Regardless of how you felt about 2014’s TEENAGE MUTANT NINJA TURTLES, there’s no question that it’s sequel, OUT OF THE SHADOWS, was an improvement. Sure, it may have been marginal at best, but the second film incorporated not only more of the characters from the classic cartoon, but also the tone. It wasn’t a home run by any means, but still provided some decent entertainment. Sadly, the box office numbers did not reflect this and SHADOWS pulled in about $245 million worldwide. While that’s certainly not a total flop, the $135 price tag (plus marketing) didn’t exactly push executives into setting up a sequel, and producer Andrew Form confirms as much when speaking with Collider.
Producer Andrew Form on the box-office performance of SHADOWS:
We were obviously surprised at the box office results. We loved the movie. We loved making the movie. From our first Super Bowl teaser to everything we launched, we felt so good about our material, and for some reason it did not find the audience that the first movie found. And we talk about it all the time, and we tried to figure it out, but we cannot put our finger on what happened. We really can’t. It’s just one of those things where we feel like we made a really great movie; we thought at the time that our release date was great, and we added all these new characters with Bebop and Rocksteady and Baxter Stockwell had a big role in the movie and Casey Jones and for some reason when it came to opening weekend…Even before the movie came out, we were feeling great. And you wake up two days before the movie opens and you go, “Wow, I don’t know if this movie is tracking as well as it should.” Then you hope, and then Thursday night happens and your midnights come in and you’re like, “That’s not what Movie 1 did,” and then sure enough your weekend comes and it’s nowhere near what anyone thought, and it’s nowhere near Movie 1, and, before you know it, it’s over. We’re still so proud of the movie; it just didn’t find an audience. We really don’t know why.
On the possibility of a third film:
I don’t think there’s Turtles 3, but I wouldn’t say there’s never going to be another Turtles movie.
I’m actually a little disappointed, but not surprised, that Paramount isn’t looking into a TURTLES 3 at the moment. I don’t love the new movies by any stretch, but TEENAGE MUTANT NINJA TURTLES: OUT OF THE SHADOWS was a step in the right direction and I feel like if they continued on that path, the third film might be the best Turtles flick to come our way. Ah well. As Form stated, it certainly won’t be the last Turtles flick, so it’s only a matter of time before someone else takes on the heroes in a half-shell.