Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles II: The Secret of the Ooze (1991)

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles II: The Secret of the Ooze has oft been described as so bad it's good. I disagree, as it fits none of the criteria: where are the horrible lines, the bad acting, the abundance of ham and cheese which makes many a bad movie hilarious? Aside from those who have nostalgia for it, Secret of the Ooze is a dull venture: the fight scenes are boring, the characters are uninteresting, and the story feels like only the bare bones of an actual script.

The first TMNT movie was no masterpiece, but it was fun and sported good fight scenes, a dark atmosphere, and gave the characters actual personality. Secret of the Ooze has none of this. Due parents bewailing the violence in the first movie, the fight scenes are toned down considerably, now filled with slapstick that's both uninspired and ridiculous. The grittiness is eliminated altogether, yet the film never really has a light-hearted feel to it either, at least not in the same vein as the enjoyably goofy '87 cartoon. Everything, including the humor, just felt bland.

But what really hurts the movie isn't the slapstick or goofiness: it's the characters. The turtles have become stripped of their individual personalities; each one of them is the same goofy, catchphrase-spewing person (or turtle, if we're going to be technical). Splinter is given little to do, April is given nothing to do save for looking pretty, and Shredder proves to be less threatening than even his '87 counterpart. The new characters, Keno, and the mutant duo of Tokka and Rahzar, prove to be unexciting as well. Now, I was not expecting Shakespeare here, as it is a kids' film after all and one obviously made to milk money, but I at least wanted entertainment, no matter how mindless or contrived it might be. The problem is this isn't mindless entertainment: it's just flat out boring.

So, is there anything entertaining about this film? Well, Shredder's new costume is laughably bad. There's the infamous scene with Vanilla Ice doing his "Ninja Rap". Keno pulls off some cool moves. And... yeah, that's it. Secret of the Ooze fits the description of "meh": it isn't enjoyable, it isn't terrible, and it most certainly isn't bad enough to be good. It's just rushed, mediocre, and isn't likely to inspire repeat viewings.