Lightning (Total Drama)

"Man! I've never kissed a Superbowl ring!"

- Lightning

Lightning (real name: Rudolph Jackson) is a camper who serves as an anti-hero and the final antagonist of Total Drama: Revenge of the Island, where he takes Scott's role as the main antagonist after his elimination (episodes 12/13.)

He returned in Total Drama All-Stars as a contestant and a minor antagonist.

He was voiced by Tyrone Savage.

Personality
Lightning is an exceedingly zealous and competitive jock who values winning above everything else. He is very vain, pompous, and egotistical, constantly referring to himself in the third person and often shown to kiss his biceps. He is also quite selfish, arrogant, and treacherous, as he always puts his own interests above everyone else's. Such an example is when he is a traitorous person who betrays Cameron on the concurrence that they made, because he slowed him down. Another is when he was more focused on winning in the finale than rescuing the others from the dangerous mutant animals, which had accidentally been unleashed into the stadium. Lightning is actually very good at sports, showing that he can somewhat back up his boasting. However, despite his athletic prowess and physical strength, he is very stupid, obstinate, unintelligent, and stubborn. For example, in Evil Dread, he is quite intransigent and adamant about digging everywhere he wants, even shoveling up Lake Wawanakwa to find pieces located somewhere on the beach. Lightning is able to misunderstand the genders of contestants like Jo and Cameron, even if they tell him otherwise. This lack of intelligence makes him easily manipulated by contestants such as Jo and Scott.

Total Drama: Revenge of the Island
In "Bigger! Badder! Brutal-er!", Lightning first appears on the boat with the other contestants. When Chris introduces him, he pushes Mike and Zoey out of the way, kissing his muscles. Later, when Cameron is drowning in the lake, Lightning saves him and calls him a "little girl" in the process, causing Cameron to protest. After all the contestants are on land, Chris warns them not to disturb the wildlife during the run through the forest and Lightning mocks him, stating he didn't want to upset the "bunnies". Jo wins the race and apologizes to Lightning for losing to a girl; he denies losing. Chris places him on the Toxic Rats, despite Lightning's suggestions for a team name (such as the "Lightning Squad"). He tries to climb the tree to cut down his team's totem pole during the challenge, but fails to do so, and later insists in the confessional that tree climbing is not a recognized sport. His team cuts down their totem pole using B's method, and when his team arrives at the cabins, he celebrates being in first place and refers to his team as "Team Lightning." When his team loses, he asks Chris where he's going to sleep and is upset when they get the same cabin as the other team's. Along with the rest of his team, he was annoyed by Staci and presumably voted her off that night.

In "Truth or Laser Shark", he is awakened by Scott, who tells him he was out kissing one of the female contestants, which he believes. When Chris tells the contestants it is time for the challenge Lightning complains he hasn't had his DPA (Daily Protein Allotment) yet. When Scott tries to leave the challenge, Lightning stops him telling him he isn't leaving until the team wins. Lightning then begins to complain in the confessional about Chris not letting him be on a team by himself and that he is used to carrying his team back home, but at least they knew how to play the game, unlike his new teammates. Lightning is the first on his team to have to run with the mutant rat in second part of the challenge and quickly manages to give it to Dawn. When he and his team lose he complains that he is on a team of losers, Sam then tells him that winning isn't everything and he begins to chase after Sam. When Scott is telling Dawn, Sam, and Lightning why Dakota should be voted off, Lightning says that all of them deserve to be kicked off based on their performance in the challenge. Despite openly insulting several of his teammates, Lightning gets the first marshmallow of the campfire ceremony that night.

In "Ice Ice Baby", Lightning complains about his food, wondering if there is any protein in it. He then eats it, only to start choking until Dawn saves him. He then thanks her for doing so, once again calling her "creepy girl." During the challenge, he kicked down a bunch of rocks that knocked Mike, Zoey, and Cameron off the cliff. Eventually, he was hit by an ice cube thrown down at him by Chef, where he crashed into Scott before both fell to the ground. In the capture-the-flag challenge, he and Sam were selected by Scott to head out and attempt to retrieve the enemy's flag. While they were running along, Sam fell through the ice into the frozen lake below, instantly emerging in a block of ice. Lightning said that he would get him out after they won, but he was knocked out by a snowball. He didn't wake up until much later, after the Rats already lost the challenge. When Sam was thawed out of his ice block due to Scott redirecting B's giant mirror, he fell on top of Lightning. Lightning, waking up thinking that they still had a chance, tried to run off to the Maggots' fort, only to fall through the same hole and be similarly frozen in a block of ice.

In "Finders Creepers", Lightning reaches for the clue, springing a bear trap that was set around it. He gives the clue to Dawn and tells her to read it even with the trap still stuck to him. When the Toxic Rats make it to the tree, Lightning reaches inside it to grab the key. He is then attacked by a mutant squid, which throws him on the ground. When the squid starts to attack Sam, Lightning punches it in the eye and grabs the key. The spider captures him and he drops the key. Lightning is saved from the spider at the end of the episode with the rest of the contestants.

In "Backstabbers Ahoy!", Lightning is annoyed by Brick when he was having a dream about winning the super bowl, until the latter's alarm woke him up. He was distressed when he noticed that his protein powder was gone and tried to eat more food at breakfast to make up the missing protein, only to be thrown out the window by a mutant raccoon. During the first part of the challenge, Lightning took over Sam's job of pumping air to Brick due to being too slow, but over did it. He was the team's boat driver until he was unconscious due to venom from the seagull Jo shot at him, and was angry with Dawn after she "stole" his protein powder. He most likely voted her out that night.

In "Runaway Model", Lightning is discussing his team with his newest team member, Brick. He insults Sam about how he plays video games instead of a physical activity. He is surprised by Sam's hand-eye coordination, and winces when Sam gets hurt by the mouse traps. He still doesn't realize that Jo is a girl when she tells Anne Maria. He is also agitated when Chris tells them the challenge. In the woods, Lightning kicks a shell, only to have a mutated turtle come out from under it and attack him. Lightning suggests catching Sasquatchanakwa, and is impressed when Brick crafts the Detonating Duffel Bag, claims it's how men get dressed. He tosses Sam the striped duffel bag, who runs to the entrance of the cave and chucks it in. He runs from Sasquatchanakwa, and jumps off the stage before he is able to attack him. He sets up an attack against the Yeti with Brick and Scott, which fails miserably. He is surprised when Sam was able to climb up the scaffold with ease, and encourages him to go on. He is upset when Chris announces that the Maggots won the challenge. He receives the first marshmallow of the night, and doesn't seem fazed when Sam is voted off, telling Brick to not say goodbye. He, again, thinks Jo is a man, as he is ecstatic about the Rats still having only male members, and asks "What girl?" when Chris mentions it.

In "A Mine Is a Terrible Thing to Waste", Lightning is watching Brick work out and decides to show him how to bench-press a log. He grabs it and lifts it with one hand and makes small talk with Brick, once again confusing Jo with a boy. After Cameron tells them there is no breakfast, Lightning tells him he needs meat, which he is unable to spell. He hears Chef outside, telling them to go to the freezer, which he does, telling him it's a good idea. While Chef takes them to the mines, he tries to chew on a 'meat-sicle', ultimately failing. He, again, confuses Jo with a boy. He is the first in the mine and cheers, which causes an avalanche of rocks to fall on himself and his team mates, which Jo scolds him for. He is frightened about losing. He lands on Brick, which causes the fireflies to escape, and runs away with Jo to catch them again. He gets attacked by them, which Jo uses for a brilliant opportunity to catch them, sticking the jar on Lightning's head. He makes small talk with Jo. She mentions that she isn't sure if firefly bites are lethal, and, once again, Lightning mistakes her for a male. He realizes that Jo's badge is orange. He complains he does not want to die, as he has never kissed a Super Bowl ring. Jo replies that she has never kissed a guy, in which Lightning tells her that he doesn't judge her sexuality, mistaking her for a boy again. He asks why Brick hasn't shown up to Jo. Jo explains to him how Brick has become 'large and in-charge', and says that he will eliminate Lightning next. Lightning asks if she wants to make a guys alliance to vote Brick off, which Jo reluctantly agrees to. He then meets up with Brick while Jo scolds him. They are then captured by the mutant gophers and are taken to Ezekiel. In Ezekiel's lair, Jo removes Lightning's fireflies which angers the gophers and make them drop his team down. Lightning successfully grabs the Rat's idol and is about to run to the mine carts, however, Ezekiel is in his path, knocking Lightning down. He ties the bombs to Ezekiel and kicks him away. He exits the mine safely. At the elimination ceremony, Lightning receives the final marshmallow, which gets lodged in his throat. He joins in with Jo scolding Brick when he is eliminated.

In "The Treasure Island of Dr. McLean", he dreamed about winning the Super Bowl, before Jo rudely dumped him into the water. He was determined as the team captain, going to lengths as trying to fight an octopus, and getting hit with a sign. When he saw Dakota pummel the mutant crocodiles, he commented that she was doing a good job, but he could do it too. When Jo pushed him to actually do it, he offered "Sha-friends?". He soon came back to Jo, beaten and bruised.

In "Grand Chef Auto", Lightning forms an alliance with Jo shortly after Chris announces the merge. He is the first one to find a key in the first part of the challenge. When the second part of the challenge starts, he and Jo are quickly captured by Chef. Jo tells Lightning to bend the bars of their cell so they can escape, which he does. She them pushes him to Fang, betraying him. Lightning tells Fang that he'll take him to Scott if he doesn't eat him. Later in the challenge, Lightning is the first and only one to tag Mt. Chrismore, upsetting Chris. He proclaims that he wants Jo eliminated, but since he did not officially win the challenge, Lightning does not get to choose who is eliminated.

In "Up Up and Away in my Pitiful Balloon", Lightning is excited when Chris announces the challenge will be an aerial obstacle course. In his excitement, he shouts "Sha-bam!" and accidentally punches Scott. He is still angry at Jo about leaving him to a shark in the previous episode, as he reveals in a confessional. Lightning chooses a helicopter from the bag of aerial vehicles, which he is happy about. He asks Cameron for help in building his helicopter until Jo tells him to get his own nerd. While looking for a fan to use, Lightning spots parts Jo would need to build her hot air balloon. He hides the parts behind a motorcycle and giant fan, until he realizes that these would be great parts for his helicopter and starts to build. Later, Lightning unsuccessfully throws an egg at the zeppelin, gaining only mocking laughter from Heather. Seeing Jo heading for the blimp, he throws an egg at her but hits Cameron's rocket instead. This causes the rocket to turn around and hit Lightning's hovercopter, which spins out of control. After he successfully manages to enter the blimp, Lightning tells Heather to hand over the million. Heather starts to fake-cry and pretends that she is about to hand him the case, only to beat him up with it. Lightning proceeds to question her sanity. After recovering, he wrestles Heather for the case, and the blimp starts to crash. While falling through the air, Lightning manages to catch the case, which Chris promptly takes from him. At the elimination ceremony, Lightning finally finds out that Jo is female, a fact that surprises him.

Lightning mostly keeps to himself in Eat, Puke and Be Wary because he wanted to focus on his athletic skills. During the cooking challenge he managed to get a mutant maggot to stay on his plate but no one could eat it. Cameron told Lightning that he could remove the tracking collars if Lightning help him. Lightning was going to betray Cameron but did not notice that Cameron just latched onto his back while he was not looking. Lightning accidentally let Cameron win when he backed up to the goal post.

In "The Enchanted Franken-Forest", it is revealed that Lightning is a loner in the competition. However, he wins the challenge and makes it to the final 2. He chooses to eliminate Zoey, in order to crush Cameron in the finale.

In the season finale titled "Brain Vs Brawn: The Ultimate Showdown", Lightning is seen taunting Cameron multiple times now that he gets to battle him in the finale. During his video chat with his father, he said he'd bet all his champion rings that his son would win. Lightning then becomes worried with the big stress now on him. At the battle arena, he gets quick to work on building his armor for the challenge, with the help of Jo giving him advice on what to use. He finally finishes with his armor being scraps of metal, a pot for a helmet, and a manican leg with spikes. He then makes fun of Cameron as he doesn't seem to have anything, until he reveals his robotic suit. The two then fight with the occasional mutant animal getting in the way. But when Lightning tries to defend himself from Cameron's blasts, he hits one towards Chris' throne and remote. The remote then malfunctions causing all the mutant creatures to appear. When Cameron's friends are in trouble, he tries to help them. But Lightning uses this to his advantage and hits him while he tries to save them. Eventually, Cameron can't take anymore and drains his battery to give off a magnetic charge towards Lightning. Everyone is stunned on what just happened as Cameron no longer has power to fight. Lightning then tries to attack until all his metal starts to rumble on his body. Cameron then tells him he turned him into a giant magnent, causing everything metal in the arena to surround him. Actual lightning then strikes him, causing everything to fly off of him and his hair turns white. In Cameron's ending, He then falls down, with Cameron falling soon after. After three seconds, Cameron then is announced the winner of TDRI. In Lightning's ending, Lightning is paralyzed after getting struck, while Cameron finally gives out and falls, with Lightning falling soon after. Chris then announces he won, with Jo being the only one who seems to be happy. At the dock, Chris tosses Lightning the million dollar case. Jo and Sam asked him if they can have some of the money, but he refuse. He then says he plans on using the money to buy a stadium for football season. But Chris warns him otherwise showing his X-rays. Lightning doesn't listen and takes one more step, only for him to fall down and break his leg. Jo got mad that she cheered Lightning for nothing.

Total Drama All-Stars
Lightning is revealed to be a contestant in "Heroes vs. Villains", and attempts to show off how to do a dive, but is kicked out of the plane by Chef. He is later placed on the Villainous Vultures. During the challenge, Lightning enthusiastically dives off the cliff, and on his landing, his fist collides with a shark, knocking it out of his path. He grabs a key, and quickly hops into his team's respective carriage, as Jo pushes it in the direction of the Hotel. During this, Jo proposes that the two strongest villains team up, and have each other's back. However, his key does not work, which angers him. His team later wins the challenge thanks to a returning Alejandro. At the elimination ceremony, Lightning volunteers to have the special prize, which is revealed to be spending a night at Boney Island, with the dangerous wildlife, much to his dismay. However, he is also allowed to search for the McLean-Brand Chris Head, and Chef escorts him away.In Evil Dread, Jo started a campaign to eliminate Lightning arguing that he is too strong of a contestant. At Boney Island, Lightning catches a fish, but throws up before returning to Camp Wawanakwa. When Scott asks if he's found the immunity idol, Lightning states he's the only immunity he needs. Throughout the challenge, he boasts about his greatness and claims to have found Jo's puzzle piece despite not doing so. Lightning digs up the most puzzle pieces, miscounts the amount found angering Jo and the rest of the Vultures, and destroys the puzzle which ends up causing his team the challenge. At the elimination ceremony, he and Jo reached the bottom two where he was shocked about his elimination and flushed away before being able to curse at Jo.

Despite being eliminated in the previous episode, Lightning was mentioned several times by Heather and Jo in Saving Private Leechball. While Heather was angry that voting Lightning off was a bad idea, Jo denies it, stating that Lighting was useless. During the challenge however, Jo begins to have second thoughts after finding out that she is the last member of her team standing. To her surprise, Lightning has left her a pre-recorded message for Jo before he left, taunting her that eliminating him was a bad idea, later on the Villains lost again but, though Lightning was never seen in the season again, his loss is avenged when Jo gets voted off, either that she costed the challenge, she was bossy and annoying or her arch rival, Heather, convinced the others to vote her off.

Lightning is mentioned in Zeek And Ye Shall Find by Cameron who realizes he can no longer trust anyone and is now a lone wolf, making him the "new Lightning".

In The Final Wreck-ening, Lightning can be seen in one of the balloons. However, he floats away with the rest before an intern can get him down.

Allies

 * Fang

Enemies

 * Alejandro
 * Cameron
 * Chris McLean
 * Chef Hatchet
 * Duncan
 * Ezekiel
 * Gwen
 * Heather
 * Jo
 * Scott
 * Zoey

Trivia

 * Lightning is the sixth main antagonist of the Total Drama series, after Heather, Justin, Courtney, Alejandro, and Scott.
 * Lightning has a tendency to talk in the third person.
 * He also tends to add "Sha" before certain words like Sha-Lightning, which Gwen insults in the confessional telling the audience that she can't believe Lightning made it to last season's finale and asking the audience "Does he ever sha-shut up?".
 * Lightning has a necklace with a lightning bolt, resembling his name.
 * Lightning appears in one Skatoony episode Sports Academy.