What did Michael Bay do to the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles? Seriously, I’m not trying to be funny; I’m asking a legitimate question.
No offense to Michael Bay fans, but the new Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (or TMNT) movie is all kinds of crazy, starting with the over the top cinematic special effects that Michael Bay is known for with his movies. I don’t know if I’m pro Michael Bay films or not, but I have watched a considerable amount of his work, and the new TMNT movie has his imprint all over it. It looked like Bad Boys or Transformers. The question is: Is that necessarily a bad thing for the franchise?
I don’t know, but I do know that I was both visually and, at times, mentally tortured with the latest adaptation of the famous comic book characters. Then again, I can be a bit dramatic (as are the majority of critics who hated the movie), so I’ll let you decide for yourself if Michael Bay did the franchise any disservice or not. Spoiler alert, if you haven’t yet seen it.
Not Quite What We Remember
According to the original comics and the 1990 live action movie, the four teenage mutant ninja turtles (Michelangelo, Leonardo, Raphael and Donatello) were mutated by a green ooze when they were tiny baby turtles living in the sewer. Splinter, their father figure who also happens to be an over sized rat, takes them in and raises them as if they were his own. He also teaches them the art of ninjutsu (hence the ninja part in TMNT) and they live anonymously as vigilantes. Until, one day they end up rescuing a young reporter named April O’Neill, who inadvertently turns their lives upside down and forces them above ground and into a confrontation with the Foot Clan, headed by their nemesis Shredder.
In the new TMNT movie, however, the origin is much different than what we all expected. Apparently, Michael Bay and co. saw fit to completely change the origin so that April O’Neill actually knew Splinter and the four turtles when she was a child. In the new movie, they were in fact her pets at her father’s lab when they were introduced to an experimental mutagen that ultimately made them humanoids. And, instead of looking like caricatures of life size turtles – like in the 1990 movie – they looked way more realistic as freakishly tall and strong bullet proof turtles. Although, April still plays a pivotal role in forcing a confrontation with the Foot Clan as in the original storyline.
Does that work for you? I have to say, I’m still not entirely sure how I feel about the change in origin. Sometimes change is good and sometimes it’s just… I’ll let you fill in the blank.
Shredder is the New Megatron
Yes, you read that correctly! In the new TMNT movie, I noticed that Shredder (in full garb) looked very familiar in his metal armored getup. Then it dawned on me. Shredder looked almost exactly like Megatron from the Transformers movie. What is that about?
I’m not sure what happened there, but maybe Michael Bay and co. got a little confused about which movie they were doing. After all, they are gearing up for yet another Transformers movie. In any case, it was completely unexpected for me when I first saw Shredder in his uniform and to be honest, I actually laughed out loud. I just knew that it was supposed to be some sort of joke…or was it?
It Gets Better…
Ok, so I gave you the bad and the ugly, now for the good. First of all, Michael Bay and Megan Fox kissed and made up after she was fired for publicly badmouthing him while promoting Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen. Apparently, they actually made up back in 2011, but since I missed that reunion tour, I’m just noticing that the two are both attached to this same project. Good for them.
The other piece of good news is that if you enjoyed this reboot of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles series, then you’re in for quite a treat. It seems that Michael Bay is set to produce three more TMNT movies, the next of which will be released in June 2016.