) - A super-strong member of the Foot Clan who is partnered with the Foot Lieutenant.
Origami Ninjas - The Foot Ninja soldiers made of paper.
Franken-Foot - A patchwork Origami Ninja made by Raphael from the remnants of many Origami Ninjas as a sparring partner, who joins the Turtles' side.
Foot Recruit (Cassandra "Casey" Jones) (voiced by Zelda Williams) - Cassandra "Casey" Jones is a member of the Foot Clan with a hyper-aggressive personality. She debuted in "Hot Soup: The Game" where she was helping the Foot Lieutenant and the Foot Brute look for an artifact. Foot Recruit's real name was revealed when she later defects to the Turtles' side during the final battle against Shredder.
Jocelyn (voiced by Cree Summer) - A Foot Initiate who gains the mark of the Foot Initiate in "How to Make Enemies and Bend People to Your Will." The Foot Recruit claimed to Baron Draxum that she got the mark because her parents are "big donors."
Analysis
Peter Vogl, referring to the movie from 1990, found the teenage members of the Foot Clan a remarkably dark representation of the youths of New York, who are so depraved and without moral compass that they prefer to follow a Japanese gangster boss rather than the generation of their parents. He found that this culture-pessimistic vision seems implausible only at first glance, considering actual cases of youths from Western countries following the Islamic State. He also pointed out that the root of the challenge depicted in Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles is not domestic, but Shredder and his assistants come from abroad. Vogl concludes that, even if not intended by the creators, the movie employs fears of city crime, of the young generation, and of foreignness.[4]
References
^Gina Renée, Misiroglu; Eury, Michael (2006). "Shredder". The Supervillain Book: The Evil Side of Comics and Hollywood. Visible Ink Press. ISBN0780809777.
^Vogl, Peter (2016). "Teenage Mutant Nunja Turtles (1990)". Hollywood Justice: Selbstjustiz im amerikanischen Film 1915-2015 [Hollywood justice: Vigilantism in American film 1915-2015] (in German). Mühlbeyer Filmbuchverlag. pp. 124–125. ISBN978-3-945378-29-8.
