With new management at Paramount, one of the studio’s most venerable franchises is under new management. Neal H. Moritz, of Fast and Furious and Sonic the Hedgehog fame, is taking the helm of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles franchise, with the ultimate aim of making a new live-action movie for the first time in a decade. Unfortunately, that’s bad news for the R-rated take on the franchise that had previously been in the works.
According to reports, the studio wants to replicate Moritz‘ success with the Sonic franchise, which brought the video game icon to life and is now on its third film (and one Paramount+ spin-off miniseries) and counting. That means bringing the Turtles back to the big-screen in family-friendly form, which means that The Last Ronin, an R-rated post-apocalyptic series based on the acclaimed TMNT comic book series of the same name, has been shelved, although a revival at a laster date is possible. The franchise has already seen some upheaval from the Paramount merger; Tales of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, a spin-off of 2023’s animated hit film Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem, has been cancelled, with its final batch of episodes set to premiere on Paramount+ next month. However, a theatrical sequel to Mutant Mayhem is still set to hit theaters on September 17, 2027.
What Other Live-Action Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Movies Are There?
Leonardo, Michelangelo, Raphael, and Donatello first hit the big screen in 1990; brought to life by a team of skilled stunt performers and Jim Henson‘s Creature Shop, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles was, at the time, the biggest independently released film in cinema history, raking in $202 million USD on a paltry $13 million budget. Two sequels soon followed, 1991’s Secret of the Ooze and 1993’s TMNT III; after disappointing returns and the gradual fading of Turtlemania, the live-action franchise ended there. It would be a decade before they returned to live-action, albeit with CGI Turtles, in 2014’s Michael Bay-produced Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Despite some controversial takes on the franchise, it was a hit, bringing in $485 million against a $125-150 million budget. A 2016 sequel, Out of the Shadows, introduced popular characters like Bebop and Rocksteady, Baxter Stockman, and Krang, but it was a financial disappointment, prompting Paramount to return the franchise to the world of animation.
The creations of Kevin Eastman and Peter Laird, the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles debuted in the independently published black-and-white comic of the same name in 1984. In addition to kicking off a massive black-and-white comics boom, the characters made a fortune in action figures, TV cartoons, and merchandise. Eastman sold his share of the franchise to Laird in 2000, and Laird sold the whole thing to Viacom, which is now Paramount, in 2009.
A new live-action Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movie is in the works, but the R-rated The Last Ronin film has been shelved for now.
via Collider