Escape to the Movies: Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles - Kids Deserved Better Than This

[Shamanic Rhythm]

Every review I've read of this has convinced me that it's far, FAR worse than I had ever expected it could be. Most of them point to it wanting to simultaneously be all Grim Dark Batman style and Cowabunga Dude Retro 90s, whilst having terrible acting, plot holes up the arse, generic action set pieces and worst of all product placement for Pizza Hut.

Just awful.

 

[Lightknight]

People complained that they were changing a Japanese character into a white guy? Guess racism only works one way. Otherwise flopping a white guy into anything else is cool?

 

[lightsentry]

Honestly, not that bad. Go see it, maybe you'll be surprised.

I saw it. It really is that bad.

I'll be honest, I had more fun at this movie, just laughing at it than I did with Guardians of the Galaxy. Although I see that GotG is the better movie, I just got more enjoyment out of TMNT.

 

[spoonybard.hahs]

People complained that they were changing a Japanese character into a white guy? Guess racism only works one way. Otherwise flopping a white guy into anything else is cool?

Heimdall from Thor says hi.

EDIT:

Of course, in the case of Heimdall, the backlash was really all about racism. Because in a comic universe where the writers took all things Norse and pretty much did whatever the hell they wanted - including putting Asians in and Robin Hood ripoffs - god forbid you randomly cast a black man in the role of a "traditionally white character in a traditionally white universe."

Also. if white male wasn't the dominate actor in films and television, you'd have something of a point.

 

[Nigh Invulnerable]

"Making a movie for kids is not an excuse to slack off." Every time I hear you say that, it makes me wish more people would say it.

The same should be applied to video games. Just because "it's for kids" doesn't mean it has to be a formulaic collectathon platformer with no other features and no sense of humor about itself.

To see proper "for kids" material, I suggest Avatar: The Last Airbender and Legend of Korra (but not the goddamn Shyamalamadingdong film), Phineas and Ferb, most everything by Pixar, Jak and Daxter (the first one at least), and Calvin and Hobbes. I have two kids, one is almost 4 and the other is 1, and watching them grow and learn has led me to be incredibly annoyed with many alleged "kids" entertainment due to the lack of treating them like intelligent humans. When my son, the older kid, watches TV, it's PBS shows and nature documentaries that don't pause to let the kid repeat a new word, they just talk about things in a somewhat simpler manner so that kids can comprehend and enjoy. Malcolm is incredibly smart and spent a few minutes the other day explaining to my wife and me about how octopi don't have bones, but do have "smoke" when they need to get away. He's not even 4 yet.

 

[spoonybard.hahs]

Honestly, not that bad. Go see it, maybe you'll be surprised.

I saw it. It really is that bad.

I'll be honest, I had more fun at this movie, just laughing at it than I did with Guardians of the Galaxy. Although I see that GotG is the better movie, I just got more enjoyment out of TMNT.

I don't see how that's possible. If GotG was the better film, it should follow you'd have more fun with its real humor, tighter writing, better acting, and just.... better everything. *sigh* This is Signs all over again.

 

[lightsentry]

Honestly, not that bad. Go see it, maybe you'll be surprised.

I saw it. It really is that bad.

I'll be honest, I had more fun at this movie, just laughing at it than I did with Guardians of the Galaxy. Although I see that GotG is the better movie, I just got more enjoyment out of TMNT.

I don't see how that's possible. If GotG was the better film, it should follow you'd have more fun with its real humor, tighter writing, better acting, and just.... better everything. *sigh* This is Signs all over again.

Not really, the humor was a little bit off base in Gotg and it had tighter script, but there were a lot more cringey moments in gotg that really pulled me out and maybe they were cringey on purpose, but the tone felt a lot less consistent than TMNT. The acting was sort of...a wash I feel, I really did not like Chris Pratt to be honest, just felt like I've seen the character so many times and the movie wrote in some scenes that he had to carry hard and it felt like he dropped the ball a bit for me. That being said, Megan Fox couldn't really carry a scene either, but there were a lot less where she was forced to. Also I didn't need to go read wikipedia after TMNT to figure out what the heck was going on.

 

[Chaos Isaac]

TMNT wasn't that bad of a film, really. It was dumb, yeah. Silly, yeah. Filled with giant turtles punching dudes. Yeah. And a lot of jokes and some culture references.

So, you know, same old same old. I enjoyed it, and i'd see it again.

It was about 100 times better of a reboot then Godzilla.

 

[spoonybard.hahs]

Not really, the humor was a little bit off base in Gotg and it had tighter script, but there were a lot more cringey moments in gotg that really pulled me out and maybe they were cringey on purpose, but the tone felt a lot less consistent than TMNT. The acting was sort of...a wash I feel, I really did not like Chris Pratt to be honest, just felt like I've seen the character so many times and the movie wrote in some scenes that he had to carry hard and it felt like he dropped the ball a bit for me. That being said, Megan Fox couldn't really carry a scene either, but there were a lot less where she was forced to. Also I didn't need to go read wikipedia after TMNT to figure out what the heck was going on.

How is anything in GotG more cringe-worthy than Mikey's hard-on for April? And you really didn't need to read Wikipedia to find out what was going on in GotG. If you did - or felt you had to - you weren't even trying to pay attention. You say Pratt was meh because you've seen the character before but... How is TMNT didn't? MovieBob was not kidding about how much it riffs off of The Amazing Spider-Man, nor how you could literally take any other property and plop into its story and get the same outcome.

 

[lightsentry]

Not really, the humor was a little bit off base in Gotg and it had tighter script, but there were a lot more cringey moments in gotg that really pulled me out and maybe they were cringey on purpose, but the tone felt a lot less consistent than TMNT. The acting was sort of...a wash I feel, I really did not like Chris Pratt to be honest, just felt like I've seen the character so many times and the movie wrote in some scenes that he had to carry hard and it felt like he dropped the ball a bit for me. That being said, Megan Fox couldn't really carry a scene either, but there were a lot less where she was forced to. Also I didn't need to go read wikipedia after TMNT to figure out what the heck was going on.

How is anything in GotG more cringe-worthy than Mikey's hard-on for April? And you really didn't need to read Wikipedia to find out what was going on in GotG. If you did - or felt you had to - you weren't even trying to pay attention. You say Pratt was meh because you've seen the character before but... How is TMNT didn't? MovieBob was not kidding about how much it riffs off of The Amazing Spider-Man, nor how you could literally take any other property and plop into its story and get the same outcome.

Because I didn't need to care about the characters to enjoy TMNT and I did need to enjoy the characters to enjoy GotG. The movies focused on different things and were structured to take advantage of their focus and I just feel like the strengths of TMNT carried it higher above its shortcomings while GotG got bogged down in what it was trying to do.

EDIT: Also I've never seen either Amazing Spider-man

 

[Lightknight]

People complained that they were changing a Japanese character into a white guy? Guess racism only works one way. Otherwise flopping a white guy into anything else is cool?

Heimdall from Thor says hi.

Hello Heimdall, I see you made it into the movie anyways. Cool.

I'll personally admit that I far preferred the new Heimdall but I didn't really have any preferrence or knowledge of Heimdall from before. Samuel L. Jackson (or Lawrence Fishburne if I were to repeat that idiot radio show that confused the two with Samuel L. Jackson on the line...) is an amazing choice for Nick Fury. I mean, I'd heard of him and seen him in practically every cross over but I didn't really care about him or follow his story.

But let's be honest. These are generally not the big title characters. Shredder is. He's the main villain. How many people do you think had actually heard of Heimdall before that movie? How many non-comic book readers had heard of Nick Fury? These aren't the characters that have spread into larger pools of knowledge. These are niche characters that were ripe for changing come mainstream.

I'll grant that Shredder was also a little more specifically Japanese. What with the martial arts and teams of Ninjas it would be a little extra weird to make him a white guy.

Of course, in the case of Heimdall, the backlash was really all about racism. Because in a comic universe where the writers took all things Norse and pretty much did whatever the hell they wanted - including putting Asians in and Robin Hood ripoffs - god forbid you randomly cast a black man in the role of a "traditionally white character in a traditionally white universe."

Heimdall happens to be a more than 1,000 year-old character. Even though I don't care about the comic book character I can understand not altering a character that was part of even a dead religion. So it's a bit different but Marvel clearly doesn't care about appropriating other cultures for profit.

Also. if white male wasn't the dominate actor in films and television, you'd have something of a point.

Wait, you mean in the US media where the US population is over 72% white (includes white Hispanic) that the majority of the actors are white too? I'm shocked and appalled, the nerve of them! [/sarcasm]

A fair world has proportionate representation. It does not give more representation to any group than its size warrants. You don't see me watching a Bollywood movie and complaining that there aren't enough white people. I get it, people are Indian there. They aren't being racist in casting the most common demographics they have there.

 

[camazotz]

Well, I may have to go see the Spider Man movies now because I swear the TMNT movie Bob saw was not the thing I saw. In my defense I have disliked everything ever done on TMNT since the original comic, so I was dragged to this movie expecting to be once again proven that the franchise sucks. Instead I actually liked the film (as did my wife who saw it with me, who loves all things TMNT) and many of Bob's comments unfortunately demonstrated severe bias....and an unwillingness to simply view the movie for what it is, rather than imposing a generation of TMNT nostalgia on it.

Let me add some examples:

1. the refined origin story made more sense to me than the original. It got rid of idiotic random chance and made it relevant. yes I know Bob hates it when everything ties in to one another, but it "worked" in this case.

2. Foot Clan still had a Japan connection, Shredder and his lady lackey were still "Japanese" at least in that special comic book way.

3. turtles were still turtles, just more teenage-like "bros" than the goofier "we are specifically targeting ten year olds" feel of prior movies.

4. Shredder's suit was very cool, and worked for me. Also necessary to make him a threat for the decidedly faster, stronger and more impressive moving turtles in the movie.

5. I found no confusion about the origin story, just extra layers of reveal as the movie went along.

6. Splinter was a perfectly decent animation, looked just like he did in the old comics. No freakin' idea what Bob saw wrong with it. None at all.

7. Was the real Shredder added in after fan outcry? No idea, but his appearance and style worked for me.

8. Megan Fox was fine. She did as well as I would expect any female lead in the same role to do, no idea why people love to hate on her so much (and yes I know about her F U comment, and frankly I can appreciate the sentiment).

Anyway.....I still hate everything TMNT, except for the original comic and this movie.

 

[camazotz]

Every review I've read of this has convinced me that it's far, FAR worse than I had ever expected it could be. Most of them point to it wanting to simultaneously be all Grim Dark Batman style and Cowabunga Dude Retro 90s, whilst having terrible acting, plot holes up the arse, generic action set pieces and worst of all product placement for Pizza Hut.

Just awful.

Nope, just turns out that a lot of people really want to hate on it. The movie is better than I would have expected for TMNT. That's a low bar by my book....I utterly despise this franchise....but I actually enjoyed it. Soooo.....maybe if one's into deconstructionism and irony the film will exceed expectations? I don't know, I really think nostalgia and Bay/Fox hate is driving this more than anything.

 

[camazotz]

I want to make one small remark regarding the racebending Shredder would have had if Fichtner had played him.

Is it really that big of a deal?

I mean, when there's similar outcry regarding movies like Argo I can understand it since it involved an existing person; but from what I remember being Japanese has never been a big part of Shredder's character.

I'm in the same boat. At best this raises a "meh" from me - Shredder never struck me as really being any distinct enthnicity back when I watched the cartoons, all you can see are his not-particulary-Oriental eyes and a bit of not-particularly-tanned skin.

The only really "Japanese" character in the cartoon I remember was Master Splinter, and that was in the most clichéd, "Ah so, Daniel-san" vein of stereotyping a martial arts master. Hardly a deep and accurate minority character worthy of "celebration"...

So yeah, I'm not surprised that Bob yet again noted this "whitewashing", but I'd have to ask - does it really matter every time? Especially when other characters in various movie/comic franchises are getting race-swapped and gender-swapped with some regularity now?

I didn't feel like Bob was criticizing the whitewashing so much as their slapdash way of fixing it. He explains much of the movie was already shot with the idea of that one dude being Shredder and only later in production did they make the call to make them two separate people, and this change was apparently painfully obvious in the final product.

It may have been obvious to Bob, but as someone who hasn't been following all this nonsense it wasn't obvious to me when I saw it.

 

[Guilen-]

I saw the new flick, and I'm going to be honest, it might not have been a great or even particularly respectful handling of the source material, but your ignominious response to it reeks a little more of your distaste for the kind of people who would approve of it more than an assessment of the actual product itself. It really isn't the worst incarnation of the turtles, I mean, it's arguably better than the third flick. It reminds me how much you talk about how the 90s sucked... and you're very, very, very wrong about that. It makes me think of how much of the geek-o-sphere, as you call it, has to do with clutching to the worldview they are desperate to maintain as opposed to being genuinely interested in things that may live outside of a typical sense of popularity. I'd rather believe it to be the latter.

 

[Lilani]

It may have been obvious to Bob, but as someone who hasn't been following all this nonsense it wasn't obvious to me when I saw it.

True, but that doesn't mean it's not there, though.

 

[Shamanic Rhythm]

Every review I've read of this has convinced me that it's far, FAR worse than I had ever expected it could be. Most of them point to it wanting to simultaneously be all Grim Dark Batman style and Cowabunga Dude Retro 90s, whilst having terrible acting, plot holes up the arse, generic action set pieces and worst of all product placement for Pizza Hut.

Just awful.

Nope, just turns out that a lot of people really want to hate on it. The movie is better than I would have expected for TMNT. That's a low bar by my book....I utterly despise this franchise....but I actually enjoyed it. Soooo.....maybe if one's into deconstructionism and irony the film will exceed expectations? I don't know, I really think nostalgia and Bay/Fox hate is driving this more than anything.

http://www.nydailynews.com/entertainment/movies/teenage-mutant-ninja-turtle-movie-review-article-1.1895485#6bggXoMeMkz4aI7v.97
http://www.villagevoice.com/2014-08-06/film/teenage-mutant-ninja-turtles-2014/
http://thedissolve.com/reviews/979-teenage-mutant-ninja-turtles/
http://www.slantmagazine.com/film/review/teenage-mutant-ninja-turtles
http://www.thewrap.com/teenage-mutant-ninja-turtles-review-michael-bay-megan-fox/
http://www.film.com/movies/review-teenage-mutant-ninja-turtles

That's a reasonable chunk of people all saying the same thing: it's trying to be charming and gritty at the same time and managing to do neither. I'm more inclined to listen to the combined opinions of several respected film critics than assume it's all down to "haters gonna hate".

 

[AsurasEyes]

I think you're overthinking the rape analogy Bob. That's Tumblr-tier levels of overthinking. Mikey's adoration of April was innocent, mostly trying to serenade her and dumb stuff like that, which wouldn't seem out of place in a kid's cartoon. Speaking as a fan of the original Turtles, they nailed their personalities perfectly, updating and modernizing them.

And on the whole Shredder got pushed aside to make way for William Fincher as the bad guy and got no screen time...you wanna know why that happened? Because people complained that the Asian character was being played by a white guy. If you had an asian guy play the role, those same people would have complained "STOP ENFORCING STEREOTYPES!" at them. You brought this up in your Lucy review, when Russian mobsters and Asian gangs are played by people with Russian accents and Asians, and you complained about the apparent "Exoticism and xenophobia".

 

[spoonybard.hahs]

I'll personally admit that I far preferred the new Heimdall but I didn't really have any preference or knowledge of Heimdall from before. Samuel L. Jackson (or Lawrence Fishburne if I were to repeat that idiot radio show that confused the two with Samuel L. Jackson on the line...) is an amazing choice for Nick Fury. I mean, I'd heard of him and seen him in practically every cross over but I didn't really care about him or follow his story.

But let's be honest. These are generally not the big title characters. Shredder is. He's the main villain. How many people do you think had actually heard of Heimdall before that movie? How many non-comic book readers had heard of Nick Fury? These aren't the characters that have spread into larger pools of knowledge. These are niche characters that were ripe for changing come mainstream.

I'll grant that Shredder was also a little more specifically Japanese. What with the martial arts and teams of Ninjas it would be a little extra weird to make him a white guy.

Also. if white male wasn't the dominate actor in films and television, you'd have something of a point.

Wait, you mean in the US media where the US population is over 72% white (includes white Hispanic) that the majority of the actors are white too? I'm shocked and appalled, the nerve of them! [/sarcasm]

A fair world has proportionate representation. It does not give more representation to any group than its size warrants. You don't see me watching a Bollywood movie and complaining that there aren't enough white people. I get it, people are Indian there. They aren't being racist in casting the most common demographics they have there.

So, it's okay to change ancillary, supporting, and background characters just as long as the whites still maintain front and center? For no other reason than, "most of the country is white." That assertion only highlights the problem, that white people are only comfortable so long as a white person (and in the case of films, white men) are cast as the headliners.

The idea that "a fair world has proportionate representation" is pretty silly because it excuses obviously flawed social norms in favor of maintaining an ever-eroding status quo. And "white Hispanic" is a horrendously bad talking point when it comes tor race. Most who select it have no idea what to put on government forms (read: there isn't an option for their racial background) and most Hispanics choose it or white because their families have lived in the US for at least two generations. Even if they are 100% Hispanic.

Finally, using India as an example makes absolutely no sense. They don't count race on their census, but tribal heritage. India is not a salad/melting pot/Whitman's Sampler of varying races, creeds, and cultures.

 

[twosage]

The new Nickelodeon show really is pretty good. I was amazed at how well they developed and balanced the brothers' personalities, while keeping them from being irritating slogan-machines. I've only seen the first season, but damn, they finally got "Teenage" right.

As for all the rest of it, I just want Hollywood to stay away from my childhood memories unless it's Marvel Studios. No one else seems to know how to take established characters and stories ostensibly for kids and turn them into a genuinely broader experience for adults* while retaining the majority of the fun, and even they struggle to make it into a good movie half the time...


*To the extent that anyone is an adult nowadays. I mean seriously people, in an era that has produced some of the most amazing television ever like Breaking Bad and Game of Thrones, why is so much of the movie industry centered around toy commercials?