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This Article Contains Spoilers -
WARNING: This article contains major spoilers. If you do not wish to know vital information on plot / character elements in a story, you may not wish to read beyond this warning: We hold no responsibility for any negative effects these facts may have on your enjoyment of said media should you continue. That is all. |
| “ | 
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| ~ Tenna's catchphrase when starting one of his challenges. |
| “ | I... I just wanted to be watched. I just wanted you to look at me... One last time... Since... since a little while ago... all that I've been broadcasting is the same reruns, over and over... I... I don't have anything that anyone wants to watch anymore... I'm irrelevant... I'm junk... I don't want to be thrown away... | „ |
| ~ Tenna's insecure breakdown. |
Mr. "Ant" Tenna is the main antagonist of Chapter 3: Late Night of the 2018 episodic indie RPG Deltarune.
The Darkner form of the Dreemurr family's old TV box, Tenna is the ruler of the TV World, a position with which he uses to entertain the masses. However, after years of no longer being used by his owners, he's become determined to try and keep an audience no matter what. He is the archenemy and former business partner of Spamton G. Spamton.
He is voiced by the game's creator, Toby Fox, who also voices Jevil, Queen, and Spamton G. Spamton in the same game.
Appearance[]
Tenna takes appearance of a humanoid Darkner with a TV as his head, possessing no facial features except for a large grinning mouth and a long nose. These features disappear when his screen is turned off. He wears a red suit with two, long coattails behind him, the word TV emblazoned on his suit lapel, a long yellow tie, black pants, puffy white gloves, and yellow pointy, heeled shoes. Tenna has numerous physical quirks that differentiate him from the previous Dark World rulers: he is much taller than anyone else (being around 5 times Kris's height at his normal height), and is rendered as a simplistic 3D model, unlike the rest of the game's characters who are 2D pixel art sprites. Thus, this allows Tenna to be far more animated than any other character.
Tenna grows and shrinks in accordance to his mood, becoming smaller the less enthusiastic he feels. Although hard to tell, he can blush pink. Sometimes, when Tenna speaks, his dialogue appears as stylized fonts. When angered, Tenna will grow fangs and sharp points will emerge from his shoulders. The flower that blooms from Tenna's nose at the end of Chapter 3 apparently appears whenever he feels overjoyed.
Personality[]
A charismatic and enthusiastic show host, Tenna is extremely energetic and peppy, seemingly wanting nothing more than to entertain his guests. This is for the most part, true as he provides to Kris and the Delta Warriors' every need, modifying games to be to their liking and doing his best to be accommodating. He also tends to make cheeky quips and commentary to keep audiences engaged. However, as noted by his shifty and nervous dialogue at certain points, Tenna is evidently secretive of his true motive, which is revealed to be his obsessive need for attention stemming from his insecurities. In the shadow mantle game levels, Tenna expresses open fear of Kris in particular, distressed that they are not having fun with his games and of them potentially turning him off again.
Additionally Tenna can be vindictive to a spiteful degree as following a perceived betrayal from Spamton G. Spamton, Tenna includes multiple slights towards his ex business partner in his games, at one point even directly blaming him for his inability to utilize technology. As well as during the Susiezilla minigame, where he depicts a giant paper mache head of Spamton and dubs him his "worst hater", ordering Susie to kill him quickly.
Wanting nothing more than an audience to watch him at all costs, Tenna has no qualms with hurting anybody to ensure that he gets what he wants, kidnapping Toriel and tormenting Kris's party to try to force them to stay. His affable persona also begins to show cracks as he undergoes rapid mood swings from apologetic to depressive and volatile. Furthermore, while mostly nice to his employees, Tenna begins showing more authoritative behavior towards them, forcing them to do his bidding under the clauses of his contracts, though it appears that he already gives them subpar treatment thanks to their poor pay.
These insecurities all stem from Tenna's fear of becoming outdated and in part due to trauma of witnessing the Dreemurr family slowly stop watching him and getting into repeated fights, seeing as he wouldn't be able to entertain others if he was thrown away. Thus, despite all his shortcomings, Tenna truly does care for others and wants nothing more than to make Lightners smile. Tenna also holds onto Spamton's Pipsis indicating he misses his old business partner to some degree. Tenna shows much more of this caring side after he's encouraged by Susie of his own self-worth, allowing him to turn his back on the Knight and help the Delta Warriors out.
Biography[]
Background[]
The Darkner form of the Dreemurr household's TV, Tenna was once a proud entertainer who loved spending time with his owners, fondly recounting the days when he was used to watch films, shows and other forms of entertainment. As such, he is keenly familiar with the tastes of both the Dreemurr and Holiday households, as the two were very close. Tenna would even become good friends with an up-and-coming salesman named Spamton G. Spamton once the library's laptop was taken to the Dreemurr household, with the two helping each other bolster themselves to fame. Tenna would also receive a pipis from him, keeping the original as a treasure and being implied to use its self-replicating abilities to mass produce ingredients for certain food items. At some point in the past, Tenna would employ a Darkner named Mike, who would become his most valued assistant. The latter detail is rather dubious however, seeing as nobody, even Tenna himself, has a good idea of how Mike looks like or who he even is, with the darkeners of the same name suggesting Mike could be the split personality of Tenna himself.
However, as time went on and circumstances changed, namely December "Dess" Holiday's disappearance, the two families would spend less time together and sooner or later, Tenna would end up completely unused, with his business beginning to fail. In an attempt to save his show, Tenna would try to learn Spamton’s secrets to gaining fame, only for Spamton to abandon him after receiving an unnerving phone call from a strange someone, plummeting from glory soon after. Tenna would assume Spamton was just ripping him off and would grow to hate him.
Tenna would be stuck keeping his business afloat with constant reruns and repetitive shows, something he grew tired of over time.
Chapter 1: The Beginning[]
Tenna, in his Light World form, can be seen as Kris makes their way through the living room as they get ready to go to school. When interacting with the television, flavour text remarks that it is unplugged and collecting dust.
Chapter 2: A Cyber's World[]
As Chapter 2 comes to a close, the television is mysteriously plugged in once more after Susie is invited to have a sleepover, with the girl deciding to binge through an entire marathon of kaiju movies before suddenly falling asleep. With a plan perfectly set in motion, Kris waits until late into the night, yanks out their SOUL, powers on the television, and creates a Dark Fountain within their own living room, bringing the television, and much of the surrounding area, to life within a Dark World. As the chapter comes to a close, a single toothy grin can be seen emerging from the television static, symbolizing Tenna coming to life.
According to Tenna's own words next chapter, the Roaring Knight would approach him with an offer: in exchange in assisting in their schemes, he would be granted an audience for as long as he wanted. Tenna would agree to this proposition and as such, begin setting up his Dark World to host a show that runs forever. However, in his secret Shadow Mantle video game level, Tenna implies Kris had also approached him to make a deal in exchange for not being turned off again.
Chapter 3: Late Night[]
After Susie and Ralsei argue over how "real" Darkners are, the mood is unceremoniously ruined by a strange voice and a spotlight. When prompted with an identity, the voice reveals itself to be Tenna, host of the game show "Mr. 'Ant' Tenna's Marvelous Mystery Board: TV Time". Although Susie objects at first, she would later join in after some convincing from Ralsei, who can't spend any time with his friends in the Light World. Overjoyed, Tenna would quickly start up his show.
The show went by simple enough, just a modified dungeon crawler known as "The Legend of Tenna", filled with quizzes, fights, and side quests, capped off with a "Physical Challenge". That round simply had a cooking challenge, one based on the cooking shows that Toriel used to watch. After passing through that ordeal, the Delta Warriors win, getting judged based on their performance in all the games. However, what Tenna failed to mention, only bringing it up now, was that there was a second round to be had. With the heroes agreeing to play along, Tenna sends everyone back to his Green Room to prepare.
What they didn't know was that Tenna was in contact with Ramb who found something, later revealed to be Toriel, in the new Dark World, and is trying to buy time based on orders from Kris and the Knight. Before he can finish, Tenna notices that Susie had walked in. Despite the interruption, the two have a genuine heart-to-heart before being interrupted by a phone ringing.
The second round started off similarly to the first, using the same dungeon crawler as before. However, partway through the challenge, Tenna leaves to answer a signal he starts receiving, reappearing on set after a short while. This time, the round ended with a musical Physical Challenge, based on the (potentially scandalous) music channel family friend December Holiday loved watching. Still, the heroes were able to pass through (despite Susie's rough play with the drum set). Despite winning, however, Tenna decided to stall for even more time with a Bonus Round, with the gang only agreeing after Tenna breaks down upon the threat of them leaving.
Should the heroes try to start up the next round, however, they walk into yet another one of Tenna's phone calls, with him explicitly stating that if Susie were to find out the truth, everything would be over. Making her presence known, Susie would interrupt, but with her being incapable of getting any information,
The heroes would wander out and unlock the passage to the right of the Green Room, only to discover that the "grand prize" that was promised was Toriel, stuck sleeping in a capsule. Feeling the need to vent out his feelings to the sleeping woman, he suddenly goes manic and lifts up her capsule, revealing that the three heroes were hiding behind it. Tenna tries to start up the Bonus Round, but now that a life is being held on the line, the squad isn't having any of it, causing Tenna to fly into an insanity-fueled rampage as he forces the warriors to partake in various remixes of the previous minigames. The team only gets away thanks to using a Zapper to ACT and use the "OffButton", buying them time.
In a panic, Tenna would start spiraling further, mistreating his workers and forcing them to find the Lightners. However, his quickly souring demeanor starts pushing everyone, even his most trusted allies, away from him. In desperation, Tenna would appear before the Lightners to stop them from sealing the Dark Fountain, revealing his own backstory and desire for a never-ending show. In one last attempt to stop them, Tenna forces the team into one last "Physical Challenge", a boss fight up against him as they try to rack up a thousand points to win. Even reaching the threshold, Tenna is unwilling to give up until the gang forces him to, shooting at his head until the set starts glitching out.
After his defeat, Tenna breaks down even more, becoming more dejected than ever before. While Ralsei tries to comfort Tenna through his own nihilistic worldview on Darkners, Susie interrupts, having a genuine heart-to-heart before promising to find him a new home. Tenna, overjoyed, promises to return Toriel by lowering her to safety. Ecstatic, Tenna lets the heroes of light pass by, only to suddenly be interrupted by two slashes. As punishment for his betrayal, the Roaring Knight has arrived to make short work of Tenna, slicing off both of his arms and dealing massive damage to him, seemingly killing him off as it decides to take on the Lightners itself.
Chapter 4: Prophecy[]
Tenna's fate depends on how the player acted in Chapter 3. If they recruited every enemy, Susie is able to successfully repair Tenna off-screen, albeit with his Light World counterpart sustaining noticeable damage. With Toriel seemingly wanting to throw it out, Susie and Kris take Tenna back to Castle Town for the time being, with Ralsei setting up his room there. Lancer will also hire Tenna as King's personal entertainer, whom he entertains with his oafish antics. This situation is temporary though, as Tenna later asks that Kris find him a new owner. If Noelle's house was visited first, Susie finds the TV outside in the rain and rushes him to the Dark World, commenting that Tenna fell sick as a result of being in the rain.
In Hometown, there is a self-proclaimed nobody who hides away in their home all day, implied to be the Deltarune equivalent for Mettaton. If the player has Kris agree to bring them entertainment in Chapter 2's epilogue and heads back in Chapter 4, they can bring Tenna over to the ghost, giving Tenna someone who'll be watching him for a good long while. The ghost will later watch one of Dess's favorite music videos and remark that it's "awakened something" in them, implying that they could assume a persona similar to Mettaton's in the future, similarly to how certain returning characters are beginning to resemble their previous counterparts.
However, if the player didn't recruit every enemy, Susie is unable to repair Tenna as the TV World Darkners are unwilling to help her, leaving his Light World form heavily damaged with a cracked screen; Susie says that he can't be brought into the Dark World, likely meaning that Tenna is dead in this scenario.
Powers and Abilities[]
Natural Abilities[]
- Leadership: Tenna is classified as a TV director as he is in charge of all his employees. When the Lightners escape, however, he loses his employees slowly as he started to have an insecure breakdown.
- Charisma: With a persona similar to Mettaton, Tenna has great charming skills to convince people to do things with him.
- TV Physiology: Tenna's greatest feature. Being a TV, he can change the reality of TV World by bringing people with him as well as the scenery by changing the channel. As shown in the battle against him playing a minigame, he uses his head to make the Lightners fight him.
In Battle[]
- All-Star Cast: Tenna will use a bunch of laughing stars in a swooping pattern. They can help the Lightners gain score by gaining a lot of Tension Points by grazing them which gives them the amount required to play a minigame.
- Smash Cut: Tenna will jump up and perform a slice with his hands together, manipulating the Bullet Board. Diagonal patterns of electricity bullets will come from up and down, while the halves of the box shift around to confuse the Player.
- Rimshot: Laughing stars with smaller ones trailing them will bounce around and unleash bullets as soon as the rimshot plays, making it harder to dodge.
- Minigame: When Kris ACTs to play a minigame (with just Susie, just Ralsei, or both), Tenna will jump to the center of the battlefield and look at fourth wall with static on his TV screen face. The camera zooms in on his face and lead to a minigame. When the minigame is complete, the camera zooms out and returns to the battlefield, with Tenna jumping back to his spot. When performing two at once, the camera backs away to the battlefield and zooms in on Tenna's screen again to transition to the next one.
- DODGE FIRE: In this minigame, Kris is taken to the Cooking Show set. Kris has to jump over the fire coming from the counter and fire raining down above until the timer runs out Jumping over the fire will earn the Lightners score.
- PERFORM: The Lightners will be taken to the Rock Video set playing the current section of "It's TV Time!" Kris has to hit the notes with the two buttons to match the rhythm. The more notes that are played, the faster the timer for this minigame finishes to end it.
- PROTECT RALSEI: Exclusive only if the Monster Movie set was done. Susie has to ram into the Tennas to protect Ralsei by pressing the button to spin dash into them. Hitting the Tenna's will earn the Lightners score.
- FIGHT: Like the other version, Susie has to fight the golden Tenna statue.
- SHOOT: Like in the Cowboy Minigame set, Kris has to shoot the Tenna's from the corresponding windows. They turn redder the longer they stay there and will shoot if left alone too long.
- DODGE: In this version, the roles are reversed and Tenna shoots the Lightners instead. They must dodge Tenna's scope shots on where he will fire until the timer runs out.
- SHOOT THE TARGETS: While using the Sharpshoot ACT from the Shadowguys, the Lightners must shoot the Tenna enemies coming in from the right until the timer runs out.
- BOUNCE THE BALL: The player must use the parasol attatched to the SOUL to bounce the ball. This one can end before the timer runs as a number below the Bullet Board will be displayed on how many bounces are left.
- DEFEAT TENNA: When the score board reaches the quota of 1,000 points, Tenna will perform all of the minigames repeated up to 21 times. When the Lightners reach back to the battlefield, they must shoot for Tenna's TV head until his ENEMY HP reaches 0. (This won't count toward lowering his actual HP.) Doing this will end the battle against him and he'll erratically change channels before he does.
- If the Dealmaker is equipped, the erratic channel change will have an additional transition with Spamton hidden in the corner.
Weaknesses[]
- Insecurities: Due to being not wanted anymore, Tenna tends to be a bit of a control freak by kidnapping Toriel in a capsule as well as the Lightners when they saw her locked in one at the Doom Board. He also feels more insecure as his crew slowly left him. He is, however, aware of his actions and feels extreme remorse as he does.
- TV Head: In the "DEFEAT TENNA" minigame, his TV head is his weakness into defeating him.
Quotes[]
Pre-Bonus Round[]
| “ | It's now time for our feature presentation... Feacher. Coming straight from your house. Coming straight from YOUR house. (Coming) He's the One (coming). The KING of ONLY! He's GROOVY and NEVER glooby! You can't get this from an EGG! The sensation of your screen, the show that makes you scream! Say it with him, folks! Mr. (Ant) Tenna's TV Time! | „ |
| ~ Tenna's introductory VHS. Notably, one of Spamton's "Pipis" is shown during the "You can't get this from an egg" line, which foreshadows the sour relationship between the two. |
| “ | What am I doing? You should be wondering what YOU'RE doing! You're about to play the greatest game of YOUR life! Answer CRAZY QUESTIONS!! Pass PHYSICAL CHALLENGES... And you'll all win some TV-Tastic PRIZES!!! FLORAL COWBOY BATH CURTAINS!!! A BRAND NEW FAMILY CAR!!! BIG BRO'S TALKER-BACKER!! KITCHEN SINK FUR-GUARD!! CHOCOLATE CHEWY ROLL-UM'S!!! A GENUINE RALSEI PLUSH!! (Ralsei: Hey I didn't agree to-) AND THAT'S! NOT! ALL! Hey Doctor Tennaville! What's today's prescription? Why, it looks like a prescription for... ONE GRAND PRIZE!? That's right! Today's GRAND PRIZE is this season's MOST popular item... Encased in our patented MYSTERY BALL... This Dark World's ONE AND GREATEST TREASURE! Hey, bet you wanna know what's INSIDE, don't ya, folks!? Well, great news, CADOOS and CADETTES! EVERYTHING can be YOURS! All you have to do is... *WIN! | „ |
| ~ Tenna introducing his game show, and foreshadowing his grand prize. |
| “ | It's normal for couples to fight sometimes! C'mon, Kris, tell 'em! | „ |
| ~ Tenna after Lanino and Elnina start fighting, seemingly hinting at the Dreemurrs' divorce. |
| “ | STOP! STOP! STOP!!! It CAN'T be over already!! NO!! The FUN-O-METER's still only at 80%!! (Susie: Huh?) Ah, you see... That was just... ... ROUND 1! (Ralsei: There's... more than one round...?) Of course!! There's 2 ROUNDS!! 2!! You haven't ever heard of a game show with just ONE ROUND, have you!? | „ |
| ~ Tenna after winning the first round. |
| “ | ... located... in the purple cliffs? Perfect! Don't waste any time. You know what comes next. Assembly, air holes, soft, soothing music... Then we just need time. One more board, just ONE more board and then... | „ |
| ~ Tenna's interrupted transmission relating to Toriel's appearance. |
| “ | Tenna: S... SUSIE!!! SUSIE, sweetheart, my STAR contestant, hey, how can I help you!? Free toy ball voucher!? Refreshments!? Lifetime supply of NON-GLOOBY slime? Susie: Just, uh... Wanted to say the games were pretty fun, I guess. Tenna: They... they are? Susie: I mean, you SAW when you interrupted us, but... Ralsei... He was being kind of... weird, earlier. I feel like this cheered him up. And... me too. It's just been taking my mind off... everything... I guess. Tenna: S... Susie...? SUSIE!!!!!!! I've never wanted to hear ANYTHING more!!! I'VE LOVED putting on this SHOW! I haven't had this much fun in years! Seeing REAL LAUGHS! REAL SMILES! From an audience of MORE THAN ONE! It's a DREAM! I... can't lie. I've been a bit, alone, until recently. Susie: I... can relate, I guess. Tenna: But hosting you and lil' Ralsei has been an HONOR! Even if you're a tad sassy! Susie: Umm, hey, Kris was having fun, too. Tenna: Oh... yeah, Kris! Haha, Kris! Good old Kris! What a stinker! Susie: ... don't you like Kris? Tenna: What the - are you kidding!? I LOVE Kris! They were one of my original viewers! I'm just not sure if, heh, they... uh, love TV. Susie: Huh? Why wouldn't they... (The phone rings.) Tenna: HEY would you look at that!! The NEXT BOARD's ready!!! It was GREAT talking to you, Susie!! Good luck out there!! Susie: Uhh, yeah! Later! |
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| ~ Tenna and Susie's exchange before the second round. |
| “ | Oh, Kris! Remember DECEMBER? Oh, that little musical prodigy... Remember when she'd grab the remote and swap it from cartoons... to that WILD music video channel Toriel FORBID you to see? (Guess your mother's never been a fan of alligators in bikinis.) Dess, rocking her guitar and singing along with those nasty, nasty songs! Didn't you all think she was just so... COOL? HECK! Maybe you could get her to come back and watch again sometime!? Haha! Just kidding! Anyway, are you ready to ROCK!? | „ |
| ~ Tenna before the second Physical Challenge, showing his knowledge on Dess. |
| “ | Phew! There you are, still sleeping like a little angel! Haha! Who the HECK knows what I'D do if you woke up! ...I'm sorry we gotta do this to you, Tori... You were the last one to really... give me a good look, back then. But hey, that's show business! Nothing... stays big forever. Without... a little HELP, that is. That's why you're gonna be our little TRUMP CARD... Heheheh... Hahahahahaha- | „ |
| ~ Tenna to an unconscious Toriel, indirectly revealing part of his plan to the three heroes as well as the heroes themselves |
Bonus Round/Doom Board[]
| “ | No, haha! Ralsei, RALSEI! Buddy-BOY! It's fine! I GET IT! Look, I get it! CLASSIC TV... sometimes just takes a little TIME to APPRECIATE! So how about this? We'll all do ONE MORE LITTLE GAME... One last ENCORE! And this time, we'll play.. until you LIKE IT. | „ |
| ~ Tenna right before the Bonus Round begins. |
| “ | GAME OVER?! The game's NEVER OVER!! And if you don't wanna play anymore.. it's time for ME to TAKE CONTROL! Mike, crank it all the way up to MAX!!
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| ~ Tenna after trapping Kris, Ralsei, and Susie in balls. |
| “ | I'm not broken! I don't have burn-in! I'm... fun!!! C'mon, say it!!! I'm!!! Fun!!! ... Fine. You don't wanna say it? Maybe a quiz will help you answer!!! | „ |
| ~ Tenna as he slowly goes mad |
| “ | PHEW! That battle was a WORKOUT!! Let's never fight again! We're a HAPPY family, aren't we, Kris!? ... Kris? | „ |
| ~ Tenna after the first fight in the bonus round. |
| “ | Ahhh... Kris, remember when your brother was here? You used to spend so, so, much time with him. With me. Watching cartoons. Playing games. Smiling. Laughing. Crying. Why? Why don't you two do that anymore...? What!? He went to COLLEGE? Well... why'd he have to go do THAT!? You. Can learn. ANYTHING! On TV! Ahahahah!!! | „ |
| ~ Tenna before the bonus cooking Physical Challenge, showing insecurity over Asriel going to college. |
| “ | They're coming out of the pipes. They're crawling out of the pipes. Where are they going...!? Hahaha... I... don't... KNOW!! Ahahahahahaha!!! | „ |
| ~ Tenna's bizarre "instructions" before the bonus cooking Physical Challenge. |
| “ | I'm sorry. I'm sorry about the pipes. I knew. I KNEW I shouldn't have done it. But you know, every pipe goes SOMEWHERE! They had to go SOMEWHERE!!! Wait, no. Not another battle. Please... The family's fighting again. | „ |
| ~ Tenna's apology for an already bizarre pipe situation, also making an allegory for the Dreemurr family falling apart. |
| “ | I know. I know what you need. To get your minds off of this. And your eyes back on me. A LITTLE MUSIC!!! That's right!! SHOW tunes!! KRIS on the PIANO!! You LOVE it, don't ya, folks!? That's right! A MUSICAL CHALLENGE! And this time, it's... Oh God. Oh God, it's coming. The music is coming. I can't stop it... | „ |
| ~ Tenna before the bonus music Physical Challenge. |
Pre-Battle[]
| “ | Where are you!? My contestants!? I'll give you funny goop that gets stuck on the carpet! A lifetime supply! Come baaaaack!! | „ |
| ~ Tenna after the heroes escape the Bonus Round. |
| “ | WHAT DO YOU MEAN YOU HAVEN'T FOUND THE LIGHTNERS YET!? Arrghhh!! You're all... FIRED!!! (All of Tenna's staff appear dejected.) I mean, uh... HIRED!!!! (Tenna's staff suddenly starts celebrating.) I mean, uh... No more POINTS until you CAPTURE them!! You like POINTs, right!? Okay, then we're CLEAR, right! You guys... (A single Shadowguy starts kicking up before the rest of the team starts cheering.) What do you MEAN you don't want to fight them!? Wh... What the!? Read the FINE PRINT in your CONTRACT, buddy! Now QUIT complaining and GO! | „ |
| ~ Tenna causing the relationship between him and his staff to deteriorate. |
| “ | WHAT!? She ROLLED OVER in her SLEEP!? Did you try the CLASSICAL MUSIC CHANNEL like I SAID!? You know she'll be in GRAVE DANGER if she's AWAKE for this, right!? ... what!? You QUIT!? You can't QUIT!!! RAMB!!! (Ramb hangs up the phone.) ARRRGH, I KNEW HE WAS A GOOD-FOR-NOTHING!!! | „ |
| ~ Tenna talking to Ramb about Toriel over the phone, hinting that he at least cares for Toriel's safety. |
| “ | L-look everyone!! It'll be fine!! I'm cutting-edge!! I'm new!! I'm TV!!! Three-colors, cathode raytube!! Make you laugh, make you cry!! Entertainment that never gets old!! (Two Shadowguys and a Zapper leave.) H-hey, stop!! Don't go...!! Darnit, this is all that little spammy MAILMAN's fault!! He... he told me he was gonna teach me how to use technology!! H... How to plug in and make! It! BIG...! And where is HE!? Arrrgh, if I could get my hands on... (One by one, the rest of Tenna's crew leave.) Wait, where are you going!? Stop!! Help me!! Help!! Does anyone know what an e-mail is??? | „ |
| ~ Tenna breaking down near the end of the chapter, further pushing everyone away. |
| “ | Elnina!! Lanino!? You two!? C'mon, old friends, you can't leave...! (Lanino and Elnina slowly back away before leaving.) Fine!! Fine, you wanna go, GO!! We'll see how far the Lightners get... WITHOUT THE WEATHER CHANNEL!! HAHAHA! How can they know the Weather without TV!?!? Hahahaha!! What? Apps? What... What are those!? Everything's changing so fast... (A spotlight appears above Tenna, covering the rest of the world in a faint darkness.) M... Mike? Mike, you... you're leaving, too!? MIKE!! NO!! ANYONE BUT YOU!! ANYONE!! | „ |
| ~ Ditto, but with his closest friends. |
| “ | PHEW! FINALLY, SOME PEACE AND QUIET! ... I WONDER IF THEY EVEN LIKE THE GAME...? I'M TRYING MY BEST TO MAKE IT FUN, BUT... HERE AND THERE, STRANGE THINGS ARE SHOWING THROUGH... OH, WHY DID I BASE IT OFF THIS STUPID OLD THING!! ... KRIS, OH, KRIS IF YOU COULD JUST SMILE... LAUGH... TELL ME I'M DOING SOMETHING RIGHT... PLEASE... WHAT THE? I HEAR FOOTSTEPS! NO GOOD I NEED TO MAKE MY GETAWAY | „ |
| ~ Tenna in the secret second level of the Shadow Mantle video game, expressing his insecurities of entertaining Kris and the lighteners. |
| “ | ... HOW DID THINGS TURN OUT LIKE THIS... KEEPING POOR TORIEL ALL LOCKED UP... IF ONLY HE HADN'T ABANDONED ME. MY OLD PARTNER... I WAS GONNA PUT HIM ON TV! MAKE HIM A STAR! I GAVE HIM EVERYTHING! EVERYTHING I HAD! MY LIFE ADVICE! ALL. HE HAD. TO DO. WAS TELL ME WHAT HIS LITTLE SECRET WAS. HIS SECRET TO BEING A BIG SHOT... IT TOOK A LITTLE SWEET TALK... BUT JUST WHEN I HAD, FINALLY, FINALLY? HA HA -- GOTTEN HIM TO SIGN THE DEAL. HE SUDDENLY HAD TO TAKE A PHONE CALL. BUT WHEN HE PICKED IT UP, HIS FACE TURNED PALE... AND HE RAN RIGHT OUT OF THE ROOM WITH THE RECEIVER HANGING! SO I WENT TO PICK IT UP... THINKING IT WAS FINALLY MY CHANCE TO BE A BIG SHOT. ... BUT THERE WAS NOBODY THERE! THAT LITTLE FREAK RIPPED ME OFF! ... I WISH THEY NEVER BROUGHT THAT LAPTOP HOME... K... KRIS! KRIS, I DIDN'T SEE YOU THERE! I... I DID WHAT YOU SAID, KRIS! HA... JUST LIKE OUR DEAL! Y-YOU AREN'T GONNA TURN ME OFF AGAIN, ARE YOU...? | „ |
| ~ Tenna in the secret third level of the Shadow Mantle video game, explaining his history with Spamton and potentially Kris. |
| “ | Tenna: No!! NO!! NO!!!! WHAT are you doing!? WHERE are you going!? Ahaha!! There are still GAMES to play!! SHOWS to watch!! Laughs and SCREAMS!! Smiles and TEARS!! Just wander back to your seats and we can... Susie: ENOUGH of your dumb games!! Why the hell do you want us to play so bad anyway!? |
„ |
| ~ Tenna and Susie as the heroes reach the Cold Place one final time. |
| “ | ...Kris. Kris knows why. Do you remember it, Kris? When everyone came over for the holidays? Back when I was just a little old TV. Everyone used to gather around my glow to watch the specials, Smiling. Laughing. Eating butterscotch pie. Wasn't that just so much... fun? To watch me. I... was so happy. Then... People stopped coming. Everyone disappeared... one by one... No one wanted to watch TV anymore. No one wanted to play games anymore. I've been all alone... Until now. When the KNIGHT appeared... The ROARING KNIGHT. And I was told that if I keep you three busy, I can have ALL the people watch me that I want. And, I've been having SO much fun playing with you all, I... just don't want it to end! So... please... just say it with me.
|
„ |
| ~ Tenna explaining his backstory and motives. |
| “ | Susie: Enough already!! (FIGHT -> Tenna) (MISS) Tenna: Wh-What are you doing?! I just had this suit DE-AXED!!! Susie: We're done messing around. Give back Toriel. Now. Tenna: Alright. I get it. I. GET IT! I REALLY get it!! Talking!! I've been doing too much... TALKING!! NO MORE questions!! What you need... Is another PHYSICAL CHALLENGE!! |
„ |
| ~ Tenna understanding Kris, Susie, and Ralsei's motives before truly engaging them in battle. |
Battle[]
| “ | That's right, folks! One last challenge! 1000 points or bust! Can you do it!? | „ |
| ~ Tenna as his battle begins. |
| “ | 1000 POINTS, JUST 1000 POINTS AND I'LL GIVE IT UP! BUT DON'T THINK IT'S GONNA BE EASY!! BECAUSE TODAY... WE'VE GOT AN ALL-STAR CAST! | „ |
| ~ Tenna firing his first attack, All-Star Cast. |
| “ | So our STAR contestants have contested our STARs! But can they survive... Another PHYSICAL CHALLENGE?! | „ |
| ~ Tenna before using one of his minigames. |
| “ | Sick of the classics?! We'll make 'em NEO! NEO shows, NEO programs, just watch, watch, WATCH! | „ |
| ~ Tenna expressing his knowledge of NEO. |
| “ | Who says an old CRT can't learn new tricks?! LOOK!! The 6PM show?! I'll show it at 5!! | „ |
| ~ Tenna showing his desperation. |
| “ | Ratings!? HA! I'll show you CHARISMA! HD's nothing when you got NOSTALGIA! | „ |
| ~ Tenna. |
| “ | Susie, you liked watching, didn't you?! Come on, tell 'em! Tell 'em! Tell 'em, Susie! Say they don't need to throw me away! | „ |
| ~ Tenna trying to convince Susie that he's still useful. |
| “ | I'm still MARVELOUS! I'm still MYSTERIOUS! Toriel oughta know she doesn't NEED a new TV! | „ |
| ~ Tenna proving his worth. |
| “ | Mike, if you're still there, ban EVERYONE from the gift shop! | „ |
| ~ Tenna |
| “ | ... WHERE... WHERE'S THE AUDIENCE? WHERE'D THEY GO...? WHERE ARE THEY!? | „ |
| ~ One of Tenna's neutral flavor texts, reflecting one of Spamton's flavor texts. |
| “ | That's it! It's time for the FINAL EPISODE! What will happen to our HEROES... When they REALIZE this show is NEVER gonna end!? | „ |
| ~ Tenna before his final attack. |
Post-Battle[]
| “ | I... I just wanted to be watched. I just wanted you to look at me... One last time... Since... since a little while ago... all that I've been broadcasting is the same reruns, over and over... I... I don't have anything that anyone wants to watch anymore... I'm irrelevant... I'm junk... I don't want to be thrown away... | „ |
| ~ Tenna's insecure breakdown. |
| “ | Tenna: You... you'll help me!? SUSIE!!! You... You're INCREDIBLE! You're AMAZING!! No... you're MARVELOUS!! I feel electric!! I feel like a million bucks!! This... this must be what HOPE feels like!! We're inventing a Hall of Fame just for you!!! Susie: But... you gotta give back Toriel. She's got people that need her, too. Tenna: I... I understand! I know it's not what the KNIGHT wants, but... Kris!! Susie!! Good contestants like you deserve a good prize!! This way!! |
„ |
| ~ Tenna after Susie promises to find him a new home and the former keeping his word and redeeming himself. |
| “ | Audience, would you please stand up and clap for our winners!! For outstanding kindness and bravery, the Lightners have won... THE GRAND PRIZE!!! Here you go!! She's all yours, folks!! How wonderful!! The family's all together again!! Now you can all finally- | „ |
| ~ Tenna after his redemption, and his last words before being brutally attacked (and optionally killed) by the Knight in Chapter 3. |
Gallery[]
Animations[]
Trivia[]
- His name is an obvious pun on the word "antenna" and "ant". The name "Ant" could be a reference to his antennas, which slightly resemble an ant's.
- Toby Fox has stated in a tweet that he originally planned for Tenna to have more insectoid traits, such as having two pairs of arms and a proboscis-like nose, but scrapped them as he didn't like the idea.
- Thanks to his close relationship with Spamton in the past, Tenna frequently references him in-game:
- In Tenna's introductory VHS, he's depicted shooting a blue orb he calls an "egg". Not only does this orb resemble a pipis, Spamton claims "egg" is a slur for them, reflecting their mutual disdain.
- He often references their past together, lamenting that Spamton promised to teach him about the internet before disappearing.
- His battle themes heavily utilise leitmotifs used by Spamton. More accurately, Spamton heavily utilises Tenna's motifs, seeing as the ads and background tracks in the TV World imply that these motifs were Tenna's before Spamton stole them.
- His outfit heavily resembles the outfit Spamton wore in the past.
- During the Susiezilla minigame, a cannon styled after Spamton's old appearance with its eyes blacked out will appear as a boss enemy. Later during his boss fight, one of the minigames based off Susiezilla will feature Ralsei strapped to a statue styled after Spamton.
- When entering the Bonus Room and going to its rightmost passage, a special cutscene will play if Spamton Neo was spared earlier: the Delta Warriors find a cupboard with a pipis inside, catching Tenna's attention and forcing them to hide. Tenna laments that his "secret" is out and that he'd take anyone to comfort him, even Spamton. Spamton will emerge from Kris's pocket to try and reconcile with Tenna, only for him to freak out and, mistaking him for some creature after the pipis, would spray Spamton with foam before placing the pipis in a safe location.
- Tenna is the only Darkner to explicitly reference Noelle's missing sister, Dess, by name, seeing as she used to come over to the Dreemurr household very often.
- At least some of Tenna's animations come from Mixamo, a 3D animation software and library. In said library, his dancing animations are known as "Silly Dancing" (The Cabbage Patch) and "Swing Dancing" (Charleston "Crazy Legs"), while his kicking animation is the Roundhouse Kick variant of "MMA Kick".
- During the first round, one of Tenna's sentences consists of the word "STOP". This is stylized as a stop-sign, albeit one that's blue, which is a reference to Sans' explanation of how blue attacks work in Undertale.
- During the cutscene where Tenna's TV screen starts glitching and flickering after his defeat, the Undertale "GAME OVER" can briefly be seen in one of the screens.
- Despite not being a secret boss, Tenna shares many similarities with the secret bosses of previous chapters:
- Like Spamton and Jevil, Tenna's Light World form is an object that's considered useless or obsolete: joker cards are often discarded during poker games, spam emails are typically ignored, while cathode ray TVs are considered old-fashioned and out of vogue. This is reflected in Tenna's fear of being ignored.
- Additionally, he, like the secret bosses, was very successful until his fall from grace, being watched every day until the Dreemurr and Holiday households drifted apart.
- He has a quirk with his manner of speaking, having coloured special effects for certain words in his text boxes.
- He has voiced dialogue (mainly his catchphrase), and lacks a text box portrait in his overworld dialogue. However, he does have a portrait of sorts which appears in his text box during certain game show battles (such as the first fight against Lanino and Elnina), as well as his boss fight.
- He is clearly mentally unstable, snapping violently when Kris refuses to keep playing along and exhibiting rapid mood swings.
- His boss theme uses leitmotifs from previous secret bosses, mainly Spamton's, with a portion of it at around 25 seconds in possibly being a short section of the "freedom" leitmotif used by most other secret bosses.
- He appears to be based off a stage of grief, his being bargaining as he tries to ensure his own popularity by kidnapping Toriel and forcing the Lightners to follow his show. He also constantly reassures himself that he's still popular.
- Like Spamton and Jevil, Tenna's Light World form is an object that's considered useless or obsolete: joker cards are often discarded during poker games, spam emails are typically ignored, while cathode ray TVs are considered old-fashioned and out of vogue. This is reflected in Tenna's fear of being ignored.
- Similarly to Queen, Tenna appears to be a caricature of one of the parents of the Lightner he's most close to. In this case, he appears to be an exaggerated version of Kris's father, Asgore:
- The two are both pariahs to their original families, with Asgore getting divorced by Toriel and Tenna being an unused television.
- They both try their best to appeal to Kris and appear "fun", with Tenna setting up his games and Asgore trying to show as much affection as possible to them.
- They are both evidently struggling with their abandonments, with Tenna trying to assure himself that he's still relevant while Asgore seemingly wants to show Toriel "what really happened" to make her forgive him.
- They both seem to be hiding more than they let off: Tenna evidently has his own schemes, which are revealed during Chapter 3's climax, while Asgore seems to not only be planning something, but may have connections to the Dark Worlds thanks to possessing a Black Shard, an item that is a chip of the Knight's blade.
- Tenna's determinant death at the end of Chapter 3 is likely meant to parallel Asgore's own demise at Flowey's hands in Undertale, seeing as both are overjoyed to see their families reunited and offer them to go live their lives happily before getting ambushed.
- The song that plays after winning against Tenna in the final fight and just before Tenna is nearly killed by The Knight, "Hall of Fame" not only harkens back to Spamton Neo's defeat with its HEY! EVERY leitmotifs, but also seems to have a short leitmotif section from the Tera Raid Battle theme of Pokémon: Scarlet and Violet, another piece of music Toby Fox composed.
- According to Toby Fox on his Twitter page, he had conceptualized Tenna sometime in 2016. He was initially supposed to be rotoscoped off a Kinect with a styling similar to Ghost Trick: Phantom Detective's 3D models, but was ultimately given his current style after the former looked incredibly bad. Thus, Tenna's current model was rendered by Chelsea Saunders instead.
- Tenna coincidentally shares a name with an equipment management company. This would result in said company getting review-bombed with positive reviews by fans of Deltarune upon the release of Chapter 3.
- Toby Fox was uncertain about audiences liking Tenna all that much, being paranoid that they would think he drew in too many similarities from Spamton, who Fox was previously worried about prior to the release of Chapter 2. Coincidentally enough, much like his predecessor, Tenna was able to stand out for all the right reasons and instantly became a fan favorite.
- Tenna is the only main antagonist in a chapter thus far to have a personal connection to Kris prior to the game's events.
- While it is mentioned by Ramb that most of the Cyber World and the Card Kingdom interacted with Kris and Noelle during their childhood years, none of the Darkners there seem to remember them.
- After the release of Chapter 3, many fans have noticed the presence of a discarded CRT television and video game console next to a mailbox in Undertale's Garbage Zone. Given the presence of the Dummy! leitmotif in both Tenna and Spamton's themes, as well as their association with trash and the fact that Deltarune was planned before the release of Undertale, the community theorizes that these are their actual alternate universe counterparts.
- Tenna's face's design could be based off the word "TV", which when rotated ninety degrees anticlockwise, resembles a pointy nose and a mouth. This is reinforced by the title card in Tenna's intro sequence, which has the word "TV" on a small TV graphic before the letters morph to resemble Tenna's face.
- During the Bonus Round, Tenna's bizarre usage of pipes may be related to an incident where Kris flushed a bath bomb down the family toilet, something that likely caused an argument as shown by Tenna stating that "The family's fighting again". Some speculate that Kris got the idea from something they saw on the TV, which is why Tenna is apologetic about "the pipes".
- During said segment, the unidentifiable black things that slither out of the pipes are disembodied ICE-E heads, as seen in the game's files.
- Tenna seems to be based on TV Dinnah, a major antagonist of the 2009 real-time strategy game Little King's Story. Aside from both of them being humanoid televisions, they both force the protagonists into both quizzes and fake cooking shows, force the player to control an 8-bit version of the protagonist(s), shoots at them as a cowboy, and both of them break their respective games' art styles.
- The T-Rank room after the first round seems to confirm this, calling Tenna the "'Little King' of his story".
- Coincidentally, around the time Chapter 3 was released, a song titled "STATIC" would feature a CRT-themed version of Hatsune Miku who not only shared the same themes of separation anxiety and nostalgia as Tenna, but also a catchphrase of "don't touch that dial". As such, many netizens have joked that Tenna is based off this version of Miku and have drawn fanart of them together.
- Tenna's colour scheme seems to resemble the colours of AV adaptor cords.
- Tennas original design was supposed to be more ant-like with four arms and being able to suck up nectar with his nose as said by TobyFox on twitter.
External Links[]
- Tenna on the Deltarune Wiki
- Tenna on the Deltarune.Wiki
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