One would think that the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles are a pretty straightforward concept. You’ve got four brothers with distinct personalities, they’re ninjas and turtles. They like to party and they fight the Shredder. Rinse, repeat, cowabunga.

But for whatever reason, current rights holders Paramount, just like New Line Cinema and others before them, feel the need to keep reinventing the wheel when it comes to the heroes in a half-shell. So we really shouldn’t be surprise to hear that a new live-action Turtles movie is in the works, just two years after the animated hit Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem. And it’s all Sonic the Hedgehog‘s fault.

According to The Hollywood Reporter, “multiple sources say Paramount wants to “Sonic-fy” the TMNT franchise,” which is why the studio has hired Sonic the Hedgehog producer Neal H. Moritz to produce the Turtles movie. “If you want Sonic, you go to the guy who did Sonic,” said an unnamed source.

On one hand, it’s easy to see why Paramount would make this move. The Sonic the Hedgehog franchise, which currently consists of three films with a fourth on the way, has been incredibly succesful for the studio. And that’s with an IP that has had no movie presence before 2020.

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles have been a much more constant presence on the big screen. Their 1990 film was an indie hit and has only become more beloved over the decades, even if the two follow-ups failed to carry the same momentum. A 2007 animated film failed to revive the movie franchise, even if television series and video games kept the turtles alive in some form. The 2012 Michael Bay produced live-action movie made good money at the box office, but was reviled by fans and critics alike, so much so that the much better follow-up Out of the Shadows (2016) flopped.

All of which brings us to 2023’s Mutant Mayhem. Directed by Jeff Rowe, from a story that Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg wrote with Rowe and Brendan O’Brien, Mutant Mayhem gave us actual teenage turtles. Voiced by a cast of young adolescents, who recorded their lines together to give the movie an improvised and chaotic feel, Mutant Mayhem captured the teen energy that the franchise has always promised.

Mutant Mayhem received strong reviews from critics and earned $180.5 million on a budget of $70 million, spawning both a television spinoff Tales of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and a sequel. But the new live-action movie announcement comes just after the cancelation of the series after its second season, which will debut on December 12, 2025. The sequel film is currently still in development, but one cannot help but wonder if the live-action movie will push it out of production.

All of which raises a question: what, exactly, does Paramount want from the Ninja Turtles? One gets the sense that not even they know. And as long as the Turtles themselves get to keep partying and eating pizza, they’re probably not too worried about it.

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