There really is no way to describe Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem without mentioning Martin Scorsese is his criticism against franchise movies and superhero movies. Considering that this movie falls into both categories, you’ll walk away with some sense that the Oscar-winning movie director is correct.
Now, I don’t always agree with Scorsese on everything and I don’t even like some of his movies. He was best buds with Roger Ebert and even the late critic had the brass cojones to criticize some of his movies. Yet the reviews for Mutant Mayhem were good, so I thought what the hell? And after watching it, I thought what the fuck?!
If you need any other example to why this movie is bad, look at the credits where you see Seth Rogen and his long-time writing collaborator Evan Goldberg receive writing credits. But surprisingly, they keep the tone mild at least for an PG rating. However, there is one pointless scene where April O’Neill (Ayo Edebiri), now a teenager, vomits excessively during a broadcast of the student news.
For the most part, it seems Hollywood has never really been able to bring the comic book characters to life in a way that appeal to both the comic book readers and those who enjoyed the success of the cartoon show. Steve Barron came close with the surprisingly well made 1990 movie but he was shit-canned before he could finished because he made it too dark.
People who went to see it were probably expecting something lighter in tone like the cartoon even though it did push the envelope too. Rocksteady, Beebop and Baxter Stockman were all humans who were turned into mutants themselves. They’re all in this movie with Rogen voicing Bepop because why not? Unfortunately, I wish the filmmakers gave more creativity to the casting of the main characters. With the exception of Jackie Chan as Splinter, the street rat turned mutant turned ninja master, I really can’t understand what they were thinking.
No, I know what they were thinking. They wanted to cast more age appropriate actors as the turtles. Corey Feldman, himself, was technically still a teen at 18 when he voiced Donatello in the 1990 movie. But Brian Tochi and Josh Pais were in their early 30s when they voiced Leonardo and Raphael respectively and Robbie Rist was in his mid-20s when he did Michelangelo. Here they’re voiced by real teenagers who sound like they haven’t been through puberty. Their voices become so annoying that you stop rooting for them immediately.
And while the turtles have always had a childish playfulness about them, here they come off as more obnoxious brats. At one point, they’re criticizing Leonardo (voiced by Nicholas Cantu) by calling him “Nardo” over and over as if it’s funny. It isn’t. Whenever people say names in movies thinking they’re funny, they’re not. The rest of the cast includes Micah Abbey as Donatello, Shamon Brown Jr. as Michelangelo and Brady Noon as Raphael.
There’s some plot about how Baxter (voiced by Giancarlo Esposito) was experimenting with the ooze on animals and it’s created several other mutants, who are led by Superfly (voiced by Ice Cube) wanting revenge. Rocksteady (voiced by John Cena) and Bebop are one of them, as well as other mutants voiced by Rogen’s new BFF Paul Rudd, now that he’s ditched James Franco, his Neighbors co-star Rose Byrne, Post Malone and others. Maya Rudolph voices Cynthia Utrom, a mysterious figure searching for the turtles.
It doesn’t really matter. It just seems a who’s who of actors they can assemble. Rogen and Goldberg also co-wrote the script with Jeff Rowe, who directs. Rowe makes good visuals and they’re easier on the eyes than Spider-Man: Across the Spiderverse. He received rave reviews for the Netflix movie The Mitchells vs. the Machines. But despite this and the additions of three other writers (Brendan O’Brien, Dan Hernandez and Benji Samit), you’d think they would have made a better movie and given the turtles more personality rather than us telling them apart by their eye masks.
Your kids may like it and if you were a TMNT fan at some point in your life, you might give it a look. But I think you will be disappointed. This is the seventh movie and fourth time the property has been produced into a franchise since 1990. I didn’t care for the live-action/CGI movies that Michael Bay producedbare. I barely remember much of the 2007 TMNT where they tried to put the cart before the horse and its negative reviews and less than stellar box office canceled any sequels. While the movie got good reviews (even though I can’t see why), it probably didn’t meet Paramount’s expectations but still made $173 million against a $70 million budget. That’s enough to greenlight a sequel and a series.
Some franchises need to just end. Scorsese is right. Not everything needs to be a franchise.
What do you think? Please comment.
Zane Says 