“Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Out of the Shadows” is a Saturday morning cartoon on Michael Bay steroids. For the under 12 set, that’s fine. For the rest of us? It’s something to actively avoid.

Not that a live-action “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles” sequel owes anything at all to an adult audience, but in an age where comic books of every stripe are tailored to be must-sees for ages 8 to 80, it’s a little disarming to find one hopeful franchise that is really and truly for kids. They’re the one audience who will just let the nonsense wash over them.

This “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles” sequel, produced again by Michael Bay and directed by Dave Green (“Earth to Echo”), is so inane that they essentially have to resurrect the main conflict from the first, when the four pizza-crazed reptiles took down Shredder, New York City’s resident bully. “Out of the Shadows” kicks off with Shredder (played this time by Brian Tee instead of Tohoru Masamune) breaking out of a police convoy, and effectively escaping the Turtles’ nunchuck-wielding, manhole cover launching garbage truck/war machine.