When Playmates Toys first acquired the rights to the obscure Mirage Comics property in 1987, the company was unsure if the Ninja Turtles would resonate with kids. To mitigate financial risk, the first production run of the original eight figures (including Splinter, Shredder, and the four Turtles) was manufactured with soft rubber heads. If the line failed, they were cheaper to produce. Once the animated series exploded into mainstream success, later releases were updated with standard, hard plastic heads.The lore behind the toy is just as fascinating. Originally created by Kevin Eastman and Peter Laird in 1984 as a parody of gritty superhero comics like Daredevil, Splinter's entire origin pokes fun at Marvel lore. Splinter is named after Daredevil's blind mentor, "Stick," while the Turtles’ martial arts group "The Foot Clan" was a parody of the evil ninja group "The Hand.

The 1988 Playmates figure is strictly tied to the 1987 animated TV series. In the original dark comics, Splinter was the pet rat of the ninja Hamato Yoshi. In the 1987 cartoon and the Playmates lore, Splinter is Hamato Yoshi, who was mutated into a humanoid rat after coming into contact with alien ooze in the sewers of New York