Ask a Question: IDW's TMNT Editor Thread
 

Hi guys,

I'm Bobby Curnow, and edit and co-plot the current IDW TMNT comic. I had a "Question" thread over at the IDW forums, but they've been down for a while, so I thought I'd start one here. Feel free to post your questions about any of the IDW TMNT comic books, and I will do my best to answer in an honest and timely manner.

A few "small print" things:

-I will reserve the right to not answer questions that could spoil things like up-coming plot points. Sometimes the mere act of choosing not to answer a question can result in a sorta-spoiler in itself, so bear with me if I ignore a question in regards to future story events, or willfully obfuscate. If I can safely tease something, I may do so, but take it with a grain of salt. It's not set in stone until you read the actual issue. Things can change last minute!

-I get lots of questions about IDW's reprint program. I have almost nothing to do with the reprints, and that department is the most overworked at IDW (just two guys handling EVERYTHING that IDW reprints, which is a lot), so I am very reluctant to take time out of my day and bother those guys. Feel free to ask questions regarding this, sometimes I know or hear things, but don't be upset if I don't have the answer and am unwilling to investigate further. That will probably be the case. It's not my area, and I want to respect the folks whose area it is!

-I've always been impressed with how respectful people are on this forum, but I may chose to not answer questions/statements that I deem to be not respectful to myself or the rest of the creative team (and yes, what is respectful is subjective). That being said, if you've got a concern or critique that is respectfully worded, i'm happy to read it.

-These are my own opinions and thoughts, and as much as is possible, not reflective of IDW or Nickelodeon/Viacom. Though obviously i'm going to tread a line that respects the fact that I am employed by, or work with, them.


Hmm... I think that's it. I'll just take this opportunity, on behalf of Tom, Kevin, the artists and IDW, to thank you all for your support and interest. We are very aware and thankful of it.


EDIT: If you'd like your question to be considered to be included in an upcoming issue of TMNT's Ninja Notes, please mark your post as "OK TO PRINT". Feel free to include your name or place of residence if you'd like, but that is not necessary. I will attribute the question to your screen name if that's all I have.

Hi Bobby! Thanks for making this and proving once again that IDW truly values their fans.

My question is...didja get my Ninja Note??? :)
Because pretty much most of my questions were in there...

Bobby, how does it feel to already be over 4 years and 50+ issues into IDW TMNT already? Sometimes it feels like only yesterday the IDW comic started, I can't believe its already been 4 years and over 50+ issues and mini's.

Did you guys ever think you'd get this far? Was it expected to be a success from the start? Looks like we'll reach issue 100 before we know it.

Hey Bobby! This is GREAT!

I've got a couple of questions for you:

#1. Not to beat that poor departed horse, but any idea when we can expect the first reprint of TMNT Volume 3 from Image Comics? :tgrin:

#2. Will Kevin be doing an annual this year, and why have we had annuals ever other year instead of truly annual?

#3. Now that TMNT has crossed over with the biggest DC comic character, does IDW have any desire to approach any other big non-IDW franchises for potential future crossovers?

More as I think of 'em. :trazz: Thank you for taking the time out of your duties to talk with us fans! It's always a pleasure!

I think so...? I honestly can't remember! You can DM me your email address and I can do a search for it.

Would you want either:

A) IDW x Mirage team-up
or
B)IDW x Nick x Platinum team-up

Thanks, Cubed!

I think we thought it would be at least a moderate success and we'd get at least a couple years of stories. We aimed for 50 pretty close to the end of the first year, so we had that in our sights for a while. What was unexpected was for word to grow and for sales to either be stable, or go up, over the years. That's been great. I hope we can make it to 100, i'm very excited for some upcoming stuff between now and then.

Worst case scenario, Bobby:

If IDW were to have to end its TMNT series, how much notice do you think you, Tom, and Kevin would have, and do you think you would be able to wrap up most of the loose ends and plots in that given time?

Sorry, it's kinda depressing... but thinking about Image Volume 3 and Mirage Volume 4 brought this question to mind.

1. I just looked at the publishing schedule and I'm not seeing Vol. 3 Image material, which is news to me. We do look to be continuing Tales and Archie. No clue as to why no Vol. 3, I'm disappointed if that's true. (it might not be, the publishing schedule changes frequently)

I'll see if I can get any more information on this next time I bump into the reprint guys.

2. The Annuals were intended to be annual, but the second one was delayed, well, a year! No plans for one this year, Kevin is busy working on a couple different original projects, outside of TMNT. (though we will still be getting covers, and now that he lives in San Diego, we are having more regular brainstorming sessions with him than ever)

3. Outside of Usagi Yojimbo, which is my favorite comic of all time, I personally usually have no taste for crossovers, so I'm not pushing for any. That being said, i've been pleasantly surprised by how much I enjoyed both Ghostbusters and Batman. And they've been financial successes, so I'm sure we'll see more in the coming years. Those deals are always hard to figure out though, so it's hard to say when and what and if we'll see another crossover.

Like, crossovers of the different character incarnations? I can't say I care one way or another, would depend completely on execution. They both have potential to be cool, or very not cool.

When we gonna see Zog (again), and more Triceratons? :D

But in all seriousness, thanks for doing this. It's always great to see proof that IDW knows its audience.

I'd REALLY like to ask a question pertaining to the upcoming P* TMNT game, but I know you can't even talk about it yet until Activision FINALLY makes an official announcement about it! :lol:

Great to have a line of communication again! You know we all appreciate it!

My query...

The trade collection containing issues #51-55 is called "Order from Chaos".

Now, is that the name of the whole arc of those 5 issues, or did you have different names for the different storylines ala "Sins of the Fathers"/"Blood Brothers" (even though the trade containing those issues only went by "Sins of the Fathers")?

And heck, since I'm bugging you, will 5-issue arcs be the new norm over the previous 4-issue formula?


Thanks, as ever!

Hard to say, sometimes decisions can be made quickly. I'd like to say that we'd get a year's notice, in which case we could do something that would be a respectful end of the series, though we'd have to omit a lot of stuff we have planned.

Honestly, I think we need at least until issue #100 to properly address everything we are setting up between now and TMNT #65. Maybe we could pull it off by TMNT #75 with the help of mini-series and whatnot.

I could have a different opinion in a month, or six months, or a year. Everything changes with time!

Couple more questions! :tgrin:

#1. Did you and the rest of the team ever consider naming the Foot Assassin in #51/52 Pimiko? I was personally hoping that would happen...

#2. Does IDW have a character blacklist, i.e. are there any preexisting TMNT characters you and the guys would NEVER, no matter what, EVER use in IDW? Not even in a throwaway gag or simple name-drop? Pimiko? Venus? Dogpound and Fishface? Eric Sachs? Cudley the Cowlick? :tlol:

We have not forgot about Zog or the Triceratons. They will play a big part, but don't expect anything this year.

I don't keep track of the video games or movies (I do watch the Nick Toon), so I wouldn't be any help even if I could talk!

I'm really excited about Deviations! Is this just a one-shot or are we going to get more on this particular story? Can you give us any info on the Dark turtles???

Oh, and while you may not have video game info, what about new info on the board game? We got one spoiler image of Casey and it looks great!!

If something catastrophic were to happen, would it be possible for the fans to somehow pitch in and help keep the comic alive? I'm guessing there's not much we can do except keep buying (which we are all thrilled to be able to do), but would there be any possibility of keeping alive in the same vein as the original Star Trek fans demanding the show be brought back for a third season?

Careful not to fry yourself on the defrib, Cy. TMNT is far from dead. Lol

Oh, absolutely. I'm just curious. As someone said in another thread somewhere, TMNT has a long history of starting strong and ending poorly or prematurely.

While I don't expect this to happen with IDW, I am curious if they ever have any contigency plans. 'Cause there have been a LOT of good comic series that ended prematurely while far lesser comics continued to sell month after month even though they're absolutely terrible.

Truthfully, we rarely have TPB titles in mind when we're scripting, so when the TPB folk ask us, Tom and I are always like "Uhh... how about... THIS!" Some have worked out well, like City Fall. Others, like Vengeance, I haven't been that found of.

I also think the TPBs make people think we are writing for the trade, when we're not. We've had 4-issue story arcs, single issues, two-parters, seven-parters and a three parter coming up. We write what fits the story we have in mind, and hope it's not too jarring when read in TPB form, which I think we've got lucky with.

"Order From Chaos" is really two 2-parters, and a single stand-alone issue. We don't have individual names for those different parts.

Basically, we just try and come up with something appropriate after the fact. Sometimes, like with "Attack On Technodrome" it's easy, sometimes it's not.

5-issue TPBs are the new norm!

What is one thing you've wanted to do with TMNT at IDW that you haven't yet been able to do? Or would answering that result in spoilers?

1. No. Pimiko carries a lot of associations with her which were not appropriate for Jennika.

2. We have a "Preferred Character" list from Nickelodeon that has all of the (very many) characters we are legally allowed to use. So basically, I have to check that list when we want to use someone, but it's rare, like Bloodsucker, when we can't. It's not set in stone, but we also try and avoid new characters from new media, at least for a year or two, more as a professional courtesy than anything else. So no plans for Eric Sachs or Fishface, but who knows, could happen in the future.

I'm a big Cudley fan, so i'd love to see the Cowlick sometime!

5-issue trades! Nice!

Thanks for the answers!

Just a one-shot story, but there's actually some elements that happen in Deviations that I think we can build on in weird ways in the TMNT ongoing. Can't really say more than that.

I'll leave it to Nate and crew to share material from the board game, but everything I've seen looks great, and I am eager to play it!

I doubt it. I think we'd manage something that would end things at least partly the way we want it, even if it's not ideal situations. I can't see us stopping cold turkey, mid-storyline like some things in the past. What I could see is us sharing storylines we didn't get to, after the fact. Would be cool to see folks tackle those storylines. But this IS morbid! We're doing great and sales are healthy! :tcool:

This one's probably been asked before, but what first got you into TMNT?

TMNT/Usagi crossover.

Oooooh. Yes, that would be great! Hopefully someday...

I'm 34, so grew up during prime Turtle-mania. So the cartoon and then movie. As I became a pre-teen I got into the Mirage comics in a big way. Though I had come across a couple before that. I recall the first TMNT comic I ever read was some late printing of TMNT #2 that my Mom somehow came across. I thought the Mousers were so cool! (still do!)

I think I'm all outta questions for now. :tlol: Thanks again for taking the time to talk with us on the 'Drome, Bobby! Here's to Issue #100 and #150! :tcool:

How do you decide what characters to include in the comic? Dark Water for example seems quite obscure appearing in just one later 1987 cartoon episode. I felt that the group had potetial never utilized within it's universe of origin not considering any other appearance outside of it. Roundtable discussion of favorite characters? Research through the vast media?

What would you say to the Turtles going abroad or exploring Dimension X? I have wanted to see more from the Nuetrinos after the amazing reworking of them back in the late teens of the ongoing.

Are we going to have any new artists in the near future?

Any chance for any of the Mirage Era artists or guest cover artists to work on full issues?

Any chance for a Tales of series to allow for other artists to work within the IDW Universe?

I'd like to see Steve Lavigne, Jim Lawson, Rich Woodall, Ben Bishop, Sal Otero and a few others work on the Turtles. (Just to name a few...)

(Okay to print.)

Hi Bobby! Thanks for this thread. As you may be able to guess if you look at sigs, I'm the main administrator for Wikia's TMNT Wiki. One thing I've been trying to figure out in terms of structure is how precisely the different incarnations of the TMNT are separated, and how they can be better categorized. Right now they're listed by like, 87 series, 03 series, 12 series, Mirage, Archie, IDW, etc. But I'd like to get a better, coherent categorization like Marvel and DC do with their New/Prime Earth and Earth-616 and the like. If I were to get an official way to designate incarnations, would you or anyone else at IDW be someone I can talk to about that, or would I have to keep trying at the ear of Nick? (I've tried getting in touch with Ciro and others at Nick and have gotten nothing)

Also are we ever gonna see Tristan Jones back on anything TMNT?

Where did the reincarnation idea come from? It's without a doubt the biggest deviation from what people expected and I am curious how you guys decided on it.

Was the low sales of the last two mini's (Mutanimals and April/Casey) the reason there is a long gap before the next mini? I remember you saying the Batman crossover wasn't the reason we won't have a new mini for a few months, so I'm curious.

Its disappointing the Mutanimals mini especially sold so little, I thought it was great! Would love to see more stories with Hob and the other Mutanimals.

Hey Bobby, has IDW ever approached Peter Laird or Steve Murphy to write a guest issue for TMNT?

Broadly speaking, we just look to see who would best serve the story we're trying to tell. Specifically, you'd have to ask Tom. I didn't remember them from the cartoon at all!

You'll be seeing more Dimension X in the future, though not for a while.

Yes on new artists. There's one i'm excited about I think maybe coming in after the Leatherhead arc.

I've got complicated thoughts on the Mirage crew. I'm a huge fan of all of them (the 30th Anniversary book was my big love letter to TMNT of the past), but i'm always hesitant to bring them on to the IDW book. Mostly i'd like for us to be blazing our own trail, at least artistically, and it's important to me that the book have it's own identity. That being said, anything is possible.

We've got something in the works that I hope will allow for a wide range of artists, and different types of stories.

That would indeed be a question for Nickelodeon, and not something I could help too much with, i'm afraid. Thanks for your work on the wiki!

No plans for Tristan at the moment. Had fun seeing him in Australia last year, though!

The reincarnation aspect is completely Tom's idea, so I can't speak much to where it came from (Tom, if you read this, you should feel free to chime in!). Once he floated it, it seemed like an idea that opened up a lot of story potential, so that was attractive to me. As an added bonus, it does help our TMNT stand out a bit from other iterations.