Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles to team with Power Rangers by Xmas

The two biggest franchises of the 1990s are teaming up! The heroes in a half shell and the teens with attitudes meet for the first, no second, time!

The two hottest children’s franchises of the 1990s are officially teaming up in comic book form! As announced on Comicbook.com (among others), BOOM! Studios is teaming up with IDW Publishing to release an inter-company crossover between Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and Power Rangers.

Their five issue mini-series will ship in December 2019, and features writer Ryan Parrott and artist Simone di Meo. This also marks an alliance of franchises controlled by corporate titans Hasbro and Nickelodeon.

The plot of the work will revolve around the color green. Tommy Oliver, known best as the Green Ranger, has gone rogue and formed an alliance with the Shredder and his Foot Clan. The Power Rangers, presumably the founding five (Jason Lee Scott, Zack Taylor, Kimberly Hart, Trini Kwan and Billy Cranston), follow him to New York City. Once there, they apparently run afoul of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. The press release implies “it’s not exactly love at first sight,” before the inevitable alliance.

More from Comics

• X-Men: 6 reasons why Marvel’s mutants are the best superhero team
• Harley Quinn renewed for a fifth season on Max (and it’s well-deserved)
• Marvel Comics announces seven important X-Men comic books
• The X-Men were betrayed by Captain America in Uncanny Avengers
• Spider-Man: Miles and Peter team-up for their first ongoing series

Ryan Parrott has quickly become the head writer of BOOM! Studios’ popular Power Rangers comics. He launched their secondary title, Go Go Power Rangers and wrote it for nearly two years before co-writing the main Mighty Morphin Power Rangers title alongside Sina Grace, and he also recently organized a crossover between the two.

His other writing credits include Star Trek: Boldly Go and Star Trek: Starfleet Academy for IDW, alongside Batman: Gates Of Gotham for DC Comics. He also writes his own creator-owned title, Volition, for Aftershock Comics.

Di Meo has drawn annuals for Marvel such as Venom, Old Man Logan and Immortal Hulk, as well as a run on Mighty Morphin Power Rangers.

Technically, this is the second crossover between the Power Rangers and TMNT. The first was in 1998, between two series produced by Saban: Power Rangers In Space and Ninja Turtles: The Next Mutation. In the episode “Shell Shocked,” Rangers villain Astronema brainwashes the Ninja Turtles (who at this time included Venus de Milo) and uses them to take over the Power Rangers’ space station. Naturally, the heroes ultimately unite against her.

Neither IDW Publishing nor BOOM! Studios have been shy with inter-company crossovers lately. The Ninja Turtles are currently on their third crossover with Batman (or fourth if readers count the animated versions). And from 2016-2017, the Power Rangers teamed up with the Justice League for their own mini series. Despite there being 26 incarnations of the Mighty Morphin series (itself an American version of the Japanese Super Sentai series), the founding teens from 1993 remain the most popular.

Whether any other villains or characters will appear from either franchise — such as Rita Repulsa, Lord Zedd, Krang, April O’Neil or Bebop and Rocksteady — is currently unknown.