A New Generation of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (at Least for Me)

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MOVIE REVIEW
Rise of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: The Movie
TV-Y7 –

Genre: Animation, Action, Adventure
Year Released: 2022
Runtime: 1h 22m
Director(s): Andy Suriano, Ant Ward
Writer(s): Tony Gama-Lobo (written by,) Rebecca May (written by,) Kevin Eastman (based on characters created by,) Peter Laird (based on characters created by)
Cast: Ben Schwartz, Omar Benson Miller, Brandon Mychal Smith, Josh Brener, Eric Bauza, Haley Joel Osment, Kat Graham
Where To Watch: Premiering on Netflix August 5

The film was an interesting take, but I was a little underwhelmed without seeing the series leading up to it. It was based on the 2018 series, the fourth animated series to take on the tale of the aforementioned mutant ninja turtles. If you’re a fan of the series, this may be a home run. I’m going to date myself a bit here and admit that I grew up with the original series, and I was quite the fan; I had the toys (the bottomless rabbit hole worth of toys) and never missed an episode in the 10 seasons of the show. So, unfortunately, I think I may be a tad biased towards that original series.

That isn’t to say that I didn’t appreciate the film; like I’ve mentioned so many times before, a 2.5-star rating from me is dead in the middle (you know, mathematically how it should be.) It’s for a film I didn’t love, but also one I didn’t hate. This isn’t school; we’re not on that scale, this is the rating world I’ve created, and I get to set the rules.

I appreciate the animation style here far more than the 2012 computer-generated imagery (CGI) take on the series. There isn’t anything like 2-D animation to fill me with nostalgia overload; I don’t necessarily have an issue with CGI, but I think in most every case, I would prefer hand-drawn. I’m sure there are examples of it being the other way around, but I can’t think of any.

The film's story feels a little small for the threat the turtles face. Again, that’s likely because I’m used to the 80/90s series where this was a regular villain. I’d be curious to hear from any fans of the 2018 series and how they liked this universe expansion.

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@netflixfamily / @TeenageMutantNinjaTurtles / @Nickelodeon
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