Spike Eel

Spike Eel
A Spike Eel from Super Mario 3D Land
First appearance	Super Mario 3D Land (2011)
Variant of	Maw-Ray
Comparable Gringill

Spike Eels are enemies found in Super Mario 3D Land. They are magenta colored eels with purple spikes on their back and three big yellow spikes on their head, that slightly resemble hair. They have a big mouth, a white lip and a single sharp tooth.

Spike Eels appear only in underwater tropical levels, notably in World 3-2, World 7-1 and Special 2-2. They stay in holes and swim in Mario's way, like Maw-Rays and Gringills. They take 15 hits to defeat with the Fire Flower or Boomerang Flower, but can be defeated in a single hit with invincibility or by transforming into Statue Mario and crushing them. They can also be attacked from the front or behind. Their tails are also spiked.

Although Spike Eels do not appear in Super Mario Odyssey, they appeared in concept artwork for the Seaside Kingdom.

Additional names

Internal names

Game	File	Name	Meaning
Super Mario 3D World	Utsubo	Utsubo	Romanization of ウツボ, meaning "Moray Eel"

Names in other languages

Language	Name	Meaning
Japanese	トゲトゲウオ Togetoge Uo	Portmanteau of「トゲトゲ」(togetoge, spiky) and「魚」(uo, fish)
Chinese	尖刺鱼 Jiān Cì Yǘ	Sharp Spike Fish
German	Dornenaal	From "dornen" (thorn) and "aal" (eel)
Italian	Anguillo Spino	Spike Eel; anguillo come from anguilla (eel) with the male suffix -o
Portuguese	Peixe-Espinho	Spike-Fish
Spanish (NOE)	Peciespino	-

Trivia

• The internal filename for Spike Eel is "Utsubo", which means "moray". It is also the Japanese name of Maw-Ray, which otherwise usually goes by the internal filename "moray".