Review of 'Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Out of the Shadows'

tmnt_out_of_the_shadows.jpg A follow-up to 2014's Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, “Out of the Shadows” is a much more by-the-numbers action flick with little added to the story of the four ninja turtles.

The film begins with our four ninja heroes taking in a basketball game where their friend from the first film “The Falcon”, aka, Vern (Will Arnett) is taking credit for saving the city – the turtles showing their displeasure by hitting him with spitballs as he attempts to talk to the crowd. April (Megan Fox) discovers a (rather ridiculous) scientist Baxter Stockman (Tyler Perry) is planning on breaking Shredder (Brian Tee) out of jail using a teleporter. During the escape Shredder is teleported to another dimension where a warlord named Krang tells him of three pieces scattered on Earth that, when assembled, will allow Krang and Schredder to conquer the planet. With some mutagen ooze Shredder returns to earth then transforms two of his minions to a warthog and a rhino. Stealing the mutagen, April gives it to the turtles who quickly realise they can use the ooze to transform themselves into humans. A rift forms in the group with some wanting to do it and others not so keen, with Leonardo's (Pete Ploszek) leadership and the cohesiveness of the group called into question…but they have bigger fish to fry as Shredder begins to assemble the pieces.

I can't say I was a bit fan of this one. The first was filled with quite deep character insights as we got to know the turtles but this one seems to be determined to simply provide us with ever more spectacular and often ridiculous stunts. The only character development here is the infighting between the turtles that is getting a bit tiresome. Having said that, the action sequences are quite spectacular though very, very heavy on the CGI. Yeah, there were elements like the tricked out garbage truck and the introduction of Casey Jones (Stephen Amell) that add a bit of spice to the mix but ultimately I was left a bit cold. I can't really say I ended up caring too much for any of them as this simply seems to be “by the numbers”.

Not really doing it for me.

Rating: “Average, but who wants to be average?”

Review Date: 2019-07-06


Directed by: Dave Green

Studio: Paramount Pictures

Year: 2016

Length: 112 minutes

Genre: Science Fiction

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt3949660/