Michael Bay. He's taken Transformers. He's taking Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. So why not just give him this lot, too?
A couple of weeks ago, Michael Bay caused the internet to erupt (again) in clammy nerd rage (again) with his choice of words regarding the new Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movie his company, Platinum Dunes, is making.
The exact quote? “These turtles are from an alien race. And they're going to be tough, edgy, funny and completely loveable”. It did not go down well with many people.
For me, the Transformers films turned my favourite 80s toy advert into a messy, badly told joke of which the punch line seemed to be: screw you, fans! And now Mr Bay seemed to be turning his personal vendetta against my childhood to my beloved pizza obsessed amphibians. I don’t remember killing any members of his family, so why was he doing this to me?
Fortunately DoG’s resident Turtle guru, Matt Edwards, was on hand for a quick Twitter chat, and we ascertained that it was probably a case of Bay flapping his lips without proper supervision from his brain. A further comment from director Jonathan Liebesman seemed to compound our thoughts. In a quote eerily reminiscent of the aforementioned chat he said “Look, it's so funny—if everyone was such a die-hard fan, they would know that the TCRI canisters where the ooze comes from. That is alien ooze.”
With these words, the healing process began.
Terrible Transformers movies and alien-Turtle threats aside, I’m not a Bay-hater. In the world of film there’s plenty of room for his brand of cinematic action porn. A world in which drama equals explosions, character development means running away from explosions in slow motion, and character motivation boils down to ‘should I cause this explosion?’
So, to show my affection for Mr Bay, I decided to put together a list of 80s cartoon series that I would be happy – nay, excited - for him to bring to the big screen.
DINO-RIDERS
M.A.S.K. was what happened in the 80s when toy and animation companies saw the success of G.I. Joe and Transformers and thought ‘they are making money, we like money!’
From such thinking, M.A.S.K. was born, a thinly veiled amalgamation of the previously mentioned shows, which astonishingly wasn’t as good as either. The curiously monikered Mobile Armored Strike Kommand (M.A.S.K. for short) had transforming vehicles and was led by a chap called Matt Trakker in a war against V.E.N.O.M (Vicious Evil Network of Mayhem), a collection of villains so stupid they had the words vicious, evil and mayhem in their name.
While the cartoons will never go down in history for their stories, they were exciting enough, and featured colourful characters in transforming vehicles trying to blow each other up, which is all you needed as a child of the 80s.
Bay could clearly run with this concept, get rid of V.E.N.O.M. or at least give them an actual goal, make it grittier and more realistic, a nice mix of CGI and practical effects, lots of car chases and of course explosions. How could Bay not make that great? How? How?
Leave your further suggestions for Michael Bay projects in the comments below…
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