Director FINALLY Comments On TMNT Aliens Issue
 

As I said, I think this deserves its own thread, because this is the first time the actual director, Jonathan Liebesman, has commented. I think a lot of people will calm down, sort of:

http://collider.com/jonathan-liebesm...erview/154499/

Hinting at motion-capture? I would be very pleased with that.

EDIT: You can merge or get rid of this thread. Sorry.

Can't say I'm shocked, I figured Bay was either not fully informed or just taken totally out of context.

Good find though man.

So we have confirmation that the Utroms will likely be the alien race the turtles are from. If this is the case then I guess everything is fine.

Although I bet Krang will be in the movie now.

It was kinda weird how he was talking like the script isn't even done yet.

Slighty more reassuring. Never really gave too much thought in what Bay said. Though I doubt this bit of news will get noticed and quell the fan rage.

Nothing will stop people hating on Bay. This alien talk will likely continue right up until Christmas 2013.

Other interesting notes: Filming in September possibly (hopefully they start sooner), and the movie could be shot in Canada.

Whoops, meant to say this will not get noticed and people will still rage because Micheal Bay is still attached to the project.

I hate being a newbie.

Now I am curious what characters will be involved and who will be cast as April and Casey... if both characters are used. I am just glad we can move on to people complaining about something else in this section. I am less concerned with the rest of the internet :tlol:

as expected

FYI - sounds like this is the route they will be going for realizing the Turtles on screen. Wow....just can't wait! This is going to be a MONSTER of a movie, if they do it right. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XM9Pvfq1KhE

His comments put my mind at ease way more than anyone else talking about the movie. He seems to be pretty knowledgeable and passionate so let's hope he has the directing skills and a solid script to back everything up.

It feels really good to know. They've got my full attention now.

I wonder if people are seeing what they want to see in this interview. He isn't saying anything different than Bay at all, he's just saying it a lot more diplomatically. He's not even saying they're not aliens, he's basically just going, "There is SOME PRECEDENT for alien stuff with Turtle origins" and then goes on to... you know... not say that they're not aliens. If anything, what he's saying could be an attempt at a rationalization for making them such.

The good news is that he seems to confirm that things are still early enough along that their origin in the film could be changed. So yeah, you can bet all the scuttlebutt going on online will probably give them pause about alien plans, and apparently it's not too late for them to change gears on it.

Okay, I feel better now. The ooze is alien, which leads me to believe the Utroms may at least be referenced in the film. They will be pet turtles who get mutated. That's more like it! And if WETA gets on boards along with Andy Serkis, then we're in for a treat. If they use them and the story is good along with the action, then we will probably get a sequel, maybe in spawn into a new trilogy.

This is certainly a "no f*cking duh" kinda moment.

He doesn't say that anywhere in the interview. Not even the existance of any ooze. He's only pointing out the Mirage origin as a rationalization for the "the Turtles are from an alien race" comment while not addressing it directly. In fact, in the next breath he pretty much says they don't even know what the origin is yet.

To me:

"the expansion will be true to the mythology"

Means something, somehow I don't think turning the guys into aliens is very true to the mythos of what the Turtles is in pretty much any fashion.

I had a feeling it had to do with the Utroms and nothing else. He may not have said out and out that they aren't aliens, but his comments lead me to believe that it involves the Utroms and that it references the ooze that mutates the Turtles.

Yeah, that's pretty much what I understood.

As I've said before Bay's words were very deliberate that if the turtles are not aliens in the script he clearly meant to give off that impression to cause controversy, so in that respect he got exactly what he wanted.

His vague reaction to the controversy his comment caused and Liebsman's slighttly reassuring but still not confirming anything bares this out for me.

If however it really was a mistake on Bay's part then I'd say it's troubling that the guy producing and has so far been the public face of the movie doesn't know the very basics of the franchise and thus probably deserved the reaction.

Either way it's not like the guy was liked even before this.

Nice find I feel much better about the movie now and especially since Kevin Eastman is working along side the Director it should be incredible. December 25th 2013 couldnt arrive any faster :tmad:

That was my first thought I am glad I didn't get to excited over it and my first instincts were correct :)

Well, this is cool. I feel more comfertable about the movie now.

This is good news indeed. At least the director has knowledge of or has read some Mirage books. Plus, the way he talked about Kevin Eastman made me more comfortable...could be premature, but I think we're going to get an awesome film...

I think Andrew's right that the way he sounded was like the script wasn't even done yet - I think this alien origin, if there was one, is going to be going through some changes because of the outrage it caused. If it's true, I'm proud!

Turtles Director talks about Alien Hubbub
 

Yeah, it even made my local paper with his comment about it. I guess this really has caused a firestorm. I am not worried about this though. Bay is but one person in a whole mess of people invovled in TMNT now. It would be nice if we can learn who exactly makes decisions Ninja Turtles-wise or who exactly is assigned to oversee the property.

Interesting article, but it really doesn't shed any light on the alien controversey. Though as long as they don't do or say anything to add more fuel to the fire, hopefully things will turn out okay.

looks like Eastman is working close with this. I wonder how much involvement they had when the 1st movie (and sequals) were being released.

The article said one of the original creators is working close on the project. That told me without saying it that the person in question was Kevin Eastman. I wonder why he decided to associate himself with it again after he went to all the trouble of selling Peter his half of the franchise? I do recall Kevin being the one to green light Venus so I don't know if he learned his lesson with that or will embrace and try to sell the alien angle.

Take a look at Peter's blog. It should have the answers. Quite a bit I would say on TMNT I and while not as much on II and III that determined the direction amd some plot points. TMNT of course Peter had a heck of a lot of say.

I love how the first sentence is attacking the fans' outrage by saying, "Any idiot knows the ooze is of alien origin..." True, but just because the ooze is of alien origin doesn't mean that hearing the words "These Turtles are from an alien race" won't give fans pause. There's a difference between the ooze being from an alien race and the Turtles themselves being from an alien race.

Andrew's right, I think as much is being read into this as was read into the Bay comment. He didn't come out and say Bay misspoke, he just said, "Well the ooze was alien so..."

This does take the edge off, a little, and hopefully it'll quail some of the Anit-Bay anger this whole fiasco has generated, but I'm still very cautiously optimistic. I mean, we Turtle fans have been bitten before.

EDIT: Oh and one more thing, is the whole "We've got Kevin Eastman involved so..." rationale starting to get less and less comforting?

I dont think anything will ever replace TMNT movie 1.

Well,I liked TMNT II a little better personally. While it had Shredder as well I liked seeing the mutants. I would like to have confirmation that Shredder will appear. Any TMNT movie has potential of being great but Shredder being involved makes it all the better!

Sad but true. At least we'll always have that.

2 was my favorite growing up but I burnt myself out on that.

1 as I grew up so did my love for that movie.

I agree TMNT 1 is a masterpiece IMO and will always be my favorite but I welcome as many new movies with the Turtles as they can give us :-)

I think that is what makes me different from Michelangelo and you. I have the same favorite order of favorites of the turtles a,favorite version, favorite episodes and such and it has never changed since I was really little. I guess I know what I like and stick with it. :tgrin:

actually, no he doesn't talk specifically that they don't know yet what the ORIGIN is but what the completed picture of the movie will look like..at least that's what his words aresaying to me...AND what he says about michael bay in that little sentence is:we shouldn't take for granted that what michael bay/any one person is saying right now about this film is giving a clear picture about what the film will be in the end because this is filmmaking and they don'T know it a hundered procent yet either at this stage of the process...
sorry, don't want to piss on all your comments here but just read some of them here, then checked out the interview myself and found this thing where Ithink your missinterpreting his words a little...

I was all prepared to type up a response but can't find words that say it any better than you do. 100% agree.

(Also: I'm kinda drunk, so there's that.)

I guess that's not untrue. He's basically saying exactly this:

"Look, Turtle fans, we don't know for sure if the Turtles are going to be aliens in the movie yet or not but even if they do end up being aliens, fans should know that it wouldn't be too much of a jump since the ooze that mutated them in the Mirage comics was of alien origin. Oh, and Kevin's here."

That's all he's saying. If there is any "hope" to be read in what he's written it's simply that things aren't quite as cemented as we might have thought by this point and things can change... but he isn't saying that they necessarily will, either.