Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Out of the Shadows – movie review

Turning a cartoon into a live action comedy adventure seems to have done the trick a couple of years ago, so a sequel was always on the cards. As a matter of fact, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Out of the Shadows received the green light the night the first film opened. The producers chose 32-year-old director Dave Green, a life-long Ninja Turtle fan, to helm the sequel.

Michelangelo, Donatello, Leonardo, and Raphael star alongside “hot” ace reporter April O’Neil (Megan Fox), her former cameraman Vern Fenwick (Will Arnett) and a newcomer, hockey-masked vigilante Casey Jones (Stephen Amell). After super villain Shredder (Brian Tee) escapes custody, he joins forces with scientist Baxter Stockman (Tyler Perry) and two dimwitted henchmen, Bebop (Gary Anthony Williams) and Rocksteady (WWE’s Stephen “Sheamus” Farrelly), to unleash a diabolical plan to take over the world. As the Turtles prepare to take on Shredder and his new crew, they find themselves facing an even greater evil with similar intentions: the notorious Krang. Shredder and Krang team up to bring to earth the Technodrome, a dangerous, alien war machine. As Green explains, “Krang is from another dimension, so he’s got all kinds of crazy, dangerous new technology, including purple ooze that can change both mutants and humans.

Meanwhile the Turtles are going through their own existential angst. To put some context around the time frame, it has been almost a year since the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles saved New York City and in keeping with their training and unconventional appearance they’ve maintained a low profile. April O’Neil has gone undercover and is investigating Baxter, this brilliant and respected scientist who just may have gone rogue. O’Neil loves her job, but she loves her relationship with the Turtles more – she is really the one calling the shots.

“The first movie focused on April’s ambition,” Fox says, “but in this film, her relationships with the Turtles and their survival as a family is her priority.”

Reprising their roles as the titular Turtles are Pete Ploszek as Leonardo, the stoic, disciplined leader of the foursome and Alan Ritchson as Raphael, the hot-headed rebel. Jeremy Howard is Donatello, the tech-savvy inventor and Noel Fisher is irrepressible, fun-loving Michelangelo, who longs to live the life of a human teenager.

I thought the first movie was better than I expected, but this one is simply long, boring, violent and at times really silly. At times the violence has quite some impact and that is concerning when this is material aimed at children. The movie has an “M” rating. The bickering between the Turtles – which is a strong subplot – irked me after a while.

Vern Fenwick, who has been handed the keys to the city for taking the credit for what the Turtles did in the first installment, is hardly given a great deal to do here, short of playing arrogant. As for the new kid on the block, Casey Jones, I found him a waste of space, who failed to contribute anything of value to the plot. The evil henchmen turned into animal battering rams are amusing enough as Turtle adversaries with no switch off value, but overall the storyline is far too predictable and relatively dull. And I say that without alluding to the orchestrated combat scenes that did little to lift me from my stupor.

Rated M, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Out of the Shadows scores a 4 out of 10.

Director: David Green
Cast: Megan Fox, Will Arnett, Alan Ritchson, Noel Fisher, Pete Ploszek, Jeremy Howard
Release Date: 9 June 2016
Rating: M

Alex First