How popular were the Mirage comics in the 80s?
 

I remember Cylons and I joking that there can't have been more than 5 or so original Mirage TMNT comics fans.

Obviously, Mirage TMNT comics were not mainstream by any means, but they must have had a respectable enough cult following, right? Otherwise, Eastman and Laird would not have gotten approached for a cartoon series based on the comics.

For all the older folks here, how many of you knew about the Mirage comics when you were kids? Did you know of them when you were watching the 1987 cartoon series on weekend mornings?

As a kid in Italy I knew there was a company called "Mirage Studios" as I was constantly reading it on the toys and every other product with the Turtles on it. However, I didn't know there was an original Turtles comics and that it was where the Turtles had originated even if I was sure the weird turtles with white eyes on the boxes of the toys where an hint to the existence of something different from the Turtles of the tv series.
I also remember seeing the names "Eastman and Laird" in the credits of the first movie and in the Gameboy games and at some point I found out, through a videogames magazine, that Eastman and Laird were comics artists and so I started to understand that there was a comics series at the beginning of it all. But this was in the late 90s, years before I got access to the web and the old Mirage website where I finally saw the Mirage Turtles for the first time.

My guess is super popular until the "guest artist years" and then a huge drop-off. It never sold anywhere near as much as TMNTA (no other TMNT comic has or probably ever will or can) but probably pretty well.

The first 11 issues probably sold the best, when Eastman/Laird were together. After that it likely declined till Return to New York which I assume had a sales bump, then a huge decline for the guest writer years till City at War started, but by then in real life a large number of years had passed and most of those original fans were probably gone by then (even if they went back to get back issues later).

Also remember Mirage issues had a weird schedule, wasn't there like 2-3 month gap between new issues at some point? I can't imagine following the comic as it was happening, like you'd completely lose interest between issues due to how long it would take for them to come out.

Imagine spending like 6 months reading stuff like Hedden-McWeeney and then the Dale stuff over years and years, hoping for Eastman & Laird's return. Readers probably dropped like flies.

I don't get why those issues weren't just stand-alone specials, rather than in the main numbered ongoing. Like they could have had those wacky stories published as random specials and it would be ok, but to include that in the main series? Weird thing is they could have used the stories they were printing in Turtle Soup or the other specials with more serious takes in the main series instead to fill those months.

The good thing is Eastman and Laird decided to get back and do City at war. Imagine if they NEVER got back.

I think the damage was largely done by that point. I'm sure there was an uptick with CAW but I don't thnk sales were super high going into Vol. 2. The large scale readers had largely left and Mirage was too niche and too damaged by the "kiddie" brand for new readers to discover it much.

Why did Pete/Kevin take such a long break from the comics? I understand they may have been busy with the licensing/merch stuff that was in full swing back then, but it's weird they went from issue 21 till like issue 48 till they got back into it full-time.

Most of Tales and the specials were written by other Mirage artists or guest writers. Archie was being handled by Murphy and Ryan Brown at the time. We know they were overlooking the 1990 movie but I don't think that could have taken that much time given they don't write the script. They didn't write any episodes of the original cartoon either, so what exactly what they doing in that time?

They were doing other stuff. Eastman had Tundra and some other endeavors. I’m pretty sure Laird had his kid around that time. Plus they were constantly being dragged into meetings and getting sued by everyone and their brother.

I think about this all the time when I look at the release schedule of Vol. 1.

We all know how agonizing 1 month can be when you’re following a good comic, but Mirage would have eons between canon issues.

why were they getting sued? And that often?



I guess it's the equivalent to people waiting for the Sophie run to end in modern day.

Because people suck ass. Everyone saw these two New England yokels making money hand over fist and sued them because they could. The biggest one was Fred Wolf Films.

Taking the 80s Black and White Boom into account, I imagine readership for TMNT was in flux a lot of the time. I'm sure there were readers who just bought independent b&w books regardless of what was in them. Considering the Turtles were the poster child for the boom, they were probably easier to come by than say, a Greater Mercury or a SilverWolf book (Not to mention much higher quality).

I imagine that readership flux continued through the guest era. Like, yeah, some strictly TMNT fans probably dropped off, but some of those issues were by (at the time) independent darlings. Fans of Veitch, Martin, Corben, Bodé, Howarth and the others probably goosed some sales here and there. I'd be surprised if at least a few of those readers didn't stick around at least a handful of issues.

No but I mean over what? Too much violence? Someone claiming they came up with the idea of martial arts animals first? Nunchucks on TV? April's ass being too hot for a kid's show? What?

Imagine you are a young dude who likes to draw this small underground comics about mutant turtles and at some point, all at once, you have to manage an empire and have to deal with international licensings and tons of legal papers and other complicated stuff. Easy to get overwhelmed!

People suing them saying they created TMNT first. Stupid stuff like that. Licnesing disputes like whatever this whole mess with Mark Freedman was: https://www.casemine.com/judgement/u...49344e47ec/amp

I think sometimes they were the ones suing other people as well. They had quite busy days!

Yeah, I’m sure there was a lot of IP theft going on. They also probably countersued most of the clowns coming at them.

Do you think the judges and jurors ever questioned the life choices that led to them sitting through civil disputes involving cartoon ninja turtles?

Yeah that’s so funny. Present day, no one would bat an eye. But imagine some judge born in like ****in 1930 having to hear some of these cases lol.

“Teenage Mutant what the hell now?”

For a real-time look, read the letters page of #15. Fans were upset that Eastman and laird were doing separate issues and handing them off completely on occasion.
I discovered Mirage right around that time, so when people were dropping off, I was coming on.

Interesting. I didn't know about the inconsistent schedule of Mirage comics.

As for fans losing patience, sure, but at the same time... this was what, 40 years ago? That's before the internet and way before the current age of instant gratification we're living in. People were more patient back then. They also had to wait for their favourite tv show or movie to air on TV on a certain time and date in order to watch it. There were no online forums or places like Reddit or Twitter for fans to vent and moan about their favourite series every single day.

This reminds me of 2006-2008 when The Irate Gamer was ripping off the Angry Video Game Nerd and AVGN fans said that James Rolfe should sue Chris Bores for it. It never happened, but just imagine being a 50-60 year old judge being assigned to a case involving two youtubers who review old ****** games. Imagine said judge also looking at those videos with all the cursing, pooping on games, etc. :lol::lol::lol:

I see what you’re saying, but even in those days comic fans were used to monthly installments of whatever they were reading.

To get specific, TMNT #28/“Sons of the Silent Age” came out in February 1990. But it wasn’t until early 1992 that they got back to telling “canon” stories consistently. Granted, some of the comics that came out in between were very fine books, but you also had the Hedden & McWeeny crap, etc.

And even from there, it was roughly another 6 months until City and War started.


lol hell yeah.

That's what people were saying about Chris Chan. Having the people of the court having to review all his documentary videos for context.

Jesus that's probably even worse :lol:

TMNT started the B&W boom almost single-handedly and sold unheard of numbers for an independent book for the time. Just as importantly it survived the bust when just about every other B&W book not named Cerebus or Usagi Yojimbo went under or went to color.

With fairly reliable, if self-reported numbers, Mirage sold over 2.3 million TMNT single-issue comic books (reprints included) from TMNT #1 to TMNT #17 (1984-1988). So I'd say they were pretty popular. Maybe not Spider-Man or X-Men or Batman levels of popularity, but far more popular than any independent comic before it. (Since is a more arguable point.)

Well, it is not that much. If you consider 2.3 million / 17 = 135.294

Yeah, the comic literally started the Independent/B&W comic revolution. The sales numbers were insanely high. I don't know the numbers, but I bet the guest era sold just as well if not better (at least on first printings) than the original Eatman and Laird issues because the cartoon and movies and music tour and everything else was huge and it was the 90's comics boom. It wasn't the same fan base that loved the first run, but there were more of them.

The idea that this was some little indie book barely getting by is ridiculous. That was what they expected, but the first (only planned) issue was so huge that they had to keep it going. I would bet the majority of the guest era issues still outsold anything IDW has ever done.

I have evidence of my claim. Here’s a transcription of a letter that got published in TMNT #8 back in 1986:

“ Turtles #6 -- still my favorite title but loosing ground fast. C'mon guys, #5 and #6 are terrible (it started with #4)-- what's going on? Victims of too much
praise? Getting sloppy... yes, I think so.

The classics #1, 2, and 3 rank a 10, Raphael 9+, and Michelangelo 9+, Looking at all your issues it seems to me that #5 and #6 are terribly over-cluttered. Waiting 3-4 months between issues is a long time to wait... we the consumers expect to see the best from you guys. Or are you blinded by success?

Already with Michelangelo the art is slipping but the story makes up for it. Let's see the turtles big and bold again, not cramped into small panels.

The turtles are best in the city fighting thugs, killers, muggers in the alleys, rooftops, streets and sewers. This space stuff sucks -- Star Wars is dead! After the Cerebus Issue, please get back to the basics, strong story and plot, and please start and finish the story in one issue. TMNT seems to work better that way. I'll be glad to see this space opera end. Also it is very violent -- "taking off heads"? Kids read this, you know. “Kick ass”? "Damn" all the time. You guys are an influence. Please consider that.

Despite all of that, I'll wait and see what #9 brings before 1 drop/continue collecting.
Color would help the turtles.”

Larry Mindy
Chicago, IL

I really hate it when people talk about how the FW cartoon was more popular than the Mirage Studios comics. Of course it was, the poorly made piece of crap was literally beamed into you house for free provided that you could stand the insipid advertisement that allowed you to watch it for no extra cost which applied to almost any other programming, of course something like that was seen more than a mail order comic book. The thing could have been a complete flop and seen for the soulless piece of thinly veiled advertisement it was and it still would have been more well known than what it was based on. It applies to practically every single Marvel and DC property as well, why the hell did you think the average person used to think Batman was about shark repellent or that Aquaman's sole power was to talk to fish?

By its very nature, TV programs receive more attention than print media. It has to, the entire model relies on it! It's practically meaningless to claim the FW show was more well known, it had nothing to with appeal or quality, the stupid thing had to and could be shown to way more people! That was the entire point!

"Star Wars is dead". If only little Larry Mindy from Chicago could have known. I wonder how old he was and how long he kept buying the comics.

:lol: pretty abysmal take all around. I was also curious about him, looked him up on Google and Facebook but got nothing.

How are you gonna rate TMNT #3 a 10/10 but then hate the space arc? Weirdo.

I admit, I've always been fascinated by those old lettercols, even in the late 1990s/early 2000s when I read them originally.

Like you read one at CAW era, or before and wonder, "What happened to this guy? Did he like where TMNT went in Vol. 2, or 3, or 4? Is he still a fan?" A lot of them even had fully printed addresses.

The space arc was an unexpected twist, you have to think the Turtles was still at the begining, a concept in the making. That guy was enjoying the series as a street level martial art comics with a touch of sci-fi and then, all at once, the turtles are on another planet with talking triceratops and laser guns. Imagine seeing it happen in a Daredevil issue! Also, not everyone is a fan of space fantasy.

Yeah, same!

Something else that always interests me is when I see they’re from some podunk town that I’m familiar with, and I can only imagine it was even more rural 30-40 years ago. It makes me wonder where the hell they were getting their comics. I guess they’d drive to the city every month or so.

It’s also funny to think about everyone writing into those early Vol. 1 issues were mostly all my parents are, if not older.

Fair points.

I always liked the space arc and thought the long car chase in #3 was pretty tedious. I mean, it’s a very special comic book by virtue of being from that magical time where it was just Eastman and Laird doing it all themselves.

But it’s definitely a weak spot in that early era. For me, at least.

It's also a little bit sad reading some of them. Because the overwhelming likelihood is that you're reading a letter (something back in an era where you'd actually have to take the care to write out a letter -- maybe by hand -- and put it in an envelope and mail it off) from someone who one day probably not too long after writing the letter you're reading completely moved on from the TMNT and never looked back.

For the sake of notncreating a new thread I’ll try asking this here:

Does anyone have a solid estimate on what a Mirage #21 with a 9.6 CGC grade and head sketch/signature from Eastman and Lavigne would be worth? How “popular” would that be?

I tried using eBay for reference but can’t find anything similar enough for reference and I don’t sell comics often.

If Larry Mindy was old enough to send a handwritten letter in 1986, we can assume he was probably at least a teenager then (probably around 16-18?), so by now he'd have to be over 50.

A literal boomer. How dare he insult Peter/Kevin's work like that and call Star Wars dead by 1986 (this was only like 3 years after the last movie came out mind you). I hope he has diabetes!

Hard in the paint!

Letter writers have been critical of Mirage TMNT since almost the beginning. If you read some of the letters published in TMNT #15, they're practically grabbing their torches and pitchforks when E & L announced their alternating issues plan. Incidentally, the comic stopped publishing letters for a long time afterward...