Trivia / Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (IDW)

• Demand Overload: Issues 95 and 96, the first issues to depict Jennika as the fifth ninja turtle, both quickly sold out almost overnight. At San Diego Comic Con 2019, pre-orders for exclusive variants of the Issue 95 sold out almost instantly and IDW had to pull the comic from sale at the convention to avoid potential crowds of comic collectors swarming their panel and booth.
  • It should also be noted that physical copies of the issues, as well as Issues 51 and 52 in which Jennika first appeared, have had their prices skyrocket on commerce sites due to how highly sought out they've become.
• Schedule Slip: The Shredder in Hell mini series is only five issues long but, despite the first issue being released in January 2019, only three issues have been released over the course of eight months. Most likely because the final issue tied into Issue 100 of the main series and the publisher wanted both them to release next to each other.
• Series Hiatus: Sophie Campbell announced on her twitter that, due to the COVID-19 crisis, the series temporarily suspended production on future issues in early 2021, along with the rest of the comic book industry. It resumed that fall, with the comic even temporarily releasing two issues a month to get caught up.
• What Could Have Been:
  • Natsu, a character introduced in "Karai's Path", was intended to be a gender flipped Tatsu, but was apparently not allowed. The final character's name alludes to this, with her name being a portmanteau of "Not Tatsu".
  • Jennika was originally planned to be a one-shot character but Tom Waltz liked her chemistry with Splinter so she became a main character and was eventually mutated into the fifth turtle.
  • Some of Tom Waltz's and Sophie Campbell's plans for Jennika's transition into the new ninja turtle didn't make it into the final version of the character. For example, Campbell suggested canonizing her fan character Artemisia, who was also female mutant turtle with a yellow bandanna, but abandoned the idea as silly. The two also discussed naming her after an artist but decided against it, believing it would be too contrived to try and force a name change on an established character.
  • Issue 117 would've featured a cameo appearance from Kirby, the fifth turtle that would've been introduced in the unmade fourth live action film. Just like the film version of Kirby however, his comics counterpart didn't make the cut.
  • Bludgeon was conceived as a version of Armaggon by Tom Waltz, but Bobby Curnow rejected it on the grounds that aside from both of them being sharks, Bludgeon and Armaggon had nothing in common. Armaggon would finally make his debut years later during the Armageddon Game arc.
• Word of Gay: Paul Allor explains in a Tumblr post that the Pride in Sally's name isn't just a play on the word for a group of lions. Whether future writers will make this a part of her character remains to be seen. [1]