Something so compelling about IDW’s Ninja Turtles universe is how it becomes richer each year. A new canon grows, new history through flashbacks explored, and a more robust universe ends up growing for the better. Enter Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: The Untold Destiny of the Foot Clan #1, a new miniseries focusing on the granddaughter of Shredder Oroku Karai, who is the leader of the Foot Clan. By the end of the issue, you’ll realize that the mystical nature of some characters is much more than you think.
As a Ninja Turtles fan who hasn’t read every comic, I found Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: The Untold Destiny of the Foot Clan #1 intriguing as well as a good fight comic. I can’t say I know every character, but there’s enough in the Foot Clan to keep fans of the original cartoon satisfied. Would it have helped if I had known every mutant as well as the robust history? Probably, or at the very least, IDW could have supplied a summary, but it’s still an enjoyable issue.
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: The Untold Destiny of the Foot Clan #1 opens at the Foot Clan headquarters, where we see Oroku Karai giving orders to her faithful soldiers. Familiar faces include Casey Jones, Bebop, and Rocksteady. They infiltrate a company hot, which means a big brawl pretty much kicks off the issue. As action comics go, the fight is intense and entertaining.
Credit: IDW
Mateus Santolouco draws the action in great detail with cool designs for the Foot Clan characters. You will believe a frog mutant is real. When a mutant whale enters the fight, things go from bad to worse for the Foot Clan folks. Bebop and Rocksteady do their worst and take a licking.
Things go from bad to worse when a new clan is introduced, and they also have a cool design. The details in the elbow tech alone are quite cool, and you’ll find yourself eyeballing it longer than usual. The battle goes from bad to worse, and soon mystical powers must be invoked, or a key character will die. Overall, the plot is a bit thin, with only four or five scenes in the issue. It’s mostly a fight comic, which is fine, but I also felt like there wasn’t enough hook by the end to know where it is going.
Erik Burnham does a good job fleshing out Oroku, who is strong-willed and a good leader but also willing to do what it takes to win. One can see she’s not evil, but she’s also willing to lose a soldier if she can win the war. Through her, we see that the Foot Clan isn’t simply an evil outfit; it is more complex.
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: The Untold Destiny of the Foot Clan #1 is a good start to a series that has some of the best art you’ll see in a comic this week. It’s a good fight comic featuring a few familiar TMNT characters, but if you go in blind like me, you might feel a bit lost not knowing some of the characters.
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