It seems the title of the darkish and mature Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles comedian e-book The Final Ronin was a little bit of a misdirect. Although that story informed the bloody story of the authentic TMNT squad as the final surviving turtle lastly took down the Foot Clan, a brand new group of 4 Ninja Turtles is rising as much as take their place in the sequel, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: The Final Ronin II Re-Evolution. We spoke with the co-creator of Ninja Turtles and the co-writer of The Final Ronin II, Kevin Eastman, about how he is elevating a brand new era of turtles.
Listed below are the new turtles in motion. Their names are Yi, Odyn, Moja, and Uno, and are led by Casie Marie Jones. Try this action-packed double-page unfold from inside The Final Ronin II by artist Ben Bishop.
“[The Last Ronin II] was one thing that we actually questioned and actually hadn’t deliberate after we began doing Final Ronin, so we discovered a spot that we wished to remain and inform tales for so long as we might. What you are seeing right here particularly takes place 16 years after Final Ronin I ended,” Eastman mentioned. “Casey Marie Jones is the girl in the purple you see there with the half of a Casey masks on, and he or she’s skilled to turn out to be the sensei and common guardian of the new turtles. They are going out on certainly one of their first missions.”
Whereas the authentic 4 turtle designs all match into the identical mould, Eastman and co-writer Tom Waltz wished to make the 4 new turtles extra distinct.
“One in every of the issues that we did wish to do was actually replace the characters. There’s two male, two feminine turtle characters, and me and Tom attempting to put in writing what youngsters may suppose and say and do,” Eastman defined. “There is a good cross part of various personalities, very like the authentic turtles. You wish to have them all the time love their household, however not all the time like them. And they also may argue. They could spat. They could have disagreements, however when they should work collectively as a staff, it is the coronary heart and soul of the household that all the time retains them collectively. And that is all the time going to be the basis of something we do with turtles.”
Making the new turtles totally different from the originals extends from their personalities right down to their bodily look.
“It was a type of issues that whenever you’re following in the footsteps of one thing that works so nicely on so many ranges. However was a type of issues additionally, whenever you look again at the authentic creation of the reveals, all of them had a really comparable look, a really comparable type. It actually wasn’t till, say, a few of the early episodes of the cartoons the place we might even did issues like altering the coloration of the bandanas and issues like that.
“However with this, Tom and I had a really particular thought, the place we wished them to be totally different species of turtles. So they’d have totally different bodily attributes, and that will translate into their peak and weight and even character. And so I gave some sketches, a complete lot of reference to the wonderful Ben Bishop and mentioned, ‘Give me a few of your first ideas.’ And so Ben actually crafted some lovely silhouettes and a few distinctive designs, and it was going by means of the technique of seeing all these ‘bare’ turtles after which wanting to place outfits on them after which play costume up and making them work logically and sensibly of what they is likely to be. But it surely was enjoyable. We had been very happy. It was a number of good work attending to one thing that I felt labored as a singular search for them,” Eastman mentioned.
The Final Ronin was an enormous hit, as evidenced by its common appearances on bestsellers lists because it got here out, so it needs to be no shock {that a} online game adaptation is already in the works, mentioned to have God of Battle-esque gameplay. The teaser trailer was launched in August 2023 from developer THQ.
“It appeared the pure that Final Ronin would evolve as a online game. It appeared like we might hit all of the attitudes and the motion and the depth of the sequence in a online game format. And we have seen a number of growth on it, and I couldn’t be extra excited in that,” Eastman mentioned. “If you take a look at it in the comedian e-book, you see flat floor, a degree of aircraft, a constructing. You see this a part of it. The online game, all of a sudden, we are able to go round the nook, and we are able to see all the remainder of it. And the designers and the artisans which can be bringing the video Recreation to life are followers as nicely. And it appears like a few of the stuff’s been ripped proper out of the pages of the comedian e-book. They are going all the approach in after which some. So it is wanting actually excited. I am excited for followers to see extra of what they’re doing in the online game.”
In an interview with The Hollywood Reporter, director Zack Snyder expressed his love for TMNT and confirmed off his authentic TMNT Mirage comics assortment. Would Eastman be keen on Snyder adapting The Final Ronin right into a film?
“Oh, most positively. Completely,” Eastman gushed. “I have been definitely a fan of Zach Snyder. We have gotten to be pals over the years. We have met on a few totally different initiatives that by no means bought off the floor, however I really feel like the finest a part of it grew to become that we bought to be pals. He is a fan, a really strong fan of this style, whether or not it’s films or comics. He is a really critical, heavy metallic comedian fan. He’d be a tremendous director. And I believed it was a deal with that he pulled out a few of his authentic comics for an interview he did lately.
“It was attention-grabbing after we checked out the alternatives to proceed telling tales in the Ronin verse, a film was positively a pure, one thing we thought could be fantastic to pursue. Paramount made their resolution to do a tremendous film with Seth Rogan with the Mutant Mayhem Mission, which I believed was completely, snigger out loud, hilariously humorous, fantastically executed. And there is going to be greater than that universe.”
The primary concern of The Final Ronin 2 releases on March 6, 2024. Get extra particulars on Situation #1 in our full preview.