Publication date: December, 2001
Writing, lettering, inking, toning: Peter Laird
Penciling: Jim Lawson
Cover painting: Michael Dooney
Production assistant: Dan Berger
Dedicated to: Kevin Eastman
Summary:
On the surface of the moon, a big robot stomps around
until he finds the Apollo 11 lunar landing site. The big robot enjoys the history and then
reconvenes with an Utrom. Overlooking a
large complex secretly built into the surface of the moon, the pair contemplate
the shocking plans they have for the Earthlings. The big robot thinks about how he’s only met
a few Earthlings in his time, and they weren’t even human. The robot asks how their "guests" are doing and the Utrom mentions that they are indignant about being confined, but are managing. He also says that their vehicle has been stowed.
Down in a snow-covered alley in New York City, the Ninja
Turtles find themselves cornered by the Madhattan Maulitia, a gang of militant thugs
out to kill any and all “aliens”. The
Turtles try to explain that they aren’t aliens, but the Maulitia isn’t
listening. The Turtles take the thugs
down pretty easy and then escape into a nearby abandoned building. Resting, Michelangelo ponders how throwing
down with street hoods was a LOT easier 15 years ago.
Leonardo rallies his brothers and they make their way to
the rooftops. As soon as they get there, they’re attacked by more Maulitia thugs, this time riding snowmobiles
across the rooftops. The Turtles take
down several of the thugs, but they decide to cut and run and escape by
splitting up (much to Raphael’s annoyance).
Donatello escapes to an alley and finds one of the Maulitia’s
snowmobiles. Deciding he could put it to
better use, Don takes it for a joyride.
Michelangelo runs out into the street to flag down
Donnie, but his brother fails to see him.
Mikey, meanwhile, fails to see a bus which clips him with its fender
and knocks him out. A strange figure wearing a helmet and a cape,
and named “Magnrok”, finds Michelangelo and pulls him into the safety of an
alley. Magnrok then radios for an
immediate pickup.
Donatello proceeds to drive his new snowmobile down into
a subway tunnel and onto the tracks. The
snowmobile doesn’t maneuver well without snow and bucks Donnie as it skids
along the rails. The snowmobile hits a
wall and explodes (because I guess snowmobiles just explode when they hit
things). Once the smoke clears, Don
looks through the hole in the old brick wall and finds a dusty old armored car,
hidden away for years.
At the Jones residence, April Jones is getting
anxious. Casey tells his wife to relax;
that their appointment with the doctor isn’t for another hour. April is just antsy, however, as she wants to
find out what their prospects for having children are. Together, they get into the Chevy and head
out.
At Stainless Steve Steel's farmhouse in Northampton, Shadow is busy sparring
with diminutive android and Justice Force member Metalhead. After a good workout, Shadow calls it quits
and thanks Metalhead. Splinter enters
the room and tells the teenage girl to be patient; her father will call with the news
about April’s appointment soon. Shadow
knows she shouldn’t be anxious, but she can’t help but feel like something big is
on the way that will change everything.
Turtle Tips:
*This story is continued from TMNT (Vol. 2) #13. The story continues in TMNT (Vol. 4) #2.
*When he began Volume 4, Peter Laird chose to ignore the
continuity of Image’s TMNT Volume 3, rendering its events non-canonical. Laird explains his stance in the letters page of TMNT (Vol. 4) #2, "As I've said before, I greatly appreciate the fact that Erik Larsen stepped up and published the TMNT book at Image, and Gary Carlson did a lot of interesting work on that series. But as I've also said, it's not the direction in which I would have gone had I been writing the book. Now that I am back and writing this new series, it makes the most sense as far as I am concerned to ignore what happened in those Image issues, and move forward using only what I think of as 'Mirage continuity'."
*As a result of omitting the Image series from continuity, there is a large gap of time between TMNT Volume 2 and TMNT Volume 4. Numerous issues of Tales of the TMNT Volume 2 were
written to account for the missing years, creating a “Mirage Volume 3”. For a listing of those issues, see my Mirage Comics Continuity Timeline.
*The identity of the Utroms' "guests" will be revealed in TMNT (Vol. 4) #4.
*Chronologically, the Madhattan Maulitia first appeared
in Tales of the TMNT (Vol. 2) #57. The
Turtles last encountered them in Tales of the TMNT (Vol. 2) #66 (which takes
place shortly before this issue).
*Metalhead last appeared in TMNT (Vol. 1) #15.
*This issue received a second printing in February-March,
2003 (cover says March, indicia says February).
There is no additional content in the second printing.
Review:
Eastman and Laird are two creators with two starkly
different sensibilities. Eastman likes
gratuitous gore, fast-paced action to the detriment of story, gritty urban
settings, F-bombs, and Julie Strain. So
much Julie Strain. Laird is the other
side of the coin. His stories veer
toward science fiction more often than not, he’s reserved to the point where he
won’t even permit his characters to curse (“holy hippo spit” is the closest you
get), he prefers decompressed prattle between characters over excessive action,
and his work is generally more PG-rated than Eastman’s stuff (Eastman’s the
editor of Heavy Metal magazine, after all).
Together, Eastman and Laird struck a great balance in storytelling. Their contrasting tastes compromised
somewhere in the middle and as readers we received comics that were equal parts
urban adventure and science fiction, explosive action and character
portraits. Individually, however, the
seams of their storytelling styles stand out like blinking neon.
Back when I reviewed Bodycount #1, I talked about Kevin
Eastman’s solo TMNT work; the sort of signatures, tropes and clichés that
define his individual style. Now that I’m
getting into TMNT Volume 4, it’s time to take a look at Peter Laird.
The man likes his science fiction and the opening pages
of TMNT (Vol. 4) #1 make no effort to hide that fact. The first thing we see are robots and aliens
exploring the moon. When the Turtles
finally do show up (in an homage to TMNT Vol. 1 #1), they’re misidentified as
aliens by the antagonists. The stage for
Volume 4 is set immediately and this is going to be a VERY science
fiction-centric volume. Lots of aliens,
lots of outer space exploration, lots of robots and lots of super
technology. This first issue is very
upfront about the direction the series will be taking and if you’ve never been
a fan of sci-fi themed TMNT stories, then you may want to opt out.
While the action in Laird's books tends to be decompressed to
the point of losing all kinetic energy (the “running battle” cliché of Eastman’s
work may be tired and overdone at this point, but the man can lay out a
frenzied action sequence like nobody’s business), he does slow down to give
characters the time to talk and digest the situation. This is both a blessing and a curse, as Laird’s
dialogue is tedious and doddering. While
not yet inundated with the “ummm”, “uhhh”, and “hmmm” noises that polluted the
scripts for TMNT Volume 2 (which were scripted by Lawson, I believe), the man is a
thousand times guilty of abusing the ellipses.
Characters talk with an excess of awkward pauses that don’t so much
succeed at giving them a unique or “realistic” voice as it just makes them all
rub off as slow and dull-witted.
Seriously, count the number of fucking ellipses in this
issue. It’s obscene.
BUT, what Laird does do, and what kept me reading through
TMNT Volume 4 even… when… I… couldn’t… stand all… of the… ellipses… was the
STORY. Laird can plot a solid long-form
story. TMNT Volume 4 truly does feel like a definite change for the course of the
narrative and the places he takes many of the characters are certainly engaging. We haven’t gotten there yet, but there’s
going to be a big status quo changer in a couple of issues that will put the
characters in a completely new situation.
A few issues after that will be a tragic sequence
that, again, truly imparts the idea that these characters are growing and
changing with time. While the execution
of these stories can be meandering, to put it politely, the actual CONTENT of
the stories is fascinating.
If you read the letters pages throughout Volume 4, you’ll
frequently see Laird responding to criticism by telling his unsatisfied readers
not to buy the comic (before obliviously spinning yarns about how the comic
doesn’t turn a profit). Mirage’s slogan
changes from “If it Ain’t Late, it Ain’t Mirage” to “Mirage: If You Don’t Like
it, Don’t Buy it”. And you know
what? I can’t argue with his logic. If you hate an ongoing series, you really can’t
expect the writers or the editors to change it just to suit your
expectations. And if all something does
is bring you frustration and disappointment, then dude, just drop the
book. I used to have the “collector’s
mentality”, that I had to own EVERY issue of a series because I’d already
invested so much into it, but I eventually outgrew that when some of the
ongoing comics I was reading started to really, REALLY suck.
For me, I don’t hate TMNT Volume 4. There are aspects about it I don’t care for
in the slightest, but disliking a PART of something doesn’t equate to disliking
the WHOLE. “Ghostbusters” is my all-time
favorite movie, but even I will admit that some of the special effects look
like shit; you can like or even love something and still be critical of a few
of its components. As I said before, the
dialogue in this comic is awful and the characters are bland as balsa wood, but
the overarching narrative and the direction the established characters go in is
genuinely fascinating. There’s enough
good in TMNT Volume 4 to outweigh the negative and as a result, I continued to
read it all the way up to its unceremonious “indefinite hiatus” (at which
point, Mirage once again changed its slogan, this time to “Mirage: We Never
Finish What We Start”).
Anyway, that’s enough waxing on Volume 4 as a whole and
Laird’s signature style. What about this
issue on an individual level?
Well, the opening is, as I said, a fine way of indicating
right off the bat just what genre this series would be miring itself in. The Utroms and the giant robot set an ominous tone with their plans and I love how the story
jumps straight from the grand scope of outer space directly to the “small time”
action of the Turtles fighting thugs in an alley. The action sequence is rather crude and
drones on for way too long, but the need to establish the Madhattan Maulitia
and their fear of alien invaders (through clumsy dialogue) was necessary, as
again, they’ll play a major part in the sci-fi themed narrative of this volume.
What you’ll notice with this issue is that the
storytelling is not especially tight.
The Turtles fight a bunch of thugs for a really long time and then just
suddenly Mike is hit by a bus and Don finds an armored car in the subway. The pacing is all over the place and there
isn’t a beginning-middle-end structure to this adventure. It’s just a whole lot of stuff that happens
and then the comic runs out of pages.
TMNT Volume 4 is HEAVILY serialized in its storytelling, so this is how
all the issues are going to be. The
issues don’t end because the story reaches an organic breathing point, but
because the comic runs out of pages. You’ll
just have to get used to it.
Anyhow, Volume 4 is not everybody’s cup of tea. I know that.
But when it introduces good ideas, they’re actually GREAT ideas. The fact that it doesn’t have a conclusion or
anything approaching closure to any of its storylines is concerning to some, but
let’s be frank, when I pulled that “Mirage: We Never Finish What We Start” gag,
I was talking about more than just TMNT Volume 4. Read through Tales of the TMNT Volume 2 and
you’ll be pulling your hair out in frustration at the number of plots and storylines
that are initiated and never resolved.
From 2001-2010, Mirage just loses any and all ability to focus on a
storyline and bring it to a satisfying conclusion (or ANY conclusion, really)
and the decade is defined by their refusal to finish anything they start. It’s hard to get mad at Volume 4 for petering
off into oblivion without tying up its loose ends when practically every major
Mirage storyline from the decade did the exact same thing.
That ball of negativity aside, this first issue lays
everything out on the table for you in terms of the direction this book will be
taking. Not just the plot and genre, but
the storytelling style. Either you can
acclimate to it or you can’t, but don’t expect it to change.
Grade: C+ (as in, “Come and enjoy all the wonderful
inking and toning work on this issue, by the way. It’s quite good. But enjoy it while it lasts.”)
