Turtles III

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle III (nowadays given the subtitle Turtles in Time, which is taken from the second TMNT arcade game) is not a memorable movie. Made in a time when the franchise was low on steam (and before the debut of Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers, a show that would dethrone the Turtles as the top kids' show at the time), TMNT III sees the Turtles going back to Feudal Japan after a scepter April gets Splinter causes her to switch places with Kenshin, a prince who is helping a village in a war against his evil father, Lord Norinaga. A conflict the Turtles actually get caught in as the villagers, led by Mitsu, as they must stop Norinaga and get back to present day New York.

Yeah, this is not a good film, as if I had to choose this or the Michael Bay Turtles as my poison, this would be my choice. New Line and Golden Harvest hire a new company instead of Jim Henson's Creature Workshop to do the Turtle suits, and while they do look like the Turtles, they are a lot different (but not as different as those ogres in turtle shell Michael Bay passes as the turtles). Also, the movie is geared to be more on the goofy side with some action, as the Turtles would spew one -liners (like Mikey imitating Elvis in Blue Hawaii with a lampshade). However, one major improvement over the last film is that the Turtles are now allowed to use their weapons again (after being banned from using them after parents complained about the first film being too violent), and they brought back Elias Koteas in the role of Casey Jones (after the character was replaced by Keno in the second film, another change done because of parental complaints), although he is in the role of babysitter and not involved in the fighting. Also, Splinter, Raph, and Donnie get new voice actors, and they are not good (Splinter got it worst, as he sounds like a horrible attempt at a stereotypical Asian senior).

However, the series does have some good moments (like Raph bonding with Yoshi, a kid Leonardo saves using CPR, and teaching to control his temper) and some good music. While the movie has been known to be bad, nowadays, it is not considered the worst TMNT film (that dishonor goes to TMNT 2014 and TMNT: Out Of The Shadows), but it is an okay film in my book.

Originally when I saw this movie, it had only just come out in theaters and I was just a kid. At the time, I thought the movie was a steaming pile of crap, no where near in comparison tot he first two. Hell, I overlooked the inclusion of Vanilla Ice for YEARS, insisting that even if he was in the second movie, it was still better than the third. However, now that I am older and a touch wiser, I've gone back and watched all three movies (I've been on a serious TMNT-a-Thon ever since I heard a new movie was in the making). While I admit the third is indeed the worst of the three, it is far from the travesty I originally thought (and thought for years). Aside from the silly story and the poor quality turtle costumes, the dialog is given several moments to shine with some surprisingly funny jokes and one-liners and minor giggles. I'm not saying every TMNT fan should go out and buy this. I don't even own it myself. However, I think you should get a few friends together, grab some snacks, some source of caffeine, order a pizza, and rent TMNT III for a night of absurdity and laughs. That's what my friends and I did <3

All in all, this is a fun movie. After the first two TMNT movies, this one breaks with the Shredder theme (fortunately as Shredder seemed about as hard to kill as the first Terminator) and takes the brothers back in time. Warring families in feudal Japan provide the backdrop for teenage Turtle-jinx while Elias Koteas (Casey Jones) displays an enlightening dual role capability. The costumes look more comfortable at the expense of realistic but otherwise, the puns - I mean fun - keeps flowing. If you enjoyed the first two then see this one.

The only thing I feel this movie lacked was Jim Hensons Studio's help. It shows by the cheapness of the Turtles (and especially Splinters) New look. Which actually looks great, but it's not the same material used in the first two. Splinter actually looks fine, but his outer appearance lacks the spirit of the original Splinter. People at Jim Henson Studios must put effort and life into anything they create because most puppeteers create their actual puppets -such was the case with Splinter in the first two. But this was taken out of the third movie...and thus the only thing to back it up would've been another return of Shredder and a good plot.

Sadly any return of Shredder would probably be a bad plot. :( As he did die in the comic book... And since the second story pushed away from the Comic's original storyline....(TGRI was really TCRI...and was run by aliens from outer-space) There was no way a plot that furthered the story would be any good...

unless....they chose the script they chose for this movie. The whole side story in Feudal Japan is it's own movie and this works excellently for the film. The Turtles show up to save April, who has been transported to Feudal Japan by a magic scepter. And of course adventure and comedy is bound to ensue.

Another thing I digged was the character development...which is sometimes sped up sometimes on Michaelangelo, Raphael, Whit, April and Casey's relationship, and Kenshin. However April (by herself), Lord Norinaga, Mitzu, Walker, and Donetello's character development works... (Don's character changes throughout the entire trilogy....first smart mouth, then joker who is a whiz with computers (or starting to be.) then finally Turtle Nerd..."I can't possibly exist without one single microchip?")

Which brings me to one another issue..... Corey Feldman's return was awesome! The second Donatello always annoyed me. I think it was mostly because Corey Feldman made Don his own character and not just the smart guy, but rather a smart guy with a smart-ass mouth. :D Corey's Return is highlighted in the credits and with good reason. He does an excellent job of following up on the second Don's attempt to be a Computer Wiz..

The rest of the cast is great, with the exception of Splinter's new voice actor. He tries... but he is no Kevin Clash. I must comment on Robbie Rist and Brian Touchi. They are Michaelangelo and Leonardo..they surpassed the cartoon voice overs from the cartoon series in the first movie...and they continued with their roles until the end and never faltered. Tim Kelleher is excellent as Rapheal, tho' it would've been nice to have the original voicer of Raph from the first or the second...he makes the role his own and that's actually good! Paige Turco return is surprising as she doesn't look herself in this movie at all. (I thought it was a third April) and this could be seen as good or bad for the film. (She looks like she's acting more like Judith Hoag) and this could be because of Elias Koteas, who is the only actor to return from the original movie. (Actor..the others did voices) 'Course I may be wrong. But his presence helps connect this film with the previous two. We get to see how Casey has changed (or hasn't) in this film since we didn't get to in the first. His appearance as Casey is short but good. He also gets a chance to play a secondary character named Whit who may be Casey's great great great great grandfather.

All and all... a good Turtle Movie on it's own.

The turtles are at it again with their 3rd Turtle movie, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles 3 but unfortunately, it isn't as good as the first two, the first one was a classic and the 2nd one was very good but the 3rd one is fairly dissapointing, the worst thing about this movie is Splinter's voice was awful and going back to time was a cheesy idea, but fortunately Elias Koteas returns as the immortal Casey Jones although he only gets to appear in about 10 minutes of the whole movie and Corey Feldman returns as the voice of Donatello (he couldn't make it to the 2nd one due to heroin addiction).

This movie gets 2 out of 5 stars instead of 1 since this movie does have Casey Jones and it's not a total waste of time.