3 out of 5

And so, essentially, ends the second-ish era of Archie Adventures TMNT: when Dean Clarrain and Ryan Brown would close out ties to pre-existing characters – Shredder, Krang, Bebop, Rocksteady – and start (with the the arc, starting in issue #28) bringing in their own internal cast, with a slightly moodier vibe to boot.

While these issues read well (even, I’d say, the filler issues – 26 and 27, with never-appearing-again mutants by scripter Doug Brammer), there is a sense that we’re being rushed through, lacking even the faux-buildup of preceding arcs with Maligna and the Mutanimals.  Slash is there; Bellybomb; Krang returns and forces an incredibly twisted mutation on Shredder, which I’d completely forgotten occurred… maybe because it’s brilliant but so short-lived.  Which – while brilliant is an overly-glowing term – is a good summary of this set, having a lot of good ideas but all being swept aside so we can start fresh afterward.  The rush also requires things to become really humorously non-sensical, such as Bebop and Rocksteady wanting to return home because they miss crime, then like a page later rewriting “crime” to mean a free-the-animals message and apparently “returning home” meant visiting Earth and then going back to the planet on which they’d previously been sequestered.  Over in the one-shot issues, Brammer and Ken Mitchroney keep things moving (and points to Brammer for making me cry foul at a gigantic plothole, before having the other Turtles point out the same a page later), but issue #27’s ‘In the Dark’ feels like it had an “include these mutants” mandates, and then a plot added later.  It wastes some horror movie / genre nods to this effect.

Also included are the April back-ups featuring Warrior Dragon – these don’t give us much, but I enjoyed seeing April in ninja mode and the introduction of Splinter’s battle armor – which would be followed up next arc.

I absolutely remember, as a kid, rereading the TMNT series multiple times… and skipping these issues.  I would pick and choose early books, generally the Mutanimals-related stuff, and then start the rereads with the next arc.  Even way back when, I guess I sensed that what occurred in the books collected here – while drawn well and written competently – didn’t amount to much.