Fightin’ with Saturday Morning Turtles and Red Sonja and Someone Who Likes Candy (or Something)

The original(ish) heroes in a half shell (Turtle power!) are back in all of their cartoonish glory. In virtual reality. For real. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Saturday Morning Adventures #1 is written by Erik Burnham, drawn by Tim Lattie, colored by Sarah Myer, lettered by Shawn Lee and published by IDW.

Who taught her how to be a badass? Looks like we’re going to find out in Unbreakable Red Sonja #1, written by Jim Zub, drawn by Giovanni Valletta, colored by Francesco Segala with assists by Agnese Pozza, lettered by Carlos M. Mangual and published by Dynamite.

Candy is pretty nice. That’s a good thing we can say, but it’s not necessarily about Sweetie Candy Vigilante #1, written by Suzanne Cafiero, drawn by Jeff Zornow, colored by Antonio Fabella, lettered by Josh Howard with assists by DC Hopkins and published by Dynamite.

Will Nevin: We’re back from our excursion into the land of manga, and you know what? I didn’t hate it! It did, however, make me throw out the schedule and pick three more timely-ish books to cover. One of them makes me feel old and unrelatable, the second is Perfectly Fine(™) and the third is … nearly an unbearable slog. Ian, as we near our 30th edition of this here column, I feel like we’re playing all the old hits.

Ian Gregory: Will, now that you’re back to picking the comics, I have a newfound appreciation for the difficulty of this task. And yet, I’m still going to make fun of you for picking bad comics, because I think it’s funny. All that work last week, picking out comics, setting up the shared document, writing the issue summaries … no thanks! I’m glad to be back to showing up late and criticizing all of your decisions.

Will: I wouldn’t have it any other way … until we do another manga week and you get to do all the heavy(er) lifting.

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Saturday Morning Adventures #1: Nostalgia, but for Kids

Will: I dropped in 1985. The first Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles animated series followed two years later. Coincidence? Absolutely. But I grew up with that show — detached and softened from the source material as it was — and loved it. Still do. So this is the part where I feel incredibly old … but probably not as old as when one of my childhood friends had a TMNT birthday party for his kid.

This franchise is so durable because it’s so malleable. It can be funny. It can be serious. It can be anything in between. Anyway, what are your thoughts on the turtles before we get into this iteration specifically?

Ian: I “dropped” (Why would you say it like that, Will? [Will: I like to make things awkward]) in 1996, and the TMNT were still going strong, even if it wasn’t through the original animated series. There were Gamecube games, live action movies and a new animated series that came out when I was 7. The Turtles are pretty much culturally indestructible at this point. I was never that big into them growing up, but they were totally inescapable. It’s one of those series where everyone knows the basics — Master Splinter, pizza, Shredder, cowabunga and so on. So while I may not have a personal attachment to the franchise, I respect the hustle.

Will: If the title is any guide, this miniseries is an attempt to capture the spirit of that first television show, and I think on some level, it succeeds. The characters all play out true to form, and as I read the dialogue, I can hear those voice actors in my head. But the story here — Donny comes up with a VR training simulator that goes sideways — is both thin and convoluted. The best episodes of the original series had some larger point, even if that was as shallow as it was a real bummer for Splinter to lose his humanity. There’s simply nothing of substance here.

Ian: It’s all very Scooby-Doo and the CyberChase. This is, essentially, a series of vignettes based around “recognize this video game or TMNT character and laugh,” without much of anything keeping the story together. As a first issue, I suppose it works in that it appeals to the target audience (kids) as well as longtime TMNT fans who would likely enjoy seeing practically every villain ever on a single page. But, as a comic, it’s hollow.

Will: At least I’ve got no complaints about the art here. It should look like the series, and it does. While that’s a low bar, not every comic clears it. (Looking at you, Batman ’89.)

Ian: This is a “kid’s comic,” so in theory it’s pretty dumbed down (I have strong memories of an Avengers comic I picked up where Captain America stopped Wolverine from attacking a kraken because “he promised not to use his claws on living things”). That said, this VR-themed issue dives straight into Plato’s Cave when Leonardo says, “It’s all in your head, Michelangelo. Your brain only thinks it’s real,” and Michelangelo replies, “How does that make it different from anything else?”

Will: Deep Thoughts with Michaelangelo. Maybe Dan’ll get that reference at least. [Grote’s note: I did.]

Unbreakable Red Sonja #1: More Sonja, but with a Tiny Twist

Will: Heeeeey, it’s a different Red Sonja title for us to cover. (Dynamite, by the way, seems to have no shortage of those.) This one is written by Jim Zub, who has credits on Conan the Barbarian and Dungeons and Dragons, so this seems to be squarely in the realm of “shit he can do.” There are fewer laughs than Immortal (no talking chainmail, after all) but I think, overall, the book works.

Ian: Red Sonja is, I guess, a playground for writers to do the fantasy series of their dreams, funded by a half-dozen alternate covers of varying lewdness. As you say, though, this is a pretty good start, and I like that it’s grounded in the more traditional Hyborean setting. Immortal has steered off into Arthuriana parody land, so it’s interesting to see one set in the classic realm of Conan and co.

Will: Again, I can’t help but compare this to Immortal — I don’t know if the art is stronger, but it’s at least more consistent. The colors, though, seem a little drab.

Ian: That’s the penalty for setting this entire issue at night, I suppose. I do like the art, and I especially love the effects on the monster exploding. The spots of dust that fill each dark space give the page a mystic quality.

Will: How’d you like that last-page reveal? It’s certainly a hook for the series, innit?

Ian: I hate to say it, but I saw it coming from the moment the fortune teller mentioned that she didn’t remember her mentor’s face. The prologue already hinted at the existence of time travel, so I was bracing myself for a classic “mentorship time loop” from the jump.

Will: I was my own grandpa this entire time.

Sweetie Candy Vigilante #1: Candy-Coated YIKES

Will: What would Leftovers be without me picking a disappointing book? This new property from Dynamite starts with a credits page that explains the story, and let me tell you, it is not a good sign when you gotta start your book with exposition to clue the readers in on what’s happening.

It gets less interesting from there.

Sweetie, our hero (?) walks into the Ice Cream Bunny bar, expecting ice cream, but all she finds are scumbags and dancers. She dispatches with a few of the scumbags — including one guy who was just recording shit — with various candy things that all generally seem to melt faces. Sweetie then brands a couple of the patrons, introduces the bar to a hulking gummy bear, enchants the sad Christmas and leaves. There — I’ve recapped the entire goddamned issue.

Ian: What the fuck.

Will: It looks great. It really does. Colors are vibrant, the action is good, the layouts are nice. But the dialogue fuckin’ kills me. “You smell like a marshmallow Peep” (all Peeps are marshmallow) and “I don’t believe in Santa. I believe in Satan and his merry elves” are lines that are DOA. And this character is just a mess. (See, again, the killing of a bystander.)

Ian: You like this art?

Will: I like it enough?

Ian: I couldn’t handle it. It was, to me, too pin-up, all the time. The character design is distracting. The coloring is too flat. The dialogue is horrible (“What is that?? OMG is that licorice?”). The actual “plot,” or rather, the events happening on the page, is seemingly totally random. I hated it.

Will: I don’t think I hated this as much as, say, Rogues’ Gallery — primarily because it gets to the action without too much of its stilted writing getting in the way. But I’m not in any hurry to pick it up again.

Ian: This one’s going on your permanent record, Will.

Will: Goddamnit. I knew I should have gone with NewThink.

Does This Smell OK?

Sound Effect Watch: In Unbreakable Red Sonja, the monster falls down with a “fwoomp.” Nothing groundbreaking here, I just like a good “fwoomp.”
Rapid fire questions:
- Best Turtle?
  - Will: Here are your definitive Turtle rankings as determined by science: 1) Donatello 2) Leonardo 3) Michelangelo 4) Raphael. No one likes an emo turtle. And Mikey can be annoying as fuck.
  - Ian: I honestly don’t know the Turtles well enough to divide them by personality, so I’ll just go by color preference: 1) Donatello 2) Michelangelo 3) Leonardo 4) Raphael.
    - Will: You took a different path, but you got to the right place.
  - Grote’s note: Excuse me. Raphael is “cool, but rude.” How could you not love that? It’s 1) Raph 2) Donny 3) Mikey 4) Leo, and I’ll brook no further argument.
- Worst try at picking up Red Sonja at a bar?
  - Will: Challenging her to an ax throwing contest. That’s going to end badly.
  - Ian: In a similar vein, arm wrestling.
- Favorite Halloween candy?
  - Will: Everyone seems to hate these, but I’m going to go with Mary Janes — those peanut butter candies in the black-and-orange wrappers. It’s just gobs of peanut butter, people! What’s not to love?!
  - Ian: Here’s the boring but objectively true answer: Reese’s Cups.
  - Grote’s note: Almond Joy. It’s the only place coconut belongs.
Valerie Bertinelli has a recipe for leftover mashed potato soup, but as I always wonder: Who has leftover mashed potatoes? Don’t you people just inhale them? Must be me, then.
Here’s a taste of a Leftovers column that actually covers food: What would you rather try — Pepsi’s Smores Collection of sodas or Old Bay Caramel Seasoning?