rich_TMNT

Nice @Turtle ! I've always liked this one...especially the colors. I enjoy the muted tones of the early colored Turtles. Congrats! This is a beautiful piece and another stunning addition.

@Turtle I remembered one more homage cover that I had forgotten about. It was a Russian reprint done by Illusion Studios (the official publisher of TMNT comics in Russia).

@nriccijr Merry Christmas to you as well ! As for #100... could be. @SpideyFein I'll check my mail EVERY HOUR !! It's, of course, a wonderful thing to hope for eventually but I'm blessed to have such a wonderful hobby which has introduced me to such great friends. I wish you and your family a very Merry Christmas! And to everyone here in Turtles-forum land...Merry Christmas and a very Happy New Year!

@Turtle I read in an article that Marat couldn't produce a second copy of Do You Pooh? due to legal reasons (or licensing restrictions)...something to that effect. Don't recall if there were further details given about it but that's all I remember. Planet Awesome is heavily connected to the Do You Pooh? books and Marat also has done a few Turtles covers for them as well. But, I don't know the exact connection between the two. What an awesome surprise! Very cool. I'm still looking for a Turtlemania GOLD edition. @SpideyFein , let me know if you need my mailing address.

@TurtleThere are definitely more copies of Do You Pooh? TMNT #1 homage than I have in my collection. The list you provided with your 6 may be the complete list but I stopped buying them after the first three so I'm not sure. I don't think the Metal edition and Chromium editions are the same thing. The metal one was a Planet Awesome exclusive. And the Black & White one is a physical copy that I thought came as a set with the regular edition but I don't recall. And, unless you've seen something to the contrary, the magazine-size issue that was released just a few months ago wasn't a Do You Pooh? book but instead a reprint of Mirage TMNT #1 (published by IDW). It was a Frankie's Comics exclusive but was only available with their 4-cover set. The Do You Pooh? books are clearly just pure money grabs by those involved with producing them and the interior story isn't really my cup of tea (which is the same in all of the Do You Pooh? books since they can't legally produce a 2nd issue). After I bought the first three, every few months they'd ping me and say, "Hey, we have a new version for you...it's a 'such and such' version limited to xx copies for $250 (or some other insane price)." I decided to just bail on them because of the increasing costs with every new issue...and I figured they'd never stop as long as they felt collectors were wanting them. So, however many more there are would likely be listed somewhere online (maybe multiple places). Two of the covers are listed on Comic Book Realm (1G & 1H) but I've not been able to find a complete list anywhere.

@Turtle Anytime! The Kickstarter one from the Munchkin game I've only seen as part of the game. You'll likely have to buy the game and resell it after taking the comic out or see if someone has the game and they'd sell the comic separately. I had forgotten about the TMNT Ultimate Visual History (Insight Editions) copies in my list. There are actually 2 versions of that one; one glossy and one matte. The glossy copies were the original ones that came with the first edition of the UVH book (2014). The matte copies are the current ones that come with the latest edition of the UVH book (2018). You can get the 2018 version of UVH (and the matte copy of the TMNT #1 reprint) at Barnes & Noble for $20.

Is this only available if one was a supporter of the project? @Ryan. Kevin Eastman just posted surplus copies of his RRRR cover for sale on his website if you're still looking for one. Kevin Eastman Studios - Drawing Blood

I think so. It was only added as a backer incentive when the campaign hit a certain milestone. I've not heard of any other way that these RRRR books were distributed.

@Turtle Here's a list of the ones I know about from the past few years. The first couple are new ones in the past few months in addition to the Frankie's Comics cover. You may already have (or know about) all of these but just in case you don't... - TMNT #1 Special Kickstarter Edition - available with the Munchkin TMNT Board Game Kickstarter campaign - Radically Rearranged Ronin Ragdolls (Eastman cover) - TMNT homage / parody available through Kevin Eastman's "Drawing Blood" Kickstarter project. There was also a Ben Bishop cover for RRRR but it's not really an homage to TMNT #1 (at least, I don't see it as one). - Teenage Mutant Ninja Cerebi - TMNT parody from July 2018 - Do You Pooh? (3 homage covers) - these were issued a few years back so you may already know about these. - TMNT Vol. V #45 Ottawa Comiccon - from back in 2015 - Squarriors #1 Phantom Variant - 2015 - TMNT Vol. I #1 (IDW) Lego SDCC 2014 - from SDCC 2014 - TMNT Vol. V #33 Jetpack - 2014

@Turtle thanks for the tag...you've nailed most of the details about this book. @MarkFaust It's TMNT Vol. I Collected Book Volume One Hardcover. This was the only HC version but it was reprinted as TPB a few times over the years...see them all here. I do believe this HC was sold directly by Mirage and not through Diamond and it originally came with a dust jacket (although some are now missing this when re-sold). There should be a COA page in the back as well. I was thinking that every one of these HCs came signed with sketches by Eastman & Laird on the interior but I'm not positive about that. Those I've seen for sale in the past I think had similar sketches and signatures. There's one on eBay right now You can see my copy here.

Good to know. Thanks. I didn't think any pre-signed books were supposed to get the blue label anymore (at least those signed on the exterior).

I was thinking that exact same thing. And the odd thing is that the CGC census shows 6 copies Universal (Blue) and 6 copies Qualified (Green). Would be nice to have some consistency in these labels as I don't see how Universal label would be possible with these pre-signed Silver books. Also note that there are ZERO Gold copies listed as Universal and all are Qualified.

Sweet graphs! As a data analyst myself, these posts made my day! Nice work man.

Thanks! Looking forward to checking it out...I'm pretty sure I've seen and read about many of these before but I didn't want to miss out on this story. Gladly!

@TMNT, where can I find this so I can read about it? I tried the link in your profile but it doesn't work. Would love to check it out.

These TMNT #1 reprints definitely aren't as valuable as they are selling for on eBay. They are included with every copy of the TMNT The Ultimate Visual History book published in 2014. However, there is also a new printing of that book from this year (2018) and it has a matte-cover version of the TMNT #1 reprint (vs. the glossy cover version in the 2014 version). More about that here if interested. Regardless of which book you buy, you can get still get these books for under $50 many places and it comes with the comic book. Prices for the TMNT #1 reprint comic book on eBay are just a combination of a seller who isn't accurately describing what he's selling (purposeful or not) and buyers who aren't aware of what this actually is. I've had multiple people contact me about this "new" variant and have had to explain to them what the book actually is. Unfortunately, some of them asked me too late and they had already purchased it from eBay.

Nice! I saw that book get listed originally for something like $5k. It's a hard book to find (especially in the shape this appears to be in). Glad you got a much better deal on it. Congrats!

What a cool item!

I concur. Great collection! My pet project for sometime in the future is to track down all the Archie TMNT Adventures printings. There are so many.

@spracknetch23 @mmmkam Thank you guys! I really appreciate it. @SpideyFein It feels awesome to finally own one...especially since I had one literally just fall into my lap years ago and basically ignored it. Appreciate the compliments and I'm so glad you enjoy (and use) my site.

You got it!

Thanks @Callaway29! It's nice to formally document this Hand-Colored Edition so that it is available for searching if others come across a copy.

@mmmkam the Turtlemania Silver should come back with a Green Qualified label, unless as @Callaway29 stated, you request the blue. My one Silver came back with Green Qualified as I didn't request anything specific. My other Silver is CGC SS as I had Kevin Eastman sign it at a show so it has the Yellow CGC SS label. Totally agree @Parabellum, the Green label doesn't detract from these Turtlemania Silver (and Gold) books. And, while we're on the Turtlemania topic...I'm now the proud owner of the little-known Hand-Colored edition of Turtlemania Special. Thanks to fellow collector @ChrisFB for this !!

I ended up buying this set of counterfeits as they are such cool pieces of Turtles history. After we all contacted him telling him they were fake, he relisted them as "I was told these were fake but nice to have" a few days later. In messages with him, he kept telling me the guy he bought them from years ago told him they were real. I sent him some freely available Google search info. re: these and I even linked him to copies of the real things on my site. I felt bad for him because it sounded like he needed the money and he was just disappointed to not get the value from them that he thought he would. This is my second set of yellow counterfeits...the first of which I bought years and years ago when I (and most everyone) thought they were the real thing (as @Turtle mentioned earlier). Interestingly, my first set has matching numbers (#220 of 500 - meaningless, of course) but this set I just bought has different numbers between 1 (#213 of 500) and 2 (#206 of 500). I've always been intrigued by sets of these sold together that have different numbers. You'd think a set of them that someone had for a long time would have matching numbers. I still wonder if there are copies out there with duplicated hand-numbering (i.e., two copies of #1 that are hand-numbered e.g., '#213 of 500')...that would be just another oddity adding to the intrigue on these. Me too! I have been looking a long time for one. I actually figured it would be easier to acquire than it has been. Re: Turtlemania Gold #6... it's crazy that it's changed hands now twice after you had it @woregul. I suppose it gives me a bit of hope when one of these does seem to come up for sale every year or so...but, having the auction taken down was just a tease. I was really hoping to finally land this thing...

Thanks! That's awesome! I love that my collection is available to the public. I always felt so bad that my years of collecting was just stored away and known only to me. With the TMNT #73 project I used Mylites-4 bags with Full-Back boards (both Standard Size). They are kind of expensive but these bags and boards are fantastic and I think they'd be great for #1-4. The size you'd need for the Mylites would be the "Magazine & Letter" which measure 8.75" x 11.5" and the Full-Back would be the "Magazine" size which measures 8.25" x 10.5". Both are available on Amazon.