Publication date: January 8 – February 4, 2015
Script: Erik Burnham
Art: Bob Molesworth
Colours: Jason Cardy and Kat Nicholson
Colour assist: James Stayte
Letters: Alex Foot
“Seeing is Believing”
Summary:
In his lab, Donatello is putting the finishing touches on
his latest invention: A hologram projection belt. By sending photos wirelessly through his
tPhone, Donnie can project a holographic image onto himself, thus creating the
perfect disguise. He uses photos of
Casey Jones to create his first illusion and heads to the surface to test it
out.
While at a coffee shop, “Casey” bumps into April. Donnie tries to pass himself off as the real
deal, but April immediately recognizes his voice and demands to know what he’s
up to. Donnie explains himself and shows
her the app on his tPhone. However, when
he tried to slide the tPhone into his holographic pocket, it just falls to the
ground and breaks.
This is a problem, because New York is just one bit wifi
hot zone and without the tPhone, the hologram belt begins picking up signals
from other phones. Once Don sees himself
turn into Dr. Blip from Robo Mecha Force Five, he decides to head back to the
lair ASAP.
Unfortunately, he picks up a signal from a police officer’s
phone, transmitting photos of a crook.
Donnie transforms into the criminal and gets chased by the cops. He undergoes several other embarrassing transformations,
including an old lady and Bigfoot, before making it safely back to the sewers.
Later, he decides to discard the hologram belt project
since he can’t fix the signal interference problem. April fishes the belt out of the trash and
encourages him to continue, although under the condition that he never
transform into Casey again. Donnie
agrees, but transforms into April instead.
April grabs the belt from him and throws it away.
Turtle Tips:
*This story is continued from TMNT Magazine (Panini) #22. The story continues in TMNT Magazine (Panini) #24.
*Incidentally, Donatello would proceed to meet Bigfoot in
the season 3 episode of the Nickelodeon TMNT cartoon, “A Foot Too Big”.
*Oddly, this issue only contained a single 6-page
story. Usually, TMNT Magazine contains
either two 6-page stories or one 12-page story.
Review:
Weird that there was only one short strip in this
issue. I guess Panini hit a time crunch
or something.
Anyhow, it was another fun comedy strip from
Burnham. Many of his stories feel like
they could be fleshed out into full episodes of the cartoon, so there’s a nice
sort of authenticity to them, even if they’re short.
I think the best bit was how Don’s Casey disguise failed
immediately because April recognized Don’s voice. It’s such an obvious thing and one of those common cartoon clichés (characters fooling everyone with their disguises even if their
voices are the same), you almost forget about it because you’ve set your
expectations so low. Also loved how he tried to slip the tPhone in his holographic pocket and immediately realized what an idiot he was.
