Sideshow SDCC Exclusive Mouser Pre-orders on June 10 & 11

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With the release of their weekly newsletter tonight, Sideshow has revealed a (slightly) better picture of their upcoming 2010 San Diego Comic-Con exclusive Mouser comiquette, as well as the pre-order dates you need to know if you want to get one of these.

The pre-order for Comic-Con attendees will be at 10:00am pacific time on June 10.

The pre-order for Comic-Con non-attendees will be at 10:00am pacific time on June 11.

IMPORTANT! If you are not going to Comic-Con, there is no way to fudge the system and pre-order as an attendee and still get the Mouser. You will need to pre-order on June 11.

I highly recommend that whichever pre-order event you participate in, you BE PUNCTUAL. This is likely to sell out quickly.

If you are attending Comic-Con but miss the June 10 pre-order event, you could still pre-order as a non-attendee on the 11th. However, you will have to pay a slightly higher price + shipping. There is no way to fudge the system and pick up the item at the Con if you do not pre-order it as an attendee.

I'll put up a reminder the week of the pre-order events - Good luck!

Mirage Auctions Original Art for Jake Black Cancer Benefit

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Mirage is at it again! This week they're auctioning the original artwork used to create the Jake Black cancer benefit t-shirt and art print as an additional fundraiser for Jake! Awesomesauce! You can click each piece of art below to go to the respective auction. Bid high and bid often!

Sideshow Comic-Con 2010 Exclusive Mouser Comiquette

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Today, Sideshow Collectibles revealed the first glimpse of the exclusive items they will be offering as part of this year's San Diego Comic-Con event in July, and a TMNT Mouser comiquette is one of the four items!!


We'll have to wait until April 15th for further details, but it is very exciting for Sideshow to be making their TMNT line part of their Comic-Con event!

For those not familiar with Sideshow's convention exclusives and not fortunate enough to attend Comic-Con this year, fear not, you're not out of luck! Sideshow always makes a small percentage of each exclusive available to non-attendees. But you will have to pay VERY close attention to the forth-coming details, as there can't be any slacking if you want to snag one. Attendees should also be prepared and alert to pre-ordering details, as all of these will be sold out before the convention starts.

Stay tuned to SideshowToy.com or Ninja Pizza to get the details as they're made available!

Mirage Selling Art Prints on eBay for Cancer Benefit

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You may recall that during last summer's convention season, Mirage Studios created two special TMNT art prints that they then sold to raise money to help Tales of the TMNT writer Jake Black pay some of the medical bills he accrued during his recent battle with Hodgkin's Lymphoma. The good news is that Jake is currently in remission and with luck his active battle against the cancer is over. However, those pesky medical bills still linger.

Mirage has found a handful of the remaining prints and they've put them up on eBay, with all money raised still going to Jake!

This first one is a "jam" piece featuring art by all of the artists who were still at the studio last year (2009).


The second print is quite monumental, as it features pencils by Kevin Eastman and inks by Peter Laird. This piece of art was the first piece the two TMNT creators collaborated on in over 18 years, and is most likely the last piece of art they will ever collaborate on.


If you weren't able to grab these last year, here's a great chance to pick up these incredible pieces of TMNT history while contributing to a great cause! You can click either picture to be taken directly to the respective eBay auction.

As a side note, I got to spend a little time with Jake this past weekend at WonderCon in San Francisco. He's looking great, and I hope things continue to go great for him!

Unpublished A.C. Farley Cover Sketch

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Back in the 90s, Mirage Studios published a series of TMNT collected books that, err ... collected some of Mirage's TMNT comic book stories. Seven volumes were published and all seven volumes featured brand new art created exclusively for those covers by A.C. Farley. However, before the series of books got canceled after the seventh volume, Farley had sketched out the cover for what would have been volume 8. This volume would have included Mark Bode's Egyptian story (TMNT #32). And Mr. Farley was kind enough to share this sketch today on his Facebook page.

Too bad it wasn't to be!

TMNT Flashback: Movie Storybooks With Read-along Cassette

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Back in the '90s, Random House released a series of TMNT books and read-along cassette tapes. Three of these sets included a cassette that narrated and performed an included comic book (reprints from the Archie series). The set pictured at left here included two brand new mini storybooks based on the first movie.

The interesting thing about these books is that while they are most obviously based on the movie, all of the artwork reflects the cartoon Turtles of the time. But the thing I love most here is the included cassette.

I remember listening to the cassette using my awesomely hip Sony Walkman while riding in the back seat of my parents' car on a family vacation... and realizing that the same guy who was narrating the story was also doing all of the voices of the different character. Oh, how I LOLed.

Now, it's not unusual for one person to read an audiobook and also do all of the voices, but I do think it is a bit more unusual for a children's tape. But really, in this case it just sounds ridiculous and silly. However, I shall leave it to you to judge for yourself.

For a limited time, I'm making both audio stories available for download here.

I'll also note that each side of the cassette features one of the two stories, read twice. Once without page turn signals and once with page turn signals. I never understood that much, either. Why not put both stories on each side of the cassette and only put the page turn signals on one side? The way it's set up you're stuck either listening to the same story twice in a row or playing the fast-forward game to find the version you want to listen to (ah, the joy of cassette players).

Special Features Update on German TMNT 1 DVD

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German TMNT fan hudemx has reported in again with some new details on the upcoming German DVD release of the first TMNT movie, which will be including special features not yet released anywhere else.

He states that a friend of his has received an advance copy of the DVD, and has this to say about the special features:

• Commentary: Director Steve Barron greets the audience in German, but then continues in English for the rest of the duration.

• Deleted Scenes: There are two scenes included, both of which are alternate cuts from two scenes in the movie. The first is of Michaelangelo ordering pizza in the sewers, and the second is of the Turtles fighting the Foot in April's apartment.

• Alternate Ending: This is the same ending as has been previously detailed by Ninja Pizza.

And here are some screen shots from the alternate ending:

The DVD is available for pre-order over at Amazon.de, but make sure you're able to play Region 2, PAL-coded DVDs before you do so.