General Tragg and The Inspiration of the Rock Soldiers
 

My father is a fan of Perry Mason and I recently learned a reoccurring character in the television show and book series is a police officer named Lieutenant Tragg. In IDW since Krang has the title of general it dropped him down to lieutenant like the Perry Mason character. It would seem no confidence that General Tragg's name came from the series as I have never heard it elsewhere and it comes from the same period of sci-fi B films that inspire some plots and episode titles of the 1987 cartoon. While it is likely is ever confirmed this is where Tragg's name came from? Also, I was wondering if there was a sci-fi film or any particular reference of where the rock soldiers were inspired from.

There is a certain possibility that the Rock Soldiers are meant to be some kind of substitute for the Triceratons, much in the same way the Foot Clan had to robots. Many of the traits are there, they're a big bulky warrior race of aliens who wind up on earth in a teleportation incident. Now the Triceratons were included in a packet of potential characters Mirage sent to Playmates, most of whom were in the show/toyline, so it's a little odd to just leave them out at such an early state. Especially considering how Playmates commissioned the creation of Bebop and Rocksteady just to have more characters to make toys out of. Several changes (the robotic ninjas, Splinter being a composite character and the removal of Tang Shen, Nagi and Honeycutt) seem largely motivated by a guideline to downplay or outright avoid any implication of death and serious violence. It's possible that the Rock Soldiers were created to fill the same role as the Triceratons but also be OK to rough up, considering the lack of blood and guts. Now there's no real confirmation of this but it does seem logical given what we know.

As for possible inspirations, if they are indeed not just censored Triceratons, could be:

• The Thing from the Fantastic 4
• The Kronans from Marvel's Thor
• It the Living Colossus

When it comes to Honeycutt, there was no need to use him to support the story.

Technically no but his whole schtick is that his memories transferred into a robot upon physical death, there's not much wiggle room to make a Fugitoid episode is they have to make him just another robot.