Here’s the first official trailer for TMNT Smash Up, fresh out of E3. The gameplay looks pretty fun, but the design looks like a smash up of the 2007 TMNT film and the modern animated series. I don’t see much of an opportunity for additional characters, but I guess we’ll find out in the fall.

It turns out that TMNT Smash-Up isn’t the only new TMNT game coming out this year. Ninja Pizza just broke the news that there is a 3D remake of the classic Turtles In Time game in the works. A couple playable levels are traveling around with the TMNT Party Wagon on their 25th Anniversary tour! It looks like they’re basically just recreating the game with modern graphics, and even keeping the awesome music!

Image from Ninja Pizza

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Image from TMNT25.com

As I obviously predicted the other day, Mirage announced a new live action Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movie today. The part that surprised me is that it is actually going to be actors and stunt men in suits with CG face replacement, much like they’re doing with the new Where the Wild Things Are movie (that is produced by the same guy as the new TMNT movie). Peter Laird announced this on his blog, and I was pretty happy about that.

The film is going to use the original comics as inspiration and the film will be a origin story, so this could be the Batman Begins of Turtledom. This is all very cool, especially since 2011 isn’t really that far away, and even if the world does in in 2012 we’ll at least get to see a new live action Turtles movie before we all blow up.

Here are some quick suggestions to Mirage and Legendary Pictures on how to make this movie awesome for new audiences and us 20-something bloggers that grew up with the TMNT.

• Don’t try to get super famous people for all the voices – I don’t want to hear Seth Rogen as Raphael or Jonah Hill as Michelangelo. Corey Feldman did a good job as Donatello though, and he needs work.
• Don’t be afraid to embrace the wild sci-fi elements of the comics – We won’t mind at all if you have Fugitoid, Mousers, or even teleportation and Triceratons. Think of how wacky Star Wars is if you really think about it.
• Don’t evoke the so called “style” of Sin City, 300, and The Spirit – It’s annoying, and in a few years will not be relevant anymore.

It sounds like the planets are aligning a little for this one, so lets hope it turns out amazing. Also, since I’ve got a couple years, I’m going to set a crazy goal right here on Saturday Morning Central. Somehow, I’m going to be at the premier of this movie in 2011.

All the more reason for you to keep reading SMC for two years, to be continued!

Thanks to the modern wonder that is Twitter, today I was introduced to an awesome artist named Alex Deligiannis. He works on The Fairly Odd Parents, creates comics, and is a huge Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles fan. He has a blog called Stay Tooned, and today he posted his version of the classic TMNT character Rocksteady.

He was gracious enough to let me post it here, but be sure to check out his sites and follow Alex on Twitter. I don’t know about you, but I’d love to see his interpretations of Krang’s Android Body and Ace Duck.

Now lets all join together and convince him to open an Etsy shop to sell us prints!

I don’t really know why I took a picture of the 25th Anniversary Leonardo next to my
Obama action figure, but thats not important. The important thing is that the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles turn 25 this year, and we all need to spend lots of money on them so they will hang still be around for a few more years. It would be pretty cool to be “writing” about the 50th Anniversary of the TMNT in 2034 on my new iBrain chip, or watching new TMNT movies in glorious HD Holovision.

Anyway, what better way to celebrate the toys of your past then duplicating them exactly and charging $8.99 for them? If I had kids, I’d be living vicariously through them and forcing them to play with these instead of Pokemon or Big 10 or whatever it is that kids play with these days.

So anyway, I bought a Leonardo, took it home, and got out 80s Michelangelo in the box to compare. The boxes are pretty similar, except with the new ones they didn’t want to print cards specific to the figures, so they just made one generic card. This means the back does not have an ID card for the character, which was always my favorite part of the packaging. Another thing its missing is Pizza Points. NO PIZZA POINTS? WTF?

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