The first casting announcement came just last month via Michael Bay's official website that he would be reteaming with Megan Fox for Ninja Turtles, but the role she was playing had not yet been specified. Well now we have confirmation that Fox is in fact playing April O'Neil, the human companion of the Ninja Turtles along with her boyfriend Casey Jones (Who has yet to be cast). The casting comes as a big surprise as Fox has a well publicized feud with Bay during the filming of the Transformers series going as far to comparing working with him to working with Hitler, and she was later replaced by Rosie Huntington-Whiteley in Transformers: Dark of the Moon. None the less it seems Bay and Fox have been able to settle their differences for Ninja Turtles, although it probably helps that Bay isn't actually the director on this one and Jonathan Liebsman is.
After Fox's surprising casting came the casting of Alan Ritchson, best known for his performance as Aquaman on Smallville as the hot tempered brother of the Ninja Turtles Raphael. Now he is joined by actors Jeremy Howard who is quite unknown but has starred in movies such as The Grinch and Galaxy Quest as the brains of the team Donatello, as well as also relatively unknown actor Pete Ploszek who has starred in an episode of Park and Recreation as the team's leader Leonardo, and Noel Fisher who has already worked with Liebsman on Battle: Los Angeles. The choices aren't exactly fitting in my eye but then again I've never seen Ploszek or Howard act, and I'm only familiar with Fisher from his young performance as bully Troy McKenzie in Max Keeble's Big Move. So in other words it'd be unfair to judge how they'd be in these roles yet.
Now we do know that Bay has spoken about how the Turtle's will be done in the movie, which will be using the mo-cap technology similar to the one used in Rise of the Planet of the Apes and Avatar. Ritchson, Plostek, Howard, and Fisher will all probably be providing their likeness to the Turtles themselves (Such as their facial expressions, features, etc. in Turtle form) as well as also voicing the actors and maybe even providing for some of the martial art moves that the Turtles are known for. While the roles of the main Turtles were the most important to fill, there's still many supporting character that have yet to be cast such as the Turtle's sensei Master Splinter, April's boyfriend Casey Jones, and the main antagonist Shredder himself. Will Arnett, best known for his work on TV shows Arrest Development and 30 Rock has also joined the cast in an unspecified role, but it's been rumored that he's playing one of two roles. Either Vernon Kitbash, best known for being the snobby cameraman of April O'Neill in the original eighties cartoon, or Agent Bishop who was a popular character from the 2003 animated TMNT series who was the leader of the Earth Protection Force (Which fits with the alien based plot Bay and Liebsman seem to be going with for Ninja Turtles).
So what do you think of the casting for Leonardo, Michelangelo, and Donatello? Are you happy with Bay and Liebsman's choices? And who do you think Arnett will be playing?
Ninja Turtles is set to hit theaters June 6, 2014
