The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle MTG Leans Into Gaming Big Time

I was very skeptical of Magic: The Gathering‘s rapid return to the streets of New York for a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles pizza party. I still am. But the set is full of a surprising amount of love for the franchise’s strong video game roots that has me softening my stance a bit.

I’ve seen all of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movies, played most of the games, watched a ton of the cartoons, read some of the comics, and played with plenty of action figures. I’m a millennial who was old enough to play Turtles in the arcade, watch them on Saturday mornings, and longingly eye the racks of toys in ’90s department stores. What I’m saying is that, as a frequent MTG enjoyer as well, I’m the perfect mark for a TMNT Universes Beyond set.

But I initially greeted news of the expansion with a groan. MTG fatigue has been setting in on a few different levels. We’re not even six months removed from last year’s New York-centric Spider-Man set, and just a few months away from a Marvel Super Heroes expansion bringing more Manhattan flavor to the card game. Plus, there’s the rapid pace of new launches. Avatar: The Last Airbender still feels fresh; Lorwyn Eclipsed seems like it just came out yesterday.

It’s too much too soon. TMNT releasing on March 6 only adds to the exhaustion. And yet I can already feel myself coming around thanks to the clever ways Wizards is trying to imbue the set with an identity drawn from multiple sources. Some cards are callbacks to the animated series, some use art from the comics, and others play into moments and aesthetics from the most recent TMNT movie, 2023’s Mutant Mayhem. Each era and sensibility gets some special attention.

Instead of relying on just the characters and conflicts to drive the lore and flavor, the expansion is effectively a multi-decade tribute to a larger pop-culture phenomenon. Different cards will tug at different parts of players’ nostalgia. For me, it’s the video game legacy that has me excited to start ripping packs with friends. The set both calls back to home console and arcade classics and channels that spirit into certain mechanics.

First, there’s the borderless pixel art cards which just look really rad. Not only are the characters pixel art but you also get 8-bit-looking color symbols and text box windows. You also have a range of video-game-themed cards like Level Up, which gives you double +1/+1 counters after attacking, and High Score, which lets you draw cards for having the strongest creature on the board. Arcade Cabinet, meanwhile, leans into the +1/+1 counter strategy with a neat four-player nod.

Let’s talk about Commander. TMNT introduces a completely novel concept to the popular MTG offshoot: coop. Instead of just one Commander card, you can have two as long as the card has “Partner.” Combine Leonardo and Donatello to create a token +1/+1 counter engine that will make everyone else at the table lose their minds as you try to keep track of your board.

And then there’s the call-outs to particular TMNT moments unique to the games. Shredder, Shadow Master creates copies of himself like in the arcade game’s final boss fight. The art for Leatherhead, meanwhile, is a riff on the Wild West theme from the alligator’s SNES Turtles In Time appearance. Most iconic of all is a card called Electric Seaweed, a plant wall which will instantly be recognizable and terrifying to everyone who died in the bomb-defusing level in the NES game.

Wizards is having a lot of fun with this set and getting creative in unexpected ways. There are land cards with pizza art where each slice represents a different color based on the toppings. Dr. Baxter’s Mousers are some of the coolest-looking token creature cards out in a while. Krang, a mythic robot, is a perfect stompy creature, as he should be. Would it have been nice if TMNT was still a few months off? Yes. Would I have loved if we only got one Universes Beyond set per year? Absolutely.

But Wizards is giving me everything I would have wanted from a Turtles set. In the meantime, I’m going to go grab a pie and a two liter and fire up the excellent Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: The Cowabunga Collection.