The original, but non-canon, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Vol. 3

When the second volume of the Mirage's TMNT comic prematurely came to an end Erik Larsen expressed an interest in publishing a turtles comic under Image Comics. Written by Gary Carlson and drawn by Frank Fosco the comic returned the franchise to black and white and took place within the Mirage continuity but was more action orientated.

The series was controversial for physically altering the turtles. In the five part opening story half of Raphael's face was scarred and Donatello was dropped out of a helicopter breaking his shell and thus paralyzing him. He soon bonded with a living armor and became cyborg, thus granting him his mobility but at the price of sharing his consciousness with an artificial intelligence that would assume control when it felt threatened. A later story had Leonardo's hand bitten off by a monitor lizard.

A more universally accepted story-arc revolved around Raphael working with the Foot Clan during a war with the New York mob in which most of the Foot was decimated. Stumbling upon an armory that belonged to the Shredder, he put on one of Shredder's armor suits using it as a weapon. He rallied the Foot survivors and rebuilt the clan as the new Shredder. He was later challenged for leadership of the Foot by Oroku Saki's illegitimate daughter Pimiko (another Image creation).

During the run the turtles were part of the Image comics universe and interacted with Image comic characters, specifically those of Erik Larsen. The initial story had an appearance by Mako, the book had guest appearances from the Knight watchman, the Savage Dragon, (whom the turtles had already met in an inter-company crossover) and had a multi-issue crossover with Vanguard. The turtles also guested in other Image books such as Big Bang Comics and Gen 13.

While the book was supposed to be published monthly it was frequently late, not even managing a bi-monthly schedule and in four years only managed to to reach twenty three issues when the comic ended. When Mirage started publication of a fourth volume it was decided that the events of the Image series would would be disregarded, though there has been some small visual throwbacks to the series in the turtles franchise since then.