Turquoise Skull Zombie

Turquoise Skull Zombie is a zombie encountered in Lost City. In a similar manner as Ra Zombie, it steals sun, but can also use his turquoise-colored skull to burn the player's plants up to four tiles in front of him. The zombie does not need sun in order to do the latter. If it manages to steal sun from the player, the sun will not be returned to them when the zombie dies, unlike Ra Zombie.

Overview
Turquoise Skull Zombie absorbs 12 normal damage shots and degrades upon absorbing 6 normal damage shots before dying at 12 normal damage shots.

Almanac entry
TOUGHNESS: Dense SPEED: Speedy

Uses skull to steal sun, then unleashes energy in a destructive beam.

Unlike the more famous skulls, turquoise skulls are non-mysterious and common as dirt.

Strategies
The instant kill abilities of Turquoise Skull Zombie can quickly become a problem, especially in the Temple of Bloom, when it is accompanied by a group of Adventurer Buckethead Zombies, Excavator Zombies, Parasol Zombies or Porter Gargantuars.

The main weakness of this zombie is his own ability to steal sun, as it keeps him from being overpowered. As it will always try to steal sun before burning the plants in front of him, you should focus on killing him. If more expensive plants are close to Turquoise Skull Zombie and you have not killed him yet, it is perhaps best to dig the plants up. Turquoise Skull Zombie, however, only uses its attack when plants are in close range; therefore, if you remove plants from his range or it is far away, it can't use the attack. Also, unlike zombies such as Gargantuar Prime, Wizard Zombie, and Octo Zombie, their attacks do not stack up and can be effectively stalled, akin to Jester Zombie, Hunter Zombie, and Excavator Zombie.

Guacodile can help stop these zombies, as they begin to rush when Turquoise Skull Zombie shoots them with his laser. Ghost Pepper can also be useful to defeat this zombie and a group of Lost City zombies. Kernel-pult may be useful to stop these zombies, but only when you have two or three columns of them.

Infi-nut can be useful as a defensive plant against this zombie because, unlike other defensive plants, Infi-nut can recover once shot by the laser of the Turquoise Skull Zombie. It is not recommended to use Infi-nut'´s Plant Food ability, as its force field can be easily destroyed by this zombie.

Boosted Iceberg Lettuce can be helpful in the Temple of Bloom to stop this zombie and other zombies.

Trivia

 * Turquoise Skull Zombie bears a strong resemblance to Archimedes Q. Porter from Tarzan.
 * The skull used by Turquoise Skull Zombie is most likely a reference to the crystal skull in the Indiana Jones movie Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.
 * This is further proven by his almanac entry, which references crystal skulls.
 * Despite stealing sun, Turquoise Skull Zombie still appears in Lost City - Day 32. This is because it does not need sun to attack.
 * Sun about to be stolen by this zombie becomes blue instead of red, unlike the color of Ra Zombie's sun.
 * Turquoise Skull Zombie can kill hypnotized Gargantuars in one shot.
 * Unlike when killed by Explorer Zombie's torch, an Infi-nut will still regenerate if it gets hit by the laser beam.
 * Turquoise Skull Zombie deals the most normal damage shots, with over 200. This means that it can destroy an Infi-nut's shield even at full health.
 * Along with Mecha-Football Zombies & Dr. Zomboss, Turquoise Skull Zombies are the only zombies able to destroy an Infi-nut's shield in one hit.
 * The beam created by Turquoise Skull Zombie is similar to Gargantuar Prime's laser.
 * It is similar to Explorer Zombie, as they both burn plants and have the same health.
 * However, this zombie, along with Gargantuar Primes, do not bring fiery objects with them in order to burn plants. Rather, both use lasers.