Your Favorite Utroms

[Toxin45]

Here are my favorite utroms Krang
Ch'rell,and Ma'rhell so who are your favorite utroms?

[Utrommaniac]

Are you trying to make me talk about Utroms???

Because I'd love to!

And I'll start with the IDW triad of Krang, Ch'rell, and Ma'riell. All with the same problem and different ways to respond to it.

Spoiler:

I think the thing I find most interesting about him is how royally he fvcks himself over and shoots himself in the foot with his intents.
He wanted to save his people and be a better leader than his father ever was. He wanted to save his people and himself from being stranded and provide a new home.

But!
He blew up an entire planet because a hitman lied to him (I have a bunch of questions about that aside from that being a complete waste of time, energy, and resources, but if Anemon's people had enough technology to have an entire food supply on another planet, I highly doubt he's the only one left. Doesn't erase the fact that he still Death Star'd a planet with nukes and only worsens his case for "I wAs TrYInG to SAve My PeOPle!!!"), tearing down another planet's entire ecosystem by removing its most valuable resource (HMMM I wonder what the biggest factor in losing his own planet was???), the weapons testing that screwed up another ecosystem, tormenting a large dangerous reptile (as if he had NEVER had large dangerous reptiles get abused under his command and then lashed out at him when he was at his most vulnerable!), continued to enslave and conquer or destroy whatever got in his way.


He started out with noble intents. He wanted to stop the rebellion and the war before it destroyed his planet and race, but his father stood in his way. So he had to do what was necessary to save what he could.
He could have kept a low profile, he could have done what his father refused to do and listened to Professor Honeycutt. But the longer he was left without a tether (I would say Ma'riell or Lorqa; Ch'rell would probably have encouraged him), the more unhinged he became.


Not only was Krang just straight up awful, but he was careless, wasteful, and downright hypocritical. In an image:


At his core, though, he seemed to want to do things differently than Quanin. Zog thought he could be better, that he could do better. Lorqa had hope that he'd be different. Ma'riell was disappointed that he did turn out to be like Quanin in the end. Maybe even worse. And I think that's Krang's greatest tragedy, moreso than the whole "planet got destroyed and my species is at the brink of extinction" problem. That in all the effort to protect his people, he became what he never wanted to be, and in doing that, doomed himself and probably his people too.


...I just wish IDW had taken the time to examine it that way, because Krang very well could have been just as fleshed out as Saki. Because he does have all the pieces there to be examined way more deeply than on the surface.

And I say all of that with him as my favorite character in IDW.


Ma'riell

Spoiler:

Still kind of figuring out what her deal is, cuz...man, she's also making bad decisions, but in the opposite direction from Krang. Under her care, the Utroms are awake. We don't exactly have a clear idea of what their living situation is like, though. It would be pretty helpful to know to get a clearer idea of what's going on.

But what we do know for sure is that she's had to pick between her people's dignity and family...and she picked her people. Which of course is eating her up inside, it has to be. Because not only does she have to leave her (older?) brother by the wayside, she didn't have time to figure out damage control because of how dangerous he is. Because of how loyal/close he was to Krang. And she just keeps stacking the pile.

"Leave Ch'rell in stasis while we figure out how to tell him that Krang is in prison."
"Leave Ch'rell in stasis so he doesn't have to go to prison too."
"Leave Ch'rell in stasis while I figure out how to tell him that Krang is dead and we don't have the body."
"Leave Ch'rell in stasis while we sort things out with the Triceratons"
"Take Ch'rell out of stasis while nothing is ready and we're under attack - oh sh!t that's not Ch'rell"

She at least has admitted that she's not prepared for leadership in the way she was used to. She's admitted she never even wanted to lead the whole population. But she does it because she's the only one for the job and is the only one who's stable enough to have the job. Even though it strips her of the tasks that she could be doing to improve quality of life for her people, and maybe even working things out with the Neutrinos for them to have a safe place to hide in Dimension X.

There's less to say about both versions of Ch'rell and I'm fairly annoyed that we have to wait to see him at his full potential. But still, here I go.

Spoiler:

So the big factor with Ch'rell is that he's an even bigger military bad@$$ than Krang ever was. And for the IDW version, that mean an unshakable loyalty. Great enough loyalty that his own sister didn't want to let him out of stasis for fear of how he would react to Krang's imprisonment. That's pretty severe. So pardon me for impersonating a certain seal meme from the mid 2000's.

And for all of that concern...he was keeping himself on a good tether when confronting Ma'riell about it. But then again, he had a battle to fight. Can't just burn all your aggression yelling at your sister.


But the most interesting thing about him so far was his reaction to Slash's sacrifice. Though it was interesting he was in the final page "reaction shots". Respectful, but a bit confused, maybe? And a bit of "Oh sure, YOU got to be there for your friend in their moment of death!"


As for Original Ch'rell...a little red mass of wasted potential.
He was pretty great up until his personality flattened like a souffle to "I want to take over the universe!!!"
There was no detail on his history, what happened for him to make him hate his own people so much and Mortu specifically (maybe his dumb name), and why he felt the need to adopt Karai out of all the children on the street - and further more, why he loved her the slight bit that he did. I do think he did love her, and Peter Laird has said that he did, just not in the way Karai needed him to.

And how'd he get that scar???

Moving onward...can't say 2003 is particularly exciting in terms of Utroms besides Ch'rell and Mortu. I've already gone into Ch'rell and Mortu is...eh.

Same thing with Mirage, save for [airhorns]my boi Obligado![/airhorns]

Spoiler:

Because yeah, he's a freakin' bad@$$!
He's so cool he can do drugs with a ghost and survive a black hole! He proves Utroms can do some kind of martial arts with their wee bodies, even in the weird tube-y shape of the Kuhn/2003/Lawson style.

But most of all, even with all the stuff he's done, he still keeps a formality and is...probably the best Utrom out of all the Utroms to have a conversation with. Sure, it'll probably go in a weird direction, but he strikes me as a combination of the first and third Doctors in Doctor Who.

And of course his (second) death is one of my favorites in media besides Audrey in Little Shop of Horrors. Spending his very last moments remembering his first and giving me a veiled hint as to how Utrom childrearing works where do they have the space to nurse in that design???

I like to think of him as Dr Xeinos' father, and Dr Xeinos as Glurin's mother. Because those three have such insane habits for the sake of science, that they gotta be related. Throwing themselves into black holes, deciding
a random baby alligator in the sewer would be a good pet, and building an inter-dimensional portal...they're all pretty extreme as far as Utroms go. Would be cool if it just ran in the family.

Other than that, there's not too much to say about Glurin and Xeinos. Xeinos just let Leatherhead assume her gender and the most interesting thing Glurin did was get so wasted off cranberry juice (another aspect of Utrom biology to surprise me; maybe they auto ferment the sugar?) he let his friends go through a portal that hadn't been fully tested and was surprised when something went wrong.

TMNT has been surprisingly sparse in terms of Utroms, and they all just kinda end up in the same slot of mysterious and eloquent smol aliens. Not a lot of deviation in personality, so no one really stands out. And it wasn't until IDW that the limit was really pushed on making each one looked distinct from one another, which helps to keep them from all being in the same stagnant personality.

[Toxin45]

Originally Posted by Utrommaniac

Are you trying to make me talk about Utroms???

Because I'd love to!

And I'll start with the IDW triad of Krang, Ch'rell, and Ma'riell. All with the same problem and different ways to respond to it.

Spoiler:

I think the thing I find most interesting about him is how royally he fvcks himself over and shoots himself in the foot with his intents.
He wanted to save his people and be a better leader than his father ever was. He wanted to save his people and himself from being stranded and provide a new home.

But!
He blew up an entire planet because a hitman lied to him (I have a bunch of questions about that aside from that being a complete waste of time, energy, and resources, but if Anemon's people had enough technology to have an entire food supply on another planet, I highly doubt he's the only one left. Doesn't erase the fact that he still Death Star'd a planet with nukes and only worsens his case for "I wAs TrYInG to SAve My PeOPle!!!"), tearing down another planet's entire ecosystem by removing its most valuable resource (HMMM I wonder what the biggest factor in losing his own planet was???), the weapons testing that screwed up another ecosystem, tormenting a large dangerous reptile (as if he had NEVER had large dangerous reptiles get abused under his command and then lashed out at him when he was at his most vulnerable!), continued to enslave and conquer or destroy whatever got in his way.


He started out with noble intents. He wanted to stop the rebellion and the war before it destroyed his planet and race, but his father stood in his way. So he had to do what was necessary to save what he could.
He could have kept a low profile, he could have done what his father refused to do and listened to Professor Honeycutt. But the longer he was left without a tether (I would say Ma'riell or Lorqa; Ch'rell would probably have encouraged him), the more unhinged he became.


Not only was Krang just straight up awful, but he was careless, wasteful, and downright hypocritical. In an image:
https://i.imgur.com/1A3ixzH.jpg?1

At his core, though, he seemed to want to do things differently than Quanin. Zog thought he could be better, that he could do better. Lorqa had hope that he'd be different. Ma'riell was disappointed that he did turn out to be like Quanin in the end. Maybe even worse. And I think that's Krang's greatest tragedy, moreso than the whole "planet got destroyed and my species is at the brink of extinction" problem. That in all the effort to protect his people, he became what he never wanted to be, and in doing that, doomed himself and probably his people too.


...I just wish IDW had taken the time to examine it that way, because Krang very well could have been just as fleshed out as Saki. Because he does have all the pieces there to be examined way more deeply than on the surface.

And I say all of that with him as my favorite character in IDW.


Ma'riell

Spoiler:

Still kind of figuring out what her deal is, cuz...man, she's also making bad decisions, but in the opposite direction from Krang. Under her care, the Utroms are awake. We don't exactly have a clear idea of what their living situation is like, though. It would be pretty helpful to know to get a clearer idea of what's going on.

But what we do know for sure is that she's had to pick between her people's dignity and family...and she picked her people. Which of course is eating her up inside, it has to be. Because not only does she have to leave her (older?) brother by the wayside, she didn't have time to figure out damage control because of how dangerous he is. Because of how loyal/close he was to Krang. And she just keeps stacking the pile.

"Leave Ch'rell in stasis while we figure out how to tell him that Krang is in prison."
"Leave Ch'rell in stasis so he doesn't have to go to prison too."
"Leave Ch'rell in stasis while I figure out how to tell him that Krang is dead and we don't have the body."
"Leave Ch'rell in stasis while we sort things out with the Triceratons"
"Take Ch'rell out of stasis while nothing is ready and we're under attack - oh sh!t that's not Ch'rell"

She at least has admitted that she's not prepared for leadership in the way she was used to. She's admitted she never even wanted to lead the whole population. But she does it because she's the only one for the job and is the only one who's stable enough to have the job. Even though it strips her of the tasks that she could be doing to improve quality of life for her people, and maybe even working things out with the Neutrinos for them to have a safe place to hide in Dimension X.

There's less to say about both versions of Ch'rell and I'm fairly annoyed that we have to wait to see him at his full potential. But still, here I go.

Spoiler:

So the big factor with Ch'rell is that he's an even bigger military bad@$$ than Krang ever was. And for the IDW version, that mean an unshakable loyalty. Great enough loyalty that his own sister didn't want to let him out of stasis for fear of how he would react to Krang's imprisonment. That's pretty severe. So pardon me for impersonating a certain seal meme from the mid 2000's.

And for all of that concern...he was keeping himself on a good tether when confronting Ma'riell about it. But then again, he had a battle to fight. Can't just burn all your aggression yelling at your sister.


But the most interesting thing about him so far was his reaction to Slash's sacrifice. Though it was interesting he was in the final page "reaction shots". Respectful, but a bit confused, maybe? And a bit of "Oh sure, YOU got to be there for your friend in their moment of death!"


As for Original Ch'rell...a little red mass of wasted potential.
He was pretty great up until his personality flattened like a souffle to "I want to take over the universe!!!"
There was no detail on his history, what happened for him to make him hate his own people so much and Mortu specifically (maybe his dumb name), and why he felt the need to adopt Karai out of all the children on the street - and further more, why he loved her the slight bit that he did. I do think he did love her, and Peter Laird has said that he did, just not in the way Karai needed him to.

And how'd he get that scar???

Moving onward...can't say 2003 is particularly exciting in terms of Utroms besides Ch'rell and Mortu. I've already gone into Ch'rell and Mortu is...eh.

Same thing with Mirage, save for [airhorns]my boi Obligado![/airhorns]

Spoiler:

Because yeah, he's a freakin' bad@$$!
He's so cool he can do drugs with a ghost and survive a black hole! He proves Utroms can do some kind of martial arts with their wee bodies, even in the weird tube-y shape of the Kuhn/2003/Lawson style.

But most of all, even with all the stuff he's done, he still keeps a formality and is...probably the best Utrom out of all the Utroms to have a conversation with. Sure, it'll probably go in a weird direction, but he strikes me as a combination of the first and third Doctors in Doctor Who.

And of course his (second) death is one of my favorites in media besides Audrey in Little Shop of Horrors. Spending his very last moments remembering his first and giving me a veiled hint as to how Utrom childrearing works where do they have the space to nurse in that design???

I like to think of him as Dr Xeinos' father, and Dr Xeinos as Glurin's mother. Because those three have such insane habits for the sake of science, that they gotta be related. Throwing themselves into black holes, deciding
a random baby alligator in the sewer would be a good pet, and building an inter-dimensional portal...they're all pretty extreme as far as Utroms go. Would be cool if it just ran in the family.

Other than that, there's not too much to say about Glurin and Xeinos. Xeinos just let Leatherhead assume her gender and the most interesting thing Glurin did was get so wasted off cranberry juice (another aspect of Utrom biology to surprise me; maybe they auto ferment the sugar?) he let his friends go through a portal that hadn't been fully tested and was surprised when something went wrong.

Oh course your user name is obvious lol.

[Utrommaniac]

Also, you do know you don't have to quote an entire block of speech? You're allowed to cut down to just one part.
Especially when it's right at the beginning of the thread; no one likes having to go through the same text as before it twice.

[Original TMNT Cartoon Fan]

I've always been fascinated with the idea of lifeforms on other planets than Earth, in science and fiction. I'm still mad at New Line Cinema for rejecting Utroms in Secret of the Ooze (Jordan Perry mustn't be an Utrom, but he should have befriended them as a link to Humans, just like the turtles have done with April O'Neil and Casey Jones).

Among my favourite Utroms, I would say Krang and Chrell, as those are the ones we know best.