5 out of 5

Even though the presentation is perhaps a tad flawed, there’s no way to not give this five stars.  The amount of – and honesty of the – information provided is comprehensive, that even for a lifelong Turtles fan, there’s new stuff here.  Plus, it’s written in a direct fashion that definitely allows the (currently) 30 years of amazing mutations the Turtles have gone through to stand as a fascinating tale of creation and creativity that I think could be of appeal to even casual fans, though the book’s pricetag ($50) might only attract those of us who are already fully on board.

So it’s about 200 pages, chock full of full-color, large photos or scans, and littered with inserts (although part of my nits) which are recreations of important pieces of TMNT minutiae, like a fan club welcome letter.  Farago moves through things chronologically, the best and most obvious path, starting from the pre-Turtles Laird and Eastman projects and up through the 2014 Michael Bay movie.  As could be expected, the wealth of knowledge is lavished on the comic origins and the climb to fame up through the cartoon and initial couple movies, but there’s truly no aspect of the history that isn’t at least mentioned – newspaper strips, Next Mutation, Image, Peter Laird’s volume 4 series, etc.  As one of those fans whose either been there for parts of the history or read up on the background before, there’s a surprising light cast upon ‘Visual History’ – that of Peter Laird as outside observer.  It’s not explicit, and perhaps I’m just sensitive to it because, for years, it always seemed like Laird was the TMNT hero and Eastman had gone his own way with his more Heavy Metal-geared interests.  You’d read the letter pages in volume 4, or his blog, and hear someone who’s so thankful for his years with his creations, but adamant that leaving the franchise to Nickelodeon after 25 years was the right thing to do.  Digging through his Turtles blog, and its endless sketches and notes, you don’t get the directness of some of his quotes in ‘Visual History,’ which suggest that, even early on, there were slight frustrations with the way the brand was being developed (though in now way denying that the success – including the money it brought in – was incredibly rewarding and appreciated.  …And spent.).  And Eastman, back in the light with the current IDW series (also talked about in the book), seems pretty positive in all of his quotes.  It’s just an interesting role reversal, but perhaps only because of assumptions I was making.

The frankness of the discussion of the business side of things is also appreciated.  Yes, the Turtles name was everywhere when I was growing up, and each iteration has had its marketing push, but it’s still easy to forget sometimes how closely tied to toys and movies the cartoons are / were, and how those typical big-business stories of producers pushing for a certain style or look are typical because they’re generally true…

I felt like there might have been a couple mistakes in the text; nothing major, just misidentifying a TMNT magazine pic as coming from the comic, and maybe a date seemed wrong to me.  But nothing that would make someone walk away spewing totally incorrect facts.  The stitched binding and width of the hardcover indentation was perfect for leaving the book lying flat.  The super thick pages allowed for really wonderful productions of all of the images, and text was well scattered through the pages so I didn’t feel like I was just reading a picture book.  The one minor thing, truly just a matter of taste: I don’t get the inserts.  I guess it’s cool in some instances to have the material of something – like a business card – recreated, but the trade off is that you get things pasted into the book that cover up the text.  I’m not sure why the layouts couldn’t just account for the shapes of the inserts.  The promo info suggests that we’re supposed to take these inserts out and do with them as we please, but you can’t tell me that the collectors buying this book are really doing that.  Unless they’re getting two, I suppose.  So it was an annoyance that this hands-free book (the lying flatness meaning I could busy myself with something and leave the book open to read) had bits of paper on every few pages that had to be held up in order to read what was beneath.

But: file this into the same wondrous category as ‘Turtles Forever,’ those projects that the rich history of the Turtles has encouraged to come to fruition.  ‘Visual History’ never felt like geeked-out fan service, though of course it works for that.  It felt like a respectful history.  It felt like the story that we all knew, but that needed to be collected in one excellently produced, well-written, impressive art book.  I’m buying a new apartment and friends and a coffee table just so I can put this out and sucker the uninitiated into reading it.