Hometown Heroes

The news is out. My first official project as a full-time writer is an eight-page short story in IDW’s Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Black, White & Green anthology mini-series. It is my third collaboration with the brilliant artist Riley Rossmo, who also did the B Cover for the issue that you see above, I can’t share much about the story yet but I can tell you it’s a story focused on Raphael. The story will be running in issue three of the four-issue mini-series. Issue three will be on sale July 31st, 2024, and the final order cut-off (the last day you can put in orders to comic stores for the issue) is June 24th, 2024 (I will be sharing those dates a lot more in the weeks ahead, so you will have multiple chances to commit this to memory!). The other stories in the issue are my Jock & Dom Reardon, Cameron Chittock & Michael Shelfer, and Carlos Giffoni & Alex Zirrit. With Cover A by Jock and a 1:10 variant cover by Paul Pople. Pretty outstanding company to be alongside!

Now with the formal business out of the way?

GUYS, I WROTE A TEENAGE MUTANT NINJA TURTLES STORY! AND RILEY ROSSMO DREW IT! THIS IS AMAZING!!!

When I left DC, I put a lot of pressure on myself about what my first writing assignment would be. As written in this Newsletter, I did a lot of stories for DC, and I continue to be deeply proud of them, but I knew once I left I had to either work on a brand new idea, or another property to show that I could write anything. I did a tremendous job with my writing work at DC, but I wanted to prove I could do that same tremendous job for anyone willing to hire me. The fact that the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles are the first non-DC property I have written for has great significance to me.

The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles were created by Kevin Eastman and Peter Laird when they were living in Northampton, Massachusetts. Northampton is about a ten-minute drive from where I grew up in Holyoke, Massachusetts. Many of my family members lived there and went to school there. As a teenager, it is also where I went every week to get my comic books at the comic book store Modern Myths, and I would go to Northampton’s amazing Forbes Library to get every graphic novel I could get my hands on.

When I grew up, anytime I said I wanted to make comic books for a living, the savvy people I knew would say “Well you know, the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles were created not too far from here.” It was inspiring. I grew up a fan like everyone who has been a kid from the eighties onward. My cousin Johnny O gave me his original issues of the first Mirage series when I was a pre-teen and I was taken aback by how cool and punk rock they were. I had seen the iconic live-action movies and grew up with the 2003 4Kids cartoon, but those comics…the Leonardo Micro-Series issue especially… just made me want to make comics more. So getting to do this short story, especially during the 40th anniversary of the franchise? It’s an honor.

Last year when I left DC, I began doing editorial work for IDW, you may have seen my name listed in some of the incredible Originals they released last year. The team at IDW is amazing, and it’s made up a lot of great folks I worked with at DC. When they were kind enough to bring me on to do some editorial work, I also expressed that if any writing opportunities ever came up I would love an opportunity. They were familiar with my writing from when I was at DC. And last April when my Superman story in Legion of Bloom, also drawn by the great Riley Rossmo came out, I made sure to give the editors copies. They liked the story but no writing came for the moment.

Then in November of 2024, I went into the IDW office to do some work and talk to the wonderful editorial team. A couple of editors (the tremendous Jamie S. Rich and Maggie Howell) asked me not only I wanted to write a story for their upcoming Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Black, White, & Green anthology mini-series, but if I wanted to team up again with the great Riley Rossmo. I said yes as quickly as I was capable of.

Then as soon as I said yes, an email went out to Riley, and he texted me saying “Cowabunga?” I responded “Cowabunga” and we immediately began putting ideas together for the story. It was the first time I knew who my artistic collaborator was going to be before I pitched story ideas, so Riley and I talked a lot about what stories he would like to do, what characters we should focus on, and what themes we wanted to hit. We landed on some great ideas, and as we closer to the story coming out, I’ll share more about the development process. Maybe I will even do a text interview with Riley about working on the comic together.

What else can I tell you for now? The comic is awesome. It is one of my favorite things I have written to date, and Riley drew the hell out of it. We collaborated very closely on the two Superman stories we did, and we collaborated even more closely here, and I think the results are all the more incredible for that. I will leave you this week with a peek at one non-spoiler page from the story!

Stay Safe!

—Dave Wielgosz