Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Co-Creators Reuniting for New 'TMNT' Project for the First Time in 25 Years

They fell out a long time ago, after creative differences. But now the creators of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Kevin Eastman and Peter Laird are together once again. They were reunited by the Netflix show The Toys That Made Us, who were doing a TMNT episode, who got them together again.

The creators of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles are now reuniting for a brand new TMNT story for the first time in decades. Eastman and Laird will join forces once again to work on Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: The Last Ronin. They’re joined by writer Tom Waltz and artist Andy Kuhn. Published by IDW Publishing, The Last Ronin will debut in the summer of 2020. A house ad for the project appears in today’s Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles #100 but provides no further details. Eastman and Waltz have worked together on all 100 issues of IDW’s ongoing TMNT series, which is now the longest-running TMNT comic ever. Issue #100 is Waltz’s final issue writing scripts for the series.

Eastman and Laird created Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles in 1984. It achieved more popularity than either creator would have expected and that newfound success took a toll on their relationship. By 1993, the two had a falling out and stopped working together. In 2000, Eastman sold most of his stake in the franchise to Laird and the mirage group. In 2008, Eastman sold his remaining stake. The last time the two collaborated creatively was on the cover to IDW Publishing’s Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles 30th Anniversary Special in 2014.

In 2009, Laird sold the rights to the franchise to Viacom. Laird maintained the rights to publish black and white TMNT comics through his Mirage Studios company, which had begun publishing Turtles comics again in 2001. Only two new issues of the Mirage series have been released since then, both online and four years apart, with the latest, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles #32, debuting in 2014.

In 2011, Eastman began working with the franchise again. Viacom licensed its Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles comics to comic book publishers IDW, and Eastman joined the series as a co-writer and occasional artist. He’s also worked on some of Nickelodeon’s more recent Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles animated series and consulted on Paramount Pictures’ reboot of the film series.

The original series was written to parody Daredevil, New Mutants, and Ronin and Cerberus, the “It Girl” comics of the 1980s. This is why the evil ninja organization is called the Foot, mocking the Hand from Marvel.

Throughout the last three-and-a-half decades, the series has grown and lasted so long because it evolved to meet a younger audience that could bond with “their turtle,” and a lot of the marketing for the series, while very 80s, worked to make TMNT a franchise that ensured kids from the ’80s and kids today are familiar with Leonardo, Michelangelo, Donatello, and Raphael.

Peter Laird and Kevin Eastman on Netflix's 'The Toys That Made Us'.

The Netflix documentary series The Toys That Made Us spotlighted the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles franchise in an episode of its most recent season. The episode got the two creators back together for the first time in years and ended with Eastman and Laird drawing the Turtles together again as they did in the early days of the franchise. But it seems like it didn’t stop there.

Are you excited to see the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles creators back together again? Let me know what you think in the comments. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles #100 is on sale now.

Director Brian Volk-Weiss says on the show, “One of them perceived the Turtles to be this amazing, one out of a thousand hit, shepherd it minute-to-minute guy. The other guy was, The first time I went with anything, I knocked it out of the park. I bet I can knock other things out of the park too… There’s a nice age gap between Peter and Kevin. They were in different places in their lives when success hit…. It wasn’t any one thing but those things added up. Things took a toll on the relationship.”

From The Beat:

THE LAST RONIN brings Peter Laird and Kevin Eastman together for the first time in 25 years

IDW is staying quiet on the news.

Last week, the highly anticipated Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles #100 hit shelves with a surprise teaser: the reveal that series co-creators Kevin Eastman and Peter Laird will be teaming up with Tom Waltz and Andy Kuhn for The Last Ronin. The series is set to arrive in the summer of 2020, according to the image, from a team of bona fide TMNT veterans.

Laird and Eastman are the two grandfathers of TMNT. Back in 1984, they were the duo that self-published the series’ first issue in black and white, under the guise of Mirage Studios. Although both Eastman and Laird have both stuck with the series in their own ways, the two haven’t worked together on a Turtles comic since 1993. Eastman himself sold his share of the franchise in 2000 to Laird, who would subsequently sell the entire franchise to Viacom in 2009 (hence the Nickelodeon cartoon, which Laird had a minor part in).

With The Last Ronin, that 25 year separation ends. The Beat reached out to IDW for comment – but the publisher is hoping to let that teaser (and the hype) speak for itself for the time being. That said, Eastman, Waltz and series editor Bobby Curnow did mention the series briefly in the following interview. They discuss heading back to Mirage’s classic oversize formatting and hoping to create something evergreen, in the vein of The Dark Knight Returns with The Last Ronin.


Spoilers for Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles #100 below!

If you’re up to date on the series, landmark issue, you know the tragic fate of Master Splinter and you also know this last issue heavily featured a samurai B-plot that would tie into the story’s climax. Presuming that these samurai are related to The Last Ronin and noting that Splinter appeared in these images post-mortem, would it be safe to assume our Rat Dad will be taking the spotlight? Or is the TMNT crew really sending him off into the sunset?

Time will tell! Hold onto your pizza boxes; we’ve still got half a year between us and this series. In the meantime, we’ve got Sophie Campbell’s upcoming run to look forward to, along with a Jennika mini-series.

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More Nick: Geocaching HQ and Nickelodeon Partner on Limited-Edition 'Rise of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles' Trackable Game Pieces!

Sources: ComicBook, Bleeding Cool, The Mary Sue.

Originally published: Wednesday, December 11, 2019.

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