BOSTON!

I'm back from my trip to Boston...but this has gone on long enough. Trips to Boston later, this week it's...

MAX VERSUS THE INTERNET: MATCH POINT! DONATELLO!!!

Some may call me mad, but I've been a fan of the ninja turtles for long enough, that I think I might be able to match Wikipedia on random knowledge about Donatello. If not...we'll have to go to a tie breaking round, but if I win, I'll have successfully trounced the internet! Let it begin.


Donatello


Overview

Heralded as the 'smart' turtle, Donatello is also known for his vivid imagination, uncanny ability to create inventions, sensitivity, and almost complete inability to fight. Depending on the series, Donatello's abilities vary greatly in scale (both as an inventor and martial artist), often to the point of ridiculousness, but a normal trend is that the more realistic his inventions are, the better a fighter he is (in other words, if he's invention lazer guns out of trash, you can bet he's going to be the first turtle hitting the pavement). The other turtles tend to refer to him as 'Donnie' rather than his full name (the others being 'Leo', 'Mikey', and 'Raff').

In the original series, Donatello wears a red bandana, as did all the turtles. In the later cartoon series, his bandana was changed to purple, which solidifies his dubious honor of being by far the most effeminate ninja turtle.

Donatello's weapon is the bo (staff), which is a strange choice for a ninja. Granted, it is a traditional ninja fighting style, and was used in the manner Donatello uses it (attacking defensively, with extended reach), but it was mainly used earlier in history, and was considered far primitive compared to the weapons of the other turtles. The bo was most commonly used in China, where Buddhist missionaries were trained in its use, so that they could better protect themselves against bandits. In Japan, people usually learned to use the bo because they had no other option available to them. It's odd that Splinter's master (or Splinter himself, depending on the version of the story) would be trained in a peasant's weapon, but he may have chosen the weapon for Donatello because it best reflected his peaceful nature.

Donatello is the sensitive, introspective turtle, although without the angst, anger or fear that Raphael has. Overall, he works the hardest of the turtles to keep the family together, but ironically he's usually the least effective in the time of an emergency, as he is far less a fighter or warrior and far more a thinker and worker. Depending on the series, he may have a close friendship with another turtle (usually Michelangelo) or side character (Casey Jones or Erma). Possibly due to his sensitivity, depending on the series, Donatello is usually the most likely of the turtles to have a girlfriend, or female admirer. Of the turtles, Donnie is also the most likely to get bullied by Raphael.

Donatello also has a creative side, and is the only ninja turtle who actually reads on a regular basis, and usually has the equivalent of a college level education (obviously self taught). This is usually reflected in the story by his crazy inventions, ability to understand advanced technology, and knowledge of random facts and trivia. When donning disguises or costumes (or for variant special action figures) Donatello is usually a literary figure (example: a hard boiled detective) or sci-fi reference (example: a John Carpenter alien).

Donatello is usually described as the smallest, weakest and slowest turtle (in video games he usually has a lack of speed to balance his greater reach), solidifing his position as the brains of the group. Donatello's presence is usually mandatory for the scene, to give plot exposition or to solve a mystery. When the action actually starts, unless he's fighting on his own, it's almost certain that he'll be the least effective in combat, and probably not get any lines until the fighting has ended. His lack of fighting ability usually isn't pointed out, however, as he still is by far a better fighter than the average villain, but not the villain leaders, as that's the time for the other turtles to shine.


Original Series

The original Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles series was far more dark, realistic and violent. To reflect this, Donatello's abilities were far more realistic, and his inventions were far more mundane. As stated before, when Donatello's inventions are more realistic, his fighting ability improves. For example, in one of the earlier storylines, Donatello hurles his staff directly into Shredder's face, smashing it into a bloody mess. As I said, the stories were violent.

There was a strong sci-fi element to the stories, however, and the fact that Donatello was the only turtle who was computer literate allowed him to understand the technology better than the other turtles.

Donatello was the most solitary of the turtles (Michelangelo and Raphael had the strong friendship), but had many solo stories with other non-turtle characters (most notably an artist that could bring paintings to life, and a humanoid dinosaur-like girlfriend).


Original Cartoon Series

In the 1987 original cartoon series that made the turtles famous, Donatello's bandana became purple, his inventions suddenly became ridiculous, and he lost all ability to fight. It even became a running joke among the fans to keep track of how many times Donatello's bo would break (which happened about every other episode).

Donatello's voice was the sillest and probably most recognizable of the turtles, although many different actors provided his voice in the run of the series. His personality was the overly effeminate and passive one we all know today (a bit lighter than the introspective loner of the original series), and he usually paired up with a side character like Erma, April O'Neil's friend, who was also Donnie's ambiguous girlfriend, or at least female admirer.

For the cartoon series, Donatello created the numerous vehicles and inventions (out of spare parts and garbage I guess) that the turtles sold to children...I MEAN USED IN BATTLE! That's right, used in battle. Donnie also usually drove, which gave him something to do when the battle began.


Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Original Videogame for NES

Starting here, and with all the video games, Donatello was the slow character with long reach. Strangely enough, in the VERY difficult Nintendo videogame, Donatello was also the strongest, which attributed solely to the length of his weapon. As anyone can tell you, it's not the length of the weapon that matters, but how...uh...perhaps we should move on.


Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Arcade Games

All the ninja turtle arcade games were basically similar, but the first version was perhaps the best. Donatello was a very popular choice for players (as was Michelangelo), not because of any advantage in the game, but because their controllers were in the traditional 'Player 1' and 'Player 2' spots, with Donatello being in the 'Player 2' spot.

Donatello's staff had the longest reach of the turtles in these arcade games (especially with his jump attack), but his attacks were the slowest.


Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles the Movie

In the first movie, Donatello was voiced by the teen star Corey Feldman, and was portrayed as the brainy genius he usually was, although he didn't seem to make any inventions, and the movie overall attempted to remain realistic. As in the original series (which the movie seems mainly based upon, albeit without the sci-fi elements), Donatello's genius is shown through his ability to fix normal machines, use computers and understand advanced technology and science. Donatello's fighting abilites markedly improved for the movies (and his bo didn't break even once), and he stood shoulder to shoulder with the other turtles in battle.

In this movie, Donatello has a strong friendship with Michelangelo (who like him retreats when Leo and Raff are fighting), and later also becomes good friends with Casey Jones. In both cases, Donatello plays off both of them very well, and in general has a lot more lines (and far more jokes) than he normally has in the cartoons and comics. This was most likely due to the fact that Corey Feldman, at that point a popular teen star, was voicing him.


Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: New Cartoon Series

The focus and nature of the cartoon series changed when they remade it, attempting to split the differnce between the cartoons and the movies, with silly ridiculous situations, traditional Saturday morning villains, and with some of Donatello's unrealistic inventions. As in the movies, Donatello had far better fighting ability than in the original cartoons (and was also a rather talented acrobat).


TMNT: The New Movie

Suprisingly, the newest animated movie appears to be based upon the movie series, rather than the cartoons. Although no reference is made to the second or third movie, there are many features of the original movie that are present in this one, including: the sewer base converted from an old train station, Shredder's defeat (and apparent death), April and Casey's relationship, Casey Jones's vigilantism, Raphael's dark side, Donatello and Michelangelo's friendship, and the conflict between Leonardo and Raphael.

Donatello's inventions in this movie involve realistic machinery and advanced computer use, but all of which is generally realistic. On the other hand, in the official videogame version of the movie, Donatello's inventions are far more advanced and unrealistic, including mechanized nunchucks for Mikey, which allow him to fly like a helicopter for a short period of time.

In this movie, Donatello has reverted a bit back towards his original cartoon roots, as he's far more effeminate, brainy, and timid than the other turtles. The movie does take time to show, however, that he's trying harder than any of his brothers to provide for their basic needs and keep them together. In combat, he is capable, but perhaps a bit behind where he was in the original movie, and in the final fight he's pitted against the smallest villain.


...

That's it! Let's see how it compares to wiki...

Pretty close. Eerily close in fact. It goes a bit back and forth, with a lot of good trivia on the wiki page (I didn't know there was an alternate disutopian parallel universe episode of the new cartoon series where all the turtles except Donnie is killed), although there are blind sights in the wiki which I picked up: he mentions Donatello as being weaker than Leonardo in the original video games (which he wasn't), he left out the classic arcade game, and I included more specifics about the movies (although the wiki does, admittedly, include more information about the comics). Overall, Donatello has a very nice wiki page, with a lot of information on the character and abilites of Donatello.

I think we're at a tie. Is there anything that can break this stalemate?

Don-san.

Splinter often called Donatello 'Don-san', which is a way of showing respect to someone, which reflects the fact that Splinter has great respect for the sacrifices that Donatello makes in order to keep his brothers together.

I forgot that.

The wiki didn't.

Damn it, they beat me by a quarter-inch.

MAX VERSUS THE INTERNET: 4-4-1

I made it far closer of a fight than most expected, but regardless, I have fallen to wikipedia. Yeah, I know that it's arguably the best of all internet sites, and I was a fool to challenge it, but I had to, for the sake of all those that would stand up against the internet and call it an ad-spewing porn machine.

Words like that get a guy slapped down. Wikipedia, I bow to your all encompassing 'universal galactic intelligence' nature, but you alone will not be enough to settle this.

We need a tie breaker! What will it be? How will this end?! Stay tuned.