Turtle Power!
Michael Bay's raging ego threatens to destroy Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles:Aliens first, no pizza next?
The story of the universally loved crime fighting Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles is rather simple: A container of radioactive slime gets dropped down into a sewer, coating four baby turtles and a rat. As a result, mutations occur, and they evolve into anthropomorphic beings with human intelligence.
As silly as that may all sound, it was that story that laid the foundation for one of the most successful comic book franchises in history. It explained why these turtles came to trust their master, Splinter, and became their own little tight-knit isolated family of crime-fighting turtles.
An alien race? This begs the question: What’s next? Will Bay switch the team over to a healthier, less pizza-centric diet?
Yet Michael Bay (Bad Boys, Transformers), who is in charge of rebooting TMNT into a new live-action movie, decided to erase everything fans loved and knew about the turtles in just 15 seconds.
At the 2012 Nickelodeon Upfront, Bay said: “When you see this movie, kids are going to believe, one day, that these turtles actually do exist. These turtles are from an alien race and they are going to be tough, edgy, funny and completely lovable.”
An alien race? This begs the question: What’s next? Will Bay switch the team over to a healthier, less pizza-centric diet? Or maybe Bebop and Rocksteady will take on more culturally relevant musical personas like, Indie-folk and Dubstep. April O’Neil will no doubt resort to becoming an easy on the eyes, damsel-in-distress à la Megan Fox’s character in Bay’s Transformers.
When the news surfaced of Bay’s alien plan, the Internet, understandably, did not shout, “Cowabunga!” Bay quickly went into damage control and released a statement on his website, advising fans to “take a breath and chill,” which is practically the worst thing you could say to fans who are already fuming.
Still, the dust hasn’t settled and fans are still left wondering how this “alien race” storyline is going to affect all that they’ve learned about the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle universe. There’s much more than the history of TMNT that’s at stake, too. The title itself doesn’t even seem to apply anymore.
But a clever user on Reddit had a good idea on how to fix that: Teenage Alien Interstellar Ninja Turtles; or T.A.I.N.T for short.
