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A Radical New Impression of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles


In all of the many iterations of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles over the years, it’s rare to find one where the titular foursome genuinely appear to be honest to god teenagers. A part of this is down to the voices -no matter how hard adult voice actors try, they just won’t be as authentic in capturing that distinct adolescent energy as real teens. But it’s in design and aesthetic as well. The last time this franchise made it to the big screen in that pair of Michael Bay-produced action-blockbuster movies from the mid-2010s, there was no mistaking the grown hulking monstrosities for teenagers -they took themselves way too seriously. However this latest reboot, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem, approaches things foremost from the angle of that first part of their name. These turtles are small, reckless, funny, over-confident, hyperactive, and naive teens -and that alone makes them refreshing.
In the seven years since this series last had a major movie released, the landscape for the superhero genre has shifted. Most notably, a little film called Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse came along, which proved that animation could still be a rich and expressive medium for high-concept comic book properties. Mutant Mayhem is pretty starkly an attempt to reinvent the TMNT franchise in a similar vein -perhaps accidentally discovering that animation comedy has always been the format it has worked best in.
The stylized look of the film is very consciously indebted to Spider-Verse, but also to Sony’s quirky action-comedy follow-up The Mitchells vs. the Machines, which director Jeff Rowe was a co-director on. He brings a decent chunk of that energy over to Mutant Mayhem combined with an aesthetic that has a similar dimensionality hugging traditional and CG elements, but with a distinctly grungy stop-motion look (particularly on the environment and the human characters) reminiscent of something like ParaNorman. It’s a fitting atmosphere for the world of the turtles, and these turtles especially, written and performed with a spontaneity of attitude quite befitting rascally New York kids who, rather than the prospect of samurai super-villains or alien invasions, are concerned more than anything about fitting in with human society.
Their desire for acceptance is the thematic crux of this movie, and it is admittedly an unimaginative one. The film doesn’t quite make the case for their attraction to human life as well as it should, though it does adequately illustrate their desire to come out of the shadows and be recognized and respected publicly. This fantasy specifically is one of several creatively illustrated sequences that speaks to both the animators’ ingenuity and the Turtles’ own personalities. And yes, they still have elements of their stock archetypes that centre them, but with interesting modern touches that also compliment their youth -Raphael is still the brash impulsive one, but he channels that through doing stunt tricks for his brothers; Donatello is still the nerdy one, but this takes less the form of intellectualism or tech affinity as with him being super into comic books and manga.
But the movie doesn’t condescend or endeavour to appropriate contemporary youth culture -indeed the creatives seem to very much be attuned to it. And even where it occasionally feels artificial, the kids voicing the Turtles and Ayo Edebiri as April O’Neil convincingly get across the attitude and humour. The movie is probably the funniest Ninja Turtles film, with Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg, Dan Hernandez and Benji Samit -two writers who worked on The Tick, and Rowe (who has a considerable pedigree from Gravity Falls) composing the script. It’s one of those films that sticks jokes in wherever it can -several of which won’t be caught on initial viewing, and for the most part earns that abundance. There’s a palpable enthusiasm all throughout, not lessened by the arrival of other mutants kicking the film’s plot and stakes into gear.
This Ninja Turtles boasts a large celebrity voice cast: Jackie Chan as a dorky, overly-protective Master Splinter, Giancarlo Esposito as the mad scientist Baxter Stockman, but mostly they’re represented through a gang of mutants committing crimes and heists led by the giant mutant insect Superfly, voiced by Ice Cube.  The talent here includes John Cena and Seth Rogen, Rose Byrne, Post Malone, and Paul Rudd -probably the funniest of the bunch as doofus skater dude Mondo Gecko. The story there however isn’t particularly gripping, revolving around this gang’s vendetta towards suppressing humanity and mutating the world around them in conflict with the Turtles desire to live with humanity and in their world -even while sharing with the villains that resentment at not being accepted. There is a lack of creativity to that main premise and drive, and while the movie briefly entertains the idea of the Turtles getting along with these other mutants, who initially take them in as part of their family, it doesn’t ever seriously grapple with their consideration of the issue. It’s also just a bit too derivative a narrative hook, even while it does take some weird and creative turns.
The action of the movie though is not at all unoriginal; it’s quite a bit fun and propulsive in fact. The fight and chase sequences have a real character to them, as elements of each of these mutants and their immediate context are used in inventive and humourous ways. The climax sequence, which I’ll only say is utterly charmingly bizarre, is full of this wild visual and tonal charisma. And it permeates too the film’s character of New York, with its sharpness of architecture, imagery of urban decay, crassness of public attitude; and yet against these an appealing pop underground flavour of artistic touches coming through in bold choices of pacing and editing, grounded cinematography techniques, and astute musical accompaniment –the variable hip-hop soundtrack fronted by A Tribe Called Quest’s “Can I Kick It?” is stupendous, obligatory reference to Vanilla Ice’s “Ninja Rap” notwithstanding.
That kind of corniness may be forgiven though in its compliance with the Turtles’ own. Mutant Mayhem is about the Ninja Turtles’ efforts to be accepted by society, as heroes or otherwise. And while that may be a very easy story to slot the Ninja Turtles into, the conviction of it at least holds true by the very teenage nature of these mutants -all teens want acceptance. Nicolas Cantu, Shamon Brown Jr., Micah Abbey, and Brady Noon are excellent as Leo, Mikey, Donnie, and Raph respectively –they imbue in these characters a fresh and endearing spunkiness that the movie reflects around them. It is built out centrally from their personality in fact, in a way none of the other Ninja Turtles movies have been (and it might not be an especially high mark considering the series’ track record, but this movie is likely the best). There may be a treasure trove of references to previous iterations of this franchise, but it is solidly a reinvention for today’s generation of kids –albeit one that taps into a universal youthful energy. A very fun and delightful animated movie, happily for this summer not in short supply.

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