If you are a person of a certain age, certainly the specific form of homemade injury depicted in today’s comic will bring wave after wave of painful nostalgia to your mind. When I was a wee tot, there was no bigger phenomenon than the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. We loved the cartoons, we loved the actions figures, we loved the hastily put together movies. I mean, we put up with Vanilla Ice in The Secret of the Ooze. VANILLA ICE!!! That’s dedication people.

Equal parts dedication could be seen on the faces of little boys who believed they could grow up to be ninjas. Maybe even teenaged ninjas! I can’t tell you how many people I know who tagged themselves in the ol’ beanbag with a pair of nunchucks they built themselves. I could have been their club president, I did it so many times. I’m lucky we were even able to HAVE Henry, let me put it that way.

I remember the day that I figured out how to make my weapon of choice from two lengths of PVC pipe, a short length of chain and several interwoven strips of duct tape. I felt like a civil engineer, like I had accomplished some great feat of constructive prowess. It was easily my favorite toy from the years 1988 to, well… what year is it again?

The producers of the freshly CG animated T.M.N.T. insist that this is a relaunch of the franchise and they have the forthcoming toy line to back it up. But let’s not kid ourselves. This is a nostalgia trip, pure and simple. I like that they stayed withing the cartoon roots of the series. The live-action movies were… interesting, but not exactly faithful – or very joyous. So I appreciate that they’re keeping our boys in green within a certain context.

Beyond that, I’m sure it’s very possible this movie could inspire a whole new generation to cut lengths of broomsticks and fashion them into crude weapons for imaginative playtime. Now that I’m old enough to by my own AUTHENTIC implements of masochism, I’ll be right along side them.

I’m looking forward to paying the hospital bills.