[Review] Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles

In the heart of New York City, the evil villain Shredder and his criminal empire known as the Foot Clan are terrorizing the streets. April O'Neil (Megan Fox), is a journalist determined to get to the bottom of it. One night, she happens upon some Foot Clan activity and witnesses an obscured vigilante fighting back against them. These vigilantes are, you guessed it--the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Of course, no one in the press believes April's account, but she's not giving up on this story. When she meets Raphael, Leonardo, Donatello, and Michaelangelo in the flesh, she bands together with them in order to defeat Shredder and save the city.

The Turtles have a creepy and darker warrior-like aesthetic to them. They're the 1990 incarnations on steroids. And if you've ever seen the 90's TV show "Dinosaurs", you'll know what I mean when I say their eye gaze and facial structures are reminiscent of those creatures, but a lot angrier. Technically, the humanized mouth movements, CGI fluidity, and scaly watermelon-color skin texture at least elevate them above video game quality. But like I mentioned, it's still kinda creepy and uncanny to see. Shredder's shiny metal, mountain-esque stature looks pretty badass here until you realize it more-so seems as though one of Michael Bay's Transformers stumbled into the wrong movie.

One major gripe is the immediately awful dialogue and foul attempts at humor that don't even deserve pity laughs. I understand that in a film where overgrown talking anthropomorphic martial arts wielding and pizza-devouring reptiles exist, there's bound to be some cheesiness. But in this case, it isn't the good type--it's stinky, moldy, and probably overpriced type.

An early focus on the origin story is the most interesting part of the duration, and there is a tightly designed hand-to-hand combat scene around the midpoint, but that's all wiped away quickly as the film delves into a run-of-the-mill blur of messy action that just feels too pointless--like a dull blade.

4.5/10