Ever since the legendary Saturday morning cartoon exploded from the manhole cover of popular culture, the rambunctious quartet of adolescent, malformed, martial-art reptiles seems to have a near unbroken run of ever-transforming properties that’s tried to keep sewer-dwelling heroes smelling as fresh as a daisy.
However, nearly forty years after Eastman and Laird’s original gritty satire first hit comic book shelves, it seems that there’s still life within the old half-shell yet – in fact, this new iteration from Superbad and The Boys creators, Seth Rogan and Evan Goldberg may actually be the best yet thanks the fact that it chooses to focus on that section of the title that past iterations usually skim over: the Teenager bit.
Adopting a similar, striking set of visuals that proves that Spider-Verse really did change our reality for the better, prepare to experience turtle power like never before.
After a youth spent lurking in the sewers under the tutelage of their human-fearing, rat father, Splinter, four, teenage, mutated, humanoid turtles – leader Leonardo, brawler Raphael, brainbox Donatello and joker Michelangelo – yearn to be recognized by the world above. Sneaking out whenever they can and dragging out missions to get supplies to take in sports games or movies, they soon catch the attention of April O’Neil, a tenacious teen girl who is trying to break into journalism despite having a nasty habit of vomiting on camera and she gives them the perfect idea to become popular.
You see, there’s currently a crimewave creeping across New York City that’s seeing vast amounts of scientific equipment being stolen by a mysterious crime boss known as Superfly and April reasons that if the boys use their skills of ninjitsu to bring him to justice, the city will undoubtedly hail them as heroes. However, once they engage Superfly, they find out that not only is his name shockingly literal, but the giant, jive-talking bug has an entire cadre of mutant hench-animals who all have been transformed thanks to the same, strange ooze that created the turtles.
Their alligences torn between the humans they so dearly want acceptance from and this new group of creature who share their origins, the four, green brothers are genuinely uncertain on how to proceed, but once Superfly’s true plan is revealed, it soon becomes apparent that the insectoid crime boss is far more bitter against homosapiens than their father, Splinter, could ever hope to be. Can these pizza scoffing, ninja weapon waving gang of turtle-teens stop the destruction of New York and clear the name of animal mutants for evermore?
It seems that getting the guys who wrote R-rated teen comedy Superbad, to take an all-new punt at the world’s most beloved turtles (sorry Gamera) proves to be something a masterstroke because I’m pretty sure Mutant Mayhem may actually be the greatest, single Ninja Turtle product that has ever existed. The secret, as I alluded to earlier, is the full embracing of the fact that our four heroes are teens and thus behave accordingly. What helps this immensely is the fact that the voice cast actually sound like adolescents instead of being made up of such random adults over the years such as Chris Evans, Johnny Knoxville and Corey Feldman and it gives the story the freshness of an origin story despite the turtles already having their personalities and abilities already established and primed for combat. While the most important aspect of any attempt to realise turtle-lore is, undoubtedly, the chemistry between the brothers – Mutant Mayhem also nails something that no other attempt has done: the nature of Splinter. Usually cast as a wizened, rodent sensei/yoda, Rogan and Goldberg’s script rejigs the resplendent rat into an over cautious shut-in who has taught his reptilian charges ninjitsu to protected them from the hated world above and his paranoid ramblings about being “milked” for their DNA. Jackie Chan takes this and runs with it, giving us a Splinter that not only is a hilariously fussy parent, but also gives us a poignant performance of an elderly patriarch who is terribly lonely while his kids sneak out to have fun.
Of course, the impressive cast work doesn’t stop at the good guys, as Mutant Mayhem features an absurdly stacked group of comedic talents who form the villains. Featuring such names as (deep breath) Hannibal Buress, Maya Rudolph, Seth Rogen, John Cena, Rose Byrne, Natasia Demetriou and Giancarlo Esposito as various wrong-uns and mutant critters, things often get a bit crowded, but stand outs include Paul Rudd’s awesomely stoned Mondo Gecko and Ice Cube who’s bitter Superfly may actually be one of the year’s greatest antagonists once the year is done.
However, while the script and performances are all top-notch, it’s the visuals that leans heavily on the wonders of Spider-Verse that ties everything together. Looking like three-dimentional children’s scrawls that renders smoke into grey scribbles and human designs that make them look every bit as exaggerated as the day glow mutants, the level of detail is stunning and perfectly fits the off-beat nature of the piece. The set pieces are even better with a deliriously fun section seeing the turtles violently take on numerous gangs of the criminal underground intercut with one another to the strains of Blackstreet’s “No Diggity” is so perfect, you could just cry and the chaotic finale that sees a Kaiju-sized mutant with legs made of countless horses is just trippy as hell.
Turtle purists may complain about the lack of Shredder, Krang and the fact that April isn’t a statuesque, lemon jumpsuited, white chick, but that’s missing the point. While previous movies have traded in hard on strenuous, rubber-suited, kung-fu; debate fueling CGI nostrils and the reliance of Vanilla Ice (nicely referenced here), Mutant Mayhem goes all-in on the inexperience of its loveable crew of shelled vigilantes to create a crazed, all-action epic that round-house kicks the heart strings as well as unpercutting the funny bone and speed-bagging the adrenal gland.
Beautiful visuals, great comedy, stirring action, fantastic soundtrack and loveable characters mean that even though Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem isn’t quite a Spider-Verse beater, it’s still a rousing example that animation is continuing to edge into brave new worlds while still being tremendously accessible to all ages – I mean, there’s a tremendous amount of weed jokes for a kids film – the latest outing for the turtle-boys may be the most bodacious of them all.
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