Secret Fifth Ninja Turtle Triples in Price Following TMNT Spoilers

Last updated on October 14, 2025

Kaito, Bane of Nightmares | Illustration by Joshua Raphael

Last Friday, WotC revealed next year's first Universes Beyond MTG set, which will return to… New York!

Yep, the Big Apple may soon become one of Magic's most revisited planes: First a brief appearance in a Doctor Who Secret Lair (as reprint of Angels of the Ruins featuring the Statue of Liberty), then as the main backdrop of Spider-Man, and next year as the hometown of another posse of heroes: Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.

Rabiah scales aside, WotC's formal announcement of TMNT's worldwide release on March 6th, 2026 has spiked some existing Magic cards – including the Ninja Turtle that we already have!

Taeko, the Patient Avalanche Price Spike

Fallen Shinobi | illis. Tomasz Jedruszek

As it turns out, Magic already has tons of cool ninjas, some okay-ish turtles, and exactly one ninja turtle: Taeko, the Patient Avalanche

Taeko, the Patient Avalanche hails from Foundations Jumpstart. It has thus far seen nearly zero competitive play, and it's none too popular in casual Commander brews, but has nevertheless been a fairly expensive Dimir creature: it was a 10-bucks card by the start of this year, costed about $8 six months ago, and although it has been slowly trending downwards it never fell below $3-$4. And, interestingly, even if it has never seen too much play, it's been traded pretty frequently.

All of the above changed quite abruptly last weekend, though:

Source: TCGplayer – Taeko, the Patient Avalanche – Foundations Jumpstart (J25), near-mint

When you look at near-mint copies, the traded volume skyrocketed from about 2-3 copies per day, to a whopping 260 copies traded during the weekend. The price shot from about $4-$5 to over $18 in those three days – and current listings are above $20 for a near-mint copy.

Why Is Taeko, the Patient Avalanche Spiking?

The main reason is, of course, its two creature types: Ninja Turtles are coming, and Taeko, the Patient Avalanche is the only one thus far. It also has a single printing; and although Foundations Jumpstart is fairly recent, it was probably sold less than Standard sets from like last year's Bloomburrow or Foundations. 

But from the reveals we saw last Friday, there may be quite a bit more to this ninja turtle.

For starters, it does look like TMNT will have ninja and turtle synergies, as we've seen with Heroes in Half a Shell:

And, probably most importantly, looks like TMNT will have a revamped version of the ninjutsu mechanic, Sneak, as seen in Raphael's Technique: 

Sneak will let you cast spells for a discount if you also bounce an unblocked attacker you control back to your hand… and notice that, unlike ninjutsu, sneak works for instants, not just for creatures.

Taeko, the Patient Avalanche happens to have two different skills that synergize well with sneak (and ninjutsu). First, it can make one of your creatures unblockable, making sure you get an unblocked attacker. And then Taeko, the Patient Avalanche gets buffed and gives you a scry 1 whenever you bounce a creature back to hand.

We still don't know exactly how well Taeko, the Patient Avalanche will synergize with the rest of the TMNT set… but, for starters, it covers a lot of bases: Two relevant creature types, and two skills that play well with sneak.

What Will Happen With These Ninja's Prices?

Satoru Umezawa | illus. Anna Pavleeva

With the usual caveat that this is not investment advice (always do your own research, folks!), this ninja hype seems real and organic. Spider-Man just proved that, while some Universes Beyond sets can be record-smashing successes, others can turn out to be a bit of a disappointment.

But, at any rate: Magic's going back to New York, and ninja turtles are coming!