Fishface (TMNT)

Xever Montes is one of The Shredder's top henchmen and the tertiary antagonist in the first season of the 2012 series TMNT as well as being a major villain in the rest of the seasons. As a human, he was a very skilled and quite aggressive Brazilian street thug. By night, however, he operated (and still does) as a ninja under Shredder's employ. After coming face-to-face with Shredder's enemies (the Turtles) a few times, he came into contact with a substance known as mutagen, transforming him into a giant anthropomorphic fish, which Michelangelo dubbed "Fishface".

History
Xever Montes was a Brazilian street urchin learning how to survive in the criminal underworld of Sao Paulo by stealing if he wanted something, until one night, his luck ran out after getting caught by the police trying to steal a briefcase (possibly filled with money) and he was sent to prison. There, he was allowed make his own weapons, but was bailed out by the Shredder, who was the briefcase's owner and claimed that Montes's skills are very useful. Thus, Montes became one of his top henchmen in the Foot Clan, and works as Shredder's street contact and third-in-command. However, he is not in debt, but simply likes a job where he can crack some skulls almost everyday.

He debuted in the episode New Friend, Old Enemy, where he is paired up with Shredder's star pupil, Chris Bradford, to find and kill Splinter, as Montes knows his way around the criminal underworlds of each city. After Bradford set the trap for Mikey, he and Montes easily captured him. After Leo, Donnie, and Raph saved Mikey, Montes and Bradford followed them into the sewer. He proved to be more than a match for Donatello and Michelangelo, but was outmatched by Leonardo and Raphael when the Turtles switched foes. The Turtles then flushed Bradford and Montes out of the sewers.

In Never Say Xever, Shredder puts Montes in charge of getting rid of the Turtles. Just as the Purple Dragons tell Montes and Bradford about their fight with the Turtles at Mr. Murakami's noodle shop, the Turtles themselves, who have followed one of the Dragons, Fong, to their hideout in the fortune cookie factory, make their entrance and a fight breaks out. While Bradford handles Donnie and Mikey, Montes fights with Leo who he is easily able to beat, until Raph intervenes. When the Foot Ninjas arrive, the Turtles retreat, much to both Montes's and Raphael's frustration. Montes punishes Fong, before realizing that they have to hold Murakami hostage over their hideout to make the Turtles stay. When the Turtles open a trash can and show a captured Bradford to him, Montes does not release Murakami, stating that Bradford's not his friend and that he wanted him to fall over. As he is cutting the rope holding Murakami up, Leonardo pulls Bradford up, as Montes orders the Foot ninjas to fight. The Turtles are able to defeat them, while dodging Montes's kunai. Bradford frees himself with one of the kunai, and asks Montes how he was so sure that Leo was bluffing, which Montes responded with "I wasn't". He is then able to defeat Raphael by hitting him while he was distracted by Foot Soldiers, which worked after a couple of hits. He uses the same tactic for Leonardo, except it worked with only one blow. When showing off his skills to Bradford and about to fillet the Turtles, Fong gives Leonardo his sword back, and the bad guys are pushed away by a water tower, giving the Turtles enough time to escape.

In The Gauntlet, Montes is shown along with Bradford being punished by Shredder, as he stated that he should have left him in the prison that he found him in. Later, at a Chinatown stand, he sees and holds a weird-looking snakehead until Bradford gets word of the Turtles's whereabouts on his phone and the two head there, thus going against Shredder's orders. They fight the brothers while Donatello is trying to shut down the Kraang's mutagen bomb, and Montes is able to make short work of Leonardo and Michelangelo, before helping Bradford defeat Raphael. After Bradford is defeated and the bomb is disarmed, Donatello helps Raphael battle Montes. Montes is initially able to beat them, but after dodging several attacks, he finds himself cornered with Bradford. He refuses to surrender, and Bradford tried to bring them down by stabbing the mutagen bomb, which instead made a straight blast that focused all of the mutagen on those two, washing them off the building. Montes mutated into a humanoid weird-looking snakehead due to the one he touched, and because of it, he can no longer breathe in the air, and was suffocating for Shredder's help.In Panic in the Sewers, Montes made a brief cameo in Shredder's pool, showing how he survived.

In Mousers Attack!, he is still confined to the pool and complains about it. Bradford (whom Mikey dubs Dogpound, because of his new dog-like form) mocks him and taps on the glass covering the water, giving Montes a painful headache. Dogpound talks about how Shredder may get hungry for sushi, enraging him, and telling Dogpound to come into the water so he can kill him. However, Montes backs down when Shredder tells him he is useless to him this way.

In The Alien Agenda, Baxter Stockman has successfully built a water-breathing rig for Montes, but an attempt at building him a set of mechanical legs turns out clumsy and worthless. Once Stockman saw a Kraang robot, he realizes that this is what he needs.

In The Pulverizer, Montes orders the Purple Dragons to steal Kraang tech, which he has Stockman reverse-engineer to make his robotic legs fully functional. When Leonardo, Michelangelo and Raphael realize that Stockman would be the one using the tech, they confront him and try to stop "whatever he's doing", only for Montes to jump in front of them in his newly-equipped robotic legs. The Turtles laugh at him, however they soon take him seriously when Montes (whom Mikey dubs Fishface, because of his new fish-like form) defeats Mikey with a single kick. Raphael knew to avoid the legs, and after lots of evenly matched fighting, Raphael pins them to the wall with his sai. Fishface then bites him, injecting venom, making Raphael unable to fight. He defeats Leonardo, before Donatello drives in with the Shellraiser. Fishface hisses at the enhanced subway car, but the Shellraiser defeats him with a shot from its garbage cannon.

In Baxter's Gambit, he is seen trying to steal Kraang technology, but because the Foot and the Turtles were after the same tech, they end up fighting each other. After battling Raphael for a little while, Dogpound is defeated, and the two retreat. Raphael chases his rival, only to be drawn in to Stockman's trap, where Stockman turns on his teammates as well. After battling Raphael again, Raph saves Fishface from a laser saw, for reasons Raph didn't know. After realizing they've been going in circles, Stockman splits the gang up, with it just being Raph and Fishface on one side. He tries to suck them into a giant turbine, only for Fishface to save Raph (as his robotic legs were able to hold on), and they escaped the fan. While they were walking together, Raph asks him why is he working for Shredder, and Fishface opens up to him. He then hears Dogpound's voice, and breaks down a wall to reunite with him and the other 3 Turtles. They battle Stockman's "Monster of Doom", which is an enhanced Stockman-pod. After Mikey and Dogpound get Stockman's UFO over the Monster of Doom, Fishface uses his robotic legs to catapult Raph in the air, where he destroys the UFO, which crashes on the Monster of Doom. To tired to fight after that, both Fishface and Dogpound agree to save the fight for another day, but as they walk off, Fishface throws one Stockman's weapons at Leonardo. Fortunately, Raphael sensed it and caught the ball with his sai. Fishface walks off with an evil smirk, with Raph glaring behind him.

In The Pulverizer Returns!, he helps Shredder with his plans to create a mutant army.

In Showdown, Part 1, Fishface guards a hologram of April O'Neil with Dogpound as a trap for Splinter. He asked Dogpound how good this "Ninja Master" they were about to fight was, but was defeated easily and then he fled into the water tank.

In Mikey Gets Shellacne, Fishface and Dogpound both take orders from Karai and kidnap Baxter Stockman to turn the two back into humans. However, Fishface witnesses Dogpound fall into Stockman's tank of mutagen, transforming into a skeleton-looking werewolf (whom Mikey dubs "Rahzar" because of his razor-sharp body), and bot mutants get electrocuted alongside Stockman when Rahzar accidentally hits the electric system and the sprinklers go off.

In The Manhattan Project, Fishface seems to be a little scared when Shredder returns and introduces them to Tiger Claw (presumably because a tiger's diet includes fish), who he offers some refreshments. When he faces Raph again, he reveals his new weapon as a larger butterfly knife called a switch saber.

In The Legend of the Kuro Kabuto, Fishface teamed up with Stockman-Fly to get to retrieve the Kuro Kabuto (Shredder's helmet) from professional thief Anton Zeck, stating that Shredder's face looks uglier that Stockman-Fly in his current state.

In Vengeance is Mine, Fishface is seen giving Karai food. Later, he and Rahzar are distracted by Michelangelo's shadow puppet skills. Then he, Tiger Claw and some Foot-Bots chase the Turtles and Karai, but Fishface is unable to catch up after Donatello pours pizza grease on the street to make his motorcycle slip.

In The Invasion, Part 1, Fishface is seen alongside Shredder, Tiger Claw, and Rahzar watching Leonardo fight against the Foot-Bots.

In the Invasion, Part 2, Fishface is ordered along with the other two henchmen to take Leo down after he is is pushed into the icy water by a Foot-Bot and gets heavily tired, before being easily defeated.

In Vision Quest, Fishface appears as Raphael's spiritual opponent where's he defeated.

In Serpent Hunt, Fishface and Rahzar are forced by the Shredder to hunt for Karai or risk being handed over to Tiger Claw. After the Turtles manage to track down Karai at a warehouse and try to convince her to come home, the two ambush all of them, hitting Karai with a taser and gassing the warehouse. However, the two argue who will get to take her back to the Shredder back on Fishface's motorcycle, which causes Anton Zeck to steal the motorcycle and Karai. Later, he and Rahzar appear with the Shredder at the docks, following Zeck's boss and Shredder's Russian business partner Ivan Steranko making a proposal with his old friend where if he and Zeck hand over Karai, they get out of the city. Leonardo and the other Turtles intervene with this, leading to a brawl on the docks. Fishface faces off against Zeck, who uses Karai as a shield to protect himself. Following Leo jumping in to save Karai, the tackle takes both individuals down and leads to him capturing Zeck. After delivering them to Stockman's lab, Fishface comments that warthog and rhino are very good combination to mutate into. He then pushes Zeck is pushed into the batch of mutagen and warthog DNA.

In The Pig and The Rhino, Fishface watches alongside the Shredder and his other mutant henchmen how Zeck and Steranko turned out, though enraged for being mutated into freaks. They attempt to stop the two mutants who try to attack the Shredder, only for their master to single them to stand down as he states that he will deal with them himself. He then watches the Shredder dodge their attacks and easily defeat them. He then he offers them a chance to work for him and capture Karai like they did before and not fail or the consequences will be severe.

In Casey Jones VS. the Underworld, Fishface accompanies Shredder and Tiger Claw in their meeting with Don Vizioso. In a discussion that followed, it is mentioned that Shredder controls the South American gangs through Fishface.

In Meet Mondo Gecko, Mondo's employer "Mr. X" is revealed to be Fishface, who took him in after he mutated into a gecko and his parents kicked him out. He's also shown to be operating mutant races that are very popular with the New York City underworld and mutant communities.

Personality
One of the Turtles' most cut-throat enemy. He is hot-tempered, treacherous, cruel, and clever. He is a criminal to the core, yet is loyal to the Shredder, as the ninja rescued him from jail and gave him a purpose and protection. He shares some similarity to Raphael, mainly in their love of violence, though he is by far more bloodthirsty.

Powers and Abilities
As a human, he was skilled in a a leg based martial art (most likely capoeira from Brazil)  and knife fighting, (He might know some ninjitsu from Shredder). He was an expert with butterfly knives before he was mutated. He is highly skilled and able to fight off at least two of the turtles on his own. His mutation gave him the ability to breath underwater, but has left him with severe weaknesses. He is unable to breathe air or move on land without help of his breathing mechanism and mechanical legs, though his martial arts allow him to use the legs with lethal skill, but his arms and hands no longer allow him to wield his blades. He also gained a venomous bite.

Trivia

 * Montes's human form is reminiscent of actor and martial artist Jim Kelly, and it is noticable that both Kelly and Chris Bradford's apparent template, Chuck Norris, have starred in two famous Bruce Lee movies (Enter the Dragon and Way of the Dragon, respectively).
 * Although Montes is not officially named "Fishface" until "The Pulverizer", he is listed by that name in some of the previous episode credits.
 * Known symptoms of Fishface's venom: delusions, fever, and nausea.
 * Fishface tells Raph the reason behind his association with the Shredder in "Baxter's Gambit".
 * Due to his accent and martial arts style, it is assumed that he is Brazilian.
 * Fishface has displayed great martial arts skills, using a fighting style reminiscent of Capoeria as well as skill with blades and throwing knives.
 * Montes knows how to ride a motorcycle.
 * It seems Motes's skinny fish arms are somewhat very strong. In Baxter's Gambit, he is seen holding Raphael's leg without any struggle.
 * He was an ally in the episode Baxter's Gambit, where he revealed himself being truely neutral.

Similar Villains

 * Leon Powalski - TBA