MISC. MANGA, *Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles X Naruto

While the heroes in a half-shell have crossed over with everyone from Power Rangers, Ghostbusters, and The Archies, this is the first official crossover the TMNT had with an official anime/manga series. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles X Naruto is an original American-created comic from IDW Publishing written by Caleb Goellner and drawn by Hendry Prasetya. This 4-issue mini-series is set in the Naruto universe, most specifically the early days of the first Naruto anime, so somewhere around the first few seasons of the show. Unlike much of the Turtles crossovers, this one actually happens in the Naruto universe instead of their being some interdimensional shenanigans where the Turtles slip into yet another time warp or wormhole. The entire comic is a big experiment trying to see if they could crossover an American property with a Japanese manga which hasn't been tried since the Avengers Vs. Attack On Titan featurette from a decade ago. There have been manga based on American comics like Batman and Spider-Man, but this is a real gamble for IDW to try and combine one of our biggest comic franchises with a worldwide hit mangs.

Lady Tsunade, the current Hokage leader of the Hidden Leaf Village, assigns Team 7 to watch over a visiting reporter from Big Apple Village(New York)named April O'Neil. Team 7, also known as Team Kakashi, consists of Kakashi himself, Sakura, Sasuke, and our knuckelhead title character. April is investigating mad scientist Baxter Stockman who is planning on making an army of animal people through his mutation experiments. Team 7 runs across a band of Foot Clan assassins who are interrupted by five masked strangers which Naruto and Co. mistake for working with the Foot. This leads to a fight between the strangers and Team 7, even though Kakashi ends it by unmasking them and recognizing the short hairy one as Hamato Yoshi, aka: Splinter, hinting that Kakashi and the humanoid rat ninja have some kind of history together.

For the beginning of a limited series, the crossover is getting off on the right foot. The comic manages to highlight all the characters' eccentricities and sets the scene for a sufficient story. Hopefully, this is the beginning of an ongoing trend where we get to see comic book superheroes team up with their manga counterparts.