Review: 'Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem' will leave you with a smile that won't quit
Cowabunga, baby! What fun to announce that the best coming-of-age comedy of the summer is "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem."
No, I'm not crazy. OK, maybe just a smidge. But a comic-book franchise from the 1980s that struck me as never that good in the first place is now in theaters as an origin story with "Spider-Verse" level animation that suddenly seems bracingly brand-new.
First thanks go to Seth Rogen, who serves the film as writer, producer, voice actor, idea man and rabid fan since childhood. Rogen thought it was time to bring these pizza-loving heroes out of the sewers and onto the streets of present-day New York with orders to grow up fast.
He also cast real teenagers to voice the Big 4 turtles, named after Italian Renaissance artists: Nicolas Cantu as Leonardo, Shamon Brown Jr. as Michelangelo, Micah Abbey as Donatello, and Brady Noon as Raphael.
By recording the actors together whenever possible, the movie achieves a level of party-down comic anarchy that perfectly matches the visuals.
And there's no need to catch up with the comic books created by Kevin Eastman and Peter Laird, previous feature films, TV series -- animated and live-action -- or the video games and toy lines with a profit that hit a billion. "Mutant Mayhem" explains it all for you.
It turns out that scientist Baxter Stockman (Giancarlo Esposito) has invented the "Ooze," a solution that creates human intelligence in animals. Later, the Ooze oozes onto four baby sewer turtles who are rescued by a fatherly rat named Splinter (voiced by the great Jackie Chan).
Enter Superfly (Ice Cube), the villain of the piece, who hates humans and drives the teenage turtles into action. Chief among their human friends is high-school reporter April O'Neill, voiced with scrappy wit by "The Bear" sous chef and Emmy nominee Ayo Edebiri.
Director Jeff Rowe ("The Mitchells vs. the Machines") previously told Variety that he wanted the look of the film to feel unslick like "the way you draw when you're a child or a teenager, and your passion and enthusiasm for making art hasn't been dimmed by formal art training." Mission accomplished.
Though this appealingly PG movie stuffs in too much backstory for its own good, its exuberance is just plain irresistible. Even the rogues are a pleasure. They include Paul Rudd as Mondo Gecko, Hannibal Buress as Genghis Frog, Rose Byrne as Leatherhead, Post Malone as Ray Fillet, and Maya Rudolph as Cynthia Utrom.
Best of the baddies is Rogen as a wicked warthog named Bebop and John Cena as his rhino pal Rocksteady. Rogen sees them both as "two angry New York bros" who come to realize that Superfly has raised them badly. To paraphrase "West Side Story," they're depraved on account of their deprived.
There's something funny and touching about watching these mutants trying to do the right thing. Corny? Maybe. But Rogen's stated goal to make a turtle adventure with "zero boring parts" is achieved in the kind of giddy, goofball delight we've been missing at the movies.
You'll leave with a smile on your face that won't quit.
