One of my favs. A month late posting but I can’t resist talking about my fondness of Spike. He is a disability-coded character and as an autistic person, I can see something to relate to. I have come to appreciate him when I revisited the series a few years ago. He is laidback and silly, and pretty unashamed about marching outside of social norms while being pretty likeable about it. That can get him into trouble, like when he eats other people’s foods or is focused on eating in the middle of danger. Still, he is pretty friendly to his friends and others.
His bond with Ducky is sweet, and often the heart or an important part of a film or episode. I like Spike and Chomper bond as sniffers in one episode. I think they would get along very well as the youngest of the group. Despite Cera’s derision of him joining the group in that deleted scene in the first film, I think they do and can grow to get along well, with Spike’s laidback tendencies calming Cera and both of them having a tendency for mischief. I can see their mud pool trips with Ruby and Tria as time to bond more. I can see the gang coming to appreciate Spike’s laidback attitude as they grow up, as a wise thing to do after all the drama they get involved in.
While his “Through the Eyes of a Spiketail” episode mightn’t be great in execution, I do appreciate and like the concept. It does show nonverbal people often have as complex thoughts and inner lives as everyone else. I just consider him hearing Cera and Littlefoot and Topps and Mr. Thicknose’s arguing as nonsensical sounds as his way of tuning it out, having long grown annoyed by/used to it. I do wonder if speaking for Spike is more challenging than just not wanting to. He only does it two times due to direct danger and he and his friends get into a lot of danger. In the episode where Littlefoot and Cera argue about the frozen watersweets, he thinks in frustration he knows where they are but doesn’t vocalize it. Maybe speaking is a challenge for him. Even if he can’t become completely verbal, I’m sure he can find other ways like some kind of spiketail sign language to communicate and his friends presumably would become more familiar with what he is trying to get across when they’re more grownup.
The episode saying his smells come out as songs to him does provide me with the amusing headcanon that when he eats during dangerous situations, the smell was like a siren song to him. I’m kind of sad Spike hearing his smells doesn’t become a meme, with pop songs and other music like “Absolute Destiny, Apocalypse” from Revolutionary Girl Utena being pasted into clips of that episode and others.
Writing him as part of an ensemble in fanfiction can be challenging when he isn’t directly involved. I keep having to remind myself to at least give one moment a page or every few pages so he doesn’t disappear from the scene. Hopefully, I’m doing him okay. I want him to be part of the group in stories, not a character only added in grudgingly because he's part of the canon.