"Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles" Co-Creator Kevin Eastman Says Nickelodeon Movies' Upcoming Brand New "Ninja Turtles" Movie "Easily The Best"

From MTV News USA on the official MTV USA website, MTV.com:

'Ninja Turtles' Creator Deems New Movie 'Easily The Best'

'Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles' writer and artist Kevin Eastman tells MTV at Comic-Con that he fully supports Michael Bay's reboot.

Kevin Eastman; Photo: MTV GeekSAN DIEGO — What's going to happen with Michael Bay's planned [Paramount Picture and Nickelodeon Movie] "Ninja Turtles" reboot? That's the question we've been asking ourselves ever since the project's release date was delayed six months and rumors blamed that bump on initial fan backlash. But "Ninja Turtles" has supporters in high places, and it turns out that the delay might have been an intentional move by Paramount.

[SDCC 2012: Kevin Eastman Talks 'TMNT'; Click here to watch MTV News USA's interview with Kevin Eastman, the co-creator of "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles", recorded at San Diego Comic-Con International 2012 [video only available to view in the USA]]

Our friends over at MTV Geek have been busy hosting day-long live streams, bringing some great comic book-related material from Comic-Con to viewers at home. They sat down with comic book writer and artist Kevin Eastman, best known for co-creating "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles" with Peter Laird. Among other things, Eastman talked about the "Ninja Turtles" movie that is yet to be and why it has him excited.

"From what I've seen, it's easily the best 'Turtle' movie yet," Eastman said. "We're talking 'Raid: Redemption'-style fight scenes; we're talking about epic 'Rise of the Planet of the Apes' sort of effects."

He said that it's "still to be discussed" whether "Ninja Turtles" is going to use motion-capture suits on its titular heroes, but did confirm that the pushed-back release date was not caused by Paramount's unhappiness with the project.

"A lot of people are worried we pushed the release date from December to May, but the 30th anniversary of the 'Turtles' is in May, so it worked out perfectly," Eastman said.

Last we heard, the plan for this reboot was to ditch the "teenage" and "mutant" elements of the story and have these "Ninja Turtles" be aliens from space. The rest of the plot will be familiar to fans of the series, but there was a very negative initial backlash to the news that these turtles would differ significantly from what we're used to. It's unclear whether that will still be the case now that Paramount is doing more work on the story concept.

Eastman, who has obviously been close to the franchise for decades, said change isn't always a bad thing. Instead of being peeved by the way Bay and company are changing his source material, he's embracing it.

"I know that Michael and his group really like that and that Paramount was supportive of that, so I think that it's great," he shared. "I grew up reading 'Captain America' and 'The Avengers' and all that stuff, and over the course of the comic book history, since 'Avengers' has been around, how many times has it been reinvented, reformatted, restructured, replatformed?

"Every person that's grown up inspired by that material wants to put their stamp on it a little bit. It just keeps getting better and better, and to have that opportunity is pretty awesome."

Also, from Total Film:

Ninja Turtles co-creator says new reboot is the best yet

Michael Bay's ill-received project gets Kevin Eastman's backing

Ever since Michael Bay announced that his production company were backing a reboot of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, fans have been merrily putting the boot into what seems generally regarded as a totally unnecessary undertaking.

The main problem seems to be with Bay's announcement that the backstory will be tweaked to recast the Turtles as alien beings rather than mutated reptiles. However, director Jonathan Liebsman was quick to reassure fans of the story's authenticity, claiming, "Whatever mythology we’re building on or expanding is coming from that guy, Kevin Eastman’s head, who created the Turtles in the first place."

Eastman was one of the co-creators of the original comic-book characters and now he too has had his say on the forthcoming reboot. And what do you know? It turns out he's all for it.

“From what I’ve seen, it’s easily the best Turtle movie yet," Eastman told MTV. "We’re talking Raid: Redemption-style fight scenes; we’re talking about epic Rise Of The Planet Of The Apes sort of effects.”

“I know that Michael and his group really like [the changes] and that Paramount was supportive of that," he continues, "so I think that it’s great. I grew up reading Captain America and The Avengers and all that stuff, and over the course of the comic book history, since Avengers has been around, how many times has it been reinvented, reformatted, restructured, replatformed?”

Even so… Turtles from space? As the script is still being written no release date has currently been set, allowing plenty more time for increasingly frantic studio reassurances that "everything is going to be okay, honest". Anyone believe them?

Source: MTV

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