Few directors have worked harder to build up an intentional reputation as one of the most macho, masculine directors than Michael Bay. From Bad Boys to Transformers, Bay has leaned into action and worn his love of explosions and guns on his sleeve. Bay has plenty of fans and supporters who admire his signature style and the influence he has had as a producer.
There are some premises and subjects where Bay’s approach is a more natural fit than others, though. When, in 2014, Bay decided to lend his producer skills to the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, no one was exactly sure what to expect. Unfortunately, what we got was not exactly what the most optimistic fans had hoped for. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles may have been a financial success, but it ultimately falls flat. Here are five reasons why it just doesn’t work.
The movie doesn’t feel confident in how it looks
All previous adaptations of the Turtles had been either animated or featured practical turtles suits. Those turtle suits may have given some people nightmares, but they were endearingly practical, and you could chalk up whatever limitations they had to that practicality. This time around, the turtles were created with computer-generated imagery (CGI), and it’s safe to say that the movie feels like it’s not totally confident in the way that CGI turned out.
Much of the movie is shrouded in darkness, and that’s especially true of the turtles themselves. What’s more, when we do see the turtles, the decision to keep them in the shadows seems justified. Their skin looks too slimy, too alive, and the overwhelming impression of these creatures is that they are slightly more monstrous than they should be.
It doesn’t have a solid take on the turtles
Making a movie about the Turtles can be tough, in part because it can be hard to distill each one of their distinct personalities over the course of a relatively limited running time. While most movies make a choice about which one or two turtles to emphasize, this movie feels like it doesn’t have a particularly firm handle on any of the turtles or their respective personalities.
The worst of this comes with the movie’s sense of humor, which is both limited and unfunny. The Turtles are often at their best when they feel like siblings who are feuding and making fun of one another even as they love each other. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles makes them feel like they barely know one another.
The movie uses April O’Neil all wrong
April O’Neil is a crucial part of any Turtles project, but everything about her use in this movie feels wrong. Megan Fox is not necessarily a bad actor, but she is ill-suited to play this kind of role. April is a hard-nosed reporter in every iteration of the story, and her discovery of the Turtles makes her one of their best human allies.
In this movie, April plays a critical role, and her backstory ultimately interweaves with the reasons that the Turtles were created to begin with. That intense, everything-is-connected plotting is typical of blockbusters of this era, but it’s not the kind of thing that meshes well with the Turtles’ typically lighthearted energy. April doesn’t need some sort of insane backstory. She can simply be a good friend who doesn’t have explicit ties to the Turtles before she meets them.
The action isn’t up to Bay’s standards
While Michael Bay might be a primary creative force here, the direction in Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles isn’t up to Bay’s standards, and that’s probably at least partially because he didn’t actually direct the movie. Jonathan Liebesman instead served as the film’s director, and the result is action that feels both muddled and overly reliant on CGI.
We know from movies like Avatar that it is possible to make a CGI-driven action movie that looks interesting and features clear action, but that is not the case here. The Turtles are meant to be ninjas, but we never really get the chance to see them show off any of their skills, and what we do see feels so generic that it falls out of your head almost the second you’ve stopped watching it.
None of the actors really pop, and it’s not totally their fault
Fox is not the only actor who feels out of sync or miscast here. The entire ensemble, including the men playing the Turtles, feel like they don’t totally know how to work with a script that doesn’t give them much to do. Will Arnett is cast in a fairly generic, funnyman role and Johnny Knoxville also makes an appearance, but these more famous names seem almost designed to cover up the total lack of thought and originality on display.
The actors are not totally to blame for their inability to make that material work, but Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles might be better if it had at least one genuine star who was capable of holding the screen and demanding attention. Unfortunately, they didn’t cast anybody all that interesting, and as a result, the movie itself is just as forgettable as the cast that was assembled to star in it.
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles is streaming on Pluto TV.
