What Was The Original Intention Of The Triceratons?
 

I read earlier today that the Triceratons were created before the Ninja Turtles were. I always thought they were created for TMNT#5-7. What was the original purpose for the humanoid orange triceratops? Were they set to be a villainous group in another comic the duo came up with or be in their own comic? Thanks in advance for the heads up.

They were created because Peter Laird really, really likes triceratops dinosaurs. True story. When TMNT came around it seemed like a good of a place for them to show up as any.

The Triceratons are also based on the Klingon's.

Peter Laird is a big Star Trek fan.

Couldn't be too much on them, though. By 1985 the only real Klingons seen were those in Star Trek 3... the TOS ones weren't quite the Proud Warrior Race they would become known as in the fandom throughout TNG and Star Trek VI yet.

The Fugitoid was also created before TMNT, so it's possible that they were always intended to be villains in his story.

That might be the answer then. Thanks,I thought they were created for the turtles space adventure. The turtles were brought to space to use other characters that Eastman and Laird came up with then. I guess The Federation were created at the same time frame of Fugi and the Triceratons then as well? The turtles were inserted in thier story and it was reworked for TMNT I guess. Ineresting. Here I thought the TMNT was the only thing that Kevin and Peter ever did together.

never knew this.

I think they actually talk a bit about this in the annotations section of the new IDW Ultimate Collection. I think Fugitoid definitely had potential to work as its own series, judging from its single issue, but I think marrying TMNT with that universe worked perfectly.

At that point, TMNT was taking off too, so I'm sure they wanted to give the triceratons some spotlight by merging them in with their most popular book.

Yeah, I detailed the early artwork of the Triceraton here on TMNT Entity.

Art featuring them dates back as early as '83, though there's no telling how long Laird had played with the idea in his head or his sketch books. The Fugitoid back-ups published in Gobbledygook (Vol. 1) #1-2 where the Triceratons first premiered story-wise predate the TMNT, so they'd appear to have originally been created as villains for Professor Honeycutt to deal with. At least before the TMNT took off and the Fugitoid back-ups were folded into their storyline.

Thanks for sharing your knowledge,guys! Were the Federation and Blanque around then as well then?

I believe so.

Everything from the Fugitoid microseries save Chapter 7 was completed in 1983, prior to the creation of the TMNT.

Eastman and Laird's original intention was to sell the Fugitoid shorts (which became "chapters" in the microseries) as back-up "pin-up comics" (hence why they begin and end with a splash page) to other publishers.

When no one was interested, they began publishing them on their own as segments in Gobbledygook. Following that, they combined the six Fugitoid back-ups in 1984 into the Fugitoid microseries comic, adding a brand new seventh chapter which bridged the old comics into the ongoing storyline of the TMNT.

So everything from the first 6 chapters of the Fugitoid microseries predate the TMNT.

Fugitoid and related characters was a failed first attempt before the one shot TMNT prody took off from the way it reads. Its funny, I have all of the 1984-1989 Mirage Studios stuff TMNT related except Fugi's one-shot due to lack of interest. It seems that one shot has history behind it I never knew.

The triceritons were kinda cool and I really did like the utrons but the spacey stories were always second best for me. I much preferred the earth based stories whether they had shredded, the foot, river creatures, mutant leeches, etc. I understand that being mutant turtles they are sci-fi but too much additional sci-fi was a little much for my tastes.

I actually feel the same way for the most part, but at the same time, the far out sci-fi stories add a welcome variety and rounds out the series nicely, I think. It's a tricky balance, so I don't fault TMNT too much when a sci-fi story doesn't quite work.