Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: New Animated Adventures #1

Based on the current Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles cartoon, this new series jumps right into the action with April heading out on patrol with Donatello for the first time after showing progress in her training as a with Splinter. Although Leonardo raises concerns that April isn't ready, Donnie underplays the dangers of scrounging in the military junkyard that ends up with April captured and the rest of the team called into to free her (without alerting the United States Government to the fact that human-sized talking ninja turtles exist).

Fans of the current show should feel right at home here as writer Kenny Byerly is one of the staff writers for the cartoon and artist Dario Brizuela stays true to the character designs of the cartoon while also giving them a little more two-dimensional comic book style. The interactions, the occasional wide-eyed blow-up moments, are all carefully recreated here.

It's nice to see the comic giving April such a large role in the first issue, as well highlight the character's tendency to get in over her head as well as her ability to prove her doubters wrong.

I really enjoyed this first issue and the comic's take on version of the characters being used in the cartoon. I'm glad to see the comic simply jump right into the world rather than feel the need to do another origin story. Fans of the other Turtle books or the cartoon are going to have no trouble following the series. It's also nice to see that IDW isn't just shoving out another Turtles title without some care to the quality of the book. This issue has sold me on the series which, as long as the quality keeps up, I hope to see get a long run. Worth a look.

[IDW, $3.99]