| Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles | |
|---|---|
TMNT #4, 2nd Print. Cover art by Michael Dooney |
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| Publication information | |
| Publisher | Mirage Studios |
| Main character(s) | Leonardo Donatello Michelangelo Raphael |
| Creative team | |
| Creator(s) | Kevin Eastman Peter Laird |
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles is an American comic book published by Mirage Studios from 1984 to 2009. Originally conceived by Kevin Eastman and Peter Laird as a one-off parody, the comic's popularity has gone on to inspire a major pop culture franchise, including three television series, four feature films, numerous video games and a wide range of toys and merchandise.
Over the years, the Turtles have appeared in numerous cross-overs with other successful independent comics characters, including Dave Sim's Cerebus, Erik Larsen's Savage Dragon, Bob Burden's Flaming Carrot and Stan Sakai's Usagi Yojimbo.
In 2009 Peter Laird sold the Turtles franchise to Viacom, parent company of the Nickelodeon (TV channel), and shut down Mirage Studios. At WonderCon 2011, it was announced that IDW Publishing had been given the rights to publish new issues and reprint the older comics.[1]
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The concept originated from a comical drawing sketched out by Kevin Eastman during a casual evening of brainstorming with his friend Peter Laird. The drawing of a short, squat turtle wearing a mask with nunchakus strapped to its arms was incredibly funny to the young artists, as it played upon the inherent contradiction of a slow, cold-blooded reptile with the speed and agility of the Japanese martial arts. At Laird's suggestion, they created a team of four such turtles, each specializing in a different weapon. Eastman and Laird often cite the work of Frank Miller and Jack Kirby as their major artistic influences.
Using money from a tax refund together with a loan from Eastman's uncle, they formed Mirage Studios and self-published a single-issue comic book that would parody four popular comics of the early 1980s: Marvel Comics' The New Mutants, which featured teenage mutants, Cerebus, Ronin, and Daredevil, which featured ninja clans dueling for control of the New York City underworld.[2]
In fact, many comics fans will recognize in the Turtles' origin several direct allusions to Daredevil: The traffic accident, involving a blind man and a truck carrying radioactive waste, is a reference to Daredevil's own origin story (Indeed in the version told in the first issue Splinter sees the radioactive canister strike a boys face, though in this world it does not split until it reaches the turtles). The name "Splinter" is a parody on Daredevil's mentor, a man known as "Stick." The Foot, a clan of evil ninja who became the Turtles' arch-enemies, is a parody of the Hand, who were themselves a mysterious and deadly ninja clan in the pages of Daredevil.
The first issue of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles was advertised in issues #1 and #2 of Eastman and Laird's 1984 comic, Gobbledygook, in addition to the Comics Buyer's Guide, issue 547. The full page advertisement in CBG helped them gain the attention of retailers and jump-started their early sales. Because of the CBG's newspaper format, many were disposed of, making it a highly sought after collector's item today. The book premiered in May 1984 at a comic book convention in Portsmouth, New Hampshire. It was printed in an oversized magazine-style format using black and white artwork on cheap newsprint and had a print run of only 3,000 copies. It was a period of intense speculation in comic book investment, with especially strong interest in black and white comics from independent companies. The first printings of the original TMNT comics had small print runs that made them instant collector items. Within months, the books were trading at prices over 50 times their cover price.
The success also led to a black and white comics boom in the mid-1980s, where other small publishers put out animal-based parody books hoping to make a quick profit. Among them, the Adolescent Radioactive Black Belt Hamsters, the Cold-Blooded Chameleon Commandos, the Pre-Teen Dirty-Gene Kung Fu Kangaroos, Karate Kreatures, and Adult Thermonuclear Samurai Elephants were obvious parodies of TMNT. Most of them sold to comic shops in large numbers, but failed to catch on with comics readers. This speculation led to financial problems with both comic shops and distributors, contributing to a sales collapse in 1986-7.
The "Return to New York" story arc concluded in the spring of 1989, and by this time the Ninja Turtles phenomenon was well established in other media. Eastman and Laird now found themselves administrating an international merchandising juggernaut, overseeing a wide array of licensing deals. This prevented the two creators from participating in the day-to-day work of writing and illustrating a monthly comic book. For this reason, many guest artists were invited to showcase their unique talents in the TMNT universe. The breadth of diversity found in the various short stories had the adverse effect of disrupting some continuity and gave the series a disjointed, anthology-like feel. Some of these artists, including Michael Dooney, Eric Talbot, A.C. Farley, Ryan Brown, Steve Lavigne, Steve Murphy, and Jim Lawson, continued to work with Mirage Studios for years to come.
Issue #45 kicked off a major turning point, as Mirage made a concerted effort to return the series to continuity. A 13-part story arc entitled "City at War" began with issue #50, which was the first issue to be completely written and illustrated by both Eastman and Laird since issue #11. "City at War," and Volume 1 itself, concluded with the publication of issue #62 in August, 1993.
Mirage Studios launched Volume 2 with much fanfare in October 1993, as a full-color series that maintained the continuity of the first volume. Written and illustrated by Jim Lawson, the series lasted only thirteen issues before ceasing publication in October 1995. The cancellation was due, in part, to declining popularity and lagging sales.
Erik Larsen came to the rescue in June 1996, with the publication of a third volume under the Image Comics banner. The 23 monthly issues were written by Gary Carlson and pencilled by Frank Fosco, and marked a return to black and white artwork. This volume is notable for having a faster pace and more intense action while inflicting major physical changes on the Turtles themselves; Leonardo losing a hand, Raphael's face being scarred, Splinter becoming a bat, and Donatello becoming a cyborg. In a startling plot twist, Raphael even took on the identity of Shredder and assumed leadership of the Foot. With Volume 3, the Turtles were incorporated into the Image universe, which provided opportunities for a few crossovers and guest appearances by characters from The Savage Dragon series. The series ceased publication in 1999, and it is no longer considered part of the "official" TMNT canon due, in part, to a lack of desire by co-creator Peter Laird to follow-up material with which he was not directly involved nor fully approved. Raph's depiction as the Shredder however, is referenced in an episode of the third season of the 2003 animated series "The Darkness Within", where Raph is exposed to his fear of giving into anger and becoming the very thing he hates.
Peter Laird and Jim Lawson brought the Turtles back to their roots with the simply-titled TMNT in December 2001. Published bi-monthly, the series took the opportunity to correct a persistent error: Since the first issue of Volume 1, Michelangelo's name had been misspelled as "Michaelangelo." It is now spelled correctly, consistent with his Renaissance namesake.
Picking up fifteen years after the conclusion of Volume 2 (and omitting the events of Volume 3), the Turtles, now in their early thirties, are living together in their sewer lair beneath New York City. April and Casey have been married for some time and remain in contact with the Turtles from their nearby apartment. Splinter continues to live at the Northampton farmhouse, where he has become a "grandfather" of sorts to Casey's teenage daughter, Shadow. The Utroms return to Earth in a very public arrival, subsequently establishing a peaceful base in Upper New York Bay. Since the arrival, aliens—and other bizarre life-forms, like the Turtles—have become more accepted within society. No longer forced to live in hiding, the Turtles now roam freely among the world of humans, albeit under the guise of aliens.
The latest issue of TMNT Volume 4 was issue #31 which came out online in October 17, 2010 several months after Peter Laird sold the Turtles franchise. It ends with "To be Continued" but the story was never continued or concluded, as of yet. Also issue 31 is free and available for viewing on Peter Laird's blog. To the much disappointment of fans Peter does not know when or if he will conclude volume 4. He has however stated that #32 has been finished and hopes to put it online like #31.
There are few trade paperback collections of the series, and there do not appear to be any forthcoming collections in the future. As part of the 25th anniversary celebrations, a new trade paperback Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Collected Book Volume 1 was released in July 2009. A new hardcover deluxe reprint collection was published by IDW Publishing, who had been given the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles rights from Viacom in 2011, including reprinting the older comics.
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