Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles co-creator Peter Laird offers sarcastic support to Michael Bay

In the latest edition of what is proving to be the most heated controversy of the week—at least until it’s announced that Joseph Kony is hosting a reboot of The Electric Company—Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles co-creator Peter Laird has weighed in on Michael Bay’s recently revealed decision to strive for more believable, grittily verité ninja turtles by making them aliens. And whereas former TMNT voice actor Robbie Rist couched his displeasure in the terms of brutal ass-rape that speaks to modern audiences, Laird’s response takes a more measured, wait-and-see approach, albeit one tempered with withering sarcasm. “I would actually encourage TMNT fans to swallow the ‘chill pill’ Mr. Bay recently suggested they take, and wait and see what might come out of this seemingly ill-conceived plan,” Laird writes on his blog, adding, “It's possible that with enough truly creative brainpower applied to this idea, it might actually work. I'm not saying it's probable, or even somewhat likely… but it IS possible.”

Having thus deployed his dry wit like a katana wielded by a giant turtle who is clearly an alien because otherwise that would be ridiculous, Laird goes on to explain how he himself had long tussled with “the weak, facile, creatively bankrupt idea” to add more turtles to the group, which always came down to “instead of there being just four pet shop turtles in that glass bowl in the origin story, there were really FIVE.” Laird disparages that ridiculous notion with a “Sigh,” then goes on to praise Bay’s inspired possible workaround: “The reason I say it could be a ‘genius’ idea is that—for the first time—someone has come up with a way to have as many freakin' Turtles as they want. I mean, if the TMNT are actually members of an alien race, there could be a whole PLANET of them!”

Laird then concludes his post with an acerbic “Joy” that suggests that, actually, he is less than enthused about the idea of an entire ninja turtle planet, despite the many possibilities for future franchising this would allow. But if it’s any consolation to Laird, his estranged former partner Kevin Eastman recently confirmed that he is now “officially on board” the production of film and, in a completely unrelated expression of purely personal opinion, Eastman says of Bay’s vision, “Trust me—it IS AWESOME.” Sounds pretty awesome! This will be awesome.