Before you lose your mind, consider that this might actually be a pretty cool move.
I know, it’s hard. We all like to raise hell when it comes to people taking dumps over beloved characters with reboots, especially when the person doing the dumping is Michael Bay. So it’s especially hard to think that any news regarding Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles could be good news – even if Bay (maybe) barely had any role in the decision at all – but this could be the exception.
Consider what the turtles are: a fun-loving, joking group of pizza-eating ninjas. Rarely do they take things too seriously. Johnny Knoxville is a fun-loving, joking guy who doesn’t take much seriously (and probably loves pizza). So after being announced as the new voice of Leonardo in the upcoming TMNT, it kind of makes perfect sense (sorry, Pete Ploszek).
Weirdly enough, so too does the inclusion of Tony Shalhoub (you know, Antonio Scarpacci from Wings!) of Splinter.
Naturally, no one seemed to like the first trailer of the movie very much, but that is to be expected. It has every opportunity to not be great, even though we should take a step back and realize that a live-action movie involving the turtles is something we’ve wanted for so long and now finally have.
But we live in a world where you can’t annihilate treasured pop culture icons of the past, and that appears to be Michael Bay’s sole purpose in life.