Had the 4th Live Action Ninja Turtles Movie gone ahead how would you feel about it?
 

So reading up on the Ninja Turtles films on IMDB and I found out about what was supposed the premise for the fourth live action Ninja Turtles film. Basically my question is had the movie gone ahead would you have seen it or are you glad they stopped when they did? Personally I don't mind the idea provided its done well but the two other times they did it weren't very good but you never know maybe someday some other person can make this idea work better then what we got before. For those who don't know this was what was supposed to happen in the fourth Ninja Turtles film:

"Kevin Eastman was working on a fourth Ninja Turtles film between 1995 and 1997 titled TMNT: The Next Mutation. In 2012, Heritage Auctions published concept arts showing a fifth turtle named Kirby, but also featured are Fang, Shredder, Spyder, Nano Spyder, Super Shredder, Casey, Talbot, Lawson, Bugman and "Evil April". Peter Laird showed some concept art of the Turtles and Splinter on his blog.

"TMNT: The Next Mutation" was a concept for fourth live-action movie should this third movie prove a success. In this concept the Ooze that transformed the Turtles and Splinter was still in their bodies causing a much more drastic 2nd mutation. Michelangelo's mutation would have gave him a more human appearance allowing him to walk amongst the people of the City. Donatello's mutation would have gave him to have psychic abilities, but have him wear an optic device because his mutation would cause his vision to deteriorate. Raphael's rage would cause him to mutate into a fearsome creature with claws and spikes jutting from his body. Leonardo would have the ability to mutate his skin into different textures. And Splinter would transform into a creature twice his size that he would have limited control over."

I would've had ZERO desire to see that mess!! :o

I would have to agree with rickwj324.

While second mutations or unstable mutations have appeared in the Ninja Turtles franchise before. Particularly with the Red Sky season of the OT series and the 2003 series.

The OT series didn't do the unstable mutation all that well because why was it only the Turtles who had the unstable mutation? Why not anyone else such as Splinter or Rocksteady and Bebop?

The 2003 series however had a good concept for the second mutation/unstable mutation by having Donatello getting attacked by a mutation carrying creature. Then having that be a slow build from there starting with a cold and ending with a Donatello Transforming.

I already heard about this in TMNT: Smash Up.

What a mess! As with the two posters above me, I couldn't imagine keeping up with that! It was already done, and not in the best way, either.

There is no incarnation of the fourth movie that didn't sound utterly horrendous. Though the fourth movie we finally got was pretty ghastly on its own, it's still significantly better than the one bandied about before ("Julie Strain is playing a wacky, evil empress from another dimension!" "the Turtles gain a second set of mutations!" "Kirby the Fifth Wacky Turtle!" "Venus is in it!" blah blah, etc etc).

It would be the "Batman and Robin" of the TMNT movie franchise.

Turtles gaining new mutations, the 5th turtle Kirby, some sort of female sorcery woman...sounds like truly horrible fanfiction.

Had that movie actually happened, the franchise quite possibly might have never recovered.

yeah, that movie would have been atrocious.

Much like The Next Mutation & musical specials, I would have found ways to enjoy it. I'm sure it would be been some sort of massacre, but I'd be lying if I said I wouldn't love to see that concept art realized in foam suits and props. There was some cool stuff being drawn up.

Why does TMNT (2007) get all the hate that it does? I really enjoyed it and thought it was pretty well done. I'd rather see a cgi continuation of that movie than the new Bay film (at least from all the details floating around about it).

Too many plots at once, boring original characters, weird character designs, too much focus on Raph/Leo, Nightwatcher, Karai is a pushover, blah blah blah.

I didn't feel like that at all when watching it. Didn't realize others felt that way. I enjoyed it in the theatre and have watched the blu-ray several times now. Thanks for answering my question though... I had no idea! :twink:

I'm pretty much the same as Powder. It would have been bad, no denying that, but I'd have found something to enjoy in it. TBH if it had come out back in 97/98 I'd have only been 12/13 so it wouldn't have needed to be a masterpiece, as long as it was as good as the OT I'd have been happy to watch it.

To this day I'd still happily pay to read those draft scripts. And, like Powder said, some of the designs are really good. Leo's costume is my favorite version of him and I wish the film had been made just so I could have a figure of that now.

I still would have preferred over what ever the heck the new movie is gonna be.

I'd probably have seen it as a guilty pleasure... :P

I'm with you if pay to read the drafts for this.

Most of the information detailed here was revealed when Eastman sold his scripts/concept art for the 4th movie. I'm guessing this direction was pretty much the way Eastman wanted to do it, but Laird likely disagreed with his vision outside of the whole secondary mutations for the Turtles.
http://comics.ha.com/c/item.zx?saleNo=7059&lotNo=92363
Here's a thread where we were discussing it:
http://forums.thetechnodrome.com/sho...t=33269&page=4

DrSpengler covered some of the various other ideas in this post:
http://tmntentity.blogspot.com/2011/...hat-never.html

I can't imagine why.... I've noticed they seem to have different ideas on what constitutes "good" story ideas.

Interestingly Peter Laird's recently been posting his old April/May 1994 sketchbook on his blog and it features some of the secondary mutation TMNT designs but this time he says they were for the potential "back to basics" vol. 3 that he and Kevin Eastman considered but never did. There were also some 4th movie sketches (Spyder and Kirby). It looks like the new TMNT designs/secondary mutations were being considered for both the movie and the comics and we got neither.

I would still love to have seen this. And if it would have cane out in 95 my ten yr old self would of been all over it.

Even shark jumps can be enjoyable.

The actual artwork I've always thought was great and I've enjoyed this period of Peter Laird putting up other designs from the project. If it were a comic series like an Elseworlds or a storyarc were the turtles temporarily get these powers and then they fade at the end.

For a movie however I would have disliked it.

On another subject Laird has mentioned a few times Vol. 4 was born out of ideas he and Kevin developed together. It's interesting a bit of clarification as to which ideas these were. No question that the execution would be different but it seems we'd still be getting Gamera-Raph and the Utrom first contact.

I would've been all over it and hyped as hell and probably liked it no matter how it turned out. I think almost anyone who would've still been a kid when the fourth movie came out would have had the same opinion and they're lying if they think otherwise. Most of the OT fans from this forum were already a bit grown up when this would've come out so to them they would've have liked it since they were already starting their teens.

if that thing came out i bet u it would be so different whether it was good or not people still wouldnt care.. i think that turtles3 would automatically be merged with the first two as one of the "good ones" when people compare it to this 4th version we have here..

i can already picture people today looking back at those times if this happened:

"f*ck turtles 4 dude it aint got sh*t on the first three!"

i guarantee u this is what we'd all be saying..

Or it would've been compared to the batman quadrilogy and how the first two are the better of the four.

How can you guarantee that?

With all that plot has to offer, none of it seems interesting to me. It's too much at once. And, when they say "Bugman" do they mean the Bugman that appeared in the OT, or a new character with the same name?

I understand that "Bugman" was Michael Dooney's nickname. The character designs I've seen actually bear a resemblance to Dooney's face. I think he was going to be a cyber-punk gang or something: Talbot, Lawson, and "Bugman" Dooney. Yeah...

My 6 year old self would have loved to see this. But then again I'm sure it would have been terrible.

I guess if you enjoy masturbating with sandpaper it could be considered that.

Well, I guess so if those are the only two options available. Can we say "rock and a hard place"?

That's a sad light to cast on the fandom. But probably true of many.

I've actually been thinking about this again today and I'm not sure it would have been as much of a mess as we're all thinking.

Kevin Eastman's auction was for 3 different scripts. We know work began on the 4th film in 1994 and that Kevin and Peter (together and separately) were working on and off on the project through to at least 1998 or there abouts. There were a lot of ideas floating around (secondary mutations, Spyder and the others, Evil April and Kasey, an Evil Empress, other dimensions, return of the Foot and Super Shredder, Kirby the 5th turtle, Venus or no Venus,etc.) but has it ever been confirmed that these were all from the same treatment? Throwing in everything would have been a huge mess but separatly there's at least the potential for some interesting stories.

I'm not saying the ideas are the greatest (and sure speaking now as an adult I'd much prefer to have seen them go down a RTNY/City at War route or Rat King or Triceraton invasion) but they were interesting enough and the concept art certainly makes it appear more ambitious than the CGI movie we finally got.

Would it have been as good as the first? Definitely not. Could the budget and 90s technology have realised the ambitions of the concept art? Probably not. And yeah, maybe it would have been Batman & Robin levels of bad. But you know what, as an adult I may grimace thinking about that film but as a child in 1997 I loved every minute of it. It can't have been any worse than The Next Mutation so it certainly wouldn't have killed the franchise.

When they were "working on it" that just consists of elementary, suggestory designs and "Yes" or "No"s on the scripts. That's it. They had no role in any kind of pre-production.

It was all the same treatment. Only, at a later point, it was decided that it would be massaged to include Venus as well.

In that case I take the last post back. There's no way they could cram all of that into one film and hope for anything even remotely good to come out of it. It's just too much, there's enough there for 2 movies, maybe even 3! Add to that the budget limitations and tech capabilities of the day and they'd be biting off way more than they could chew.

Wouldn't be that much different, really. Instead of the 4 Turtles going on to discover Kirby, the 5th Turtle, it'd be the 5 Turtles going on to discover Kirby, the 6th Turtle and battling the evil Empress of another dimension and all that crap. It's possible the secondary mutations thing would have been dropped once they conceded to make it a NT:TNM continuance, since the whole thing about NT:TNM was "The guys are still mutating!" and that quota would already be filled. Or maybe not.

I wasn't thinking Venus (who I agree could be inserted or removed pretty easily) so much as the whole Kirby/alternate dimension (I'm assuming evil April & Kasey fit in here)/evil empress story plus Spyder and the evil Mirage guys story plus the return of Super Shredder and the Foot story and then the secondary mutations on top of all that. It just seems like they were trying to include too much for one film. They needed to pick one (maybe two) of those and focus on doing it well. No wonder Kevin and Peter kept rejecting the scripts.

It's mind blowing that instead of adapting the comics these were the kind of ideas being set forth for a movie.

Right? Even at the point they were considering this awful movie, there was a multitude of awesome source material to draw from... yet it comes down to crap like, "Oh, we must mutate the Turtles into new stuff, that's the only way we can keep things interesting for the little tykes!" or "We need Kirby, the 5th Turtle!" or extra-dimensional garbage while only further distancing themselves to the Nth degree from the only movie (which was grounded) that was ever received halfway decently -- the first one.

Seriously, Bay if you want to make a good turtles film, make THIS!!!!

Loooooool I dunno about that, guy.

Granted, modern CGI would give this a better chance of not being 100% terrible, it would never work for modern audiences & it's not what TMNT fans want.

...but I'd still be there first day! :trazz: