Donatello
Portrait of a Ninja Turtle
written by Mike originally for Poprocks & Coke on June 7, 2025

Hi, I'm Mike Fireball: Ninja Turtle Fan. Well, ok, so maybe I didn't watch every episode, or collect every toy, or make a costume & hang out with them like that little brat, Zack. But I can still say with confidence that I'm a huge Turtle fan. Certainly not the biggest, but I think it's safe to say that I have the equivalent of a brown belt in Ninja Turtles.

That being said, I welcome you to my addition to a very special coverage of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Three of my friends joined me in choosing one turtle each to focus on. Their links are at the bottom. As for me?

Yup, Donatello. My job here is to defend the awesomeness of the Turtles' creative genius. And since my colleagues are apparently under the crazy notion that he sucks, I have to put in that much extra effort. But before we get to that, let's get some background on the guy.

On the back of the packaging of the original 1988 Ninja Turtle action figure lineup was a stupid little profile card with some vital "tortistics" about the character. You won't believe how clever Playmates thought this was. You also won't believe that they didn't stop there. Here's some excerpts from Donatello's profile:

WEAPONS: Bo (Staff), Turtle Fist Daggers, Ninja Stars, Kama
It's always nice to have an action figure come with extra stuff, but aside from the ninja stars & the Bo (Staff), I've never seen Don use any of this.

BIRTHPLACE: Joe's Pet Place, Slowklahoma
LOL get it? Because he's a turtle, & turtles are known for the slow speeds at which they move! Get it? GET IT?! HAHAHAHA. Seriously, I hope that guy got fired.

HEIGHT: 4' on two legs
Doesn't somebody check these before they go out? That has to be a typo. Unless they renamed Munchkinland "New York City" while I wasn't looking. And I'd have a hard time believing that Casey Jones was a midget this whole time.

Ok, we're not getting anywhere reading this stupid thing. Let's talk a little about Don's choice of weaponry...

The Bo (Staff). Sure, it just looks like a plain old ordinary stick (Stick) to the untrained eye. And yes, it is the simplest of martial arts weapons, almost always the first that one learns to wield in the discipline. But that's where the beauty of the Bo (Staff) lies... in its simplicity.

None can match its versatility. Remember that short cartoon on Sesame Street, where the kid's playing out all these scenarios with nothing but a Wooden Stick (Broom Handle) & the power of his imagination? First he pretended it was a baseball bat, & hit a home run. Then he pretended it was a horse, & rode around on it like a cowboy. Then he pretended it was a double-edged light saber, & took on an entire fleet of storm troopers...

Sure, he may have looked like a loser with no social skills, but take that idea into battle. Whereas the katana blade & the sai are limited in attacking methods, the Bo (Staff) can be used in a wide range of pummeling techniques. And that, my friends, is what makes it such an excellent weapon.

You know who else thought so?

It was in the Turtles' first video game for the NES where the power of Donatello's Bo (Staff) truly shined. He was, without question, the best of your arsenal of four. In fact, he was so awesome, you wouldn't even play as him for 80% of the game. You'd save him for the boss fights, because you knew he could tear the place up. The Bo (Jackson) did the most damage and had the longest range of the pack. Nintendo Logic? No way. Video gaming is a Japanese-based industry, & as I'm sure you know, everyone in Japan knows at least a little ninjitsu.

Want to see Donatello in action?

Watch me beat the crap out of Rocksteady.
812 kb .wmv

But the case most people use against Don's awesomeness is not his choice of weaponry, but rather his prime identifier... the purple mask. I'm not even kidding. Somehow, the notion came about that wearing purple makes Donatello less of a man... er, turtle. The theory behind this is that purple is apparently a favorite among gay people. Never mind the fact that it was perfectly acceptable for straight men to wear purple in 1988, & it would be at least another 6 years before the Justice Cabinet of Homosexuals would patent it as their identifying hue, which, oh yeah, never happened.

I always thought of purple as sort of a "light black." Donatello's a ninja. It works. Either way you look at it, the truth is, it does take a real man to wear purple as his identifying color & get away with it.

And it takes an extremely big man to wear a matching purple fanny pack while sitting on a renown triathlete's lap & get away with it. LOL INSIDE JOKE~!!

Not even a gay man would attempt that. But if you're still not convinced, perhaps you'll listen to a higher authority. Time now to turn to the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movie trilogy...

If anyone's in a position to convince you that Donatello was just as radical, if not more so, as his brothers, it's the man who provided his voice for two of the three Turtle movies. If you don't already know who that man is, prepare to have your mind blown...

No joke. 80s icon Corey Feldman was the voice of Donatello in the first & third installments of the TMNT movie trilogy. Why not the Secret of the Ooze? Probably related to his drug problem around that time. Whatever it was, a Trump card like Corey Feldman is hard to beat. Look at the rest of the cast. Michaelangelo was voiced by Cousin Oliver. Splinter's voice was the same guy who does Elmo. Donnie? His lines came out of the mouth of Corey frigging Feldman.

So what does Corey have to say about his tenure as the radical reptile? Here's an excerpt of an interview he did for the UK Metro newspaper on September 24, 2025 (which, incidentally, was my 23rd birthday)...

UK METRO: When you did Donatello, did you ever think you'd got a raw deal? Let's face it, he was a crap turtle.

COREY FELDMAN: I didn't perceive it that way. I always thought Donatello was the coolest.

UKM: Come on. He had a wooden staff and purple headgear - hardly manly stuff.

CF: He's a turtle, go give him some respect - and from what I hear, a lot of turtles don't have very big staffs. His is huge - he pulls it out and the girls drop in their pants. And purple is very manly. You wouldn't want orange or red - those are gay colours. Don't fuck with my Donatello.

I should just win this argument now, but we haven't even gotten to the Donnie's dominant personality trait, the one thing at which he excels beyond his brothers...

DONATELLO. DOES. MACHINES.
That's a fact, Jack!

How Donatello managed to get a bonus IQ boost from the almighty mutagen is a mystery, but his genius seems to know no bounds, & has helped the Turtles out of many a sticky situation. He's the kind of Turtle you rely on to think quickly under pressure without panicking. Shredder's got a new machine, you say? No problem. Donnie can figure out how it works in a matter of minutes. Never mind that the thing's just been invented. Don's got it covered.

Some people will argue that Don's a bit of reckless for a scientist. Most scientists will take the time to calculate hypotheses & run experiments before putting a machine together out of spare parts you found in the sewer. Not Donatello. He doesn't have time to test crap. Teenage impetuosity? Maybe. Ninja courage? That sounds more like it. So maybe not all of his inventions work perfectly every time. Donnie is, first & foremost, a ninja trying to keep the big city safe. What he lacks in perfectionism, he makes up for in quick ninja thinking, & it's this on which he relies most heavily. Because let's face it: being a ninja is just more important than being a scientist. Even Don knows that.

If nothing else, the fact that Donatello was the only Turtle to not have one of those stupid "Bodacious Birthday" action figures should say something about his intelligence.

Here's a look at some of Donatello's greatest inventions...

The Turtle Blimp. Ok, so maybe Don got a little ambitious with the giant TMNT logo slapped on the middle of the thing & "KOWABUNGA DUDES!" spraypainted over top. So much for the art of invisibility. But the design of the Turtle Blimp is nothing short of a work of art. Only Donatello could patch a bunch of sheets, wires & scrap metal together in the frigging sewer, & create a perfectly working blimp with enough strength to easily carry the weight of the Statue of Liberty.

* * * *

The Turtle Comm. Don's Turtle Communicator was more than just a brilliant device used to contact Splinter, April, Casey Jones, & Usagi Yojimbo. The Turtle Comm had the best reception ever. "Hi. I'm 50 feet underground, looking for the Technodrome. Can you hear me now?" No problem for this shell phone.

* * * *

The Party Wagon. Never mind that Donatello learned how to drive all by himself. The dude fixed up an old van & turned it into the ultimate battle wagon. It'd take at least 2 episodes of "Pimp My Ride" to cover the Party Wagon in detail. Plus an extra episode for Don's later modification...

The Muta-Party Wagon.
This space reserved for a joke about Power Rangers.

* * * *

The Alphabetical Insult Game. In the first TMNT movie, while Donnie (who, in case you forgot, is voiced by 80s icon Corey Feldman) is working on the truck with Casey Jones, he comes up with what has to be one of the greatest games ever invented, but you don't figure out what they're up to until more than halfway into the scene (play the clip - 773kb .mp3).

They call each other stupid, second-grade, G-rated names... in alphabetical order! And since Casey finished at Z, that means Donatello started it. If that game doesn't spell pure genius, I don't know what does. We should bring it back. I'll start, Acid breath!

I think I've made my point. Don't count out the nerdy Turtle with the purple mask & the wooden stick. Donatello is a Turtle who uses his head first, & his Bo (Staff) when he has to. And that is the true way of the ninja. Turtles fight with honor.

Three of my friends have written pieces for the other 3 Turtles, so here they are...