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Title: We Wish You a Turtle Christmas
Director: Larry Osbourne
Writer: Tish Rabe (created by Kevin Eastman and Peter Laird)
Distributed By: Family Home Entertainment
Starring: James Eric Anzalone, Alfredo Miller, Florence Reymond, and Ronn K. Smith
Release Date: October 1994
MPAA: N/R (G)

They’re back, they’re bad, and they’re totally more tubular radically 90s catchphrase than ever before. It’s Christmas Eve in New York and all is peaceful. No Technodrome, Bebop or Rocksteady, or all that other stuff you don’t care to watch. But watch out, because the turtles are in trouble. They GOTTA GET A GIFT GOTTA GET A GIFT GOTTA GET A GIFT FOR SPLINTERRRRRRRR! Will they be able to give the gift to Splinter in time for Christmas? There’s only one way to find out with this musical Christmas spectacular.

There are some things that one must avoid during the holiday season. Too much eggnog, electric bills, suicide. And of course, Christmas specials. Now, there are plenty of exceptions, such as A Charlie Brown Christmas. But with the turtles, you’re scraping at the bottom of the barrel. It was late ’94 when the franchise was on its last legs. Actually, the franchise wasn’t on its last legs. The legs were long gone by the time this one came out.

Now, I’m not going to rip it apart for the hell of it. Like any other Movie Monday, I’ll try to be fair rather than satirical. And when you watch the first minute of this you may think to yourself, “This can’t be that bad. Sure it’s tacky and kiddy, but maybe it’s just over-hated.” And then it gets worse. We Wish You a Turtle Christmas is one of those films where just when you think it couldn’t get any worse, it does.

For starters, the music is terrible. I suppose the singing is on tune (not to be confused with good), but that doesn’t save it by a long shot. The music sounds like it was played on one of those cheap Casio keyboard samplers. You know, that button you push on the keyboard where it plays an automatic tune. Except these songs are far from being on the same level of genius as Wesley Willis. Rather, most of them are just Christmas songs replaced with corny lyrics about the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. With some exceptions, like “Wrap Rap” (which is as bad as you’re probably imagining right now).

And what also throws off the songs, is the Turtles’ accents. I don’t know why the hell they decided to hire one actor that sounds like a bad John Travolta impersonator, and another who has a Jamaican accent. Both in singing and in acting (acting?). It’s just the Turtles and a bunch of random kids that they lured down to the sewers. Oh yeah, and GOTTA GET A GIFT GOTTA GET A GIFT GOTTA GET A GIFT FOR SPLINTERRRRRRR! Who sounds more like an asthmatic old man than Splinter (Jack William Scott).

But you know what two characters they have missing? April O’Neil and Casey Jones. I mean, who would you rather watch? A bunch of random kids, or the two most well known humans on the show? I know they probably didn’t have the budget to hire the actors from the films, but I’m sure they could find two people to portray them (April would probably have a Bulgarian accent and Casey would probably have a French accent).

Speaking of budget, this has to be without a doubt the lowest budget Turtles project. The costumes in this make the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles III costumes look like something created by Stan Winston. They look like cheap pieces of plastic ready to fall apart at any second. But it’s not just the quality of the costumes. It’s also because the lip syncing is awful and sometimes their mouths won’t stop chattering after they have spoken. Not to mention that they all have permanent troll faces.

But I get it. They weren’t making this for grownups or even Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles fans. This was just made to squeeze in another quick buck out of the young Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles fans. All I can say is thank God I wasn’t that much into Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles as a kid. That’s one video I got to avoid. And if you’re smart enough, you’ll avoid it at all costs, too.

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I GOTTA GET A GIFT GOTTA GET A GIFT GOTTA GET A GIFT FOR SPLINTERRRRRR!

Andrew Hudson
ahudson@comicattack.net
@Hudsonian