Movie Review: Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (2014)

My son and I went to see the new TMNT movie the other day.  He's gotten into the Turtles, and really wanted to see it, so even though I could have easily skipped it, we went.  And per usual, those wondering if there are "curse words" in the movie, there are a few, but nothing too bad.

And I was not blown away by it, but it wasn't all that bad, either.  Capsule review - don't bother unless you have kids that want to see it, like me.  I want to add "or unless you're a massive TMNT fan" but then I wonder if actually that might be a reason to skip it...

Spoilerish commentary below.  Click away if you don't want to have the rather weak plot spoiled for you.




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Still with me?  I'll start with the good parts.

There were plenty of funny moments, lots of callbacks to the original comics (maybe more than I caught, as I've not read that many of the original issues yet) and to the 80's/90's Saturday morning cartoon.  And lots of general pop-culture references.  My son was really excited when he picked up on them. 

The action scenes were a mix, some fun to watch, others either too fast or too drawn out. 

The voice acting for the turtles and Splinter were all pretty good.  And the turtles definitely were written as, and performed as, teenagers!  Leo and Raph are at each other's throats most of the movie, Mikey has an annoying crush on April O'Neil, and Donatello is a big stereotypical nerd.

Big spoiler (I think, based off of the trailers/promo material I'd seen going into it) - The Shredder actually IS Japanese!  They made it look like the William Fichtner character was the Shredder, but he's actually Shredder's minion. 

Not so good stuff?  Well, I wasn't fond of the turtles being 6' plus tall, nor of their weird facial animation/rendering.  I think it's that the eyes were too human.  Splinter looked pretty cool, though.

The "Foot Clan" really only has two ninja, Shredder and Karai.  Everyone else is just a mercenary with guns and occasionally melee weapons. 

Maybe the cartoons have made Baxter Stockman seem too incompetent, but they could have used the original comics version of the character rather than Eric Sachs as the main villain (yeah, Shredder is really the secondary villain in this one, even though the climactic battle is against him, and plays out similarly to TMNT #1).

Was the cartoon that influential that April O'Neil needs to be a TV reporter?  And why was Whoopie Goldberg as her producer not given any funny lines?  And why didn't April show her cell phone video of the turtles to Whoopie to save her job/prove she's not crazy when in the very next scene with her she's showing it to Sachs?

Hmm, I could go on, but that' probably enough.  It wasn't a great movie, but it wasn't dreadful either.  My son really enjoyed it, so that's worth something.  We got to spend a quality afternoon doing something together that he enjoyed.  I won't recommend seeing it, but I won't judge you if you watch it and find you like it.

In a world... (March Madness Day 20)

20 Which setting have you enjoyed most? Why?

Published or homebrew? And non-D&D (because really, the most fun we had back in the day was with the Known World of the Expert Set/Isle of Dread, and more recently, I've had some good times with various other D&D worlds, including our sorta stalled out Vaults of Ur game).

Let me think of what non-D&D campaign settings I can think of that got more than just a session or two of play (sorry, WEG Star Wars, as much as I love original trilogy SW, I never got to play it much).

The Frontier Sector – Star Frontiers

Marvel (616?) Universe – Marvel Superheroes RPG

Gamma Terra – Gamma World

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles – TMNT and Other Strangeness

Prequel Star Wars – d20 Star Wars RPG

Not sure if it has a name, but the dystopic future of Trinity RPG

Arkham, Mass. and environs – Call of Cthulhu

Aliens/Predator-verse – d20 Future

and tons of D&D settings (homebrew and canned) or settings that never saw play beyond one or two sessions (and actually I'm trying hard to remember if the Marvel game actually got that far or not...)

If I had to pick, though, it would be Gamma Terra. From my first introduction to it through the Endless Quest book Light on Quest's Mountain to our early 90's game with the old BECMI group, to my more recent games with the Busan Board Game Group, it's always consistently provided a strange, funny and dangerous place to adventure.

The Frontier Sector would have to come in second just from sheer numbers of sessions played within it.

Feels like I step on fortune cookies (March Madness Day 18)

18 What is the crunchiest RPG you have played? Was it enjoyable?

This would have to be various Palladium games. TMNT and Other Strangeness and Heroes Unlimited being the ones I've actually played, a few others I've poured over options, cross-checked other rulebooks, and endlessly pondered what sort of PC to make for char-gen, but then the game never got off the ground.

Palladium games are fun, but sometimes the crunch does get in the way. From my limited play experience, though, once you've made your character, playing it isn't so hard (unlike 3E/Pathfinder, where you're in char-gen mode every time you level up).