IDW Publishing’s announcement that it had acquired the license to do new stories based on the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles was big news a few weeks back; drafting in original co-creator Kevin Eastman was a coup in itself. But with the storied history and industry-changing success this indie-darling has achieved, one could argue that more exciting than the new comics is the news that IDW will be reprinting the out-of-print early stories including the original first story-arc and more.
Over the course of the past twenty six years, a plethora of stories featuring this green-skinned quartet and their rodent mentor have hit comic shelves but if you were to ask about them in any bookstore in the world, you’d be met with a blank stare. From its original miniseries on to the numerous animated-inspired series over the years, noneof these comics are in print as collections for people to buy. I came to conclusion while working on a TMNT edition of our Thursday “Where Do I Start?” feature and realizing that none of the classic and overlooked stories they’d done over the years were in print, or had been in quite some time – even the initial B&W first issue that started it all.
While most of the attention behind IDW's acquisition of the TMNT license relates to the new series, Iook forward to IDW's plans for "newly remastered collections of classic Turtles comics". Many epic stories have been lost in the sands of time with no re-release or collection since their original publication in the 80s. Some standout material in the TMNT archives includes the original storyarc by Laird & Eastman, to the the late 90's updated series by Peter David & LeSean Thomas, as well as runs by Steve Bissette, Rick Veitch and even a standalone miniseries by Simon Bisley called Bodycount. Will IDW bring these back? I hope so!
Find us on Facebook
Follow us on Twitter
Subscribe to our RSS Feed
Some rights reserved.
I am super excited about this. I have been looking around for some TMNT omnibusses or TPBs of the original stuff from when I first started reading comics and everything is so pricey. Fingers crossed we get what it should be.
Ya know, I’ve always wanted to read some of the original stories. TMNT with Steve Bissette sounds pretty awesome sinca I am loving his work in Swamp Thing right now. Hopefully there will be a nice HC for me to grab.
I want a classic TMNT omnibus. That would be rad!
Most important comic of the 1980s
I’m excited to see IDW’s treatment of the older comics. They have done such an awesome job with collecting so many other great series, that I know we’re going to see some gorgeous product from them.
So excited for this. I need to complete my run of the original Mirage stuff, only missing a few issues, but I’ll still buy IDW reprints. Maybe I’ll paper a room with them like that Equals Three dude did with Watchmen, haha.
I love the turtles, but I never read a single comic of them. I have only know them through the TV series and the movies. I can’t wait to read the comics for the first time.
I can’t wait for this. I really hope they collect the City at War story from the end of vol.1. It also seems a shame that nobody talks about vol.4, I thought it was fantastic. Somebody needs to inspire Peter Laird to finish it
There is a new HC collection coming out in a few months that reprints the first 7 issues and the Raphael micro-series (1-shot). It’s exactly half the number of issues that the Mirage TMNT collection from a year or two ago had, but is a hardcover instead of a paperback. It’s still almost double the price ($50 instead of $30) but I guess at this point people will have to take what they can get. I still have the first 4 oversized collections First Publishing released back in the day (in color!), but I still got the paperback collection since it had all 4 micro-series and the Fugitoid issue with the Turtles in it. It might just be nostalgia talking, but these are still some of the best comics I’ve ever read!
Can’t wait for this. I was trying to track them down about a year or two ago to no avail. With the great job they did on the Rocketeer HC I’m really looking forward to a great end product.
A couple of years ago I picked up the TMNT Collected Book 1 and it rocked my world. The comics are fantastic. I might have to pick up the hardcover just for ease of read’s sake. At over 300 pages my hands hurt after reading the other collection for a bit.
I had 4 collected volumes of the early TMNT but got misplace by me ma. Needless to say I miss them terribly and I am REALLY looking forward to seeing them reprinted. I miss so much because they were a great read and I enjoyed the artwork as well.
With the possibly of these reprints a hole will be filled in my life.
I would have to dig through my collection to check what I’m missing , but I have many of the early Mirage books, plus the four volume TPB collections done by First many moons ago. I believe I have all four of the ‘micro-series’/one-shots that were done, plus some other Mirage tie-ins like Turtle Soup and Gobbledygook bagged and boarded. Can’t wait for new stories and an excuse to pull out my original issues.
This is great news!