I hadn't watched this movie in years, I was a huge Turtle fan back in the day, but then I bought the 3-disc movie set and the first one I popped in was Secret of the Ooze to watch with my friends. It was 10 times funnier than I remember because there were so many jokes that I never picked up on/got when I was kid that I can now (eg. the Ralph Nader/net joke).

The movie is much lighter and campier than the first but it works better that way. I mean, come on, we're dealing with a group of teenage mutant turtles who were trained in the art of the ninja by a giant rat named Splinter in New York City. You can't take it too seriously and the movie works well to just have fun with Leo, Donnie, Ralph and Mikey. The one flaw of this movie was no more crazy Casey Jones and the addition of that annoying Asian kid Keno (Surf Ninjas, another classicly bad great movie). Aside from that, I liked that the turtles had to deal with the fact that there origins were essentially a scientific "uh oh" and this movies has some of the best lines. Donnie: You take the ugly one!

Ralph: No, you take the ugly one!

Leo: I'll take the ugly one!

Mikey: Which one's the ugly one?!

Oh, it doesn't get any better than that. Oh wait, Vanilla Ice is in the movie too so I guess it does.

This Turtles film is almost as good as the oringal. It's not quite as dark and serious as the first and does have a few goofy gimmicks. Actually specifically, it's the two mutants Shredder creates that are gimmicky. Still it's a cool movie. If you liked the first or anything Ninja Turtles related, give it a shot.

The beginning was very well done in this movie. Probably the funniest start to a movie i've seen in a while. The movie is very energetic with such scenes like the beginning, great fight scenes. This movie obviously had a bigger budget, 25 million dollars to make. Bigger sets, and a cheesy, and i mean it, cheesy publicity stunt by Vanilla Ice. While the movie fails on a dramatic point, it rules on fight scenes and comedy. This is the only movie i have ever scene get away, and have absolutely no explosives or bombs in the movie, and yet people like the fight scenes. Actors changed on Donatello and Shredder, the new actor for Shredder was impressive, really did have a resemblance to the first shredder. Donatello however, even though the new actor is equally talented in fights scenes, in some ways better then the original actor, he doesn't have that voice fans liked about the original actor, i can't remember any of the actors names playing the turtles. But they are talented, great fight scenes in those heavy costumes. Even doing flips in the costumes which is amazing, i always thought the flips from the original movie were done on strings because those costumes have to weigh a ton, but they were doing backflips in this movie. Truly amazing, Turtles ruled the 1991 year for their genre, 78 million in box office, a great number for this.

This film opens with tremendous confidence and energy. The humor of the Turtles may be so 1990 but I still dig it. The opening scene in the shopping mall is way funny and a great way to introduce is to the sequel. At the time the style of the Turtles wasn't so stale, so the plot may seem a bit childish or dumb now.
I have no doubts that if this movie were made today it would not be subtitled 'The Secret of the Ooze'. One can hardly expect high art from a movie called Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles II but they could have subtitled it something a little less crass. Apparently taking place right after the first movie (where's Casey) it wastes no time bringing back the Shredder and the rest of the Foot Clan.
This time Shredder aims to steal the cannister of ooze that mutated our heroes so he can make his own monsters to avenge his defeat. The result is Tokka and Rahzar and it seems like a half-attempt at a live-action version of Rocksteady and Bebop. As you can imagine, this plot isn't very clever. But the movie never really lulls so long as our heroes are on screen.
Look out for a cameo by Vanilla Ice (looking alarmingly like Dolph Lundgren) at the end. It's so dated it may be difficult to watch but as long as your alone you won't have to cringe.
The DVD has wonderful motion menus as well as a great 1.85:1 anamorphic picture with Dolby 5.1 sound. Extras are thin but still it's a great buy.

I'd really like to give this movie 5 stars because I love and have loved the ninja turtles since they came out in the late 80's. The movie is well done, the costumes look better in the second movie then they do in both the first and the third movie, and the overall tone of the movie is upbeat.

However there are several glaring flaws that caused me to wonder if the editors were sleeping when this movie was on the cutting room floor.

Things like their bandanas kept getting caught up under the spot where the turtle heads went over the neck on the costume. Costume malfunction? Constantly. Also there are SEVERAL scenes where they would have weapons strapped to their backs, then they wouldn't have them, then they'd have them again. I mean come on, what kind of ninjas would go into battle without their weapons? And at the end...when Shredder dumps the ooze on himself and mutates into SuperShredder....why in the world did his armor and clothes mutate also? (besides the fact that someone thought it would look 'cool'?)

Overall, the scripts were done well, even Ernie Rayes did a good job as Keno, AND did his own fighting sequences. Casey isn't in this one, we can only assume he's goongalla gone for a while...maybe he went back up to that house in the first one?

Two of the turtles voices are the same, Leo and Donny. Raph has a different actor in each movie, and Donny....only because Corey Feldman was working out his cocaine issues. His voice actor was good still, and I rather liked it better then Corey's voice, though Corey's voice was much more distinctive. And Leonardo's voice actor is the same guy who voiced Bunji from the Bionic Six cartoon (anyone remember that one?)

And don't forget to watch out for cameos by three of the four turtle actors.Read more ›