Publication date: January, 1992
Story: Paul Jenkins
Pencils, inks: A.C. Farley
Letters: Mary Kelleher
“Original breakdowns”: Jason Eastman
“Halls of Lost Legends”
Summary:
Out in the forests of Northampton, the Turtles are
working on another one of Splinter’s elaborate exercises. In this case, he sent them each out into the
wilderness blindfolded to expand their senses and intuitive abilities. Donatello is having particular trouble with
this exercise, failing to see the point in the whole endeavor. His brothers tell him to focus, as his
goofing around is ruining it for all of them.
Suddenly, Don bumps into what feels like a brick wall. He removes his blindfold and finds that he’s
standing outside of a vast city of varying architectures with a huge tower in
the center. The other Turtles take off
their blindfolds and see it, too. They
decide to venture inside and explore the massive tower.
Inside, they find endless, uninhabited hallways lined
with locked doors. They manage to break
into one labeled “Aurora” and find an armored knight laying on a dais. Leonardo takes a look at him and finds that
the knight is still alive, but he isn’t breathing. Just then, a man walks by the door and the
Turtles rush to speak with him.
The young man introduces himself as Locke and tells the
Turtles that they’re “early”. He tells
them that they have come to the Halls of Lost Legends in the land of All
Creation. Apparently, when mankind first
created mythology and religion, their belief brought the creatures of legend to
life. They then took up residence in All
Creation until mankind’s belief in them disintegrated. Once that happened, the figures of myth were
turned to “statues” and placed in the Halls of Lost Legends, where Locke acts
as curator. Locke warns the Turtles to
leave, as they don’t belong in the Halls yet and their presence could create a
great disturbance. Don isn’t buying the
story and runs off to find the truth behind the “illusion”. The other Turtles continue exploring together,
despite Locke’s warning.
Donatello comes to a room labeled “Asgard” and forces
open the door. He sees Odin sitting on a
throne, motionless. Don’s attention is
drawn to a shield with a turtle symbol in the center. Looking into the reflection of the shield’s
polished surface, he can see that Odin is actually weeping.
Elsewhere, the Turtles enter the door labeled “Cronus”. The titular Titan then slams the door shut
behind them and, thinking that the Turtles are more of his wayward offspring
out for revenge, vows to eat them. The
Turtles put up a fight, but the Titan proves too much. Don then comes rushing in and stabs Cronus in
the eye with his staff. Before Cronus
can regain his senses, the Turtles flee the chamber and lock the doors behind
themselves.
Don tells his brothers that Locke has been hiding
something from them. They head toward
the chamber marked “Ector”, as that’s where Locke was headed when they first
bumped into him. They pass several
figures such as Merlin and Paul Bunyan, all frozen stiff, and find Locke at the
top of a staircase. Locke again warns
them to leave, but the Turtles are no longer falling for his ruse. Don then shows Locke his own reflection in
the shield, revealing his true identity: Loki.
Not wanting the Turtles to ruin his plans for seizing control
of All Creation, Loki opens up a portal and summons four of the most ferocious
monsters of legend: Fideal, Cerberus, a mantichora and Grendel. The Turtles each take a monster and with some
effort, Raph kills Cerberus, Mike takes down the mantichora and Leo shreds
Fideal. They all then join Don and
together they fell Grendel. Loki
prepares to summon Nyarlathotep and Baal next, but Mikey takes him down with a
throw of his nunchaku. Putting his
katana to Loki’s throat, Leo forces the trickster to free all the inhabitants
of the Halls of Lost Legends from his spell.
Later, once all the figures are freed, Merlin approaches
the Turtles and delivers his gratitude.
He explains that Loki had discovered an ancient curse and used it to
freeze all the inhabitants of the Halls.
His intent was to fill the Halls with creatures of his own nature, such
as Cronus and all the monsters he had summoned. The
frozen figures of myth then used their last ounces of willpower to summon the
Turtles to the Halls early in the hopes that they could defeat Loki. And speaking of Loki, Merlin says that he
will be returned to his prison to await Ragnarok. The Turtles have more questions, but Merlin
says that they must leave and teleports them all back to their camp where
Master Splinter awaits.
They tell Splinter their story and find that he doesn’t
doubt a word of it. The Turtles ask
Splinter what all that stuff about them arriving “early” meant and Splinter
says that, one day, they will reside within the Halls of Lost Legends. Leo is incredulous, as the Turtles keep their
existence secret and could never become legends… or could they?
Turtle Tips:
*The Halls of Lost Legends will be glimpsed once more in
TMNT (Vol. 3) #25.
*According to Peter Laird, all issues published between
TMNT (Vol. 1) #21 and TMNT (Vol. 1) #45, with the exception of TMNT #27 and
TMNT #28, are non-canon. Despite that,
there is nothing in this issue to contradict Mirage continuity. So decide for yourself whether it “counts” or
not.
*This issue also featured a bonus pin-up advertising TMNT(Vol. 1) #44 by Rick Arthur and Mark McMurray.
Review:
The guest era of TMNT Vol. 1 is nearly over and Paul
Jenkins and A.C. Farley pull out all the stops.
Many people hate the guest era, and I’m not entirely fond of it myself,
but stories like “The Halls of Lost Legends” make the whole experiment
worthwhile.
The basis of Jenkins’s story is a concept that interests
me; the idea that people can bring their beliefs into existence through sheer force of
will, thus providing an origin for religious deities and superstitious entities
the world over. One of my all-time
favorite Stephen King short stories, “The Boogeyman”, covers the same concept
(albeit in an obviously more horror-themed way). In that story, a grieving father claims that the Boogeyman killed his son. He
rationalizes that children believe that the Boogeyman is real and that their
fear is powerful enough to will the creature to life. An episode of The Real Ghostbusters also
dealt with the subject, in “Elementary, My Dear Winston”. The idea was that so many people the world are
under the misconception that Sherlock Holmes was a real historical figure that
their combined belief brings his “ghost” into existence (because of course he'd be dead by now). And for a great, GREAT movie that deals with
this subject, you really ought to check out John Carpenter’s “In the Mouth of
Madness”. In that one, an author named
Sutter Kane (standing in for H.P. Lovecraft) becomes so popular the world over
that more people believe in his books than they do the Bible or the Koran, etc. As the global majority begins to ascribe to
his view of reality, so change the laws of the universe and all sorts of
monstrous, impossible things begin to happen.
As you can see, this isn’t exactly an unexplored topic,
but it certainly is one with plenty of room to move around. It also allows for deities and creatures of
multiple religions and mythologies to coexist when, if any of them were the “right”
religion, such a thing would be impossible.
In the grand scheme of the Mirage TMNT universe, “Halls of Lost Legends”
provides a convenient explanation as to how the Turtles can encounter so many
creatures of conflicting myths and belief systems across their adventures.
As a Donatello spotlight, “Halls of Lost Legends”
challenges his rational, analytical mind and he spends most of the story
looking for the man behind the curtain.
The story forces Don to accept that supernatural things may well exist
in the world, whether he can explain them away or not, and ties back into his
earlier lesson about intuition. If you’ve
been reading the recent TMNT series published by IDW, Don has a similar crisis
when coming to grips with “reincarnation” and so forth. Of course, in terms of the Mirage universe,
Don’s sudden incredulity toward all things mythological seems a little odd,
considering he’d already encountered mythological deities of American Indianfolklore and even dealt with the idea of soul transference. One would think he’d be over it by now. Ah whatever; I'm just picking nits.
A.C. Farley only penciled two complete issues of TMNT
Vol. 1, but of them this is his best. It’s
a real beauty in terms of layout and detail and the way he renders all the
legendary monsters is just amazing. The architecture
of the Hall is glorious and, ya know, I’d really like to play a video game on
this very subject and setting. I imagine
that would be a lot of fun. Bonus points
also go to Mary Kelleher’s lettering, particularly for Cronus’s dialogue, as it
boasts a faux-Greek font that helps give it some extra personality.
Farley contributed a lot to the TMNT during his tenure
with the brand; particularly in the realm of painted covers, posters and
trading cards and even a few really cool statues. From what I’ve read, his relationship with
Mirage ended on a sour note over the mandatory retroactive work-for-hire
agreements, which is a shame, as he was one of their finest recurring “guests”. The real tragedy is that he never penciled
more than two issues, as his work is simply stunning.
Grade: A (as in, “And what happened when the spell was
lifted on Sleeping Beauty’s chamber? Did
she wake up?”)
