Image Comics’s ’90s ‘Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles’ Comics Are Finally Going to Be Finished at IDW

Almost 20 years in the making, IDW Publishing announced today that they would revive Gary Carlson and Frank Fosco’s 1990s Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles run, reprinting it in color for the first time and giving Carlson and Fosco the opportunity to conclude the series.

The title ran for 23 issues from 1996 until 1999 before disappearing out of print. Rather than being absorbed into the history of the Turtles when the next relaunch came in 2001, the series was almost immediately rendered non-canonical by co-creator Peter Laird, who never finished the stories and instead moved on to a different take.

“IDW wanted to do it. The fans seem interested in it. Our run has always been the ‘black sheep’ — unofficial stories of the TMNT,” Carlson told io9. “At the time we were doing a back to basics/not the TV cartoons version of the guys and the fanbase then didn’t buy into it.”

Rebranded as Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Urban Legends, the dark and violent take on the beloved heroes in a half-shell will remain non-canonical, but now the story will finally get its last two issues, its conclusion, and there will be no more guessing or fan-fiction.

“We’re staying true to our original vision,” Carlson said. “We knew back then that the end was near and we were aiming to finish out the run leaving the TMNT more or less as they had been when we started our run. We didn’t quite get there. Now we will.”

In the ’90s, Image Comics was finding its footing. Recently founded, the publisher was selling millions of units per year and immediately became a disruptive force in the market — but with those huge numbers, and the relatively unfettered creator freedom Image offered, came a lot of missed deadlines.

Like, a lot. It kind of became their thing.

Many projects would recover and be finished, or end due to all the normal factors (sales, schedules, creators getting bored or antsy or moving on). Some simply vanished.

The most notorious of the disappeared projects is likely Darker Image #2, followed by the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles series which was published by Image partner Erik Larsen and written and drawn by his frequent collaborators Carlson and Fosco.

The first issue of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Urban Legends is set to hit shelves May 16.