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This week on STS we will be doing some cross Columnization (is that even a real word?) with Comic Attack’s new film reviewer Andrew Hudson. If you have yet to check out some of his awesome movie reviews, make sure to click on his name and do that. So this month Andrew and yours truly will be reviewing all the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles feature length films. Andrew has already gotten the ball rolling with the first two live action movies Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles II: The Secret of The Ooze. So without further ado, let’s get into this Comic Attack team up!

Title: TMNT
Written by: Kevin Munroe
Director: Kevin Munroe
Company: Warner Bros. Pictures, The Weinstein Company, Imagi Studios
Distributed by: Warner Bros. Pictures
US Release Date: March 23, 2007
Length: 87 min.
MPAA: Rated PG

After a long absence from the big screen, the turtles burst back onto the scene in 2007 with the CGI animated adventure TMNT. Yes, I know, even the title is so hipster! Warner Bros. brought out some heavy hitters to voice some of these iconic characters, including Chris Evans as Casey Jones, Sarah Michelle Gellar as April O’Neil, Patrick Stewart as Winters, Laurence Fishburne as the narrator, and they even got Kevin Smith to do a cameo. The creators behind this movie also stepped up the animation from traditional animation to fully CGI animation. The new look works really well for the turtles and really enhances the action and fighting scenes. From the effort put into this movie, it looks like the creators pulled out all the stops to give the turtles new life in the 21st century.

The basic story revolves around an ancient empire that was cursed due to some rare astronomic occurrence that opens up a gateway to another dimension every 3000 years. The ruler of that empire gained/was cursed with immortality and his top generals were transformed into immortal stone creatures. While the portal was open, 13 monsters from the other dimension came to our world as well, and have been roaming the globe ever since. Fast forward 3000 years or so and we find April O’Neil traveling the world collecting what she believes to be stone statues for a very wealthy individual who happens to be the same immortal ruler from before, Winters. As Winters goes about reanimating all his stone generals, he hires the Foot Clan, now lead by Karai, to find and capture the 13 monsters as they descend upon the city.

Meanwhile, we find the turtles in complete disarray as a result of Leonardo’s year long absence after being sent away by Master Splinter on a training mission from which he hasn’t been heard from since. Donatello and Michelangelo deal with his absence by distracting themselves with some interesting jobs, and Raphael deals by becoming a motorcycle riding, helmet wearing, vigilante. While scouring the globe in search of Winters’s “statues,” April finds Leo and convinces him that it is time to come home. When Leo does finally return home, Splinter charges him with the task of getting his brothers back together and functioning as a single team again. Leo’s task is made that much harder by Raphael, who has some major issues with his “big brother’s” return. As the turtles train to be a cohesive unit again, the tension between the two brothers escalates until it reaches a breaking point in the form of an all out throw down between the two ninjas. The turtles must find away to work through their inner turmoil in time to stop their adversaries from reaching their ultimate goals, or all will be lost.

TMNT is a can’t miss movie for any Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles fan. The story is fun and full of great action and humor as only the turtles can bring. I really liked the idea of everyone being a little bit older and the guys dealing with some more “grown up” issues. The fight between Leo and Raph is something every turtle fan knew would one day come and has been waiting to see it, forever. It was also great to see April and Casey Jones together as a sort of adult couple, and how they had developed a life without the turtles. The addition of Karai, who filled in for the “deceased” Shredder, was also a great idea, and bringing the Foot Clan into the movie in a way that made sense was also a plus. This reinvention of the Ninja Turtles is a complete win, be sure to check it out.

Nick Zamora
Nickz@comicattack.net