Seth Rogan has given us a refresh on the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, that 80s TV phenom that delivered as advertised. In TMNT: MUTANT MAYEM, we have the origin story of the unusual Chelonians and their equally mutant rat father, Splinter (Jackie Chan). Unlike the previous TMNT films, and the iconic Nickelodeon series, the visuals have the trappings of a graphic novel, and the sensibility of a neo-noir. Worry not, though, the turtles themselves remain the wide-eyed wisecracking kids out to stop evil and eat pizza, but the New York City streets, and sewers, they walk are very mean.
We start with Dr. Baxter Stockman (Giancarlo Esposito), a lonely scientist longing for a family. He plans to create one with the mutating ooze he’s invented and the animals that he prefers to people. His experiments are interrupted by the TCMI and its band of mercenaries, who fail in their mission to capture Stockman and his notes, but inadvertently allow the ooze to seep into the sewer. Thus, are created Donatello (Micah Abbey), Michelangelo (Shamon Brown Jr.), Raphael (Brady Noon), and Leonardo (Nicolas Cantu) from the baby turtles that Splinter discovers when on the run from the humans out to kill him for being a rat. He raises them up in the safety of the sewer, training the boys in martial arts from cheesy videos, and instilling in them a dread fear of humans. Scum of the earth is the operative phrase, and images of them being milked in bizarre experiments are constantly invoked to keep them scared.
Boys being boys, they are as curious about the human world as they are afraid of it, and during their forays into it on errands involving shoplifting and movies, they begin to question Splinter’s worldview. An accident with a throwing star sparks a friendship with April O’Neil (Ayo Edebiri), a forthright budding reporter on her high school paper who longs to be a hero by restoring the school’s prom when a curfew threatens to cancel it. The impending curfew is courtesy of Superfly (Ice Cube), one of Dr. Stockman’s escaped experiments grown big, bad, and out for revenge. He’s also, indirectly, the reason for the boys’ first real battle. That would be with some of the minions who stole April’s scooter while gathering the parts for a super machine that Superfly will use to destroy humans and let the mutants live in peace.
One thing leads to another, as they do in films like this, and the boys decide to become heroes by stopping superfly, thereby teaching the humans that there is nothing to fear from all mutants, and maybe finally get experience the wonder and magic of high school (as seen in a clip from FERRIS BUELLER’S DAY OFF).
The tone is quirky and wistful against a story of rage channeled in decidedly unconstructive ways. The violence may be in a cartoon but is not always cartoonish and rendered such that even a squashed cockroach can provoke sympathy, and the hordes of humans bearing down on a hapless, pre-mutant Splinter, the stuff of horror. It’s a tricky line to walk, but it makes the consequences of failure dire as the action builds to ever more elaborate battles with the stakes getting proportionately higher. It culminates in the most ingenious monster to stalk New York since the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man in GHOSTBUSTERS, and a breakneck struggle to stop it that ratchets up the tension in similarly ingenious ways. Plus, there’s a mad scientist (Maya Rudolph) who pretty much makes Superfly’s case for wiping humans off the planet.
TEENAGE MUTANT NINJA TURTLES: MUTANT MANIA is sophisticated enough to show both sides of the destroy all humans proposition (without actually endorsing human extinction). It’s also goofy to good-naturedly play into its preposterous premise with oddball characters that somehow manage to have real emotional resonance. It also makes an excellent case for helmets, but not blinders.
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