The Ninja Turtles are back! As someone who grew up with the classic TMNT cartoon, I can honestly say I love the latest take on the Turtles. So needless to say, I was pumped to check out this panel at the end of my second day at New York Comic-Con. Thankfully, it was every bit as awesome as I hoped and made the time spent in an absurdly long line totally worth it.
I knew Executive Producers Ciro Nieli and Peter Hastings would attend but it was a nice surprise when the Turtles came out to bust a move. Then, one by one, the voice actors for the Turtles and Splinter made a surprise appearance. Greg Cipes (Mikey), Rob Paulsen (Donatello), Sean Astin (Raphael) and Hoon Lee (Splinter) took to the stage. Unfortunately, Jason Biggs (Leo) couldn't make it.
A few jokes later and Ciro got to showcase some sketches for upcoming mutants in the show. One thing is clear -- the dude loves TMNT (he remarked on the Mirage comics a few times). He revealed sketches of Donatello's pet cockroach which tragically suffers not one, but two mutations. We also got a glimpse of Leatherhead and Mousers. Leatherhead looked incredibly intimidating (especially for a kids show) and the Mousers were covered in extremely shiny chrome and the inside of their mouths had vibrant red designs. Speaking of Leatherhead, Ciro showed us a quick (and not complete) video of the team battling the villain. There was no audio, so the voice actors ad libbed some hilarious dialogue and battle cries.
== TEASER ==
Now it was time for the main event: 10 minutes of footage from upcoming episodes. Thankfully, it was every bit as good as what we saw in the pilot. We observed firsthand why they have "ninja" in their title as the team stealthily took out Foot Ninjas one by one in the sewers. In another scene, Splinter proved to be hysterical yet again as he provided mixed words of wisdom and we got a first look at Metal-Head! Donny creates the bot to fight for them and it was especially amusing to see him using the device like he was playing a video game. Unfortunately for them, the connection gets severed and a Krang takes over the overpowered creation. The footage also revealed Baxter Stockman in a huge combat armor. He humiliates the team in an especially entertaining action sequence but the real highlight was seeing him struggle to give himself a villainous name. It appears not everyone is as gifted as Mikey when it comes to nicknames.
When the panel appeared to be over, Vanilla Ice (yes, Vannila Ice) popped up on the video displays to introduce a new set of footage and no one could have guessed what would come next. The amazingly popular (and addictive) Gangnam Style began to play. That's right, we were treated to a music video of people in Ninja Turtle costumes doing the insanely famous dance around various places in New York (sadly, there was no elevator pelvic thrust but there was an elevator scene). Go Ninja, go Ninja, GO!
What do you think of the animated series so far? Nick has already renewed the show for a second season.