IDW Publishing has released a preview to the first issue of the upcoming gritty, dystopian Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles tale TMNT: The Last Ronin, which puts the lone remaining Ninja Turtle (which one is still a mystery) on the path for revenge in a story first conceived decades ago by TMNT co-creators Kevin Eastman and Peter Laird.
In these interior pages by Eastman, co-writer Tom Waltz and artists Esau and Isaac Escorza, that lone Ronin sets out on his mission under cover of subterfuge.
"It's the TMNT event of 2020!" reads the official solicitation for TMNT: The Last Ronin #1. "Springing from the minds of TMNT co-creators Kevin Eastman and Peter Laird comes an epic like you've never seen before!"
"In a future NYC far different than the one we know today, a lone surviving Turtle goes on a seemingly hopeless mission to obtain justice for his fallen family and friends," it continues. "Kinetic layouts from Eastman, inks from Esau and Isaac Escorza and a thrilling script full of surprises from longtime TMNT scribe Tom Waltz all combine to make this one of the most memorable TMNT stories you will ever read! Oversized in both format and page count, this is a perennial TMNT tale that can't be missed!"
The Last Ronin was originally planned as a story to follow up the very first longform Ninja Turtles arc from their late '80s Mirage Comics heyday – but plans were scrapped when the franchise took off as one of the best selling and best loved toylines and animated series of the '90s.
"I stored this particular set of notes in an old brown elastic-bound folder with a bunch of other TMNT ideas for 20 years before rediscovering it about 10 years ago in a massive file reorganization," Eastman tells Newsarama of the genesis of The Last Ronin. "It did not have a final title, none that I could find or remember, but I was thrilled to read through what we were thinking about the future of our characters all those years ago."
"It brought back a lot of great memories before I put it into storage again, I couldn't imagine how it could ever be realized in the current IDW TMNT universe, it just didn't fit into any of the continuity," he continues. "When I re-re-discovered the files in late 2018, the ongoing IDW TMNT series was racing towards issue 100, which, after nine years of work it would wrap up a massive storyline... that's when I thought of this story again, but it struck me in a completely different way this time."
Here's a gallery of interior pages:
TMNT: The Last Ronin #1 (of 5) is due out October 28.
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