Publication date: August 28, 2013
Story: Kevin Eastman, Bobby Curnow, Tom Waltz
Script: Tom Waltz
Layouts: Kevin Eastman
Art: Mateus Santolouco
Colors: Ronda Pattison
Letters: Shawn Lee and Tom Long
Editor: Bobby Curnow
“City Fall, Part Four”
Summary:
At a warehouse, Karai ferrets out a gang of Savate
ninja. The Savate feel they have the upper
hand, but it was all an act so that Dark Leo could ambush the Frenchmen. Karai wants to kill the field leader, but Leo
insists she let him return to his boss, Victor, with the warning to stay out of
the Shredder’s way.
At the hospital, Casey and April receive a status update
from Don and Mike (via Skype). Casey is
blown away by the idea that Leo has switched sides, but Don tells him there’s a
lot of that going around, as Hob and Slash seem to be getting buddy-buddy with
them, lately. After the call ends, Casey
confesses to April that he feels useless sitting in his hospital bed, missing
all the action. April tells him that she’s
just happy to know he’s safe and the two finally share a kiss.
In the alleys outside the Skara Brae, Raph shakes down
the hobos Timmy Two-Shoes and Kanada. He
remembers them from the whole briefcase incident and demands they give him the
scoop on everything going down in the underworld scene. Timmy says that there’s a major power
struggle in action and it goes all the way up the ladder.
Elsewhere, Victor and the Savate crush a unit of Foot
Soldiers. Victor is approached by the
Italian Marcello, who says the Families have called an emergency
conference. Victor has a sit down with
Antonio, the head of the Italian Families.
Antonio says he’s concerned about Victor’s confrontational approach to
dealing with the Foot Clan and that it’s causing them all trouble. Marcello speaks out of turn, causing Victor
to kill him and tell the families they can either be predators or prey.
At Foot HQ, Leo and Karai deliver news of their
successful ambush to the Shredder and Kitsune.
Karai is incensed to learn that it was Leo’s decision to use her as bait
to lure out the Savate and she questions Leo’s qualifications for Chunin, as
he once again shied away from killing.
Shredder silences Karai and then dismisses them both. Before leaving, Leo looks at Shredder and
Kitsune and has a brief vision of Hamato Yoshi and Tang Shen. Once they leave, Shredder tells Kitsune he is
concerned that maintaining his "no kill" order to Leo will only stunt his
effectiveness as Chunin. Kitsune warns
Shredder that Leo’s grip on his past life still remains and that forcing him to
kill may break their hold on him. A Foot
Soldier delivers a message from Victor: A severed hand with the note “WAR” on
it. Shredder informs Kitsune that the time to
keep Leo on a leash is running short.
At the Jones household, Casey’s dad thinks about the
trouble his son is in and how useless he’s been as a father. He declares “No more!” then tears off his
shirt, revealing a tattoo of a purple dragon.
At a safe house (marked with the same purple dragon
symbol), Splinter has a pow wow with Old Hob.
He says that he will consider joining with Hob’s mutant gang, but only
under the condition that Hob help return Leo to sanity. Hob accepts, though under a condition of his
own: Splinter must complete a mission for him as a show of good faith.
Prowling the streets, Raph interrogates crooked
Detectives Miller and Corbin, demanding they tell him where the Foot Clan
resides. Raph is pulled away by Don and
Mikey, who have had enough of Raph’s tortured loner act. Raph confesses that he feels responsible for
Leo’s predicament, but his brothers tell him that this is no way to get things
resolved. They decide to work together
on a plan.
Elsewhere, Shredder and Leo monitor Savate headquarters
for their decisive strike. Shredder
orders Leo to fight alongside him, demoting Karai and Alopex to the secondary
unit. Alopex whines to Karai that being
reduced to back-up is demeaning. Karai
informs her not to overestimate her value, but that a secondary strategy is
never a bad thing to have...
As she says this,
in a secret lab somewhere, two thugs are transformed
into a mutant warthog and a mutant rhino.
And they couldn’t be happier about it.
Turtle Tips:
*This story is continued from TMNT (IDW) #24. The story continues in TMNT (IDW) #26.
*Timmy Two-Shoes, Kanada and Detectives Miller and Corbin
last appeared in TMNT Annual 2012, which is also when the whole “brief case
thing” that Raph references went down.
*This issue was originally published with 5 variant
covers: Cover A by Santolouco, Cover B by Eastman and Pattison, Cover RI by
Mark Buckingham and Charlie Kirchoff, Cover RE for Jetpack by Eastman and Cover
RE Jetpack with Michelangelo bandana.
Review:
Whew! That was a
lot to take in, wasn’t it? There’s a
strange flow to the narrative of “City Fall”, as we drift from segments that
are loaded with story and narrative progression, and then into segments that
are all action and spectacle. Toss in
the vital interlude chapters in the form of the Villain Micros and you’ve got
an arc that moves at a disorienting pace.
It’s not a terrible structure, as it keeps you on your toes, but it
certainly feels rather spastic.
The fourth chapter is all about moving things along and
only here, at the halfway point, do we finally get to see the gang war come
into play. This thing has been simmering
since as far back as TMNT #6; nearly twenty issues ago. It’s gratifying to finally see the plot
thread come into relevance, but yikes that was a long wait. Still, it’s
comforting to know the writing/editing team behind IDW’s TMNT have had such a
far-reaching game plan since Day One. We
live in a time where creative teams are swapped out every 6 issues and the “grand
scheme” approach has become a relic of a bygone era.
So knowing that this was all planned out two years in advance is
impressive. Just, you know. It can be a bit of a nerve-grinder to read a
plot thread in one issue and then have to wait 20 issues for it to bear fruit.
The Savate ninja are finally taking center stage and man,
they had better live up to the hype. All
they’ve been utilized for so far was comedy relief in the 2012 Annual. I enjoyed that story, but as a first
impression, it made the Savate out to be woefully ineffectual criminals. Having been placed under new management since
we last suffered them, however, I expect they won’t be rendered in such
humorous capacity again. I suppose it’s
a side effect from leaving a plot point to boil for two years, but it's a gamble; you build a lot of
hype and if you fail to deliver, the whole thing could blow up
in your face. If the Savate don’t satisfy
20 issues worth of build-up, well, that’s two years of plotting and two years of reader expectation down the
drain.
But before we get all doomy and gloomy in here, the “Krang
War” arc was much the same. General
Krang was introduced in TMNT #1 and it wasn't until TMNT #17 that his arc came to a head. And I loved it. The build-up was long and excruciating, but
the end result was a satisfying read that met my expectations. No reason the same can’t happen for the Savate,
so let’s wait and see what happens (and if you've been reading this comic, waiting is something you ought to be an expert at by now).
Karai is still pouting about rank and respect, and it’s
gotten to the point where that’s all she’s been doing for I don’t know how
long. “Grandpaaaaa why don’t you appreciate
my accomplishments!?” “Grandpaaaaaa why
do you like Leonardo more than me!?” “Grandpaaaaaa
why can’t I be second in command!?” “Grandpaaaaaaaa!!”
Jeez, put a lid on it, you big crybaby.
I remarked in my review for the Karai Villain Micro that
she lacks a personality beyond being resentful and entitled, so I’m really
hoping “City Fall” is where Karai finally grows as a character. The editor’s remarks in the letters column
assures us she’ll be a major player in the second half and we’re already seeing
her handiwork at the end of this issue, so I’m content to presume big things
await her.
And oh yeah, now there’s a cliffhanger splash page if I
ever saw one. I’ve been anxiously
awaiting Bebop and Rocksteady since they first cameod (as humans) in the Raph Micro almost two years ago. Again, their
development has been another long simmering plot point, but one that’s finally
come to fruition. I don’t want to talk
about them too much until they’ve finally done something in this series, but
man, I can’t wait until they do.
All these paragraphs and I’ve yet to remark on the
Turtles. With so much going on, the
non-Leo TMNT kind of fall into the cracks of this issue. Don and Mikey are reduced to giving Casey and
April status updates and reigning in Raph’s renegade act. The end result is that they decide to work
together to get Leo back, an obvious conclusion I would have thought they’d have been
able to come to without making a big production about it. Really, Raph’s rebelling just serves to
remind readers that the surplus of characters introduced in the 2012 Annual
still exist.
Anyhow, to wrap things up (I haven’t even bothered with
developments like Casey and April locking lips, Splinter and Hob playing odd
couple, the Purple Dragon foreshadowing or Shredder revealing that he ordered
Leo not to kill anybody), after last issue’s lack of story, this issue just
unloads the plot developments on you. But I’m digging
seeing all these long stewing storylines finally pay off, so hey, bring em on.
Grade: B- (as in, “But the editor’s note at the end said
Pizzaface is never gonna happen. I am
disappointed beyond the realm of consolation”.)
