'Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem' review -- lively and lovely reboot

Aug. 4—You can't keep a good turtle down — or at least not four specific young male turtles.

It's hard to fathom, but the "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles" franchise stretches back just shy of four decades, pals and comic authors Kevin Eastman and Peter Laird dreaming them up in November 1983 and getting them on the page the following year. The quartet of highly skilled, good-natured and pizza-loving heroes — Leonardo, Michelangelo, Raphael and Donatello — would go on to star in animated TV series, movies, video games and even a stage musical.

That's a lot of "cowabunga," dude.

We get more (if not that word specifically) in "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem," a reboot headed for theaters this week that undoubtedly will draw endless comparisons to the "Spider-Verse" films thanks to its street-art animation style.

And, no, neither the looks nor the storytelling of "Mutant Mayhem" reaches the heights of 2018's amazing "Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse" or its even more spectacular sequel, "Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse," which began dazzling audiences in late May.

The visually astounding 'Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse' manages to improve on 2018's first impressive chapter — Movie review

That said, this new spin on the "TMNT" formula DOES look pretty darn good and IS consistently entertaining, a mix of the family-friendly irreverence and heartfelt moments representative of the franchise at its best.

An origin story with a prologue set 15 years before the main story, "Mutant Mayhem" quickly enough introduces us to this version of the fab four: Michelangelo (Shamon Brown Jr., "The Chi"), Raphael (Brady Noon, "Good Boys"), Donatello (Micah Abbey, "Cousins for Life") and Leonardo (Nicolas Cantu, "The Walking Dead: World Beyond"), whose leadership is a work in progress.

On this night they are on an important mission: to, um, acquire groceries — including Go-Gurt and a family-size bag of Doritos — without any humans seeing them. Their adoptive father, Splinter (Jackie Chan) — a giant rat who, like them, was created by a scientist's power "ooze" — has taught them a resentful diatribe about humans that one of them notes is "objectively problematic."

Splinter mostly prefers to keep them hidden and safe in their home within the sewers of New York City. However, they are teenagers, and they dream of having more, including, you know, attending high school.

They encounter a teenage female, April O'Neil (Ayo Edebiri, "The Bear"), and take the opportunity to try to be heroes after her scooter is stolen while she is conversing with them. It takes the turtles a minute to get their heroics going in a positive direction, but soon they are working with April, a high school journalist working on a story about a criminal who goes by Superfly wreaking havoc in the city.

Of course, Superfly (an enjoyable Ice Cube) proves to be a giant fly, a maniacal insect leading another a gang of mutants who include Leatherhead (Rose Byrne), Ray Fillet (Post Malone), Mondo Gecko (Paul Rudd), Wingnut (Natasia Demetriou), Rocksteady (John Cena) and Genghis Frog (Hannibal Buress).

Stopping them will take more than the combined efforts of the turtles and April, and all the mutants need to be wary of Cynthia Utrom (Maya Rudolph), a government operative with a mysterious agenda.

While it delivers in terms of action and adventure, "Mutant Mayhem" ultimately works because Leo, Raph, Donnie and Mikey are a fun hang. These are likable and relatable teens even as they walk the earth as turtles carrying swords, staffs and the like.

That this works as a teen romp is hardly surprising given that the film is produced and co-written by pals Evan Goldberg and Seth Rogen, who also voices the mutant Bebop and has been a "TMNT" fan since age 5. Among the pair's successful projects are 2007's "Superbad" and 2019's "Good Boys," both of which capture the adolescent-male experience at different phases.

And then there's director Jeff Rowe, the co-writer and -director of the impressive 2021 animated adventure "The Mitchells Vs. the Machines," which also dealt with familial themes while filling the frame with visuals that wow.

With some of the credit belonging to production designer Yashar Kassai ("The Mitchells Vs. the Machines"), the film's aforementioned visual style lends a ton of personality to the film even as, again, it brings to mind the Spider-Verse.

Co-written by Dan Hernandez, Benji Samit, Rowe, Goldberg and Rogen — with all but Hernadez getting a story-by credit — the movie could do a better job of establishing the differences in personality among the turtles earlier than it does. That is, obviously, a minor gripe.

Another: Chan's Splinter. On paper, casting the martial arts movie star as the turtles' master makes a lot of sense, but the voice performance by the "Rush Hour" star feels distractingly out of place

The rest of the voice work is, at the very least, solid, with Cantu, Edebiri and Rudd emerging as the standouts.

As the credits begin to roll, stay seated for a tease of a sequel, which already has been green-lit, as has an animated series designed to feature adventures set between the big-screen affairs.

More of these Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles? Dude, cowabunga.

'Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem'

Where: Theaters.

When: Aug. 2.

Rated: PG for sequences of violence and action, language and impolite material.

Runtime: 1 hour, 39 minutes.

Stars (of four): 3.