Another sequel is on the way for the sewer-dwelling turtle brothers, with Paramount eyeing real-life, non-turtle brothers Colin and Casey Jost to write the script for an as-yet untitled Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movie.
No plot details are known but Michael Bay is set to return as executive producer, which implies a lot of explosions are likely to befall the titular tubular turtles. Andrew Form, Brad Fuller, Scott Mednick, and Galen Walker are set to produce. Colin Jost scored an Emmy nomination for Saturday Night Live and Casey Jost writes for Impractical Jokers. This is their first major studio gig.
Turtles are hot property at the moment. Nickelodeon, part of Paramount and the company who owns the rights to the franchise, is launching that other Turtle reboot from Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg. The Boys' duo are plotting an animated feature which will exist as a standalone, away from the live-action franchise continuity.
Paramount's anthropomorphized action franchise kicked off in 2014. The first instalment, which starred Megan Fox as April O'Neil, failed to win critics over yet rang up $493 million in receipts at the global box office. A sequel, 2016's Out of the Shadows, saw Fox and stacks of cash return. Despite netting $245 million worldwide it was considered a box office bomb due to its $135 million production budget.
Five years on and the half-shell heroes are no longer box office poison. Deadline reports Paramount now consider the Turtles a "high priority" in light of the Nickelodeon animated feature entering development.
The Jost brothers' sequel will be the eighth feature-length movie based on the characters, who started life in a self-published comic from 1984. The turtles made the leap to the big screen in 1990s Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles from New Line Cinema, a smash hit which made a cool $200 million and launched a franchise which led to two further sequels, including the Secret of the Ooze which holds the honour of being Vanilla Ice's big screen debut.
The Jost Brothers' Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movie is currently without a release date, so why not check our picks of the most exciting upcoming movies of 2021 and beyond?
