#still sad that he was cut out from the show OUGHH

[poritora]

Young Griff

[joyfuladorable]

if no one's asked for '03 mikey yet, it is i: asking for '03 mikey. and if someone already has, uh uh uh [rolls a dice] ... got a sixteen, so '03 don.

HANNAH!!!! 🎉🎉 I haven’t been asked yet! I will do both of ‘em though just for you!!

Mikey

How I feel about this character:

MY BEST FRIEND MY FAVORITE CHARACTER IN ALL OF TMNT CANON!!!!!!! The first call I ever had with some friends in the fandom had me clocked immediately as a Mikey kinnie cuz of the way I laughed, lmaooo! He’s Silly!!! Even in the bleakest of moments!! Bro sometimes falls under the sway of pessimism, but he’ll always pull through! Also, whenever he’s especially annoying, I nod in solidarity cuz that was straight up me as a kid. Take me as an example for who he may have grown up to be!

All the people I ship romantically with this character:

Nope! I truly don’t think I’ve ever seen or will ever see a ship for Mikey that’ll spark an unhinged joy for me, lol

My non-romantic OTP for this character:

DUOSSSSS!!! I adore his dynamics with all of his family, so it’s in the moment what my preference is and what I’m feeling! He’s vitriolic besties with Raph! Got a fun mentor-mentee dynamic with Leo! The way Don tends to indulge him, lol! And Splinter over here being a tired father trying to instill lessons in him because he knows Mikey’s capable of it. Truly the family of all time.

My unpopular correct opinion about this character:

See my answer about Rise Mikey! Don’t babify him!! Also, another gripe is that some folks write 03 Mikey like other iterations, and that’s just not it y’all. He’s the Least Sweetie out of all of ‘em!! Go read Hannah’s enneagram about him to understand! (I can’t embed the link for some reason so uhhh here!!) https://www.tumblr.com/redstringraven/723683618143256576/an-excruciatingly-long-ramble-about-the-03

One thing I wish would happen / had happened with this character in canon:

I WISH we’d gotten a focus episode on him that wasn’t another lesson for him to be humble! Gimme The Christmas Aliens 2!! where he kicks ass solo style!!

———

Donnie

How I feel about this character:

Now, here’s a Real Sweetie!! I enjoy that he can be analytical yet grounded. He’s not all machines! He cares so much about the people they meet!!

All the people I ship romantically with this character:

My friend’s Renatello propaganda got to me, lmao! I really enjoy the idea of two different kinda smarties being sweet to each other.

My non-romantic OTP for this character:

See my Mikey answer, lol! It’s so hard to choose!! I like how he and Raph play off of each other, the mutual support with Leo, snack buddies with Mikey, and oughh the connection with Splinter and specifically when Don calls out to him in the mind probe scene…

My unpopular opinion about this character:

I actually think folks focus maybe too much on his traumas??? Or at least, they focus ONLY on it, and that’s sad!! Let him have his whimsies!

One thing I wish would happen / had happened with this character in canon:

That being said, the lack of acknowledgement of most traumas from the show in canon is also a bit sad! They know how to do call backs!! Let Don have that cut line about alternate realities in S5! Got the fandom out here still writing catharsis for it 20 years later smh (/lh)

[raptorrobot]

I love playing toys!!

How do you think Icarus would be if all the bad stuff didn’t happen to him and he remained an angel up until the events of the Ultrakill game?

What was the designed process like for Icarus (both prime and angel)? Were there any details you had solidified all the way through or things that changed over time?

ouhhhh what an interesting query !!!!

genuinely in that case i think 3-2 would be a dual fight with both of them involved. that's gabriel's guard dog ! he's still going to be taking that seraph everywhere with him !

icarus prime also wouldn't be canon in this scenario either ! no divorce fights no attempted suicide no second death just two angels against the world

and; oughh . i love this second question so so much. i will be yapping about it under the cut

why explain the basics when i can just show them ! here's icarus' first ever ref sheet compared to his most recent one;

yeauh . big differences

most notably: he was not originally a prime soul, he was just a fallen angel ! hence the shackles and funky satanic imagery patterns on him

the scariest part: AH !!!! TWINK !!!!!!! he was SO skinny back then it almost makes me Sad looking at it now . it was an intentional design note, as at this point in his development i wanted him to look like an emaciated animal - but his fatness is so important to him now that seeing him without it is DEEPLY jarring

some consistencies: his hooves, claws, and head have always remained consistent in his design ! i've just always loved the shape language of them too much to change . i actually tried to phase out the more animalistic parts of him (hooves & claws) when developing him into a prime soul (to be more consistent with the two canon ones) but i just. couldn't . they were so integral to his design at that point that i couldn't imagine him without them . and of course, his head is pretty much the exact same from the point of conception; the cross-face, dual horns and head wings have only changed via stylistic evolution and nothing more <3

colours: they're So Different now . since he originally belonged to heresy rather than violence, i really wanted to hammer in that red - which persisted up until somewhat recently, when i phased it out for the full blue/silver scheme . his prime form and angel form now share an almost identical colour palette, which i think is fun ! another reason for getting rid of the red was because i wanted him to stand stark against the colours of violence (specifically red & white); as minos does wifh gluttony and sisyphus does with heresy. it also makes him look softer :]

in regards to his angel form; i cannot find any old refs of it unfortunately but the change in that design has been even MORE drastic . though one thing that has always been super important to it is the silver metal; he has always supposed to look like a subordinate . being bereft of colour and the brighter hues of angels like gabriel is a Very Important Contrast that i like emphasising

the black metal in his design is a recent change though ! it used to be silver and white up until recently, not silver and black . the reasoning behind this one is that i'm a sucker for dark colour schemes in armour and it looks cool . it's an excuse to make him look more intimidating too since he's a bodyguard !

[quirkle2]

tell me abt warriors I dare you <33

you've made the worst mistake of ur life /lh

(mind the tags btw . might get a lil dicey for some)

TL;DR: im mentally ill.

god where do i even start . fuck.shit .

i think what i like about him most is his Goofiness. he just ? does really silly things solely to get a laugh out of people, even if it makes him look stupid or ridiculous in the process. he Lives to make legend laugh especially, and he's basically always tryin to get a smile out of him someway or another

he's dramatic and cranks his reactions up to a 9 purely to spark some smiles. legend gently kicks him in the shins for making a dumb joke and it doesn't hurt him in any way, but he still yelps and holds his foot and hops around like it's been run over by a boulder. twi playfully shoves him back when they're joking around and wars makes a show of leaning away until his back is on the ground as if the push had really been that strong. wind is sitting in front of him, and wars' drink is on a table behind the kid, so he takes the opportunity to lean forward to Squish wind underneath him, going oh so sorry kid so sorry i'm in ur way it'll just be a second so sorry oughh this sucks doesn't it while he's literally already got his hand around his drink. he's just staying there to listen to wind giggle. he's just a silly guy

he's also just,,, so fucking gentle dude. he's so Gentle w everybody. when he was young he learned all that bullshit abt never showing weakness, never crying blah blah blah Gross . wars thinks that's gross. he was raised on that for most of his childhood, but first, he learned to be gentle and caring from his mom :) she taught him that and he's always stuck to it

he's always so ready to help ? to Fix? he is 100% constantly looking to make sure everybody is okay around him. he lives off of hugs, loves them to death, and is prolly the most cuddly of the chain in my eyes. is always offering them, gets sad when he doesn't get one within like a day VGIEAYVGA and he's always right there to comfort the others; always holding them, always lookin out for them. rly emotionally open i guess ? always happy to listen and happy to comfort. gentle big bro vibes

^ due to all that, sometimes the chain genuinely almost,, forgets he's a captain. he can look scary on the outside if he's fully geared up, but the chain has long-since been desensitized to how dangerous they all look and they see Family there instead of Hero Figure. wars is so gentle and kind and loving and doting that sometimes their memory of what that scarf around his neck rly means fades a bit

that's not to say they don't think he's a good captain—quite the opposite, they think he's an incredible one—but it's just,,, wild to see him hugging people and ruffling hair and being Silly one moment, and then he's a fucking cold, unstoppable force the next. eyes kind and fond at first, but when a battle starts they r Crazed and focused and he's slitting enemies with such perfect swipes that they are cut clean through. it makes them all realize just how gentle he rly is w them ? there is just Something abt that . smth that gets me

^ expanding on him looking out for them, he's really good at spotting when somebody needs a break ? he's . rly good at People. he knows how to read them, how to approach them, what to say, when to say it. and after a while of getting to know the chain, he knows how to look for signs Individually for the different boys. he knows his family very well; if something is wrong, he will likely be able to tell. true to his captain instincts, he keeps them all in his sight, looks after his family closely. a good leader,, good brother :)

he likes to gently remind them to take care of themselves. he's definitely one of those people that mother hen you a bit; he likes to check on everybody, ask if they've drank anything, if they've eaten yet, are they okay, what's on their mind, stuff like that. he needs to know everybody's okay,,, he worries otherwise :(

^ he loves to preach about self-care, and i think one of his biggest flaws w that is that he doesn't follow his own advice at all. he's a huge fucking hypocrite. he knows the consequences of lack of self-care, knows how important it is, and he's even said so most of his life—it's one of the biggest reasons he's such a revered leader in his era, bc he's just,, The Best in terms of tending to his troops and paying attention to mental limits as well as physical. he just,,,, seems to think he himself is exempt from that

he thinks he can just keep working. he thinks he's immune to every type of exhaustion and he will keep going until he collapses. he's got a nasty habit of throwing himself away to keep others standing, and the most concerning part of that is that if somebody points it out or asks if he's pacing himself, he seems to be absolutely clueless to the damage he's doing to his mind and body

. i'm gonna go on a mini-tangent inside this bigger tangent if you don't mind <3: a lot of people tend to characterize him as this over-confident asshole who thinks he's amazing—and that's a perfectly acceptable characterization btw, the freedom of interpretation is a wonderful thing—but i personally see him very differently. i think that characterization tends to stem from that mission in his game, where he gets overconfident after receiving the master sword ?

and to me, that was . a very small fraction of that game. like so small. it was One mission, and then they never touched on it again. and when i think abt that mission, i always remember a line from the start of the game; i don't quite remember when it was said, but at some point the narrator says, "Link did not believe himself to be worthy," in response to him being a Hero ? or smth of that manner. and i think abt that line all the goddamn time.

wars did not have a lot of confidence in himself. he's gotten much better over the years, especially when it comes to combat and leading, but he still doesn't have the confidence he maybe should. when he got the master sword, he felt Power in his hands that he previously had not owned. he'd felt useless before, just a Fucking Guy who suddenly got promoted to Captain and Hero Status, fumbling around and hoping for the best. and then he suddenly had power in his hands. i don't blame him for feeling unstoppable and taking advantage of that—he'd wanted to help, and he finally had a way to do so effectively. he just went too far in an attempt to make things better, and became a little blind to his limits

so he is Not confident. my wars isn't, at least. he has faith in his own combat and leadership skills, but that's pretty much where the confidence ends. he doesn't think of himself as this unstoppable, perfect Heroic symbol. he thinks of himself as Guy Who's Pretty Good At Swinging Swords and Yelling.

and that's ? part of why he thinks he's exempt from all that self-care stuff. he either forgets and gets too caught up in everybody else's problems to care for himself, or he,, genuinely thinks that throwing himself away to keep others up is Okay . like he Deserves that.

i won't get super into it here cuz it's part of his dumb backstory created by my dumb brain, but a lot of that has to do w how he was treated in the army, and his dumbass dad <3 worked him to the ground and pretty much, overtime, made him think that if he wasn't being useful, he didn't have worth. and he's experienced people leaving him bc he "stopped being useful."

so yeah he has abandonment issues . but the chain slowly and surely helps him through those insecurities :] tries to make sure he knows he doesn't have to work himself to death for them to love him,, doesn't completely fix things obviously, and he still struggles w it, but it helps A Lot

another thing w him preaching self-care and then not caring for himself,, he tends to think like that with trauma as well. continuously tells the others that it's okay to Not be okay and that whatever trauma they're dealing w is valid and it's okay to be vulnerable, but then he ,,, goes against all of that for himself.

tries not to "burden" the others w his shit, kinda keeps it locked up, and he tends to think badly abt himself when he's having a tough time. just,, rly beats himself up for Having Trauma, especially when it gets in the way of his productivity and he ends up being "less useful" bc of it. and sometimes he doesn't seem to realize that the chain seeing him like that hurts them a lot, and they're more than willing to console him and try to make it easier on him.

^ over time they Also help him w that,, they help each other a lot. for years, he's tried to repeat the same stuff he tells other people to Himself—stuff like self-care, vulnerability being natural and Okay—but he's never had the self-worth to rly put much stock into it. the chain showing him love even when he was "being useless?" that helped him get over that hurdle

and his constant Care and reminders to take care of themselves r eventually gently reflected back at him—"have you eaten today buddy?" "yeah. what about you?"—just to get wars in the habit of asking Himself the same questions. they do a lot of little things like that in hopes that eventually it adds up to him healing

they care each other they love each other im soso So. ososs ososo ioghugohughgo /pos

wow okay uh im literallyso sorry i just . think abt him lots. this was completely unnecessarily long okay bye