RAPHAEL
(SAILOR)
PROJECT# 481
CLASSIFICATION: REPAINT/CUSTOM
BASE FIGURE: MIDSHIPMAN MIKE
MATERIALS USED: HOBBY KNIFE, ACRYLIC PAINTS
FIRST APPEARANCE: "GREEN WITH JEALOUSY"
"Three sailors? I've hit the naval
jackpot!"
Preamble: In the original Teenage
Mutant Ninja Turtles cartoon show, whenever the Turtles needed to venture
forth from the sewers and into the city streets, they needed to wear
some kind of disguise. Of course, "disguise" is a fairly subjective
term, since they just went from looking like naked anthopomorphic reptiles
to anthropomorphic reptiles wearing clothing, but that's a minor consideration.
(One supposes that citizens of New York just don't pay very close attention
to passers-by.) Trench coats and fedorah hats were their default attire
of choice, but on at least one occasion, the Turtles dressed up in sailor
suits. It must not have been their favorite get-up, since it turned
out to be a short-lived proposition. Very short-lived, actually.
They actually only spent about two minutes of screen time in their
naval uniforms, but it's one of the things that makes the episode "Green
With Jealousy" stand out, visually, from the rest of the many, many other
episodes that were produced in 1989. Two years later, they even produced
a toy called Midshipman Mike that may very well have been inspired by the
episode in question. Michaelangelo was the only one to get the sailor
treatment in action figure form, however. It took me a little while,
but I finally collected four of them together in order to do my versions
of the Turtles as they appear in this episode.
Construction: Midshipman Mike was
sculpted with a lot of extra details in an effort to make the action figure
interestingnot just the fish friends perched on his shoulder (how do
they breathe?) and the barnacles on his legs and back, but also the letter
insignia on his hat, the anchor tattoo on his arm (shades of Popeye), the
"USTF" rank insignia on his breast, etc. These helped to lend the toy
an air of authencitiy, of sorts, but they didn't match the cartoon appearance
of the Turtles so I got rid of them. I also bulked up the sailor hats,
added a tie to the front of the outfits, and whittled away at the boots to
change them into bare feet. I worked on all four Turtles at once, making
the same physical changes to them four times in a row and then painting them
all at once, allowing me to use the same specialliy-mixed batch of paint
to get their skin tones to match each other.
I wanted Raphael to actually be able to hold his
weapons in a way that he could use them, something the original toy wasn't
really sculpted to do, so I cut off Raphael's left arm at the elbow and
reattached it so that his arm was straighter, enabling him to thrust his
sai out in a more menacing pose.
Comments: For some reason, I'd remembered
the Turtles wearing these outfits on more than one occasion, so I was
surprised to find during my research that "Green With Jealousy" remains the
only episode in which they dress up this way. One supposes the existence
of the Midshipman Mike action figure served to somehow validate the costume
in my mind, thus lending it a credence it hadn't earned in the seriesor
perhaps the outfits simply stood out in my mind because it was so rare to
see the Turtles disguise themselves in anything other than their regular
fedorah hats and trench coats.
PORTRAIT OF MUTANT MARINER RAPH
The Notorious Nautical Ninja!
Favorite Expression: "I yam what I yam!"
Favorite Food: Spinach...wait, no, that's some other sailor
Batten down the hatches,
bos'nhere comes Mutant Mariner Raph! It's not enough for the
green teens to beat the fungus out of the Foot Clan on the ground and in
the airnow it's time to sink their ships, too! Raphael is just
the rip-roarin' reptile for the job. This salty-shelled sailor has
got a pair of sturdy sea legs, and nothing makes him seasick except the sight
of a fleet of Footskis on the port bow. Just feed him a pizza topped
with freshly-caught trout, and Raph will be right as rain in no time! |
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