When I was talking with my uncle about how the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles have been rebooted numerous times over the decades, he said, "I never really understood the 'teenage' part of that title."
Well, this time, the "teenage" part of the Turtles is emphasized, and the "mutant" part plays a bigger role in the story, while the "ninja" part is a bit more questionable, as these turtles were actually taught martial arts via kung fu movies by Master Splinter. And in this movie, they refer to Splinter as "Dad," which makes sense - that's really what he is to them.
The Turtles have been reimagined many times, so to say it changes details shouldn't really matter at this point. In the past, we've seen Shredder go from being a one-off villain in the original comics, to a recurring human threat, to an alien wearing a human disguise. We've seen April be biracial in the original comics, white in most of the cartoons, and black in the most recent cartoon series and this movie. She's been an adult and a teenager. Other characters have appeared in various forms as well.
So what makes this version of the Turtles mythos stand out? This time, the turtles themselves have yet to directly enter the human world, and it fascinates them. They're also teenagers who actually act like teenagers, complete with the emotions and maturity level one might expect. When their goofing around with ninja star stunts results in them annoying April O'Neil, a high school student with ambitions of being a news reporter, a series of events plays out that results in April being the first human to accept them.
I was surprised by the focus on nearly all mutant villains. But I ended up liking them, and I found Superfly to be interesting and entertaining. His voice actor has a lot of fun with the role, and I felt that he really shined. The totally different story meant new villain motivations, as we see the competition between two vastly different ideas as what "humans accepting mutants" means. It also brought some plot twists that dramatically change things, in my opinion for the better. I also found the ending to be refreshing, and a very fun new direction to take this franchise. I really hope the teased sequel does interesting things with where the story seems to be going.
Ultimately, I felt that this movie had a lot of what made the Spiderverse movies work so well - art and animation that's fun to look at, fun characters and great dialog and acting, a story that's easy for kids to understand but also works well for adults to be able to take seriously, lots of fun humor, and action that flows very well (Splinter in particular was great fun to watch!). Of all the versions of the Turtles, this is easily my favorite.
WesternAnimation My favorite reboot of this franchise
When I was talking with my uncle about how the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles have been rebooted numerous times over the decades, he said, "I never really understood the 'teenage' part of that title."
Well, this time, the "teenage" part of the Turtles is emphasized, and the "mutant" part plays a bigger role in the story, while the "ninja" part is a bit more questionable, as these turtles were actually taught martial arts via kung fu movies by Master Splinter. And in this movie, they refer to Splinter as "Dad," which makes sense - that's really what he is to them.
The Turtles have been reimagined many times, so to say it changes details shouldn't really matter at this point. In the past, we've seen Shredder go from being a one-off villain in the original comics, to a recurring human threat, to an alien wearing a human disguise. We've seen April be biracial in the original comics, white in most of the cartoons, and black in the most recent cartoon series and this movie. She's been an adult and a teenager. Other characters have appeared in various forms as well.
So what makes this version of the Turtles mythos stand out? This time, the turtles themselves have yet to directly enter the human world, and it fascinates them. They're also teenagers who actually act like teenagers, complete with the emotions and maturity level one might expect. When their goofing around with ninja star stunts results in them annoying April O'Neil, a high school student with ambitions of being a news reporter, a series of events plays out that results in April being the first human to accept them.
I was surprised by the focus on nearly all mutant villains. But I ended up liking them, and I found Superfly to be interesting and entertaining. His voice actor has a lot of fun with the role, and I felt that he really shined. The totally different story meant new villain motivations, as we see the competition between two vastly different ideas as what "humans accepting mutants" means. It also brought some plot twists that dramatically change things, in my opinion for the better. I also found the ending to be refreshing, and a very fun new direction to take this franchise. I really hope the teased sequel does interesting things with where the story seems to be going.
Ultimately, I felt that this movie had a lot of what made the Spiderverse movies work so well - art and animation that's fun to look at, fun characters and great dialog and acting, a story that's easy for kids to understand but also works well for adults to be able to take seriously, lots of fun humor, and action that flows very well (Splinter in particular was great fun to watch!). Of all the versions of the Turtles, this is easily my favorite.