"You are a Spiketail, so we will call you 'Spike'." The subject(s) detailed in this article has/have been given a conjectural (and, as a result, unofficial) name, due to the lack of an official name for the article subject(s) to be referred to by.
“
Never mind that Sharptooth...worry about this one!
”
— Cera warning the others, who are looking at the Swimming Sharptooth below, that the Plated Sharptooth is approaching.
The Plated Sharptooth is olive green in color and dull green plates on his back with stripes of the same color going across them, and has a bright, dull green underbelly. He bores three fingers with sharp claws, as well as pronated hands, and with long arms. He has very sharp, white teeth, and has two brow ridges on the top of his head. His eyes are drawn in an unusually animalistic manner, with a lack of expression, prominently slitted pupils, and dark marks under his eyes. These physical traits mark him out as an unusually dangerous sharptooth.
Gender
It can be assumed that this sharptooth is a male, as Littlefoot says "I don't think he can reach us" while hiding under a large boulder.
Personality and similarities with Sharptooth
Plated Sharptooth is sometimes compared to the original Sharptooth in terms of his characterization. As he seems to be determined to find, and likely harm the children throughout the film. His persistence can be noted in a few scenes where the children are hiding from him or manage to outsmart him and he gains the upper hand once again just to get them. While it cannot be said what would drive him to be like this as it is implied he followed them to the Mysterious Island, it might either be because they are easy prey or simply desperation (which might have been caused due to the Locusts earlier in the film depleting the herbivore's food sources, thus making them move and leaving the Sharptooth to fend for his territory). Whatever the reason may be, the Plated Sharptooth's likeness to the original appears to define a good portion of his personality that is seen.
Papa after being slashed by the sharptooth
He also holds the distinction of being the first, and only character to ever draw visible blood on screen, as he claws Papa Sharptooth and Mama Sharptooth with his hand and toe claws respectively. And, unlike the first film, the scenes were not altered for the movie's final revision. Not even the original sharptooth did this; it was only visible through a shadow. To be fair, Sharptooth was ripping Mama Longneck's back open with his mouth and claws. A slash on the face wouldn't be as gory as ripping apart a creature's back.
Strength and similarities with Sharptooth
While not quite as unstoppable as the Sharptooth of the first film, the Plated Sharptooth has displayed unusual persistence by jumping over chasms, flipping heavy rocks as though they were small stones, and fighting off other sharpteeth in an attempt to get at the heroes. Once again, many can still make a comparison between the Plated Sharptooth and the original one when it comes to their shared trait of their unbelievable strength and athleticism. He is able to leap a crevice to continue his chase of the children and is able to take on two adult Tyrannosaurs with somewhat little difficulty (he only falters when Papa Sharptooth catches him off-guard). Unlike most large Sharpteeth in The Land Before Time movies, it seems that the Plated Sharptooth has also been given Sharptooth's aerobatic ability to jump at extraordinary distances. In addition, the Plated Sharptooth's personality and characterization are very similar to those of the Sharptooth from the original film. In some ways, one could describe the Plated Sharptooth as a sort of "tribute" to the original Sharptooth himself. This could have been the idea of Charles Grosvenor when he directed the film (this was his first in the Land Before Time series).
Unlike most Sharpteeth in the sequels, who are usually somewhat incompetent threats and are shown to be somewhat afraid of grown leaf-eaters, this Sharptooth is shown to be far more dangerous and determined. He has no problem jumping over a small ditch to get at his prey, fighting off two others of his kind, and even wounding them with his claws. In addition, his slit pupils and more animalistic expressions make him out to be a particularly more menacing and dangerous Sharptooth.
History
“
You can't do that to my mommy!
”
— Chomper, after his mother is taken down by the sharptooth
The Sharptooth is first seen emerging from some trees on the island exactly 45 minutes into the film, where he sniffs the air and growls. He then bites and crunches up a bush the main characters were hiding in not long before, and begins to walk in their direction, though he doesn't find them for a while.
Later in the film, he sneaks up behind Littlefoot and roars right behind the young Longneck. He runs into a grove of roses and finds Cera, Ducky, Petrie, and Spike hiding in a grove of roses where Chomper had hidden them, where upon they flee in terror. He then eats the grove of roses, spits them out and then runs after the gang.
As he gives chase, the gang then runs across the log which they had travelled across before, and from the extra movement, the log collapses into the crevice below. The children start to taunt the Sharptooth, which he then responds by easily jumping over the crevice. The children continue to run across the island to try to outrun the sharptooth, but it keeps pace with them, all the while Chomper hears the growls of the sharptooth and the screams of Littlefoot. He quickly turns around and heads toward the noise. Meanwhile, the gang try to escape the Plated Sharptooth by hiding under a giant rock. The sharptooth sticks his head under the rock, but he cannot reach them. Knowing he can't reach, he simply lifts up the rock, and bites down, but bites into the dirt. As he continues to follow the kids, he shakes the dirt out of his mouth and growls.
The gang ends up running to the edge of the island, and are cornered at the edge of a cliff by the Big Water. They see the Swimming Sharptooth (the secondary antagonist that attacked them earlier in the film) but Cera tells them to not worry about it, but worry about the Plated Sharptooth, who was walking towards them. Just before he is about to eat them, Chomper comes to his friends' aid and bites him on his tail. He attempts to kill Chomper in response, but Cera then rams the sharptooth in the back of his right foot. Chomper then lets go, and the sharptooth bites his own tail instead, causing tears to well up in his eyes as he cries out in pain. He turns toward Cera, and lets out a massive roar in fury.
As the Sharptooth is about to resume his assault on the main characters, Chomper's parents show up and engage him in a fierce fight. He proves a formidable enemy as he engages his opponents separately. Papa Sharptooth charges at him, but he responds with a couple of headbutts, almost knocking Papa off balance. Papa Sharptooth then quickly turns. And he bites and sinks his teeth into the Plated Sharptooth's stomach. The Plated Sharptooth roars in pain and then tries to fight off the pain by slashing Chomper's father's snout (with his left finger claws). This causes Papa to let go. The Plated Sharptooth headbutts him away (and presumably knocking Papa Sharptooth unconscious). Mama Sharptooth immediately engages the Plated Sharptooth. They circle around each other for a while, growling and snarling, but then the Plated Sharptooth cuts Mama Sharptooth's left leg with his left toe claws, causing her to roar in pain. The Plated Sharptooth then immediately turns to the side, and hits her with a massive tail whip. This sends her flying through the air, before crashing to the ground, unconscious.
As an angry Chomper looks on, the Plated Sharptooth starts toward her. Chomper's father re-engages a distracted Plated Sharptooth and delivers a tail whip of his own to his face, knocking him over and sending him towards the cliff edge. This sends him plummeting into the Big Water below. He is knocked out and tumbles towards the gang. Littlefoot, Ducky, Petrie, Cera and Spike run, but Plates' tail sweeps Chomper off with himself in the process, and Chomper lands in the water first, after his mother gets up. When Chomper tries to swim up, the Plated Sharptooth tries to catch Chomper in his mouth on the way down, but without success. Then, Chomper reaches the surface, but so does the Plated Sharptooth. Littlefoot then jumps in the water to rescue him. The sharptooth then lunges at Chomper, and they both go underwater, but Littlefoot seems to have saved Chomper, and they resurface. As the Plated Sharptooth resurfaces, he is caught in the current and washes away screaming.
Plated Sharptooth's defeat
He presumably drowned off-screen, somewhat similar to the fate of the original Sharptooth in the first movie, or was possibly eaten by the swimming sharptooth.
Audio
Plated Sharptooth attacking Littlefoot
Trivia
Due to his unique design compared to other sharpteeth, many fans speculate that he may be a Giganotosaurus; the title of a video starring the sharptooth that is hosted on the official YouTube channel for the franchise reflects this interpretation,[2] though whether or not he was intended to be a Giganotosaurus during the film's production is still unclear.
The Plated Sharptooth is among the most agile Sharpteeth in the sequels, with other notably athletic Sharpteeth including the Horned Sharptooth and the original one.
It's unknown whether this Sharptooth drowned when he fell into the Big Water, was eaten by the Swimming Sharptooth, or made it to shore after being dragged away by the current. Along with several other antagonists in the franchise, he has an unknown status.
Due to the fact that, within The Land Before Time universe, larger Sharpteeth are depicted as highly inadequate swimmers, it is most likely that the Plated Sharptooth drowned within the current.
He is the fifth antagonistic character to be defeated by a Sharptooth, after Ozzy and Strut, and Ichy and Dil. (Ozzy and Strut: Chomper's Parents, Ichy and Dil: Swimming Sharptooth, Plated Sharptooth: Chomper's Parents)
The Plated Sharptooth wounds Chomper's father
His red eyes and three fingers somewhat make him resemble the Tyrannosaurus rex from the 1940 Disney movie, Fantasia.
The fact he has red eyes, attempts to eat the children, fights a team of Tyrannosaurus, and meets a watery end also makes him quite similar to the Indominus rex from the film Jurassic World, although that movie came out years after The Mysterious Island was released.
If the possibility that he was ultimately killed and eaten by the swimming sharptooth after being washed out to sea is true, then he and the Indominus are even more similar, as the Indominus was dragged into the Jurassic World Lagoon and eaten by the Mosasaurus in the climax of Jurassic World.
However, no evidence within the series supports that the Plated Sharptooth should have been able to have survived to that point; within the series, Sharpteeth (even small ones) are poor swimmers, mainly because of their diminutive arms (at least for the bigger ones, though their arms are still quite long), therefore the Sharptooth would have most likely drowned before the swimming sharptooth, or any other marine predator, could properly kill him.
The music that plays when the Sharptooth first appears and eats the bush is part of Michael Tavera's recomposition of "The Rescue/Discovery of the Great Valley" track from the original film's soundtrack.
After the Plated Sharptooth accidentally bites himself in the tail, the roar he utters is a modified, low-pitched Howie Scream.
The gang find footprints near the Big Water in the desert near the land bridge to the island. Although never brought up again, it can be assumed that the footprints belong to the Plated Sharptooth, and that he may have crossed the land bridge to the island to find food.
Evidence to back this up would include Chomper saying that it's a good thing that him and his parents were the only big sharpteeth around. The sharptooth may have crossed the land bridge the day before, unknowingly to Chomper and his parents.
