CS Soapbox: Things We Expect From The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Reboot
Last summer brought the interesting announcement that a CG movie would reboot the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles The all-star team of Seth Rogen, Evan Goldberg, Jeff Rowe and Brendan O’Brien founded a franchise business. While Rogen has offered that the film will put the age of the characters more prominently, there is still a lot of unknowns about what fans can expect from the next film. On a whim and the need for nostalgic fun, I went back through every theater Turtles Movie and with everyone fresh on my mind now, let’s explore some of the greatest things we need to see of the future franchise.
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Bring back some reboot cast members
Say what you want about the production produced by Michael Bay TMNT Movies – and believe me, I know there’s a lot you can say – one thing they did pretty well was building their ensemble roster. Sure, Megan Fox’s April was just a feast for the eyes, Johnny Knoxville and his successor Pete Ploszek weren’t a good fit for Leonardo, and Tony Shaloub was just as boring as Splinter. That being said, Noel Fisher and Alan Ritchson were perfect as Michelangelo and Raphael, Stephen Amell was a very personable Casey Jones who deserved a better script, Gary Anthony Williams and Sheamus were killers than Bebop and Rocksteady, Tyler Perry made for very fun fun Baxter Stockman, Brian Tee is the menacing Shredder and Will Arnett is weird like Vern Fenwick. I understand Paramount is probably trying to distance itself from the last two films, but given how well many of these cast perform for their roles, it would really be a shame if none of them come back, which could be possible when the studio finally stops stuck at my next point …
Treat the Turtles Actors better
It’s an unofficial tradition that dates back to the original 1990 film adaptation and continues into the 2016s Out of the shadows that the actors who portray the title characters never get any love or respect for their work on the films. If you look at the poster of each film, after a quick look, it becomes clear that none of them credit the actors behind the turtles under the cast sections, while the first two films only credit two of the human character actors and the Bay-produced reboots with zero actors Credits on their. Most egregious is the 2007 CG film TMNT, in which Chris Evans, Sarah Michelle Gellar, and Patrick Stewart were rightly listed among the cast, even including Kevin Smith for his cameo and Laurence Fishburne for his narration. They have a fully animated movie that makes it easier to place the stars behind the turtles on the poster and yet they have been left out. Combine this with Ritchson’s stories on Collider Live about the dire conditions he and his Turtle co-stars went through on the reboot films, and it shows a pattern of studios behind the films that has a general lack of appreciation or respect for shows their cast that really has to come to an end as they are the real heart of these films, just like Bradley Cooper and Vin Diesel from Guardians of the Galaxy or Andy Serkis in the planet of monkeys and Lord of the rings Trilogies.
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Tone Down Raph versus Leo
I’ll be honest, I’m tired of almost every single film believing that the most interesting element of the title team is the dynamics of Leader Leonardo and Hot Head Raphael. It may be something that has been explored in the comics, but no movie has ever really touched it down in a unique or compelling way, with Leo being consistently secret and only fueling Raph’s anger as they disagree on how to go about it deal with their current situation. One of the few things that got the sequels to the original trilogy right was moving away from it and making them feel like a united team of fools who throw pokes for fun instead of hurting each other. Sibling rivalry may be a group dynamic, but it has to cease to be THE dynamic in any story. Speaking of repetition …
No more. Paper shredder.
Every superhero or team may have an archenemy, but the problem with this is that Hollywood puts them on screens that they believe every movie should feature this villain in some form, whether as a minor or a major antagonist. Between Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield Spider Man In the 80 years since The Joker made its comic debut, audiences have been portrayed by over 20 stars in film, television and video games with two reruns of Norman and Harry Osbourne and their goblin transformations. For the TMNT Universe, the leader of the foot clan, Shredder, was the villain for the films and he’s the least interesting on screen now, especially since he’s generally been reduced to a character hiding in the shadows while other characters hide boast of his fighting skills which make his quick dispatch by the Turtles boring every time. During their 30 year life in comics, the Turtles have come across a number of interesting villains who don’t yet have the correct fees on-screen. Many of them were to arrive in sequels to previous projects that were later canceled, from the Triceratons to Karai even to Krang and Baxter Stockman, the latter of which made their big screen debuts Out of the shadows but weren’t used sensibly enough, and the plot threads were left open so that both characters could come back in meaningful ways. With the next movie it would be nice to see the story finally move away from Shredder and the Foot Clan and focus on someone else, possibly even the path of the Tom Holland led Spider Man Movies that focus on other villains and skip worn-out territory of the original story instead of repeating the deaths of the goblins and Uncle Bens all over again.
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Don’t be afraid to get violent
One of the key elements of the comics that the films have been very inconsistent with is the overall tone. Kevin Eastman and Peter Laird’s comics started out much more violent and gritty than the more colorful and cartoonish tone the franchise would eventually take, and that departure has gotten pretty stark, and the films can never quite strike the right balance between the two worlds . While the original 1990 film actually stayed relatively close to the starting material, parents’ concerns about the violence observed in the film led to almost every subsequent film weakening it more and more, with the first sequel not even allowing them to just use their guns Close combat. While the 2007 CG film attempted to revert to a darker tone, its attempts at showing family-friendly humor and action didn’t seem to fit the mold, and Paramount reboots took a similar approach to that Transformer Movies, but couldn’t quite find the right mix of comic book action and humor and edgier characters and texts. A tough R. Turtles Film isn’t what I’m suggesting as that would be a far too drastic tone shift, but instead of indulging in the studios’ desire for a strictly family-friendly getaway, do something that pushes some boundaries. The fact that the heroes are teenagers and the worst curse words we’ve heard from them are “damn” and “shit” feels very imprecise for this age group’s vocabulary. While some parents may be concerned, it would also be nice to finally see one of the heroes actually kill an enemy, and then see their emotional struggle with the action, as in every movie the group has defeated countless enemies without blinking showing an eye or some kind of emotional distress. When you investigate this, a unique level of character development is added to the story that was not previously seen in a Turtles Film and wouldn’t turn away parents who are still complaining about the violence as younger viewers can actually see possible ramifications for the spread of violence in the world, no matter which side of the moral line you are on.
With the creative talent behind the project, my concerns about the film are very small as the group has consistently delivered, and if any of these things come to fruition in the next film, fans should be very excited about the future of the film TMNT Franchise has in store for you.
What would you like to see of the next? Restart Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles? Do you agree with the points raised here? Let us know in the comments below!
