Leonardo Hamato - Blog Posts
little punks 🐢⚔️
This animation as well as the song have entirely consumed me. Please send help, I literally can’t think of anything else. @sporkarts
TMNT: INVERSE - Test Animation
Do you remember the rain?
Here's a test animation made by our incredible artist @sporkarts! This animation has Leo (without her hood on!) and Splinter.
What is TMNT: Inverse? So glad you asked! Inverse is an indie animation project that is working to bring our original TMNT iteration to life with an animated series!
The premise? What if the turtles and Splinter were raised in the Foot Clan.
If you have any questions, please feel free to send us an ask and check out our pinned post!
PS. We are currently looking for compositors for the project. If you're interested in applying, send us a DM for more information!
"Hey...I like the sound of that...You've been Portal Chopped-"
TW! Limb loss, poorly drawn blood
Got portal chopped!
He would definitely lose his arm because of his own stupidity
🎉 Happy birthday Ben Schwartz!!! 🎉
hope and sacrifice.
I need to expand on this more on here because I'm going insane thinking about this.
the main themes in the rise movie center around hope and sacrifice. hope, being a ninjas greatest weapon and what leo ultimately uses to get the team motivated, and sacrifice which leo actively uses. these two concepts are interchangeable and are used to develop this unhealthy view of being a hero.
leo being the prime example of this.
leo is notorious for being a martyr in the movie not because he wants to be self sacrificial and thinks he deserves it (although a small part of him might think that) but because thats what he's been taught and grown up to think. of taking responsibility. of allowing to take hold of the "burden" of caring for his team, for his brothers. he must sacrifice a part of himself in order to be a worthy leader. no more immature pizza stacking competitions, no, leo must sacrifice that part in order to mold into being a leader. he must sacrifice his childhood.
its no surprise leo wants nothing to do with this idea, its no surprise he's constantly rebelling against this notion and not taking it seriously because as much as we have seen leo act dumb and immature, we know that he is smarter than he acts. he knows that being a leader is sacrificing the part of freedom he loves so much. the part that can joke around with his brothers and can allow himself to easily fight off bad guys without worrying because thats not his job. he's just leo.
thats raphs job.
raph has sacrificed this part of himself. his identity is surrounded by being the oldest, being the responsible one, having the "raph chasm", being the leader. raph was born as the eldest son to take the responsibility and with little to no help from splinter (because lets be honest raphs relationship with his brothers is also very parental), raph has had to create this idea of what being a leader is not only to himself but for his brothers. he has created the mold of being a leader from shows, from experiences, from being the oldest. he must sacrifice a part of himself, a part of his freedom, a part of his childhood, in order for his brothers to be safe.
and now his younger brother is being pushed into this with little to no warning.
(now I could go on and on about how the season 2 finale was the catalyst for raph and leos bond and brotherhood to slowly unravel BUT thats another thread.)
the rejection of the leader position from leos perspective makes so much sense. leo is still a kid. this responsibility isn't for him, he's not equipped to make these decisions. thats for raph. thats for the oldest.
which makes why raph is so upset with leo in the beginning of the movie so much more real. all he's known is this great weight of carrying the burden and guilt of his brothers and the actions that could cause them to get hurt, he has taken the fall, taken the blame, and has done so without faltering (kind of). although leo is the "faceman", all of the brothers show some sort of mask to hide behind in an unhealthy way. donnie hides behind his science and his title of being the "smart one", mikey hides behind the fact that he is the youngest and his many dr. personas. leo and raph both hide behind some form of bravado that masks the fear they have for their brothers and their safety. raph uses his anger while leo uses his laid back attitude. both are hiding their fear. their both scared.
this is where hope and sacrifice begin to blur.
casey jr. introduces us to the idea of hope because he essentially is the human personified version of hope. he is future leos last hope. he is what is left of an entire civilization that has now been destroyed. but what is hope without sacrifice. casey jr. has witnessed both future mikey and future leo sacrifice themselves for the greater good. for hope. since this is all casey jr. has ever known, especially with how he grew up (another major theme but ill talk about that another time) the idea of sacrifice is hand in hand with hope. with winning. with being a hero.
so when leo comes back after raph sacrifices himself so leo can escape, casey jr. is more thrilled than anything that they have the key. because they "won", because raph sacrificed himself, because hope is nothing without sacrifice.
and this is again another reason why leo begins to put the two together and create his own warped idea of being a leader.
being a hero.
learning about his future self, of how much casey jr. idolizes him and calls him "the greatest ninja the worlds ever seen", of how he was a leader and led the entire revolution. of how he saved the world by sacrificing himself. its only until raph does the same does the gears begin to turn.
being a leader is about sacrifice.
and so getting thrown into the prison dimension is the responsible thing to do. its the right thing. its the sacrifice that someone like leo believes is what a leader would do because yeah leos the leader now and leaders do whatever they can to make sure their team is safe.
that their brothers are safe.
the words "its not about me" play into this mindset and although by the end it helps leo learn that he needs to put more trust in his brothers and allow the burden of being a leader to fall on more than his shoulders, "its not about you" is exactly the mindset that raph had in the beginning of the movie. and because of this, raph and leo both are stuck in this cycle of responsibility and freedom. of having to navigate between wanting to sacrifice their future of being heroes in order to just live like normal people for a few minutes or sacrifice their own individuality to bare the weight of the world on their shoulders. and with their situation of being literal mutated turtles created only to become super soldiers, they automatically are deemed special and were brought into this world in hopes of fighting against humanity.
A ninjas greatest weapon is hope after all.
I drew this on Thursday I do believe. Anyways I've been wanting to draw Vampire Leo for a LOOOOOOOOOONG time. I love it. Although, I do think I could improve.
(I know I spelt Vampire wrong in the fanart lol)
I messed up on Leo so bad
*Internally crying right now*
Honestly, I've never drawn Usagi before, surprised at how he turned out.
I have better art of Leo I swear, my hand was shaky with the sharpie. :/
(My art is usually all sketches, they look better as sketches)
Anyways I had fun drawing it. What should I post next? If y'all wanna see pre drawn and already finished art just ask.
IFORGOTLEOSBLUSHOMGD:
My design of Leonardo from ROTTMNT + human designs
I hc him as : demiromantic gay demisexual and a transmasc demiboy who uses he/they pronouns :D
Two more to go!!
I am IN LOVE with the fic like father like son🖤💜
Yeah I never finished colouring this🤷🏻♂️ still proud of it tho
@eternalglitch
Heeeyyy love ur stuff ur doing amazing work <33 okay byE-
drew some stuff on a whiteboard
so I drew the disaster twins and my ocs
Also my ocs
Practice sketches with Leo
Thought I would include the coloured doodle here too
Sneak peak 2-!
Behold the scenes that kept playing in my brain that made want to do this entire thing in the first place 😂 it’s not done obvi but these are the main bits lol
I’m really proud of myself it turned out way better than I thought haha.
.
for some context have this:
Let him go-
It’s the incident oop-
Gift for @biconic-disaster25 ! Based off her amazing fic: “Who says nostalgia can’t solve anything?”Her fics are amazing and I highly recommend ppl read it
.
Sophie if you’re see this, I just want to say thank you. Your fics been such a huge source of comfort to me during trying times and inspiration to me ( heck your fic, “Where the Cherry Blossoms bloom (that’s where I’ll be)” is what literally inspired me to make Healer!Cj’s Ninpo teal). I don’t know what I did for you to regularly comment on my Healer!Cj posts but I just want you to know that such acknowledgment is so very encouraging and it means so much to me. Esp when it comes from someone whose stories I love/admire so much. Your ability to write such nuanced, realistic and wholesome dynamics and emotions in such a raw but organic way is incredible to me. But that’s enough mushiness for now. Hope you like this gift heheh and I hope my silly little au was able to bring you just a fraction of the joy I felt reading your stories and I hope you have an awesome day! Now see ya~😜
.
Also ngl low lighting pieces are rlly not common for so hope it turned out ok 😅
This is generally set over the course of a few days to maybe a few months post-invasion. Generally speaking, Casey has always struck me as a doer not a thinker. He can never sit still, And coupled with a new environment, unsettled by lack of familiarity, insecurity over not having anywhere else to go, not wanting to be a burden/wanting to help his family (even if they’re different) and fueled by a need to manage (*cough ignore *cough) his crushing grief and general anxiety. Casey does what he does best and moves… to an unhealthy degree.
People talking about how Finn Wolfhard always plays a struggling queer boy in love with his best friend when they could be talking about how Ben Schwartz always plays struggling lonely blue ADHD boys.
I mean between Dewey, Leonardo, and Sonic it's pretty clear.