HOME | DD
WonderDookie — Rat King
Published: 2009-09-20 08:30:18 +0000 UTC; Views: 10775; Favourites: 150; Downloads: 2307
Redirect to original
Description
Another Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles villain redesign. This time it's the Rat King. This guy I took A LOT of liberties with. I basically rewrote his whole origin, making him less of an intimidating figure, and more of an annoyance. My version of the Rat King is constantly attacking the turtles trying to claim their corner of the sewer as his own. He's always spraying them with cheese in a can to attract his rat minions, or swinging his dead cat clubs at them.Anyway. This drawing took me F'ing FOREVER. I think I drew the sketch about two months ago. I've been having a really hard time motivating myself to color in this really OCD vector style anymore. It's SO tedious.
Related content
Comments: 84
haha. Thank you!
I'm also not a fan of the new Nickelodeon series, but I feel like we're a minority. The over the top anime expressions that they pull REALLY annoy me. And Mikey's voice makes me really angry too.
👍: 0 ⏩: 0
Seeing this pic, I realize how silly it is that a man who lives in the sewers amongst a bunch of rats would be clean shaven. In reality, he probably would look like a bearded insane homeless man. 
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
haha. I agree! I always thought that the Rat King was a bit too unbelievable. That's why I had to change him up so much. I think some people that are Rat King fans weren't particularly appreciative of that though. haha.
👍: 0 ⏩: 0
Thanks. I wanted to do something very different with the character.
👍: 0 ⏩: 0
I'm surprised to see that I never even left you a comment on this epic reinterpretation of the Rat King.
The creepy old Burger King crown just seals the deal for me. This is one of my all-time favorite pieces of TMNT fan-art. Both this one and your April O'Neil piece are my favorites out of your whole gallery.
Ever think about redoing the whole Channel Six News crew like Irma and Burne Thompson?
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
haha. Thanks.
I think you mentioned something about it on that Technodrome forum at some point. I haven't been back on there in ages though.
I hadn't thought of doing them. I'm still trying to finish the version of Scumbug that I drew about a year ago. haha.
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
Yes, I know I gave you some kind words there, but I figured you deserved some praise on your deviation page too!
I can't wait to see that Scumbug now. Were you planning on covering any more of the mutants?
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
haha. Thanks. I might just end up coloring it differently than I did those other characters. I can't even bring myself to do vector illustration anymore. It's so tedious.
We'll see how the Scumbug turns out. I just might!
👍: 0 ⏩: 0
The design for the new TMNT series looks really good too.
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
I haven't seen the new Rat King. I'd really like to see how they did some of the villain designs, but the only designs I've seen are the turtles and Splinter. I am hoping the designs are a bit more inspired than the turtles... and that horrible new hip-hop theme song.
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
I think the designs on the turtles are great. They're simple while having subtle details that reflect their personality. Splinter I'm not digging so much, but I'm hoping his character makes up for it. As for the theme song, yeah I would've preferred a brand new theme song instead of a remix of the old one, but I don't mind it.
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
The turtles look pretty good. I like the proportions of their limbs and stuff. I'm not a huge fan of the 3D though, it looks a bit like video game quality. I always prefer 2D animation to 3D as well. I saw an action figure for a female character that I assume is meant to be April. It was also a bit questionable.
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
I've never had a problem with 3D. Sure it tends to age fast, but when done right you have a show with the advantages of 2D animation with the added bonus of depth. Plus the animation in the promos for TMNT look great for a 3D animated TV series. It's faster and doesn't try to push their limits. Also yeah, that's April. They changed her age to 16 which a lot of people seem to mind for some reason.
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
Eh. I don't care what age they make April so long as they give the character a bit more depth.
I just really don't like 3D stuff. It looks too mass produced to me. They really don't seem to push designs very far with 3D either. Everything is just made to look "streamlined".
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
That's great. I see a lot of other people worry about the age. I really hope they do give a new direction to a character who's always been necessary yet un-engaging. My favorite April so far is the movie version. She was someone you could believe would hang out with teenage mutants.
I don't know what you mean by "mass produced". If you mean "cheap", it's probably because 3D can be expensive and you won't get Pixar-level quality from a TV budget. I'm sure the developers wouldn't have gone with 3D if they didn't think they could do something different with it.
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
haha. You have a lot more faith in television producers than I do. Typically I view them more as predatory than entertainers. In my opinion, just because someone is regurgitating a famous serious or method doesn't necessarily mean that they have a particular vision for it (just look at all of the recent movie reboots).
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
I do have faith in them. You get things like Transformers because CGI lets you do anything without having to be creative(though there is no other way to make transforming robots). But those are blockbuster movies. You're not going to get TV studio to spend that kind of money on a show just for the novelty. 2D is still just as popular as 3D even if there's been a lot of it lately.
I'm still really exited for the new series. I feel like at least someone there really cares about making it a good show. Have you seen their Rat King? It looks really good!
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
haha. I think you've forgotten about the live action Ninja Turtles show from the 90s. That was made just for $$$ without really having anything to ad to the series.
The cast for the new show looks pretty good. That's cool that Sean Astin is doing voice (too bad Corey Feldman isn't still involved... THAT would have been perfect).
The Rat King does look pretty interesting. That's much better than the other versions I have seen, and it's nice that somebody actually thought to themselves, "Waitaminute... how did this guy get so beefy!?"
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
I'm aware of the The Next Mutation(Peter Laird is on record of hating that show, especially Venus de Milo), but I was talking about spending money on novelty to make a profit. That show kind of did the opposite. It was the cheapest looking TMNT property I've known. It didn't seem to take any chances in terms of effects.
I think the show has potential to be the best TMNT series. It avoids the things that turned 80's series fans away from the 2k3 series(boring designs, not enough voice acting talent) and has the things that I thought made the 2k3 show better(more focus on action than comedy, dialogue that sounds like an adult wrote it)
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
Yeah, but they didn't know it was going to do the opposite. For all they knew it was going to be the next Power Rangers.
I am getting a bit more hopeful about the new show after seeing the cast... but I've been burned too many times in the past. Not just by the turtles, but by so many other pathetic attempts to capitalise on my childhood (Transformers 2 & 3, GI Joe, Arthur, Alien Vs. Predator, etc.)
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
The new Thundercats became a big hit. I don't see why this series wouldn't work. Honestly, I'd like a lot of 80's shows to be reinvented. I feel a lot of them were good in promise but laughably poor in execution.
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
Did it? haha. That one WAS really bad in the first incarnation.
I could definitely see the potential of GI Joe or He-Man in a new series, if they retain the quirky characters. I really enjoyed that series of animated GI Joe shorts that they released prior to the movie a number of years ago.
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
You know what was really good in 80's cartoons? The voice acting. Yeah we still have good voice actors, but that area was something that era rarely failed at. This isn't really a response to what you said. I just didn't know what else to say.
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
haha. It does seem like voice acting was more of an art back then. Nowadays production companies are too concerned with getting big name actors to do the voice acting, but screen acting and voice acting are very different!
👍: 0 ⏩: 0
haha at the beginning I was like 'wtf this is such a mean stereotype' 
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
haha. Stereotype? What stereotype was it?
Thanks! I definitely had some fun redesigning this guy.
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
Of rats, you no the plague in England wasnt really because of the rats but because of the flees on them, and there not dirty, either
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
OH! haha. I thought you thought I was stereotyping redheads, and I was thinking to myself, "I've never heard that stereotype about redheads before. That they have huge feet and live in the sewers."
You must have a bit of a hard time of it if you're sensitive to rat stereotypes though. There are a lot of them out there.
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
haha course not 
👍: 0 ⏩: 0
Thank you! I had a lot of fun with this one.
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
I can tell! ^_^ Nice work.
👍: 0 ⏩: 0
haha. Yeah. I was figuring he uses it to cover his enemies with cheese and then sick his army of rats on them.
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
om nom nom! Sounds like fun lmfao. Well maybe not for the ones getting devoured.
👍: 0 ⏩: 0
Thanks man! I definitely wanted to try a new take on the character. The old one seems a bit boring to me.
👍: 0 ⏩: 0
haha, love this character remakes, great use of colors man
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
Thank you. I tried to do a bit of a Halloween color scheme on there. Seemed appropriate.
👍: 0 ⏩: 0
Damn I havent seen ninja tutles in AGES and they had some crazy villians!
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
haha. Yeah they did. The villains are real fun to draw too. Cause of the craziness.
👍: 0 ⏩: 0
Oh man, this guy! To be honest, I don't remember him much from the cartoon, but I do remember him from this Turtles comics I had - not the original stuff either, it was comic adaptations of the cartoons or something. But yeah, he'd show up in a few issues. This drawing takes me back...! I wish I knew where those comics are...
Anyway, great work, as always. The coloring may be tedious, but it sure produces awesome results. And that dead cat club is wrong, but hilarious
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
I just remember thinking he was pretty lame in the cartoon. Pretty humdrum. I think that's why I felt so compelled to draw him. NO TMNT villain is allowed to be humdrum!
Urgh. And I think I am done with that way of doing the coloring, but I'm definitely not done with those characters in general. I have two more of them sketched out and ready to color when my new computer gets here.
👍: 0 ⏩: 0
This is great! I was waiting for you to do this, and the wait was worth it. I love the tail. LOL! Now to the Space Traveling Cow Head. lol
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
haha. I didnt' think that Rat King was typically a character that people waited for. But that's awesome! Glad I didn't disappoint.
That cursed Cow Head! It haunts me.
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
Give in to the Space Cow HEad
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
| Next =>