REVIEW:
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem was a pretty good animated movie. That shouldn’t really be surprising, considering that the movie is from the mind of Seth Rogen and his longtime writing partner, Evan Goldberg. Pretty much everything these two have written together or produced together (like the show The Boys on Amazon,) has been funny and smart. From Superbad to This is The End, the two are naturals.And sure, some projects are better than others (The Interview isn’t great, for example,) but the movies are always funny.
So when it came out that Rogen and team were being handed the reigns to the Ninja Turtles franchise, people were excited. And now we have the result, and it does not disappoint. As expected, the movie is very funny. It is packed with humor. But what wasn’t as expected was that the animation would be great (they took the success and accomplishments of the animation style from the Spiderverse movies and ran with it, to the point where the you can see the individual drawn lines, sometimes just squiggly lines, all over this thing.) The animation style is sketch, as if a kid was doodling in a notebook. And it works. It’s creative, different, and fun.
The cast is also fantastic. Because the movie is packed with mutant villains, Rogen got tons of A list stars to voice characters here. But he also saved the turtles themselves, for actual teenagers. That seems like a no-brainer, that the Teenage turtles should be voiced by teenage actors, and yet, believe it or not, it has never been done before. But Rogen, who is very much in touch with how teenagers think (Superbad, which was all about that, was his best movie.)
As far as the story goes, it’s just okay. In fact, it’s probably the weak link of the film. A villain named Superfly (not sure why they didn’t use Baxter Stockman, other than that they seemed to want to get rid of the animated show / comics idea that a mutant is a combination of a human with an animal,) is trying to take over the world. Stockman is in the movie, as a scientist, but he never becomes a mutant. Instead, Superfly is a giant fly (voiced by Ice Cube,) who wants to turn all humans into mutants (a plot that feels familiar, and similar to the Amazing Spider Man, with what the Lizard wanted to do to people.) It’s a fine story, but also pretty basic.
The fun doesn’t come from the story, but from the characters. Jackie Chan, in particular, is hilarious. He plays Splinter (no longer called Master or Master Splinter by the Turtles, but instead, called “Dad.”) Chan makes the comedy here work for him, often preaching ridiculous theories to his children, like the idea of people wanting to “milk,” them. That milking idea is actually a running joke throughout the movie, and it’s pretty hilarious. And to add to the comedy, this movie has a bunch of pop-culture references, such as talk about Mark Ruffalo as the Hulk in Avengers Endgame, and how he improvised a certain scene.
The movie has a lot going on. It’s smart and funny, in terms of its tone and style. It’s also short, which goes a long way (ninety minutes, which feels quick and refreshing.) The second half does get a little tiring, as the movie turns into. sort of spin on Godzilla with a giant monster attack, but the humor is still there, the whole way through. For Rogen and his team, this one is definitely a success.