Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles is a 2014 American science fiction action comedy film based on the franchise of the same name. This is a reboot of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles film series. The film is directed by Jonathan Liebesman, and stars Megan Fox, Johnny Knoxville, Pete Ploszek, Noel Fisher, Jeremy Howard, Alan Ritchson, Danny Woodburn, Tony Shalhoub, William Fichtner, and Will Arnett.
The film was announced shortly before Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles co-creator Peter Laird sold the rights to the franchise to Nickelodeon in 2009. It was produced by Nickelodeon Movies and Michael Bay's production company Platinum Dunes, and distributed by Paramount Pictures.
The film was released on August 8, 2014.
Cast:
Megan Fox as April O'NeilMalina Weissman as young April O'Neil
Will Arnett as Vernon Fenwick
William Fichtner as Eric Sacks
Alan Ritchson as Raphael
Noel Fisher as Michelangelo
Pete Ploszek as Leonardo (motion-capture performer)
Johnny Knoxville as Leonardo (voice)
Jeremy Howard as Donatello
Danny Woodburn as Splinter (motion-capture performer)
Tony Shalhoub as Splinter (voice)
Tohoru Masamune as Shredder
Whoopi Goldberg as Bernadette Thompson
Minae Noji as Karai
Abby Elliott as Taylor
Taran Killam as McNaughton
K. Todd Freeman as Dr. Baxter Stockman
Paul Fitzgerald as Dr. O'Neil
Plot: (FULL Spoilers)
April O'Neil, a reporter for Channel 6 news in New York, has been watching a mysterious organization called the Foot Clan terrorizing New York. She stumbles upon a robbery they are committing one night and notices a strange looking figure having foiled it. She tries reporting back to Channel 6 about her findings, but no one believes her.
Meanwhile in the sewers, the Ninja Turtles tell their master, Splinter the truth about April having spotted them. Splinter orders they find April and bring her to their lair, as she is now in great danger from the Foot Clan since she made contact with the Turtles.
The Turtles find April and obstructs her view with what looks like a sack so she will be unaware of their lair's location. They take her to Splinter, who explains to her how she saved their lives from the laboratory by rescuing them from the fire and releasing them into the sewers. She tells them that she told her father's associate Eric Sacks about them and was unaware that Sacks was actually allied with the Foot Clan's leader, The Shredder, whom Sacks then relayed the information to. Now that Shredder knew of their existence, he and his Foot Clan minions go into the sewer to capture them so they can use the mutagen in their blood in Shredders scheme to spread a deadly virus throughout New York. Splinter and the Turtles fight against them, but are ultimately defeated and their home destroyed. Shredder kidnaps Leonardo, Donatello and Michelangelo and leaves Splinter greatly injured. Raphael was not captured because the Foot Clan believed he was already killed in the battle.
April who managed to hide from the destruction attempts to dig Splinter out from under the rubble. Raphael emerges from the rubble too and joins April in digging Splinter out also, and then April attempts to tend to Splinter's wounds. Splinter instructs Raphael and April to save the other three Turtles before Shredder can extract the mutagen from them that he plans to use in his scheme to poison New York. April calls Vernon to give them a ride to the laboratory where the other three Turtles are being held hostage.When the trio arrives, April frees the other three Turtles while Raphael fights Shredder. After they are freed, they join Raphael in fighting Shredder. Shredder escapes after defeating them again and April leaves with the Turtles and Vernon to return to the Turtles' lair for a new plan. During the escape, they are pursued by Shredder's Foot Clan in trucks but eventually manage to defeat them.
The Turtles plan that they will attempt to hold off against Shredder on the rooftop of Sacks' building before he is able to finish setting up the device to release the toxin onto New York, while April and Vernon attempt to gather the mutagen from inside the building. April eventually manages to acquire it and heads onto the rooftop to give it to the Turtles. While the Turtles and April hang from the fallen tower, they manage to give April the momentum she needs to kick Shredder off the tower, finally defeating him as he falls to the ground greatly injured. After the Turtles retreat back into the sewers, Shredder is seen touching some of the mutagen.
The film ends with Vernon attempting again to catch April's heart with a new car he had just bought, but the Turtles arrive in a new car they had just built and accidentally destroy Vernon's car when Michelangelo sets off a missile. Vernon starts getting upset as April gently sways him away while the Turtles offer her a ride in their new van, which she kindly rejects.
The Verdict:
For those who know me personally will be happy to know that I didn't give Michael Bay my hard-earned money to see this, I had the "pleasure" of watching this through other means. I wasn't too thrilled to watch this to begin with and even more so to write this review on it - hence the lengthy gap between the release weekend and the time I actually got this review posted when I actually already had this handwritten (along with my review for Michael Bay's Transformers: Age of Extinction) for a while now.
That being said, let's do this review a bit different. I'm going to start off with my issues with the film, then end on a positive note.
The film starts off with the Foot Clan being attacked by some shadowy figures that we all know that are the Turtles, but we, the audience, don't actually see the Turtles until about roughly 30-40 minutes into the film because the film decided it was a brilliant idea to follow April O'Neil around on her failed attempts to get her career as a news reporter kick-started. Eventually, April swoops too deep into the Foot's operations and finds herself right in the middle of one of their heists, but the Turtles save the day. She gets a glimpse of the Turtles on her camera phone and hilarity ensues as the Turtles are forced to reveal themselves to her. You've seen this scene play out in the million and one trailers for this film and it's no different. Bay has the Turtles oogling Megan Fox's beauty, much like Sam in the Transformers films. We get it already - she's hot. Moving on...
This series of events forces the Turtles to bring April to their lair where their origin story is revealed.
I don't even spoil how stupid the "remix" of the Turtles' origin is because I literally burst out laughing when I watched the scene. It's really THAT bad. You have to see that part for yourself. The only thing that I'm going to say is that I seriously doubt anyone could become a master ninja just from reading a book someone threw in the trash... Also, to say Master Splinter isn't even Asian in this continuity that's pretty fucked up to stereotype him like that. I can't say I'm surprised, especially given Bay's track record on the Autobot's stereotypical personalities in ALL of the Transformers films to date.
Much like my issue with The Amazing Spider-Man 2 where the film decided it was a great idea to make the origin story "predestined" in terms of how these heroes got their powers, I feel like this type of storytelling kills the awe and magic that made their origin story special. That's like the military telling Bruce Banner that "yeah even if you didn't push the kid off the testing field, we were going to push you out there anyway to make sure you became the Hulk. There wasn't no accident..."
Will Arnett's Vernon Fenwick (a character created specifically for this film and only related to the character from the 1989 cartoon by name alone) was enjoyable for the most part, but his presence felt forced in the last hour the film when his appeal would have benefited the stale opening 30 minutes of the film with Megan Fox's April O'Neil.
As for villains in this film, I didn't mind Sacks and I didn't mind The Shredder wearing armor like he was fucking Iron Man or the Silver Samurai from The Wolverine, but it pissed me off that they had Karai in this film in a role that was completely meaningless and forgettable. She wasn't established as Shredder's surrogate "daughter" or anything. She was merely a random high ranking Foot Soldier in Shredder's forces. That's it. She barely had any dialogue. If they were going to do that to her, I would have had her just be a nameless female Foot Soldier or one of the Purple Dragons. Karai is a vital character in the TMNT universe, especially with the Turtles' on/off rivalry with the Foot Clan. It's a damn shame to see Michael Bay completely waste this character in this film.
My last, but biggest gripe with this film is how the Turtles looked. In terms of computer-generated animation, Michael Bay has come a long away from the indistinguishable mess of metal and wires that was supposed to be Transformers in combat from that franchise to the the hulking brutes that are supposed to be the Ninja Turtles we know and love. To make matters worse, the film provides absolutely no explanation on why the Turtles look like this, ranging from Raphael wearing shades on his head that he never pulls over his eyes, Leonard covered in mostly samurai armor, Michelangelo covered in sea shells and beads as if he just came back from a cruise in the Bahamas, and Donatello being absolutely nerded out from head to toe - glasses, goggles and a photon pack that were possibly stolen from the set of Ghostbusters. I swear everything about Donny screamed, "NERD!!!" from the top of their lungs in this film. I get it - Donny's the scientist and resident geek of the group, but damn it was a bit overboard here. I know people complain about Donatello having buck teeth in the current 2012 animated series on Nickelodeon, but this iteration was far worse in my humble opinion.
I just can't fathom why Michael Bay choose to make the Turtles look like absolute nightmare fuel for children in this film when their previous iterations have all been far less horrifying. It didn't help when Mikey took off his mask to show April and he looked just like Shrek on crack.
(Sighs) I feel like everything I say about this film is going sound negative, but let's end on a good note, shall we?
There is a scene near the end of the film where the Turtles and April are falling off of a tower and Leo says: "I think this is it. Do you guys have any last words?" Donny replies with "It was me who licked the icing off the Pop-Tarts and put them back in the box!” Mikey adds to the humor with, "I never understood the ending of Lost!" And then Raphael says: "If this is our final moments, I just want you all to know that all those times I pushed you, picked on you, bullied you, and pushed you beyond your limits, it was because I was scared! I was scared because I thought I would never be able to catch up to you and call you brothers! It’s because I love you guys! I love you guys so much!” He says all this while crying! The feels, man. THE FEELS!
This is a prime example of why I can humbly admit that the Turtles' personalities and the concept of Turtles' brotherly bond are intact in this film, despite their hulking, brute appearances. If Michael Bay got anything right, it was each of the Turtles' distinct personalities. Raph is rude and always inching for a fight, Leo is the fearless leader, Mikey is a goofball and provides the comic relief, and Donny is the resident dork who always has a plan. I found myself laughing at their dialogue and verbal exchanges more often than I thought I would going into this, but I'm sure there's TMNT fans who are far more critical of this film and of TMNT in general that they aren't even going to like this tidbit.
Another thing I loved about this film was the action sequences. I think everyone is going to rave about the battle against the Foot Clan as they all raced down the side of the mountain, but that sequence has been spoiled almost in its entirety in almost all of the trailers and commercials for the film, so there's little surprises there to get excited about. I thought the several encounters against Shredder were all well-done and kept up with Shredder's menacing demeanor in his portrayals in TMNT media as of late, especially the 2002 and 2012 animated series.
With the tease that saw Shredder reaching and touching the mutagen at the end of the film, I think we all knew that Michael Bay was going to get the green-light for a sequel, which is slated for a 2016 release. Despite the vast amount of negativity surrounding this film, it wasn't really THAT bad. Bay's original concept of "alien" Turtles was axed, but audiences still had to deal with the nightmare fuel that was comprised of Turtles' appearances in this film. If you can stomach their appearances, along with the 30+ minutes of Megan Fox/April O'Neil unnecessary drama, I can definitely suggest this to casual TMNT fans, who might just find something to enjoy here. To the hardcore (especially long-time) TMNT fans, I suggest avoiding this film like the plague. It's not TMNT: The Next Mutation-level bad, but there's more than enough here to piss you off.
Michael Bay's TMNT 2014 reboot gets an average score of 7 out of 10 from me. I had my closure with the TMNT I knew and love back with the animated feature, TMNT Forever, but I'm willing to give these new spins on the TMNT license a fair chance before I quickly discard it as trash.
That being said, let's do this review a bit different. I'm going to start off with my issues with the film, then end on a positive note.
The film starts off with the Foot Clan being attacked by some shadowy figures that we all know that are the Turtles, but we, the audience, don't actually see the Turtles until about roughly 30-40 minutes into the film because the film decided it was a brilliant idea to follow April O'Neil around on her failed attempts to get her career as a news reporter kick-started. Eventually, April swoops too deep into the Foot's operations and finds herself right in the middle of one of their heists, but the Turtles save the day. She gets a glimpse of the Turtles on her camera phone and hilarity ensues as the Turtles are forced to reveal themselves to her. You've seen this scene play out in the million and one trailers for this film and it's no different. Bay has the Turtles oogling Megan Fox's beauty, much like Sam in the Transformers films. We get it already - she's hot. Moving on...
This series of events forces the Turtles to bring April to their lair where their origin story is revealed.
I don't even spoil how stupid the "remix" of the Turtles' origin is because I literally burst out laughing when I watched the scene. It's really THAT bad. You have to see that part for yourself. The only thing that I'm going to say is that I seriously doubt anyone could become a master ninja just from reading a book someone threw in the trash... Also, to say Master Splinter isn't even Asian in this continuity that's pretty fucked up to stereotype him like that. I can't say I'm surprised, especially given Bay's track record on the Autobot's stereotypical personalities in ALL of the Transformers films to date.
Much like my issue with The Amazing Spider-Man 2 where the film decided it was a great idea to make the origin story "predestined" in terms of how these heroes got their powers, I feel like this type of storytelling kills the awe and magic that made their origin story special. That's like the military telling Bruce Banner that "yeah even if you didn't push the kid off the testing field, we were going to push you out there anyway to make sure you became the Hulk. There wasn't no accident..."
Will Arnett's Vernon Fenwick (a character created specifically for this film and only related to the character from the 1989 cartoon by name alone) was enjoyable for the most part, but his presence felt forced in the last hour the film when his appeal would have benefited the stale opening 30 minutes of the film with Megan Fox's April O'Neil.
As for villains in this film, I didn't mind Sacks and I didn't mind The Shredder wearing armor like he was fucking Iron Man or the Silver Samurai from The Wolverine, but it pissed me off that they had Karai in this film in a role that was completely meaningless and forgettable. She wasn't established as Shredder's surrogate "daughter" or anything. She was merely a random high ranking Foot Soldier in Shredder's forces. That's it. She barely had any dialogue. If they were going to do that to her, I would have had her just be a nameless female Foot Soldier or one of the Purple Dragons. Karai is a vital character in the TMNT universe, especially with the Turtles' on/off rivalry with the Foot Clan. It's a damn shame to see Michael Bay completely waste this character in this film.
My last, but biggest gripe with this film is how the Turtles looked. In terms of computer-generated animation, Michael Bay has come a long away from the indistinguishable mess of metal and wires that was supposed to be Transformers in combat from that franchise to the the hulking brutes that are supposed to be the Ninja Turtles we know and love. To make matters worse, the film provides absolutely no explanation on why the Turtles look like this, ranging from Raphael wearing shades on his head that he never pulls over his eyes, Leonard covered in mostly samurai armor, Michelangelo covered in sea shells and beads as if he just came back from a cruise in the Bahamas, and Donatello being absolutely nerded out from head to toe - glasses, goggles and a photon pack that were possibly stolen from the set of Ghostbusters. I swear everything about Donny screamed, "NERD!!!" from the top of their lungs in this film. I get it - Donny's the scientist and resident geek of the group, but damn it was a bit overboard here. I know people complain about Donatello having buck teeth in the current 2012 animated series on Nickelodeon, but this iteration was far worse in my humble opinion.
I just can't fathom why Michael Bay choose to make the Turtles look like absolute nightmare fuel for children in this film when their previous iterations have all been far less horrifying. It didn't help when Mikey took off his mask to show April and he looked just like Shrek on crack.
(Sighs) I feel like everything I say about this film is going sound negative, but let's end on a good note, shall we?
There is a scene near the end of the film where the Turtles and April are falling off of a tower and Leo says: "I think this is it. Do you guys have any last words?" Donny replies with "It was me who licked the icing off the Pop-Tarts and put them back in the box!” Mikey adds to the humor with, "I never understood the ending of Lost!" And then Raphael says: "If this is our final moments, I just want you all to know that all those times I pushed you, picked on you, bullied you, and pushed you beyond your limits, it was because I was scared! I was scared because I thought I would never be able to catch up to you and call you brothers! It’s because I love you guys! I love you guys so much!” He says all this while crying! The feels, man. THE FEELS!
This is a prime example of why I can humbly admit that the Turtles' personalities and the concept of Turtles' brotherly bond are intact in this film, despite their hulking, brute appearances. If Michael Bay got anything right, it was each of the Turtles' distinct personalities. Raph is rude and always inching for a fight, Leo is the fearless leader, Mikey is a goofball and provides the comic relief, and Donny is the resident dork who always has a plan. I found myself laughing at their dialogue and verbal exchanges more often than I thought I would going into this, but I'm sure there's TMNT fans who are far more critical of this film and of TMNT in general that they aren't even going to like this tidbit.
Another thing I loved about this film was the action sequences. I think everyone is going to rave about the battle against the Foot Clan as they all raced down the side of the mountain, but that sequence has been spoiled almost in its entirety in almost all of the trailers and commercials for the film, so there's little surprises there to get excited about. I thought the several encounters against Shredder were all well-done and kept up with Shredder's menacing demeanor in his portrayals in TMNT media as of late, especially the 2002 and 2012 animated series.
With the tease that saw Shredder reaching and touching the mutagen at the end of the film, I think we all knew that Michael Bay was going to get the green-light for a sequel, which is slated for a 2016 release. Despite the vast amount of negativity surrounding this film, it wasn't really THAT bad. Bay's original concept of "alien" Turtles was axed, but audiences still had to deal with the nightmare fuel that was comprised of Turtles' appearances in this film. If you can stomach their appearances, along with the 30+ minutes of Megan Fox/April O'Neil unnecessary drama, I can definitely suggest this to casual TMNT fans, who might just find something to enjoy here. To the hardcore (especially long-time) TMNT fans, I suggest avoiding this film like the plague. It's not TMNT: The Next Mutation-level bad, but there's more than enough here to piss you off.
Michael Bay's TMNT 2014 reboot gets an average score of 7 out of 10 from me. I had my closure with the TMNT I knew and love back with the animated feature, TMNT Forever, but I'm willing to give these new spins on the TMNT license a fair chance before I quickly discard it as trash.
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