you know what I'm here for.

you all KNOW what I'm about.

there he is. hate him

i want to talk about.

his praise kink BOTTOMLESS BLACK HOLE OF A NEED for recognition and validation

why is he like that? why does it never seem like enough? why is he so weak to it?

part of it is insecurity, probably

if you can't convince yourself you're good enough, no amount of praise will convince you

BUT. i think on the flipside

donnie just reeeeeeeally loves to be doted on

as just part of his personality

when he wants attention he wants BUCKETS of it. when he wants recognition he wants HEAPS of it

I was going to say the praise kink but you got it there

and when he gets praised for doing something cool or impressive or being good looking or ANYTHING, it makes him want to provide more opportunity for that to happen again

he will build you awesome things!!! he will get that stuff you wanted or needed!!! he will provide and take care of you and be relied upon!!!! tell him he's so smart and capable!! TELL HIM YOU CAN'T LIVE WITHOUT HIM!!!!!!

and not to be That Guy, but personally i find it really cute when someone who enjoys being praised works hard to get more and more of it*

* i may be biased bc my sister does this

i think also, unfortunately, its sometimes seen as kind of self-serving or childish or cringe to constantly want recognition and praise

wanting to be doted upon is a BAD thing

i think also ALSO, part of the reason might be because the desire to be doted upon implies also wanting to be taken care of

which like in some respects, donnie is fine with

but he doesn't ask for it, and in some cases actively rebuffs it

HE wants to provide and be relied upon

its just also nice if ppl who rely on him go OMG DONNIE YOU ARE SOOOOO SMART AND SOOO FUNNY AND CAPABLE AND VALUABLE AND! A LITTLE HANDSOME? WAI

Bro wants permanent cheer squad to appreciate his every move

this was probably part of the uncle tello/casey bonding process tbh bc casey thinks like 90% of what he does is So Cool and So Impressive and he would love to hear more

sephiroth is unashamedly a fan. he'll supply praise once he figures out it's a motivator.

yeah... I doubt he grows out of it, maybe is more subtle but it's never gone.

simultaneous huge ego want recognition vs huge insecurity need reassurance: symbiosis

I was skimming the internet and found this which also sums him up

Post by @randomlilflea · 1 image

Enjoy

if he is a little freak!!! then What is the big deal

He's just PASSIONATE!

About SCIENCE and explosions

obv anything can be ignored OR dialed up to eleven in order to make the joke

but i do enjoy finding roots for these traits for consistency's sake

anyway once he figures this bolin thing out they are going to be INSEPARABLE

fontech: tbh it probably did a WHOLE LOT

runedwriting: yeah donnie already likes bro bc he seems very similar and has already gone "you are a good scientist and the best I've ever met" bc donnie. does not understand how low that bar is LMAO

still compliment!!

it's too bad seph is too hung up on blonds and donnie found his counterpart in a guy who punches rocks, they could have been disastrous together.

it would have been The Worst and i would have enjoyed it

bolin is a much, much healthier option

donatello hamato once again forced to squint at emotions algebra 😞

at least these are like... positive emotions...

donnie has many positive emotions almost as many as negative ones

and sometimes his positive emotions are negative only for OTHERS

we love to gleefully plan murder and then wonder why the ppl in our empathy bonds are miffed

doesn't make any sense

autism + parental emotional neglect + you're a genius and you can provide for your loved ones in a way that only you can and that gives you the validation you've been missing

KJ comes in swinging with the patented baseball bat

im back here

first of all, this cad thread so good, akai i love u

donnie's emotions are SO fucky wucky i love getting into the mud with him

you can fit so much gifted kid burnout in this little bastard

all of the boys were traumatized by absent parenting and i love picking apart how it affected each of them

wrt donnie's black hole need for praise and validation, i think part of that is also kind of, in a way, addressed by raph too

in that i don't think that donnie is a good boy, but he WANTS to be a good boy, at least sometimes

specifically because he wants to live up to raph's ideal of him

like yes obviously he will protect his own and his family and the people and things he loves. like duh

and he doesn't ENJOY seeing people get hurt or die or anything like that

but i think he's far more concerned with how something like that (people getting hurt, lives being ruined) will affect his brothers than like. any overarching care for 'people' as a whole

someone is getting mugged. donnie: ah sucks for him. BUT. raph will be DISTRAUGHT if it isn't stopped.

therefore donnie stops a mugging

(it helps that usually if you do nice things for people, they are happy and praise you for it)

i cradle the turtles in my hands. donnie why are u 3 burnt out gifted kids stacked up in a trenchcoat

because he Refuses To Get Help

it's ok if ppl help him not die in a fight bc like. he's weak or smth whatever. but not that one time. or that other time.

every other time donnie CANT get help. he is the HELPER

but hes getting some help now at least a little bit

do not let him know that's what he's doing

absolutely not

cad just passes along his actual therapy schedule like heres the times/days i have blocked off for when other people talk about their feelings, visit to talk about not-that whenever

(no one else ruin this for them)

donnie like why and cad goes hm....i'm going to need to break my microwave more often............

honestly he never uses tech bc hes from oldschool fantasy land AND he grew up like an amish fuck, its almost always not even on purpose

texting donnie (badly): soRRY I think i PUT METAL in the microwavE AGAIN

he texts casey like "how do i break [appliance] in a believable but fixable way"

jkdghldsg

casey comes over next session and breaks it for him without even questioning

(i joke but even cad doesnt text that bad. anymore.)

he could probably use someone to teach him how to take better relic photos tho.

casey: and it's just like /gets a fork out from cad's silverware drawer/ i don't get why they keep saying it's for ME, you know? /puts in microwave/ like i don't WANT you to stay away, so who is it really for?

donnie gifts cad a selfie stick

dskhdfsl EXACTLY HOW IT WOULD GO thank u yes good

cad attaches the selfie stick to his staff so he can take photos with his crystals. they're mostly photos of his flesh eating beetles, but

flesh eating beetles

yeah they are his children what of it

literally it is called staff of swarming insects it casts insect plague and it eats people its great

he loves them

well what are their Names

based on his naming convention in canon at least a few of them are named after his annoying siblings

egg i was talking to sora and we came across an astonishing similarity i had not realized before

cad's family includes:
-4 total children
-he is a middle child
-has fellow middle child he especially bickers and bonds with
-youngest he is extra protective of/affectionate towards
-eldest has a hero complex

AYO

also sibling rAN OFF to be a HERO ALONE and got TRAPPED and almost DIED-

DANG THAT'S GETTING SCARY NOW

thats all i could think of at least lmao (that last one i just realized now)

I'm still laughing about this

THE SIMILARITIES ARE SO POWERFUL

time to bond through annoying siblings

i cannot state how important it is to me that the twins a.) do not know who is actually older and b.) switch off/argue over who is older depending on the situation

every time i see fanworks that are like "____ is the older twin" i go "cute but wrong" in my head

yes.

reminded of the cass apoc comic where leos like lol i guess im older now and regrets immediately

so real

leo giving himself psychic damage is funny, but extremely sad, LMAO

HE'S THE ELDEST NOW........

speaking of psychic damage

since it's going to be relevant soon i wanna talk about how donnie feels about romance and what i think it'll be like

rise is interesting in that it leans into the "mutant freaks" thing WAY. WAY LESS than most of the iterations. they even have the hidden city as a whole society where they can just be they

before that though, as far as the BOYS knew, they were mutant freaks never to be accepted by society (tone of show largely being comedic so it's never a big deal)

splinter knew there was a whole society of ppl who would accept his kids tho, like, eventually

so he probably was absolutely fr with that "marry them off" comment, him over there thinking for 13 years that he gonna eventually get them down there and they can go live real lives

but the boys probably assumed they likely would never have something like that, even after meeting april. probably more likely they didn't think too hard about it bc they were young anyway

but don and leo are the two who have made the most comments about romance/ attraction/etc in canon (which is. so very, very little) that can't 100% be taken as a joke (ie dressing up as a girl hippo)

i think donnie had vague ~ideas~ about dating but never really thought it would happen. more just played pretend with the idea, like with atomic lass

it was all imagination and image crafting for him. he probably got a handful of crushes on fictional mean cute girls. he definitely wrote self-insert fanfic at least once

power was his first actual for real crush i think

and she's so AGGRESSIVELY UNINTERESTED that he's kind of settled himself into that "i will like her from afar and it will be so noble and sexy of me" sorta. look he's a teen with so many problems

the way he likes her also is very superficial; not in that he only likes her because she's cute, but he really doesn't know much about her

he has this image in his mind of what it would be like if they date and she PROBABLY does not match that at all. he just likes that she's cute, a little mean, and encourages/appreciates his violence

STOP MAKING ME DO MY JOB 2025

the siren song of every one of us tbh

jobs

ITS HAPPENING im so normal

I LOVE ROTTMNT!!

yeah buddy!! lots of this might not make sense bc me and my circle mostly use plurk for dreamwidth journal RP tho, how'd you find your way in here

not entirely sure they're a person

me either, but just in case i want to be nice

I was wondering who this was, ngl, jkd

welcome, mysterious traveler. May you find your way through these uncertain lands and find a cool turtle

help I'm sorry some random alter doesn't know how Plurk works

steps away…

finding a rat is an acceptable alternative but there's more turtles than rats

I'm so sorry that Power was his first for-real crush, that's just bad luck on his part!

do NOT apologize it's been SO fun

bolin just asked donnie out and he had a short crisis about her, too

AHAHAAHA oh my god

GO, RUN DONNIE, BE FREE

DONNIE WILL PROBABLY BE LIKE so......im dating this guy...... JUST TO GAUGE HER REACTION and when she's like cool i don't give a shit he'll be like i have to let you go power and she's let me go??? you could not hold me if you tried weakling

LMAO DANG BOLIN SHOOT THAT SHOT

somehow this whole situation turns into an arm-wrestling match

3 way arm wrestling

Let 'em WRASTLE

donnie is so about bolin being excited to date but you give him 3 weeks of a doting boyfriend and he'll be HOOKED mark my words

donnie, coming out the other end of the adjustment period: ykw i get it now

this shit fucking rules actually

donnie: i wasn't sure if i could be attracted to bolin but then i measured his eyebrows and they are 120% thicker than the average brow and now we're getting married

he doesnt even have to draw them...

superior brow haver

I'm coping with hell week by listening to "watch me work" for the trolls world tour ost and picturing donnie voguing to it on his date with bolin

and bolin STILL. SOMEHOW. having a crush

which btw comatoseroses i need u to know that donnie is not really aware that bolin LIKE likes him, he just thinks bolin is curious abt the energy

donnie pls......

bolin: you're so amazing and smart
donnie: yeah that's true
bolin: we have good energy so do you wanna go on a date?
donnie: sure let's check this out
bolin: donnie i have a crush on you
don:

HE DIDN'T EXPLICITLY SAY IT

its part of why donnie is being kind of aloof abt it, he legit thinks they are doing a mutual experiment to see if the energy is romantic

donnie: he thinks he might have a crush on me
bolin: babe we are at the altar be fr

bolin: i don't usually date guys
donnie: yeah me either
bolin: do you wanna go out?
donnie, assuming they are doing mutual bisexual exploration together for science: yeah ok

comatoseroses: GIRL PLEASE

he's so ppl dumb high EQ bolin save him

one eska memshare is gonna slot it all into place someday. take bolins hand u will both get there

donnie after he witnesses all of that: IM HIS TYPE

they'll date 3 months and be making out and donnie is like 1 min and starts taking notes on his laptop

bolin like ig this is normal for him.....haha he's so cute

see donnie gets it type: Unhinged

normal turtle behaviors.... probably. 🥰 red flag who

listen, IS donnie capable of being a cute lil fella? yes. involuntarily

tell me more

he never does it on purpose but he has been fully formed with little guy genes

it comes with liking to be cozy, making oneself small when scared, and being desperate for the approval of parental figures. the potential for cute is there

he stompy his feet when mad and sometimes it's not serious and sometimes it is and it's also involuntary. he kicky him legs

I CANNOT. BEGIN TO STRESS THIS ENOUGH. it must be INVOLUNTARY.

any attempts to be cute on purpose must be GROSS AND CRINGE (and seldom)

he is also a repugnant feral lizard who crawls on all fours (hands and feet not hands and knees) for the coffee pot to get the last mug before someone else can

the dichotomy is CRUCIAL

he is an intolerable persnickety b-hole who hates to be wrong and has not exercised his sympathy muscle in years

pets him at a respectful distance with a sanitized claw hand

^ safest handling measures

He's enjoyably scrungly, cute purely by accident

little guy but also. a Creature

la creatura

God yes.