" .. .. the covers for an upcoming tales mini series fet. Mikey! .. .. "

-- Steve Lavigne







..>v<

-->> TMNT art-legend Steve Lavigne has been inking, penciling, painting, and slappin coulor over the Green Gang scince nearly the beginning !!



He's posted some art auctions for the fans ..featuring the work of Steve himself with work he helped create with other Mirage greats like Mike Dooney, Jim Lawson, and Chris Allen.



It's the core and heart of TMNT history baby !!



** OWN IT !! CLICK HERE !!











-- Dan B. on the official TMNT [ dOt ] com .. ::







--"Chris from 4Kids Entertainment has sent me a big batch of production artwork from the "Ninja Tribunal" episodes that I'll be cleaning up and adding to the **Art Gallery (Click Here) - this week I've posted pix of Aikido Joi, Shikendo Faraji, Shotokan Tora, Tang Soo Adam, Ninja Tribunal (Blue Eyes, Green Eyes, Silver Eyes and Yellow Eyes), Chikara Shisho, Hisomi Shisho, Juto Shisho and Kon Shisho.




-- **Sven sent in an image of an old handheld video game from Konami - note that this is a "Hero" Turtle release, so it was probably only available in the U.K. and England.







..>v<

-->> ..thanks to Slash for the head's up ..


From the blog of **Simon Furman ::


"The latest issue of Titan’s torrid Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (#12) comic/mag hits UK stores today (March 27th) and features (among the usual fun, features and free gift goodness) part 1 (of 2) of an all-new, all-different comic strip: ‘Rewind’, written by me with art by Diego Jourdan (and Kris Carter on colours). What makes Rewind different? Well, for the first time ever, anywhere, the ‘Fast Forward’ Turtles (of 2105) appear side-by-side with their 2005 counterparts, uniting the then and now. ‘Fast Forward,’ ‘Rewind’… geddit? Anyway, how this all works (and trust me, it took some temporal twisting) centres around a certain Chronox Corporation and the kidnap of Splinter. Suddenly, the Turtles of two eras are investigating the same mystery, but the coming together of the two Turtles teams may just equal catastrophe! For a peek at cover to the issue (so’s ya know what to buy!), click on the thumbnail .. .. "











"I have a website called AstroBoy World and to mark the 1 year anniversary of the TMNT movie I wrote an article about it and how it relates to Imagi's upcoming AstroBoy movie.



**Read it here.



Sayonara." -- Ninjatron



..some awesome insight on TMNT' s and Imagi's important & impact on the world of animation.










-- ..available at Hot Topic now.. !!










- The following via Steve Murphy..















..".. a bit of too-cute TMNT DIY crochet crafting: **a hat and **amigurimi. .."




-- Steve Murphy









..>v<

"The cover to Tales of the TMNT #50. Artist Paul Harmon's starting to layer in tones. Wonder how he's going to color it?"


-- Steve Murphy


**


-->> .. ** This cover is to be coloured by Mirage - Vet "Steve Lavinge" !!

>v<

Courtesy of Ryan Broan

Family Home Entertainment presents "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles" - The Turtle's Awsome Easter // VHS (( 1992 ))

Family Home Entertainment presents "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles" - The Turtle's Awsome Easter // VHS (( 1992 ))
Originally uploaded by tOkKa

HAPPY BUNNY-DAY , Baby !!

..from Mikey's TMNT !! ..

**The Turtles Hit New York Comic Con


NECA Reveals Details on NYCC Exclusive


03/21/2008


**


"Last week we revealed the much anticipated New York Comic Con Exclusive Edition Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Box Set. Today we reveal how you can get your own set, limited to 500 pieces. The sets go on sale the morning of Saturday, April 19 at NECA’s Comic Con booth.


Sets are priced at $50, payable in cash only, and limited to one per customer. At the time of purchase, the guest will receive a color-coded ticket or voucher, assigning a specific time to return to the NECA booth to have your set signed by Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles co-creator Peter Laird. Mr. Laird will only be at the booth from 1 - 3 PM, and will only be signing the exclusive set.
Complying with the color-coded schedule will ensure that all 500 sets can be signed by Peter Laird.


Good luck and we hope to see you all at this year's New York Comic Con!


Make sure to check back at NECAonline for the latest Comic Con updates and more!"



**


..>v<

-->> Early TMNT - ( Original Series ) s.6 DVD review courtesy of Vaughn Michael .. - ** CLICK HERE .. !!







..>v<

"Tales #50 wraparound cover pencils by Paul Harmon, based on a design idea by Ryan Brown."



-- Steve Murphy







-->> ..inks..








**


"This set includes Leonardo, Donatello, Michelangelo, and Raphael, with their signature weapons, in new tube packaging.


The photo shown is an unfinished Leonardo, to show the tube packaging.


Product Number: NEC10839


Shipping Weight: 2.52 pounds"


**


** Click for info & preorder at B.B.T.S.





..>v<

Heroes in the Clamshell


NECA Releases Images of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Action Figures in Packaging
03/17/2008


With the arrival of Series 1 of NECA's Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Action Figures mere weeks away, fans have been anxious for any and all Turtles news. Today, NECAonline reveals the first official photos of all four single-carded Ninja Turtles in their completed packaging. If you aren't one of the lucky 500 guests at this year's New York Comic Con who snags our Exclusive Box Set, the only way to get all the Turtles accessories is by getting all four single-carded figures.
Exclusive accessories include:




* Detailed Bases
* Mini-turtles
* Alternate Climbing Claw Hands
* T.C.R.I. Ooze Cannister with Donatello
* Throwing Stars with Michelangelo
* Throwing Knives with Raphael


**Take a look at our extensive gallery of Series 1 in packaging and make sure to check back at NECAonline for the latest Turtles updates and more. (( **CLICK FOR FULL 360 PIX !! ))

**



-->> .. Thanks to Tristian J. and Steve Murphy for the heads- up !!


..>v<

Shamrock Shakes

Shamrock Shakes
Originally uploaded by Waffle Whiffer

-->> ♣ ♣ ♣ ♣

..>v<

**


DISSOLVE TO:


EXT. MANHATTAN SKYLINE AERIAL VIEW FROM NYC HARBOR - NIGHT.


Raphael poses dramatically on the ledge of a terraced skyscraper. All his senses are acute, attuned.


RAPHAEL (V.O.)
Ah, the night air... I love it! I despise the dank, dark underground. My brothers don’t seem to mind it...


FAVOR as he scans around, sniffs the air, looks up the sky.


RAPHAEL (CONT’D)
...but this is where I belong. Such a feeling of freedom, so much room to move about!


TIGHT on his face.


RAPHAEL (CONT’D)
I am Raphael, ninja turtle... and master Splinter chose me for this task...


WIDER as he prepares to leap.


RAPHAEL (CONT’D)
...to deliver a message of challenge...


WIDER as he leaps off the building ledge into the night air.


RAPHAEL (CONT’D)
...to the Shredder.


FOLLOW as he acrobatically, gracefully, twists and turns through the air before silently landing on another rooftop.


RAPHAEL (CONT’D)
Splinter told me to infiltrate the Shredder’s headquarters...
He leaps to the ground, an alley near the city’s docks.


RAPHAEL (CONT’D)
...and deliver a calling card.


WIDE as he silently leaps up and over a high, barbwire-topped fence.


RAPHAEL (CONT’D)
My pleasure!


PULL AWAY to show him land silently on his feet, some twenty yards behind two FOOT NINJA GUARDS.


RAPHAEL (CONT’D)
Two guards on the right...


REVERSE to over-the-shoulder shot past Raphael to an expansive view of the grounds of the Foot Headquarters. The two guards are to our right, on one side of a low building, a third stands to its left side. Each guard has a sheathed katana blade strapped to his back.


RAPHAEL (CONT’D)
...one on the left.


REVERSE to tight on Raph’s face as an intense, grimly mischievous grin spreads across his features.


RAPHAEL (CONT’D)
They’ve all got to go.




Recognize the above? It’s a passage from a screenplay adaptation of Eastman and Laird’s Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles #1 that I was hired to write back in September.


The idea was to release a direct-to-DVD CGI film version of the comic in May 2009 to coincide with the 25th anniversary of the TMNT. The DVD would act both as an anchor for other licensees to sell and market their product around, as well as to provide a “bridge event” leading to the second theatrical CGI film slated for March 2010.


Imagi Animation, producers of the recent TMNT film, agreed to come on board. Peter Laird (and/or Mirage Licensing – I suppose the two are interchangeable when it comes to money) would finance the film almost solely out of his/its own pocket, with the hope of recouping the investment back from direct sales, the sale of broadcast rights, and potential cross-sell partner promotions (say, from heavy hitters like Ubisoft).


Mirage hired me to write a screenplay adaptation of the first issue – nothing fancy, no new frills, no additional scenes or dialog – straight. I did. It met with approval. The execs from Imagi flew in from Hong Kong to discuss both the creative and business ends, and it was decided that since the first issue (and resultant faithful screenplay) had certain idiosyncrasies that might be problematic for a film – a preponderance of voice-over; an extended flashback sequence that takes up nearly half the running time; a story that only spotlights two of the four turtles, practically ignoring the other two – I was asked to do a major rewrite, one that would strip away all the voice-over of the primary story (revenge upon the Shredder) and minimize as much as possible the voice-over of the flashback sequence, while also creating additional dialog for all four turtles that at the very least would give us intimations of their personalities (as those personalities had developed later over the course of the comics, etc.).


I did. The new draft was well received. Pete then decided that the DVD would run both versions of the story. The “A” or lead story would be the latter one, while the “B” original straight adaptation would be included as a DVD extra. Cool idea. To minimize production costs, A would utilize as much of the B footage as possible (I would then re-write A with this in mind; which I did). To further minimize costs, the soundtrack would utilize the originally commissioned Marco Beltrami score that was written for TMNT but that was later discarded in favor of Klaus Badelt’s less (shall we say) dark and moody score that accompanied the film. And of course both A and B versions would use as many “assets” from the TMNT film as possible (existing sets, backgrounds, etc.).


But when Imagi finally crunched the numbers and worked the DVD film’s completion time into their studio’s production schedule, things began to look a little dicey. For one, the budget for an all-CGI film would be between $5-7 million, even given the aforementioned “short cuts.” Everyone then agreed that the logical spot to make cost cuts would be to the flashback sequences set in Japan, and we all began to look at more traditional (non-CGI) ways to animate those sequences – everything from the type of animation used in Kill Bill, to a barely animated woodblock style similar to what is found in some traditional Japanese art, to “stage play” live action sets like those used in the “book excerpt” portions of the Paul Schrader film Mishima.


Yet even with this reduction (in whatever form it might take) in the CGI running time, the budget didn’t drop that substantially. And once it was determined that Imagi “quite possibly but not definitely” would deliver the completed film in September 2009 (they would shoot for that date, but there are almost always potential production problems to every film that could extend completion time), things began to look even more dicey. After all, the actual anniversary is in May, not September, and while that difference in a few months may not seem like that big of a deal, the prospect of the film coming due even a bit later in the year, beyond September, did not bode well for the ancillary licensing program that would circle the DVD’s release, all of which has to be choreographed as tightly as possible so as not to create a situation where licensees lose money should they release their product earlier than the film’s on-shelf sale date.


Given all this, Mirage CEO Gary R made the recommendation to not go forward, and thus Peter Laird made the subsequent decision to pull the plug on the project.


The major event anchor to the May 2009 anniversary was thus, uh, sunk. However, another, less potentially exciting (but nonetheless interesting and fun) idea has been developed, one that involves neither Imagi nor myself, one with hurdles of its own to overcome, and which, of course, I am not yet allowed to discuss in a public forum. Time will tell….


Personal epilogue: I did, at least, get paid. The rights to both screenplay versions belong to Mirage (it was, after all, a work-for-hire deal). Oh, and the working title of both screenplays was a nod to one of the favorite Bruce Lee films of my youth: Enter the TMNT.



-- Steve Murphy







--Danny B. at the offical TMNT HQ ..::


- **TMNT Volume 4 #15-21 are now available for legal download for US citizens at wowio.com! ** ( CLICK )




-- **Posted the extended synopsis for Episode #143, "Zixxth Sense". (( ..and that's all she wrote for Fast Forward !! The adventure continues this fall !! ~t ))




- "Due to a clerical error on Diamond Comic Distributor's part, Tales of the TMNT #47 will not be listed in the April issue of Preivews. Both issue #47 and #48 will be listed in the May Previews. We'll stagger their release so #47 will come out in early July and #48 will arrive in shops in late July.."


..>v<

-->> ** Click here here for craft creations of TMNT ,Sonic , Yugi, Dino King and more on 4Kids !!








-Alien Hunters : Multiflex and Buzrock .. U.K. Exclusive ?!


From Hero .. ::More UK TMNT related news comes in the form of a recent scalping trip by yours truely to a large Bristol based Woolworths store.


Found today were the highly sought after Multiflex, Buzzrock and Secret Agent Donatello (from Fast Forward).


Finding these in Woolworths and nowhere else makes a lot of sense since 'Woolies' are known to get action figures exclusivley to thier own chain. ..



..**Click here


..>v<

DAVID ANTHONY KRAFT'S Comics Interview #27 ..cover by Kevin Eastman & Peter Laird (( 1985 ))
Originally uploaded by tOkKa

-->> ..Covers just don't get much cooler than this.


**Ahem ~~**
But what a buncha boneheads..
.. i guess anyone gives a buncha green idiots the front cover of a nerdy magazine.. you gonna go all out and 'ham' it up like a buncha Ninja Hogs !!

What's shakin' , Bacon ?!


Oii..

I think i have a fanzine someplace with the same art.

.. ..

"An early conceptual drawing of everyone's favorite derivative mad scientist, Baxter Stockman."

-- Steve Murphy



..

>v<

-->> Via Steve Murphy::






"..press release regarding the recent completion of Peter Laird's buyout of Kevin Eastman's interest in the TMNT property and the Mirage Group of businesses."



--Dan Berger



♦ ♦

-->> ..





- From Danny B. :: Posted the extended synopisis with screen shots for **Episode #142, "The Day of Awakening."
(( The beginning of the END for TMNT : F. F. ~ t))

..>v<

-->> MORE TALES OF TMNT 50 Goodies n' tasty Morsels !!











"Here is the final design for Leatherhead for the 50th issue of Tales of the TMNT! Awesome!"




-- Ryan Brown




**











"Cover rough and character scale sheet by Mister Paul Harmon."


-- Steve Murphy

".. .. Here's a peek of artist Paul Harmon's first rough take on the character Leatherhead, for a story slated for Tales of the TMNT #50. .. .."



-- Steve Murphy


**









"Here's Paul Harmon's second rough design for the character Leatherhead. I like his style. What do you think?"
--Ryan Brown









**












-- Thanks to RM for the heads-up .. ::



NECA Unveils a New York Comic Con Exclusive



**Click here for the release announcement & more pix of the pack !!



"NECA’s 2008 convention season kicks off with the 3rd annual New York Comic Con April 18 – 20th 2008! This year, NECA has a very special exclusive, and a very special guest. Peter Laird, co-creator of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, will be appearing at the NECA booth on Saturday, April 19th, from 1PM-3PM, signing a New York Comic Con Exclusive Edition Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Box Set.


This set contains all four Ninja Turtle action figures, plus additional accessories and diorama bases. This exclusive, limited to just 500 pieces, will be the only version of the box set to contain all the additional accessories from the single-carded Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Series 1 - in stores this May.


The Exclusive Edition box set will cost $50 and is limited to one per guest. Purchase details will be revealed in the coming weeks. For now take a look at official photos of our upcoming exclusive and keep checking back at NECAonline for the latest Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles updates and more!"




..>v<