Megan Fox Lands Role As April O’Neil In Upcoming Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Movie

Megan Fox has landed a role in the upcoming Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles reboot, playing the reporter friend of the crime-fighting turtles.

Fox has joined the Michael Bay project as April O’Neil, the film’s leading lady. Unlike the campy Turtles films of the early 1990s, this reboot is supposed to be based on the original TMNT comics that debuted in 1984, Hollywood Reporter noted.

The role brings something of an unlikely reunion, as Fox left the Bay’s Transformers franchise three years ago after comparing his directing style to the rule of Hitler.

Fox said the director “wants to be like Hitler on his sets, and he is. So, he’s a nightmare to work for.”

But the incident now is apparently behind Bay, who wrote about Megan Fox’s new role on his blog. Bay posted a terse message on his Thursday that read, “TMNT: we are bringing Megan Fox back into the family!”

Megan Fox reportedly accepted the role based on the storyboards from director Jonathan Liebesman, which seems more likely than the script blowing her away. There was a huge fan blowback when the script leaked onto the internet, Screen Rant reported, though Bay said that was really just a flawed first draft.

Even with those assurances, many fans are still worried about the TMNT reboot, and with Fox’s casting as the redhead, tenacious reporter April O’Neil. Screen Rant explains:

“She’s certainly not the first actress who springs to mind when thinking about the April O’Neil of the comic books, the cartoons, or the original movie series, and not just because she’s a brunette either. Is Fox’s casting further confirmation that Ninja Turtles will be a major creative departure from the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles of yore?

“Last we heard, the titular turtles would be aliens instead of mutants, and the antagonists would be a covert military group led by Colonel Shredder. There’s no telling if that’s what we’ll end up seeing when Ninja Turtles finally reaches theaters, but you can probably expect a certain ‘Bay’-ification of the source material if Fox as April O’Neil is any indication.”

While Megan Fox landed her role, the filmmakers are still searching for actors the play the turtles themselves. They are reportedly seeking “mostly relative unknowns” for the roles of Leonardo, Michelangelo, Donatello, and Raphael.