![]() ![]() The movie begins with a view of New York City in the middle of the day, with people going about their everyday lives. Regardless, this landed the movie in some hot water with the usual suspects and even Henson himself, and like Batman Returns, this backlash would affect the rest of the series even though it didn’t really effect the Box Office too much.īut for now? Let’s take a dive into the sewer with a look at the first half of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (90) and see for ourselves just how lean and mean this green machine is. But things still stay in the realm of “PG-by-1990-standards,” and nobody ever rips off anyone else’s nose with their teeth. ![]() The violence is ramped up somewhat in comparison to the other films in the series, the tragic origin of Splinter is retained in full, and the Turtles even use mild profanity. By God, would it show…Īs for the tone of the movie, the writers opted to forgo the silliness of the then-airing cartoon in favor of a darker plot more in line with the series’ indy-comic roots. ![]() Later films turned away from Henson and his company, and it would show. In order to bring the Turtles themselves to life, the producers turned to the legendary Jim Henson, the man behind The Muppets, resulted in some of the best puppet work I’ve seen in a movie. They partnered with the Chinese studio Golden Harvest, known for martial arts films such as Way of the Dragon (where Bruce Lee kills Chuck Norris with a Dragon Sleeper) and Enter The Dragon (quite fitting really, as Bruce Lee served as an inspiration for Eastman and Laird), and hired Steve Barron, who did the Jonathan Taylor Thomas version of Pinocchio as well as the music videos for such songs as “Take On Me” and “Billy Jean,” to direct. This one we’re talking about today, released in 1990 at the peak of what was affectionately called “Turtlemania,” was shopped around to various production studios such as Disney, Warner Bros and Paramount, who all turned it down before New Line Cinema picked it up. In fact, the first time I actually watched it was in the summer of 2014, about the same time Michel Bay’s reboot hit silver screens.īut more on that movie later. So yeah, the movie I’m about to review this week pretty much passed me by when it came out, given that it literally did so the year I was born in. Heck, I even remember watching that live-action Fox Kids show where there was a girl turtle. In fact, my love of the TMNT stems from the later cartoons, such as the 4Kids series in 2003 and the Nickelodeon version in 2012. Power Rangers and Star Wars were more my jam as a kid. Now, I was born in the later years of said show, so I don’t remember watching it a whole lot. So, think of it as a cross between X-Men and Daredevil, with tons of Saturday morning goofiness thrown in for good measure.ĭue to its unique nature, the franchise ballooned in popularity in the late 80’s, thanks in no small part to the classic cartoon that was rather loosely based on the far grittier comic. ![]() Taking their names from the famous artists of the Italian Renaissance, Leonardo, the stoic, cool-headed leader, Raphael, the hot-tempered rebel, Donatello, the tech-obsessed genius, and Michelangelo, the fun-loving prankster, have since trained in the ways of Ninjutsu via their mentor, the mutant rat Splinter (who is sometimes the former martial arts master Hamato Yoshi, and sometimes his pet depending on which version you’re watching) in order to protect the city of New York from various criminals and mutants while simultaneously keeping themselves hidden from the outside world. These four brothers began their lives as normal Red-Eared Sliders until they were one day exposed to a strange alien ooze that gave them human size and sentience. The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles are just what their name implies them to be, a team of, well, adolescent mutated turtles who also happen to be ninjas. The movies, I mean.īut first, a brief history lesson for those not yet familiar with the series. And I’m going to be looking at all of them. Cowabunga, dudes! Uncanny Fox here, ready to kick off my next series of reviews: the theatrical exploits of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles! Yes, the Turtles have come a long way from their humble beginnings as a black-and-white comic from the minds of Kevin Eastman and Peter Laird, spawning four TV shows (with a fifth one on the way), one weird live action series, countless toys and video games, a couple of creepy live stage shows (?), and no less than six feature films. ![]()
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