Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem Review: A New Take On The Turtles That Is Sure To Create New Fans

In their almost 40 years of existence, few comic book characters, with the possible exception of Batman, have seen quite as many iterations and adaptations as the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Each generation since the 90s has grown up with its own versions of the characters on the big and small screens. Jeff Rowe and Kyler Spears' Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem marks the seventh feature film for the characters in just over three decades – and while this new version may not supplant whatever version you grew up with as your favorite, it is without question one of the better feature films in the franchise and it will almost certainly create a new generation of fans.

Featuring a new version of the iconic characters, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem brings us another new origin story for Leonardo (Nicolas Cantu), Donatello (Micha Abbey), Raphael (Brady Noon) and Michelangelo (Shamon Brown Jr). The core elements are all there: turtles, ooze, a rat that teaches them martial arts, and some bad guys that need to get beat up by ninjas. This time around, the villain is Superfly (Ice Cube), who is another mutant with a similar origin story to the turtles and has grown up without a father figure like Splinter (Jackie Chan). As a result, he has gone down a bad path and puts together a plan to see mutants supplant humans as the dominant species on Earth.

The story is pretty simple and the plot doesn’t do much of anything particularly new or interesting with the Ninja Turtles. Where Mutant Mayhem does stand out is its characters, specifically the Ninja Turtles themselves. While they are, as the title tells us, supposed to be teenagers, they are most often portrayed in both live-action and animation by adults. Here, the Turtles are voiced by actual teenagers, and that decision makes a difference. They really feel like kids for possibly the first time ever. 

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem has an excellent voice cast that truly enhances the film.

This isn’t just the right choice from a voice acting perspective, but it’s a necessary element of the story being told. While the Ninja Turtles have all been trained in martial arts (in this case, apparently from old VHS tapes and the internet), they’ve never actually used their skills in a real fight before we meet them. So when they get thrust into the action trying to help human teen April O'Neil (Ayo Edebiri), they have to learn by doing and screwing up.

This contributes to Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem being one of the funniest in the franchise. The Ninja Turtles were designed as a parody of the dark gritty comics of the late ‘80s and ‘90s, and as such, they haven’t always been able to simply cut loose and be funny. But these Turtles are hilarious as they try to navigate the human world –a difficult enough task for any teenager, never mind one that is also a turtle.  

Having said that, it’s the grown-ups that appear to be having the most fun in Mutant Mayhem. Jackie Chan, playing the overprotective Splinter, is a particular stand-out. We know Chan can do comedy in live-action as well (well, almost as well) as he can do action, but his comic timing is absolutely perfect here playing the overprotective dad who tries too hard. Ice Cube as the villain Superfly is also perfectly cast. The physical character, a mutated housefly, doesn’t exactly give a lot of opportunity for showing emotions physically, so the voice work has to do a lot, and it does.

The Ninja Turtles animation style is unique, but it may not be for everybody. 

In addition to not seeing the Ninja Turtles quite this way before from a character perspective, we’ve also never seen them look like this from an animation perspective. Mutant Mayhemart style is unique, though the rule-breaking style has clearly been inspired by Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse. It’s not quite the look of a comic book in motion, but it’s very highly stylized in a way that makes the animation look almost claymation-like at points. It’s certainly not forgettable, but I found that the style gets a little messy during moments of extreme high action, making it hard to follow.

Mutant Mayhem’s themes get muddled, so the movie’s most emotional moments don’t hit as hard.

The other place where Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem gets a little muddy is in its themes. The film’s primary message is one of acceptance, as the Turtles' primary goal is to be accepted by the human world. The turtles' method of being accepted, flies (pun intended) directly in opposition to that of Superfly, leading to the conflict. Several other characters have their acceptance storylines to be dealt with as well. 

This makes it all a little confusing when what is supposed to be the big emotional payoff moment for the Turtles is neither directly related to, nor in opposition to, this idea. It makes what are supposed to make the movie’s most emotional moments not hit as hard as they otherwise would. The dialogue also gets a little ham-handed when it comes to characters announcing their various epiphanies, but this is a movie designed to be enjoyed by kids, so we can give that a pass. 

I will always have a soft spot for the original Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles animated series, as well as the first live-action movie, as it’s the stuff that I grew up on. And while there are many very clear and obvious ways that it could be argued that Mutant Mayhem is superior, from technical skill to characterization, I certainly haven’t found a new favorite Ninja Turtles movie. But anybody being introduced to the Ninja Turtles for the first time with this movie is likely to become a fan.