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Ninja Turtles is an upcoming reboot type film in the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles film series, currently in development by Michael Bay for Nickelodeon and Paramount Pictures.

Production

Following the news of the buyout of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles franchise, it was announced that Nickelodeon would produce a new film through Paramount Pictures with an expected release date sometime in 2012. In late May 2011, it was announced that Paramount and Nickelodeon had brought Michael Bay and his Platinum Dunes partners Brad Fuller and Andrew Form on to produce the next film that reboot the film series. Bay, Fuller, and Form would produce along side Walker and Mednick. For the script, the studio originally hired Matt Holloway and Art Marcum to write the film for close to a million dollars. A year later the Studio turns to writers Josh Appelbaum and Andre Nemec to rewrite the script. In February 2012, Jonathan Liebesman was brought in to negotiations to direct the film. Later in March, it was announced that Paramount had pushed back film's release date to Christmas Day 2013.

In early March 2012, Michael Bay revealed at Nickelodeon's upfront presentation that the film will be simply titled Ninja Turtles and that the turtles will be "from an alien race". News of Bay's creative change was met with negative criticism from within the fan community. In response to the announcement, actor Robbie Rist who voiced Michaelangelo the first three films, wrote to Bay accusing him of "sodomizing" the franchise. Rist later remarked that he could have been out of line since Bay makes more money than he does. In response to the feedback, Bay issued a statement asking fans to calm down since a script had not been revealed, his team was working closely with the creators, and would include all the elements that made them fans to begin with. Both Brian Toshi, who voiced Leonardo in the first three films, and Judith Hoag, who played April O'Neal in first film, have voiced their support towards the creative change. Peter Laird expressed his thoughts on the change asking fans to take Bay's advice and wait until more of Bay's plan is made available. Laird also stated that he felt the "ill-conceived plan" could be a "genius notion", as it would allow fans to have the multitude of bipedal anthropomorphic turtles that they have been asking for. He would point out that while the concept of a turtle planet back story made for a great run of the mill science fiction story, but it had no real place in the Ninja Turtles universe. TMNT co-creator Kevin Eastman stated that he had been invited behind the scenes of the film, and concluded that he was officially on board with the project and that, although he could not say much, he believes it to be "awesome". Via Twitter, Corey Feldman, who voiced Donatello in the first and third films, voiced his support for the film saying that he loves Bay's remakes and he is eager to reprise his role. In response to the backlash, Liebesman stated that he was glad to hear about the fan's response, since he and Eastman had been locked in a room working on ideas that, from his own perspective as a fan, everybody will love. While he would not confirm whether or not Bay's comment did represent the film's premise, he did stress on the ooze itself and its background in the original comic, reminding that the ooze was the product of alien technology. In regards to how the Turtles would be rendered, Liebesman would not say exactly what visual direction would be taken, but he did state that he did enjoy Weta Digital's work in Rise of the Planet of the Apes. He also pointed out that the film would not be exclusively about action but will also focus on brotherhood, friendship, and responsibility.

In late March, Michael Bay posted on his website explaining the title change and stressing that nothing had changed regarding the Turtles. He stated the reason the title was shorten was at a request by Paramount to make the title "simple". He continued that the Turtle were the same as fans remember and regardless of the title change they still act like teenagers. He urged everyone to give everybody who was involved a chance, as they had the fans interest at top priority and would not let anybody down. On June 12, Eastman revealed some of the things for the film stating that April would not be a 16 year like in the 2012 series, he feels Ken Watanabe would make a great Shredder, he'd like to bring Reyes back as a Foot lieutenant, and martial arts wise they are looking at Fist of Legend and The Raid: Redemption. Three days later, it was reported that production for this project has been shut down. While the release date has been pushed back five months, the work stoppage for the film was said to be "indefinite". However, other sources say that the film will be released on May 16, 2014 due to problems in that script that need to be corrected. In July 2012, Eastman called it "easily the best Turtle movie yet". Jessica Biel told Collider that she would consider playing April O’Neil in the film. Eastman also mentioned that the movie is creating its own story but has to be true to the source material or else they will get "murdered".