The Big Picture
- Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem has joined the $100 million club at the domestic box office.
- Mutant Mayhem was produced for a relatively low budget of $70 million, in comparison to big-budget animated hits from Disney and Dreamworks.
- The movie has received positive reviews for its unique animation style and relatable portrayal of the titular characters, and plans for a sequel and spinoff series are already underway.
Even after it became clear that the one-two punch of Barbie and Oppenheimer had greatly impacted Mission: Impossible — Dead Reckoning Part One at the box office, it was bold of Paramount to proceed with the release of its animated underdog Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem just two weeks after the “Barbenheimer” event. But the decision seems to have paid off, with Mutant Mayhem now becoming a proud member of the $100 million club at the domestic box office.
The movie has made just under $37 million from overseas markets, for a running global haul of $137 million. While this might not seem like a lot, especially when compared to the numbers that major animated hits deliver, Paramount also didn’t spend the kind of money that big-hitters such as Disney and peak-era Dreamworks would spend on their movies. Mutant Mayhem, which is designed to reboot the long-running franchise for a new generation of fans, was reportedly produced only for $70 million; by comparison, Pixar’s Elemental cost a reported $200 million to make.
The well-reviewed movie utilizes a unique animation style that combines a 2D aesthetic with vibrant comic book-inspired visuals, and is clearly aping the success strategy that made Sony’s two animated Spider-Man movies — Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse and Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse — such beloved blockbusters. The two movies have grossed a combined total of $1 billion at the global box office, in addition to the glowing reviews that they’ve received. The first film also won the Academy Award for Best Animated Feature.
This Marks an Auspicious Start to a New Series
Mutant Mayhem is the best-reviewed movie in the franchise’s history. Directed by Jeff Rowe and co-written and co-produced by Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg, the film draws from teen movies and actually presents the titular characters as relatable kids. The franchise debuted on the big screen with a trilogy of live-action movies in the ‘90s, before being rebooted in 2014 with the big-budget hit Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, co-produced by Michael Bay. The film spawned a commercially disappointing sequel, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Out of the Shadows, which brought the Bay duology to an end. An animated film called TMNT was released between these two series in the year 2007.
Regardless of how well Mutant Mayhem does in the long run, a sequel and a spinoff streaming series are already in the works. Mutant Mayhem features the voices of Micah Abbey as Donatello, Shamon Brown Jr. as Michelangelo, Nicolas Cantu as Leonardo, and Brady Noon as Raphael. You can watch our interview with the lead cast here, and stay tuned to Collider for more updates.
