TMNT: Odyssey is a 110-page Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles fan comic from 2015, written and self-published by Andrew Modeen and drawn by a number of artists — primarily Jim Lawson, one of the veteran artists from the original TMNT Mirage comic, but many other artists who have worked on TMNT have contributed to this comic, including Dan Berger and Rick Arthur; even A.C Farley and Rick McCollum & Bill Anderson have provided covers and back covers.
The comic serves as a sort of Grand Finale for the Mirage continuity as a whole, and to a lesser extent also for the entire pre-Paramount Global TMNT franchise.
It's the year 2105 in the Mirage universe. An aged and blind Donatello, the last living Turtle, is about to die quietly in his sleep when Renet, the Timestress, shows up — also dying. Her timeline has been wiped out by the sorcerer Savanti Romero, who has returned; he's resurrected his wife Juliet, and the two have teamed up with the demon Mr Null (from Archie Comics' Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Adventures) and a mysterious entity calling himself "the Shogun," all seeking to not only remove the Turtles from time and space, but possibly end the entirety of The Multiverse. In her final moment she bestows upon him her last powers of healing, time travel and teleportation, and begs him to save everything. A revived and more powerful Donatello proceeds to go back in time to each of his brothers' dying moments and pluck them out of the timestream to go on one last odyssey through time and space in what might turn out to not only be the last battle of their lives, but also the greatest, as they have to stop The End of the World as We Know It.
With its focus on a multi-dimensional threat and the appearance of several versions of the Turtles and their allies and enemies, the comic might look a lot like a more serious and less kid-friendly Turtles Forever (the events of which are referenced briefly), but it's actually a reimagining and reworking of Andrew Modeen's earlier TMNT fanfic Transencion and its sequel Deliverance, (both available here
), both of which preceded Turtles Forever by several years and featured characters from the various TMNT universes interacting, with a heavy emphasis on the Mirage and Archie universes. Even the character of the Shogun comes from Transencion, as does the way the Mirage Turtles team up with Slash from the Archie universe and Venus de Milo from Ninja Turtles: The Next Mutation.
TMNT: Odyssey was crowdfunded and initially available in a limited softcover run, but Andrew has also made a digital PDF version available for free here.
The comic would later on get a sequel/prequel by the same creators and set in the same continuity called TMNT: Origin.
This comic provides examples of:
- Adaptational Jerkass: Savanti Juliet was no saint in her single appearance in the Mirage comic, but she did have a certain dignity to her and seemed to truly love and grieve over her husband. Here, she's a flighty and disloyal Bitch in Sheep's Clothing towards him; acting all sweet and loving towards him but secretly plotting revenge on him for "abandoning" her. Later on, she proves that she essentially just wants to hook up with whoever's the biggest and baddest dude in the multiverse, to the point where she addresses the Shogun as "my new love" when he proves to be stronger than both Romero and Null.
- Adaptational Dumbass: Briefly discussed by Michelangelo towards the end of the comic, when he observes that in most of the TMNT universes he isn't "Michelangelo the thinker" or "Michelangelo the writer" but "Michelangelo the absent-minded party dude." At first he found it insulting, but he came to envy those other versions of him since they seemed so much happier than him.
- Adaptational Villainy: Michelangelo is the Shogun. Though he's more a Well-Intentioned Extremist than actually evil and it's more than hinted that he's gone more than a little crazy with the power of the Turnstone, he still causes the end of a multiverse and essentially kills billions of people.
- Art Shift: Most of the comic is drawn by Jim Lawson, but several segments, especially those taking place in other dimensions, are drawn by other artists and have radically different styles. The one-panel appearances of the 2003 series and the 1987 series mimic the art styles of those respective cartoons, and even the Next Mutation series is represented with a photorealistic CGI image.
- Bittersweet Ending: In the end, the Turtles fail to stop the Shogun's plan. The Multiverse is destroyed and reborn, and all the Mirage Turtles, as well as Slash and Venus, and pretty much everyone else, are dead. What's more, all the Turtles failed on a personal level. Mike is of course the standout here, he essentially became the villain of the story, ended The Multiverse in order to start a new one... but the other three are also tested in some way and fall short. Raphael succumbs to his rage and kills Mike while he's calmly talking, pretty much ensuring that the destruction-and-rebirth process will happen because Mike isn't alive to control it. Donatello, seeing the Turnstone, has a chance to stop everything and save the multiverse, but decides not to because it would be "playing God," and so he just lets it happen. And Leonardo gets his hands on the Turnstone at the last moment and... doesn't stop the end of the multiverse either, he just tries to alter the new one a little to "restore his honor," though we never find out exactly what he altered. And then they all die. It's almost a "Shaggy Dog" Story... but what stops it from being a complete Downer Ending is that the new multiverse is alive and thriving, and we specifically see the Turtles of the new universes (the IDW universe, the 2012 universe, even the Michael Bay universe) bursting with energy and zest for life in a way the Mirage Turtles never had. The IDW Splinter even gets a "life is good, and life goes on" speech — the first time any Splinter has had more than a silent cameo in the comic. And the Mirage Turtles may be dead, but they take up their destined place in the Halls of Lost Legends.
- The Cameo: Superman, Batman and Captain America are also enshrined in the Halls of Lost Legends.
- Canon Welding: A lot of the "guest artist" issues of the Mirage run are referenced in the story, even though most of them have been declared non-canon. Same with the Image series, which is stated to have taken place in the Mirage timeline (Cyborg Donatello and Michelangelo's fling with Horridus are both referenced) — and the Palladium RPG sourcebooks, which are very blatantly not canon, are still included in the Mirage universe here.
- Continuity Porn: The number of Continuity Nods here are mind-boggling. The vast majority of them are for the Mirage universe, as there's some reference to almost every major and a good deal of the minor events of the Mirage comics, but the Archie comics get a decent amount too.
- Darker and Edgier: The Mirage continuity was already set in a bit of a Crapsack World, so there's nothing new there... the Darker and Edgier part is in how this comic essentially manages to turn the entire TMNT multiverse into a Crapsack World.
- Deal with the Devil:
- Venus turns out to have made one with the Shogun, in that she'll work for him in exchange for having her home dimension restored. The Turtles see through her almost at once, and she switches to their side without much prompting, realizing just how disappointed Chung I would be with her if he knew.
- This is also what the Shogun did, even more literally, as part of his power came from making a deal with Null.
- Delayed Ripple Effect:
- This is what happens if someone's past self or their ancestors are killed — their present-day selves don't instantly vanish, but they are doomed to die or fade away before long. This is what happens to Renet in the beginning of the story, though she makes it to the aged Donatello and manages to transfer the remainder of her power over to him before fading away.
- It also seems like this is going to be the fate of the Turtles, since the Savantis go to the past and destroy the pet shop where the pre-mutated baby Turtles came from. It becomes a Race Against the Clock to stop the bad guys before they fade away... though they never actually do.
- Evil Is Hammy: Savanti Romero, the hammiest of all the Mirage villains, is in fine shape here.
- Grand Finale: It's probably the closest thing we'll ever get to one for the Mirage continuity. Sure, it's very much an unofficial fan production, but with all the offical Mirage artists that have contributed, as well as Andrew Modeen's Ascended Fanboy situation (he was a story consultant on the TMNT Urban Legends finale, which bridged the Image comics with Mirage Vol 4), it could pass for a canon Grand Finale with only minimal squinting.
- I Did What I Had to Do: The Shogun's attitude towards the atrocities he commits. Whereas Null and the Savantis just do their thing For the Evulz, the Shogun just views all the death and suffering as an unfortunate necessity for his goal of recreating the multiverse.
- The Multiverse: It's in danger of being wiped out again.
- Reality Warper: The Shogun, with the power of the Turnstone.
- Resurrection Revenge: The Mighty Mutanimals, who were infamously killed off by Mr Null in the Archie series, finally get their revenge on him when a powered-up Venus calls them briefly back to life to take him down.
- Sixth Ranger: Both Slash and Venus become this to the Mirage Turtles on their odyssey.
- Stable Time Loop:
- What's kind of being set up with the Turtles all being plucked from the timeline on the same day when they're fated to die. If they don't come back from their mission... well, they would have died that day anyway. Of course, the entire thing becomes moot when the Savantis kill the infant pre-mutated Turtles back in their old pet store.
- A more traditional kind occurs when The Shogun seemingly vaporizes Michelangelo. In truth, he didn't kill Mike, since he is Mike — what he did was send his younger self back in time, wiping his memories of everything that had happened, so that the younger Mike could proceed to do everything he needed to do to become the Shogun.
- Stuffed in the Fridge: Discussed by the Shogun after he kills Venus de Milo.Shogun: Is this called "fridging", by the way? I assure you all, the nerve centers of her tiny brain were the first thing to go. She is in no pain.
- Take That!: The "Turtles and Splinter are the reincarnations of Hamato Yoshi and his sons" plot from the IDW comic (which wasn't too popular with the fans at first) is treated as a stupid idea when the Shogun mentions it as a possibility for the new multiverse. The IDW Turtles and Splinter themselves, though, are treated with dignity in their brief cameo.
- Took a Level in Badass:
- Donatello, who goes from frail, blind and dying to a powerful time-traveler when Renet transfers her power to him.
- Venus was already a formidable warrior, but when she becomes Renet's replacement as a Timestress, her power reaches new levels. And then she's unceremoniously killed by the Shogun.
- The Shogun qualtifies too, since he's actually Michelangelo.
- Well-Intentioned Extremist: The Shogun is trying to wipe out The Multiverse, but it's only so he can rebuild it better than it was. He is actually an older, time-displaced Michelangelo, who is on a huge I Did What I Had to Do kick — disillusioned with the way everything went to hell after Splinter's death he sought to use the power of the Turnstone to "set everything right" and create a new world where things would turn out better. Of course...
- With Great Power Comes Great Insanity: ...it's more than implied that he's gone mad with the power of the Turnstone and isn't all there.
- Wicked Cultured: The Shogun likes to quote Shakespeare and Voltaire. It's actually kind of a hint to his true identity, as the Mirage Michelangelo was a writer and an avid reader... at least when the scriptwriters remembered. He also directly states that he was putting on an act, because he didn't want his brothers, and especially not Savanti Romero, to know that it was him.
- The Worf Effect: It gets vaguely ridiculous with the Shogun, who effortlessly kills some of the most powerful beings in the Turtleverse just to show what a threat he is.
- Unholy Matrimony: Savanti Romero and Juliet, at least at first. Turns out their relationship isn't as sweet and loving at it seems.
