About:
- Genres:
- Animated
- Science Fiction
Fix: Superheroes, Found Families, Teenagers, Mutants, Ninjas, Turtles
Platform: Paramount+
Paramount+ Summary:
After years of being sheltered from the human world, the Turtle brothers set out to win the hearts of New Yorkers and be accepted as normal teenagers through heroic acts. Their new friend April O’Neil helps them take on a mysterious crime syndicate.
FYA Summary:
Leonardo, Raphael, Michelangelo, and Donatello are four mutant turtle brothers who want nothing more than to be accepted by humanity. But their mutant rat father, Splinter, has warned them time and time again that humans are terrible, hateful creatures who will lock them away to experiment on them—and milk them.
Turtles don’t have nipples, you say? So do the teens, but when they find themselves caught up with a group of mutants set on eradicating humanity, milking becomes the least of their problems.
Familiar Faces Voices:
Jackie Chan as Splinter
I’ve been watching Jackie Chan movies since I was little, and I’ve long viewed him in a fatherly figure light, so it was fun to realize that he voices Splinter. This version of the character is a little more paranoid than others, but he’s a really great dad to the Turtles, and his suspicions of humanity aren’t without merit.
Ayo Edebiri as April O’Neil
It seems like Ayo is all over the place these days, and I am all for it. She’s a funny, talented actor who brings a lot to every role she’s in, including that of April. I love that they aged down the character and made her a more modern journalist while keeping her strength and friendship with the Turtles intact.
Ice Cube as Superfly
I’ll be honest, Ice Cube kind of scares me. He’s got a “don’t mess with me—or else” vibe and pretty much always looks like he’s grumpy. He could be a total teddy bear in real life, but that ferocity lends itself nicely to being the voice of a villain like Superfly, a creature who blames humanity for, well, everything bad in the world. (He’s not totally wrong?)
The cast also features the voice talents of Seth Rogan, John Cena, Paul Rudd, Maya Rudolph, Rose Byrne, Giancarlo Esposito, Post Malone, and Hannibal Burres, among a bunch of other folks whose names I didn’t recognize.
Couch-Sharing Capability: Family Movie Night
Although this movie was marketed more toward kids, I found myself feeling a lot of nostalgia for the original TMNT cartoons and movies of my youth while watching, and that makes me think this movie would appeal to folks of all ages. Invite all your millennial friends and their kids to join you in watching, and everyone will have a good time.
Recommended Level of Inebriation: Six Pack … of Soda
This movie is, at its heart, a kids movie. If you feel comfortable partaking of adult bevvies while watching, feel free, But it’s more appropriate to be drinking soda or something a teen might drink in mixed company.
Use of Your Streaming Subscription: Cowabunga!
My husband’s a huge TMNT fan, and we’d hoped to make it to the theater to see this while it was there. We didn’t make it happen, so I was glad to find that it was available via streaming not long after its release. There’s a message of wanting to be accepted/wanting to belong at the heart of the movie that resonates, along with one on the importance of family and friends. The animation style is super unique, too, which I dug. Overall, I enjoyed it much more than I expected to, and that’s always a nice surprise.
We published this review during the 2023 SAG-AFTRA strike. This work would not exist without the labor of actors, and we support their goals.
