Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Tournament Fighters (TT Top 50 Edition)

[Dracula]

#35: Muckman

Points: 64 | Lists: 3​

I like monsters made of garbage. -- Johnny Unusual

Muckman is the first character on this list who was created expressly for the Playmates toyline. His file card paints him as an unnamed “sewer worker” who stumbles into some retromutagen ooze and becomes a shambling garbage monster. Though you’d expect him to take this poorly, Muckman instead embraces his life as a trash golem and even helps the turtles fight the Foot Clan when the time comes. And he’s never seen without his bin-riding ally, Joe Eyeball.

From a toy perspective Muckman is simply one of the best ever. The toy is bursting with sculpted detail and some of it will turn your stomach if you look too close. He was designed to interact with the green ooze that Playmates sold in plastic canisters. You can pull off his hat and dribble slime down through his head and watch it ooze out his mouth, or dump it in his trashcan backpack which ports through a hole in his stomach. His “muck gun” (amusingly pieced together with old cans and soda bottles) has a hole all the way through it so you can load it, too, with slime.

And the artistic merits of his little buddy Joe Eyeball are too obvious to state.

Muckman went on to appear in some cartoons and video games but we will always remember him for making our parents wonder if we had all gone insane.

I admire the flex of preferring life as garbage. -- Bulgakov

Oh and since I am a big fan of this green weirdo I have collected many toy versions of him which I thought you might wish to see all standing together:

(This is every unique mold of Muckman made so far. There are some other toys of him but they are basically the same ones but in glow-in-the-dark.)

 

[Falselogic]

I love how Muckman's stench is too much for his olfactory system and so he's got that clip on his nose.

 

[Dracula]

I love how Muckman's stench is too much for his olfactory system and so he's got that clip on his nose.

There is a funny little anecdote in his original file card that says the clothespin isn't to keep the stench out it's to keep the garbage in which raises all sorts of other questions but it's still very funny

 

[Falselogic]

There is a funny little anecdote in his original file card that says the clothespin isn't to keep the stench out it's to keep the garbage in which raises all sorts of other questions but it's still very funny

His garbage brain leaking out, huh?

 

[Dracula]

​

#34 Sewer Lair​

Points: 65 | Lists: 3​

"(You know what sucks? Actual sewers. They're dark and gross and smelly and boring as shit. But a cool sewer hideout where you can watch TV with your friends? Cool as shit.)" – Jbear

The very first thing you see in the original TMNT animated series during the intro is a glowing sewer lid. On page four or five of the first issue of the Mirage comic the turtles beat up some mooks and then escape into the sewers. One out of every three of the Playmates action figures came with a sewer lid as an accessory.

What I’m getting at is the sewers are pretty important to the Ninja Turtles and that’s because they live in them. And every child of the dirty 90s grew up believing that every suburban manhole cover concealed a secret world of vast caverns and ninja lairs. Actually most of them were just pipes barely big enough for a raccoon but that didn’t stop us from believing.

The crown jewel in this sewer mythology is the home of the ninja turtles. Depending on what version you’re watching or reading this lair might be a hidey hole with a few rooms or it might be more like a stadium. Regardless there is usually a TV and a couch and some arcade games and a punching bag shaped like Shredder. Usually it’s kitted out with all the turtle tech and vehicles so it often ends up feeling like a punk version of the Batcave.

Of course there were toys. The original sewer playset has two levels, one that’s supposed to be the street level and one that’s the inside of the lair. There’s a periscope disguised as a fire hydrant and an elevator and a manhole cover and a trapeze made of power lines. There’s a gas pump so you can pull up the Party Wagon for a refuel. There are modular pipes you can hook up to the Technodrome or (like me) set them up on the floor and use them to play Mario.

But the best sewer lair has gotta be the one from the 2012 show both in cartoon and toy form. Folks if you haven’t figured it out I’m religious for this cartoon. Every turtle has their own themed room and it’s so full of sweet little details. Then the toy is like five feet tall and has everything you could imagine in a playset. Grognards like me said there hasn’t been a good playset since 1994 and I know I’m completely wrong because this one exists.

Anyway leave it to Ninja Turtles to make us wish we could live in our garbage.

 

[Lokii]

Was there ever a set for Secret of the Ooze where they lived in an abandoned Subway restaurant?

 

[Octopus Prime]

L’il Tiny Octo remembers watching the commercial for that playset and the announcer said “Speaking of going up… the turtles can use the elevator!” Or some such and nobody mentioned “going up” prior to that.

that was the moment I realized commercials were lies, told by the deceitful

 

[JBear]

My favourite thing about that box for the old sewer lair is the fidelity to the figures. They all look authentically rigid and awkward, clearly drawn with the actual toys in mind. I don't recall if any of the other boxes for that line were similar or not.

 

[Johnny Unusual]

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1662674710927384576

 

[Purple]

Objection! Critters' original script didn't have the kraits being particularly mischievious or muppety at all! That was last minute executive meddling and it would still hold up quite well as just a tongue in cheek thing with vaguely menacing space monsters menacing rural folks while shapeshifting space bounty hunters impersonating a rock star and local oaf blow them away with ridiculous space cannons! Now 2 you could argue was riding those coat tails, but it's one of the best entries in the whole subgenre.

 

[Johnny Unusual]

Objection!

Note that you are basically objecting to the dismissiveness of Raph in the movie. I suspect Dracula is a fan. I haven't spoken with him on this but knowing his likes, I feel confident in this. He is free to prove me wrong, though.

But yeah, it's definitely on the better end of the spectrum compared to, say...

 

[Dracula]

I love all Critters, Gremlins, Ghoulies, and yes even Hobgoblins on occasion

Raph is the one with poor taste

 

[Johnny Unusual]

I cannot echo the Ghoulies love because it's a movie that had a great poster but the toilet ghoulie is in there for like 4 seconds. Even the sequel did not even consider it could be set in a toilet factory.

 

[Daikaiju]

I find it interesting that Konami's first TMNT game went with the the Mirage Comics 1.0 version of the lair, complete with sliding brick wall entrance.

 

[Octopus Prime]

I love all Critters, Gremlins, Ghoulies, and yes even Hobgoblins on occasion

Raph is the one with poor taste

It’s for this reason and this reason alone I consider him to be the least reliable Ninja Turtle.

But then again, perhaps he is one of those cursed with a Natural Sarcastic Voice (he is both “cool but rude”) so maybe he was earnestly impressed with Critters’ storytelling

 

[Dracula]

My favourite thing about that box for the old sewer lair is the fidelity to the figures. They all look authentically rigid and awkward, clearly drawn with the actual toys in mind. I don't recall if any of the other boxes for that line were similar or not.

Objection, the Splinter figure definitely cannot sit cross-legged

But yes I think some of the other vehicles/playsets did feature toy-inspired artwork like this and I love it. The lair art definitely makes me want to cram some figures in there and play with them and it's always been a playset that feels kind of limited based on the actual space inside. The art helps me enjoy it more!

I find it interesting that Konami's first TMNT game went with the the Mirage Comics 1.0 version of the lair, complete with sliding brick wall entrance.

Still wonder what reference material was actually handed to the Konami dev team because yeah that whole part really feels ripped right out of the comics and there's not a lot of other direct comic references in the game!

 

[Purple]

It’s for this reason and this reason alone I consider him to be the least reliable Ninja Turtle.

But then again, perhaps he is one of those cursed with a Natural Sarcastic Voice (he is both “cool but rude”) so maybe he was earnestly impressed with Critters’ storytelling

OK... I'll set down my weird kitbashed armor and ooze cannon for now... but I've got my eye on him.

 

[JBear]

I love all Critters, Gremlins, Ghoulies, and yes even Hobgoblins on occasion

I won't stand for this blatant CHUD erasure.

 

[Johnny Unusual]

I won't stand for this blatant CHUD erasure.

No one is erasing CHUD but this is an accumulation of films where the monster top out at the size of a particularly large teddy bear. I've yet to see CHUD but I think they are the size of hunched over people. Smaller than regular people but not small enough. Of course, this is just MY rubrick. Meet me here to discuss further.

 

[Lokii]

#33 Scumbug​

Points: 66 | Lists: 3
"I hate Critters!" - Scumbug, probably
​

With the C-listers a simple pattern emerges: take a profession, take an animal associated with that profession, mash em up and you've got a new toy to sell to the kiddies. Hence, Scumbug, the bug exterminator who was turned into a roach after contact with the ooze. Scumbug only showed up in a couple Archie comics (where he has an insane backstory as you'd expect) and one episode of the cartoon where his only presence was to fill out a rogues gallery. But despite his tangential nature Scumbug looms large in the TMNT collective conscience because it seems like everyone had his figure.

"Also had this figure." -Johnny Unusual

Like Muckman or Wyrm the toymakers sought to appeal to the tykes by leaning hard on the gross-out factor. Scumbug is the rare turtle to be caught halfway through mutation, with both human and insect bits, and that is so, so gross. A regular brundlelfy situation here. And of course he's covered with all sorts of little bugs and stuff you don't notice until you start looking closely at the details.

Every gross-out figure has to have a Weird Foot, and while Scumbug's isn't particularly showy it might be the most disturbing of the lot. It's hard to make out because the paint scheme hides the details but apparently one single toe decided to go full bug and is bursting through the top of Scum's shoe. I don't know what it is about it that gets so under my skin but seeing that toe makes me shudder in horror. A good reaction for a figure of this nature and thankfully the upcoming Super 7 revamp of this figure displays The Toe in all it's visceral glory.

 

[Dracula]

I love how the TMNT line already had one weird purple bug guy and Playmates was like how about another and let's make him even more disturbing?? The fact that he's an exterminator by trade just makes it more delicious. Adore the Ed Roth eyeballs and how his antennae are done up in a ponytail like yeah we're uncontrollably mutating into several bugs at once but style is still important. Oh and the original toy has a cute little feature where his jaw moves when you twist his head.

 

[Lokii]

I like how his extermination backpack connects into his chest for no discernible reason

 

[JBear]

Oh, those are just his nipple pumps. The backpack is for storing the milk.

(I'm sorry.)

 

[Octopus Prime]

had Scumbug as a L’il Octo, was one of my favourites of the whole line

 

[Falselogic]

One of my votes, I had the figure as a wee lad, It's the little bug legs that are hugging his torso that are the real creep show.

 

[Johnny Unusual]

Even as a kid, I thought that guy bursting out of his own flesh was pretty fucked up. Still loved him, though (which is weird, because as a kid I loved monsters but not so much the morbid like dude shedding his skin).

I'm not curious about the chronology about when they either ran out of weird animals and were just like "I dunno, a cat?"

(like, it's not a BAD sculpt either but it's so much less imaginative.)

 

[Octopus Prime]

This thread is really revealing to me how much of my favourite aesthetics were informed by Ninja Turtles

 

[Lokii]

(like, it's not a BAD sculpt either but it's so much less imaginative.)

Weird foot? Check. It’s a good toy.

 

[Daikaiju]

This thread is really revealing to me how much of my favourite aesthetics were informed by Ninja Turtles

Counterpoint: I will find your time machine and reveal that YOU informed the aesthetic.

 

[Octopus Prime]

Good luck! I hid that thing really well!