The turtles have been a cult classic since their appearance on Saturday Morning in the 80’s. There is a special place inside my kid sized heart that will always treasure the phrase “Cowabunga”. And while the newest rendition, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles:Mutant Mayhem, takes some interesting liberties with the Turtle’s lore, it is the first time we see a scene play out the message behind the franchise that we’ve always known to be there. That regardless of how we are treated, we should always do the right thing.
Don’t know if that says something about the next generation needing things spelled out for them (told not shown storytelling), but it's nice that the Turtles now have an Uncle Ben moment.
This time around the filmmakers focused heavily on the teenage aspect of the turtles. While the ninja component is resorted to the ability to make fight scenes look cool, gone is what else is formed from such training, such as honor, wisdom, patience, and self control. Raphael is almost given permission to embrace his anger personality, instead of being a character who wrestles with taming his rage. But this speaks directly to what the filmmakers wanted to highlight. These are teenagers. They are four brothers who make mistakes, struggle with identity, and learn things the hard way sometimes. You know… teenagers.
The film is really a prequel to its title. Though you might not realize it right away, the movie is actually setting up our heroes in a half shell. For the majority of the film we are watching Leonardo, Donatello, Raphael, and Michael Angelo live out a day in the life of a teenager. We are privy to all their outings, banter, and shenanigans. Something they try to hide from their father, Master (not a master in this version) Splinter.
This version of Splinter struggles with his own issues of raising teenagers as a controlling helicopter parent. Splinter’s personality is probably what gets hurt the most by this variation of his origin story. With very little wisdom to offer the boys, Splinter’s main characteristic is his goal of keeping his teenage boys safe. This provides great set-up for Leonardo’s character arc. Out of all the brothers, Leo holds the moral of the story in his heart from the beginning. Even without the proper training, Leo still strives to uphold the values that would have come from it. This echos a passage out of Romans…
Even Gentiles, who do not have God’s written law, show that they know his law when they instinctively obey it, even without having heard it. They demonstrate that God’s law is written in their hearts, for their own conscience and thoughts either accuse them or tell them they are doing right.
Romans 2:14-15 NLT
Leo, who may not fully understand why, has a high regard for honor, respecting his father and himself. He can not lie to his dad about where he and his brothers have been and he confesses to the truth when he is asked, knowing his brothers will be mad at him for doing so. He does the right thing, regardless of how he will be treated.
For the rest of the movie his brothers make fun of him; the consequences of his betrayal. Little jabs and pokes that mock Leo for holding a high standard. You are almost drawn into it yourself as you watch the film, though I doubt the filmmakers were this deliberate. What they might have accidentally or intentionally created is the perfect example of how we wrestle with the presence of righteousness.
Often when we view God’s righteous character displayed it can, as the scripture pointed out, convict us or even affirm within us that we were made to live in God’s image. When we are presented with the reality of our shortcoming of God’s righteousness, we can often lash out. The brothers, knowing in their hearts that Honor should be upheld, focus their guilt on belittling Leo’s actions. By tearing down the very thing that convicted them, they know longer feel the guilt that tells them to change. However, two wrongs don’t make a right and the more they go down this road, the more reconciliation will be need.
Although you can feel affirmed in the moment when you do the right thing, the way others react can eventually get to you. Leo could only take so much and eventually when the opportunity to lie to their dad is presented again, Leo goes along with it. It is hard to uphold righteousness and holiness, especially when you desire to be liked by everyone. Acceptance has its place, but acceptance by whom is important. When we value acceptance for the wrong reasons, we very easily let go of the standard, integrity, and character we were made to uphold.
Eventually the turtles are presented with that threshold in the acceptance of our super villain, Superfly. Our turtles are presented to a world of mild violence, second-tier language in pursuit of being accepted by all humans. Superfly wants the same thing but chooses destruction instead of righteousness. Eventually, through his actions, he holds a mirror to the turtles, and even Splinter, of their character and the consequences because of it.
In the final battle, we finally arrive at that beautiful moment when the turtles let go of acceptance from the world at the cost of integrity and honor. Leo leads the way as he tells his brothers how they were made to do the right thing regardless of how they will be treated because of it. The best part is when Leo affirms each brother, putting the value of acceptance in its proper place… within a righteous community.
So whoever knows the right thing to do and fails to do it, for him it is sin.
James 4:17
For it is better to suffer for doing good, if that should be God’s will, than for doing evil.
1 Peter 3:17
Sadly, I wish the filmmakers had ended the film right there. They might have undone the message of their own film by having the Turtles do the right thing and give them their cake too. In the end the message is still not lost and applicable to the conversation of training up our children.
Motion Picture Rating (MPAA) PG for sequences of violence and action, language and impolite material