IDW TMNT # 34

By Mark Rodriguez

Last time the TMNT and their friends return to New York and Hun goes after Casey. After a bar brawl, Hun tells Casey he either has to join the Foot or get out of the city, or else Shredder will have Hun kill him. Casey decides to stay and fight and Hun regrets what he has to do. This issue brings back not one, but two classic TMNT characters from past incarnations. The first one was spoiled by the editors and such if you go on the Technodrome forums, but the second one was a complete and total surprise.

The issue opens with April being on the phone with her parents and finding out the good news regarding her father's recovery. She's with Donnie and waiting for Casey and Angel to show up. Casey is so high strung that he almost attacks April when she calls out his name. April invites them to join them over at Harold's lab to return the gear he gave them during the rescue mission to get Leo back from the Foot. Casey walks off, saying he needs some space. Angel decides to tag along.

Harold is his usual pleasant self and insults Angel, calling her a preschooler. Don shows Harold the Fugitoid's notes that will help build a teleportation device so they can shut the Technodrome down before it's fully built. Harold asks why he has to be dragged into this. April says his anti gravity gauntlet helped last time though it was damaged by one of Karai's arrows. Harold says that device is obsolete and he has incorporated improved versions of his inventions in a super suit. As he shows it off to April and Donnie, Angel finds something covered under a tarp and reveals a robot turtle.

 In the sewers, Splinter and Leo discuss their next course of action. Leo is starting to agree with Donnie about having to worry about the Technodrome. Splinter says the Technodrome is years away while Saki is already at their doorstep. 

Back at the lab, Harold explains he built the robot turtle as security in case he ever gets attached by Stockman and his men. It doesn't have a name yet so Angel calls it Metalhead. Harold has a remote for it but hopes to make it run by itself one day. Angel doubts it works, and Harold activates it. It walks towards Angel and accidentally knocks down a stool, and then politely puts it back into place. Everyone is impressed but Angel notices that it's smoking and it starts to malfunction.

 Harold says it still overheats easily and tries to turn it off. Metalhead grabs the remote and breaks it. He then prepares to attack Harold until Donnie gets him out of the way. Metalhead sees April and considers her a deadly threat. Angel smacks it with a chair before it can blast her. 

April wonders how the robot knew her name and Harold says he put the entire Stockgen employee list in its data base. Don tries to attack Metalhead but it sends him flying with his own built-in anti gravity gauntlet. He then turns his hand into a machine gun and opens fire on Don and Angel. He then switches his machine gun for a flame thrower. April yells out to Donnie and Metalhead remembers that April is the prime threat and transforms into car-mode and runs up to her. 

April and Harold dive out of the way. Angel stands in front of Harold's super suit and bangs her sticks together to get the robot's attention. The mechaturtle fires off a laser that shatters the display case. Don rushes off to help but Angel has slipped in the super suit and is ready to rumble.

Angel uses the anti gravity gauntlet to send a table flying at Metalhead, but the robot punches it into splinters and starts to open fire. Angel dives out of the way. Metalhead tries to find her but Angel has turned invisible and appears behind it, blasting his arm off with a concussion grenade. She then uses the anti gravity power again to send the robot flying into a wall and it finally shuts down.

Everyone is impressed by how well Angel adapted to the super suit, even Harold. He asks her what her name is and Angel says she's Nobody.

Meanwhile, Lindsay, one of the scientists working for Stockman before Stockgen was blown up is on the phone with her mother, discussing how hard it is for her to find work. She then runs into Old Hob and Slash. Hob has a gun at her and says her job hunt is over.

My Opinions. 

Wow. What an intro to Metalhead. They sure like making him pint-sized nowadays, don't they? I think the original version is the only one that's  bigger than the turtles themselves. This version of Metalhead is pure bad ass. He's armed with the usual arsenal of weapons that robots usually have, but this one also has a built-in anti gravity gauntlet and can transform into a friggin car. Now THAT'S being creative with an older character. I also found it amusing that it spoke like Harold, using his expressions like 'meh' and 'obtruse'. Though I'm wondering how he called Angel 'preschool' if Harold just met her now. Does he leave the robot on just randomly recording on-going conversations?

As for the other classic character, we got Angel now calling herself Nobody. For those that don't know or having seen the 2K3 episodes he was in, Nobody was a Batman-ish vigilante that was a cop in his normal life. So, yeah... Nothing to do with a street urchin wearing an invisible super suit with anti gravity gauntlets and concussion grenades. Much like Chris Bradford turning into Rahzar in the 2012 cartoon, this incarnation of Nobody has nothing to do with the original except for the name. Ironically this might turn Angel into more of a somebody to help out in future stories.

Of course the fact that Nobody is a parody is a Batman kinda went full circle when the New 52 Batman and Robin comic introduced a new villain named Nobody who also uses a super suit that makes him invisible. I'm sure it's unintentional but how can one miss that?

The comic was fun and entertaining. As for the story, the little subplots are interesting. I liked seeing Splinter and Leo  argue about what's more important. Splinter seems pretty one-track minded towards his own quest to take Shredder down and Leo is having a hard time disagreeing with him. 

Metalhead definitely took center stage in this comic. Though in the scheme of things it almost felt like a filler issue. Had Metalhead been random robot # 45 this issue would have been a waste of time. But since he is a classic character you just know he has to come back sooner or later and Angel gained a super suit out of the deal. I guess I kinda wanted to see the  story progress further. I liked seeing Metalhead but it was kinda disappointed that once he was put down the comic ended. It seemed to have gone by so fast. But that's how it is with a good story. You just wanna keep reading to see what happens next. 

As for Old Hob... What plans does he have in store for Lindsay?