Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movie review round-up: Turtles take one hell of a shelling

“Bland”, “unoriginal” and “dull-witted” to highlight just a few derogatory adjectives used

Reviews have not been good for Jonathan Liebesman’s take on the much loved eighties cartoon (Paramount)

For those movie lovers that have been sitting on the edge of their shells in anticipation of the October cinema release of the new Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles film…..STOP!...apparently it’s not very good.

The film, which is due to be released in the US on Friday -17October in the UK -, saw US movie critics get their first look at Jonathan Liebesman’s take on the much loved eighties cartoon this week, and boy did they not like what they saw.

While there was a general consensus that the special effects were impressive, that was about it.

Top film critics across the US were unanimous in their view that the film was “bland”, “unoriginal” and “dull-witted” to highlight just a few derogatory adjectives used.

Justin Chang from Variety said the film was not “a particularly good movie”, while Forbes called it a “Cowabummer” saying it was “a bad movie, filled with terrible expository dialogue and lacking in scenes where our heroes actually talk to each other.”

The Guardian’s Jordan Hoffman was critical of the film for being “completely generic and video gamey” making him “want to crawl into his shell” before the film was over.

Yet it was not only the plot, characters and general quality of the film that was criticised, other reviewers called the film “too violent” and even “sexist”.

Film.com’s James Rocchi said the movie was "incredibly violent for a PG-13 movie" and contained some "disquieting" sexism, including innuendo-filled jokes about (Megan) Fox-as-O'Neil.”

Fox, who plays the film's heroine April O’Neil, was not spared abuse and her performance was called “poor” by a number of critics.

The Washington Post’s Sandie Angulo Chen said she was far too sexualised saying that “lingering shots of Fox will help young men in the audience overlook the continuity errors and sillier plot details”.

The poor reviews will compound the gloom that has surrounded the film’s release.

Earlier this week, Fox reacted to the wave of criticism from reviewers and fans alike telling the doubters to "love the film", or “f*** off”.

This came after the movies marketers made a major faux pas when last month, Paramount Australia decided to announce Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles' cinema arrival on September 11th alongside a poster of the turtles falling from a burning New York skyscraper.