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No quiero que el mutante tenga orejotas.

No quiero que el mutante tenga orejotas.
I do not want the mutant to have big ears.
From Lesson 296:Augmentative suffixes (-ón, -ote, -azo)·Spanish (Latin America)

Questions & Answers about No quiero que el mutante tenga orejotas.

How did we get orejotas from the word for ear, and what does the -ota suffix add?
The base word is oreja (ear). We drop the final vowel and add the feminine plural augmentative suffix -otas. While you could just say orejas grandes, adding -ote or -ota often gives a slightly comical, clumsy, or disproportionate feeling, which fits perfectly when talking about a mutant's giant ears.
Why use the subjunctive tenga instead of the normal present tense tiene?
The phrase No quiero que (I don't want that) expresses a desire or wish about someone else. In Spanish, verbs expressing wishes or influence require the verb in the second part of the sentence to be in the subjunctive mood. That is why we use tenga.
Why is there no word for 'some' before orejotas? Could we say tenga unas orejotas?
Yes, you could say unas orejotas, but it is very common in Spanish to drop the article when talking about unspecified quantities of things a person has, like physical features. Just like you might say tiene ojos azules (he has blue eyes), you can simply say tenga orejotas (has big ears).
Is the word mutante always masculine?
No. Like many Spanish words ending in -ante (such as estudiante or cantante), mutante can be either masculine (el mutante) or feminine (la mutante) depending on who you are referring to. Here, we use the masculine article el for a male or generic mutant.

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