A shell-shocking saga of mutants, martial arts and New York mayhem, the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles trilogy brought comic book grit, practical effects wizardry and pizza-fuelled fun to a generation of moviegoers, helping turn four sewer-dwelling brothers into global pop culture icons. Launching in 1990 with Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, director Steve Barron's gritty, high-energy adaptation of the underground comic became a box office phenomenon, fusing martial arts action, streetwise humour and the groundbreaking animatronics of Jim Henson's Creature Shop. The 1991 sequel The Secret of the Ooze is an irresistibly fun second slice: a deep-dive into the turtles' origins where new mutant foes Tokka and Rahzar are thrown in the mix. double the stakes, double the pizza! Rounding out the trilogy, 1993's Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles III sends the heroes in a half shell back to feudal Japan in a time-travel adventure full of samurai showdowns, ancient legends and comic chaos.
This was a huge part of my childhood. Secret Of the Ooze may be the first film I have a memory of seeing in a theater. My dad actually enjoyed the TV show so much he would tape it for me and pause the tape during the commercials while recording so I could watch the playback without them. Will absolutely be getting this set.
I haven't watched these in so many years and I can still remember lines. "Cappa? Cappucino? Nah makes me hyper. Lots of cappa." "Ancient...Japanese...demon..." "ohhhhhhhhhhhh"
I saw all of these around when they came out (and my grandmother was fond of reminding me how much she hated sitting through the first one— I had to wait to watch the other two on VHS) but they left no cultural mark on me whatsoever aside from being an IP that was inescapable growing up (video games, the animated series, commercials, etc). Even when I was going through my massive nostalgia rewatches a decade ago, these never even occurred to me to be something I wanted to revisit. But this does seem like a better use of Arrow’s time then some other acquisitions, as I’m fully aware many of my fellow elder millennials do carry a torch for the series
I rewatched the first two last year and came out with the feeling that they’re okay. Better than I expected, but definitely not worth the feverish devotion I gave them at the time.
When they pop out for the freeze frame entrance, the theater went nuts. Apart from that scene, I remember the criminally under used Elias Koteas was a great Casey Jones. Despite being a casual fan, I knew the villains from the 2nd one didn't match up with the TV show. What I know about the 3rd one I only know from Angry Video Game Nerd. I guess I'd watch the first one again, but I'd rather play the arcade game, which for me is peak TMNT. This will surely sell out and go for big bucks on the secondary market.
knives wrote: Thu Aug 14, 2025 9:45 pm
I rewatched the first two last year and came out with the feeling that they’re okay. Better than I expected, but definitely not worth the feverish devotion I gave them at the time.
I really think the first has an incredible amount of depth. Raphael as the nucleus of the story, and him undergoing the sturm und drang of adolescence while simultaneously having to live underground as a superhero is very moving.
Steve Barron was arguably one of the three primary architects of the music video aesthetic, with the others being Russell Mulcahy and Zbigniew Rybczyński. I love Electric Dreams, too
I think the second is so beloved just because of that opening sequence (although the underground club for teens made single-digit me really excited to get older but also weary of hocking packs of cigarettes after all the anti smoking ads I saw).
For me the costume design of the Turtles is the big reason these worked so well in translating the cartoon phenomenon to live action. They perfectly tow that line of being over the top while still feeling like they belong in this version of New York.
I will probably buy this because I was that huge TMNT fan as a kid.
The first TMNT was one of the key films of my childhood, though it took me a while to see it fully. We rented the video when I was 5 but I found it too intense, so we stopped it around the fire scene. I was given the junior novelisation for my birthday that year, which has some marvellous gritty black-and-white photos in it that looked like something from the 50s.
Anyway, I'm 8, it's New Year's Eve 1994 and TMNT is on TV. I start watching it, we get up to the fire scene...then everyone makes me change the channel to Coronation Street! I was guttted...and there is a photo to prove it!
I finally saw the complete film (well, sort of - it was heavily cut by the BBFC AND BBC1 for a morning screening) in December 98 when I was 12, and I loved it! Still do.
The original was the first film I ever saw in a cinema, on Boxing Day 1990 at Norwich Odeon, aged just six. I sent a screengrab of my Executive Producer credit in the Arrow booklet to my long-suffering mum - who took me to that showing as part of a very intense period of Turtlemania, starting from the cartoon's UK premiere on BBC1 (as "Hero Turtles") in January of that year - and it was, unexpectedly, quite an emotional moment.
I'm not remotely part of the target audience for this, although it reminds me of a friend expressing absolute incredulity that I'd never seen The Goonies, to which my response was "Well, I was eighteen when it came out, and it's a kids' film." (And, by all accounts, an exceptionally noisy and annoying American kids' film.)
Although my late father once ended up presiding over a court case involving Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles - I think it was a trademark dispute or some such. Obviously, not being the target audience himself and with offspring who were too old for him to have needed to chaperone them in the cinema, he'd never heard of them, but he was astute enough to be able to foresee mocking tabloid headlines about out-of-touch judges, so he kept quiet and gleaned everything necessary from the evidence.
JamesF wrote: Fri Aug 15, 2025 10:56 am
The original was the first film I ever saw in a cinema, on Boxing Day 1990 at Norwich Odeon, aged just six. I sent a screengrab of my Executive Producer credit in the Arrow booklet to my long-suffering mum - who took me to that showing as part of a very intense period of Turtlemania, starting from the cartoon's UK premiere on BBC1 (as "Hero Turtles") in January of that year - and it was, unexpectedly, quite an emotional moment.
Same for me, first film I ever saw in a theater in New Jersey when I was 3 1/2. My mother claims I was running around the aisles and was annoying enough that she took me out before the movie was over while my grandma stayed to finish it because she "wanted to see how it ended." My somehow less-than-vague memory of it was standing in the aisle and staring at the screen in awe, and every time the picture cut, I would jump. I clearly didn't know what a cut was so I guess in my brain each time the image on the screen changed, I got excited?
I remember liking the original cartoon series of the Teenage Mutant 'Hero' Turtles back in the day, although I think it got mixed together in my childhood memories with Bucky O'Hare.
I'm afraid that the idea of live action Turtles always rather put me off (although these 90s interpretations are nowhere near as upsetting as the mid 2010s Michael Bay ones), and I still have not seen the animated 2007 TMNT film, which I think tied in with the dark and gritty 2000s series. Although the later series were the ones I have really enjoyed (to the extent of buying the series on DVD) in the form of the more recent 2012-17 Nickelodeon CGI Teenage Mutant *Ninja* Turtles series, which was much more humourous but still went off to do space adventures and eventually the mutliverse stuff (long before Marvel were doing it in their films) where our fun loving turtles get thrown together and forced to team up with their cheaply animated 80s counterparts and their 2000s morose and deadly serious versions! And that was followed by the just as good Rise of the Ninja Turtles series from 2018-2020 which kept the comic tone but stuck more to the urban setting - I particularly liked the episode where they blatantly riffed on Five Nights At Freddy's!
So I'm actually more into the Turtles in recent years than I ever was!
I went to see the 35th anniversary screening of the first film at my local Cinemark on Friday, and I must say it held up to and perhaps even surpassed my memories. I hadn’t watched this since elementary school (about 30 years ago), but I really do appreciate the gritty, very 90s indie look of the film. It helps ground the absurdity in a way that makes it believable. I was also still impressed by the puppetry and the turtle costumes. Seeing the martial artists genuinely performing in costume in unbroken takes at the climax makes me (going into geezer mode here) long for the days before Hollywood leaped to CGI for every fantasy film. It was a fun time.
All that said, I will not be picking up this trilogy set. I bought the barebones trilogy Blu-ray set for about $7 at Walmart a few years ago and that will suffice for whatever twinge of nostalgia I feel for these.
I quite like the third film, certainly more than II, though I can see why it was felt to be a let-down at the time as it's basically the Turtles in a historical drama with little sci-fi content and lame villains.
• Brand new 4K restorations of all three films by Arrow Films
• 4K (2160p) Ultra HD Blu-ray presentations in Dolby Vision (HDR10 compatible) of all three films
• Perfect bound collector’s booklet in the style of a Roy’s Pizza menu, featuring new writing on the films by Simon Ward, John Torrani and John Walsh
• Reversible sleeves featuring original and newly commissioned artwork by Florey
• Double-sided foldout poster featuring original artwork from Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and the “Map of the Kappa Realm”, a stylised re-creation of the ancient scroll that appears in Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles III
• Two additional double-sided foldout posters featuring original and newly commissioned artwork by Florey
• Eight character trading cards
• Roy’s Pizza loyalty card
• Four character stickers
DISC 1 – TEENAGE MUTANT NINJA TURTLES
• 4K restoration of the film from the original camera negative by Arrow Films approved by director Steve Barron
• Two lossless stereo mixes (original theatrical mix and alternate “warrior” mix) plus newly remixed Dolby Atmos audio
• Optional English subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing
• Brand new commentary with director Steve Barron
• Brand new commentary with comic book expert and podcast host Dave Baxter
• Rising When We Fall, a newly filmed interview with director Steve Barron
• Turtle Talk, a newly filmed interview with actors Robbie Rist, Brian Tochi, Ernie Reyes Jr and Kenn Scott
• O’Neil on the Beat, a newly filmed interview with actor Judith Hoag
• Wet Behind the Shells, a newly filmed interview with producer Simon Fields
• Beneath the Shell, a newly filmed interview with puppet coordinator and second unit director Brian Henson, and Rob Tygner, puppeteer for both Splinter and Leonardo
• Teenage Mutant Ninja Turf, a newly filmed featurette exploring the film’s locations in New York City and North Carolina
• Alternate UK version with unique footage prepared for censorship reasons, presented in 4K via seamless branching
• Alternate ending from VHS workprint
• Alternate Korean footage
• Theatrical trailers
• Image gallery
DISC 2 – TEENAGE MUTANT NINJA TURTLES II: THE SECRET OF THE OOZE
• 4K restoration of the film from the 35mm interpositive by Arrow Films
• Original lossless stereo audio and optional DTS-HD MA 5.1 surround audio
• Optional English subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing
• Brand new commentary with director Michael Pressman moderated by filmmaker Gillian Wallace Horvat
• John Du Prez to the Rescue, a newly filmed interview with composer of the trilogy John Du Prez
• Hard Cores, a newly filmed interview with Kenny Wilson, mould shop supervisor at Jim Henson’s Creature Shop
• The Secret of the Edit, a newly filmed interview with editor Steve Mirkovich
• Behind the Shells, an archive featurette from 1991
• Theatrical trailer
• Image gallery
DISC 3 – TEENAGE MUTANT NINJA TURTLES III
• 4K restoration of the film from the 35mm interpositive by Arrow Films
• Original lossless stereo audio and optional DTS-HD MA 5.1 surround audio
• Optional English subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing
• Brand new commentary with director Stuart Gillard
• Daimyos & Demons, a newly filmed interview with actor Sab Shimono
• Rebel Rebel, a newly filmed interview with actor Vivian Wu
• Alternate UK opening
• Theatrical trailer
• Image gallery”
