TEENAGE MUTANT NINJA TURTLES II: THE SECRET OF THE OOZE (1991)

 

PHENOMENALITY: *marvelous*
MYTHICITY: *poor*
FRYEAN MYTHOS: *adventure*
CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTIONS: *cosmological*

On watching the first two TURTLES live-action flicks, I see that they anticipated the pattern of nineties BATMAN movies. The  BATMAN franchise got two good films done before the pinheads in marketing ruined the franchise by insisting that violent superhero films ought to be more vanilla in order to avoid offending parents. The TURTLES franchise got one tolerable movie with barely anything like "real violence." Nonetheless, immediately the same kind of people who turned down the first movie for distribution put on pressure to make the terrible terrapins even more limited in their capacity for carnage. Thus Movie Number Two-- OOZE, for short-- avoids having the heroes use their signature weapons for the most part, fighting with fists and feet only. 

Behind-the-scenes meddlers are almost certainly the reason the script went awry as well. The first movie's script was largely the product of one Todd W. Langen, credited with almost totally rewriting a rejected script by a Bobby Herbeck. Langen must have been largely responsible for keeping the jokes under control and injecting other complementary emotions, like fear for loved ones or romantic aggravations. But in OOZE the four Turtles become four joke-machines, without even the minimal distinction between their respective characters.

In addition, all the support-characters suffer accordingly. Casey Jones is omitted, and there is much less for both Splinter and April O'Neil (now played by Paige Turco) to do. Shredder returns from his untimely death at the end of the first film, but his conflicted relationship to Splinter, the one who witnessed his first criminal deed, is gone. In the old Shredder's place is just a standard villain seeking revenge on the heroes. His vengeance is now possible because Shredder (now played by Francois Chou) obtains a supply of the evolution-enhancing drug known as Ooze, the thing responsible for changing Splinter and his four "sons" into humanoids.

In fact, the film's only plotline concerns Shredder using the Ooze to create two new animal-humanoids whom the Turtles can only defeat with strategy rather than martial might. Originally these two hard-hitting mutations were going to be versions of two characters from the TV cartoon, but the owners of the franchise prevented that, resulting instead in two new monster-pawns.

There are two new characters. One is Keno, a martially skilled young man who becomes a Turtle-ally, but though actor Ernie Reyes Jr. displays genuine fighting-abilities, as an actor he's dull as dirt. In contrast, there's also a goodguy scientist named Perry, also a Turtle-ally, and though his lines aren't that great, actor David Warner delivers them with great panache, making him the standout performer of this bland outing.

The spongy plot could be forgiven if the jokes were any good, but most of them are predictable and pedestrian. And not only has the violence been made more vanilla, the producers' devotion to that ideal is shown by their inclusion of a long "ninja rap" song by none other than... Vanilla Ice.