Megathread The Lara-Su Chronicles and Ken Penders topic - READ PAGE 164, POST 4096

[Atharun]

What little I have seen of this project and his other self made work, the more I find it difficult to not smh. The art style is def not to my taste and the whole thing just seems unappealing. I always felt he tried to force a bit too much of a heavy sci-fi angle on the Sonic stories and this project seems to take it into overdrive.

As for Shade and the Nocturnus clan, I think they were a better version of that concept and would like to see at least Shade and Ix make a return someday, even if only in comic form.

Funny thing is, in the comics I liked Dr. Finitevus as a villain. While Penders technically created him as the scientist off to the side, Ian really made the character. Shame since he was an interesting villain.

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[DabigRG]

21 minutes ago, Atharun said:

Funny thing is, in the comics I liked Dr. Finitevus as a villain. While Penders technically created him as the scientist off to the side, Ian really made the character. Shame since he was an interesting villain.

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Actually, Karl Bollers created him. Mr. Flynn just used that Albion Scientist you're referencing to give Finitevus a relevant backstory.

[Atharun]

Actually, Karl Bollers created him. Mr. Flynn just used that Albion Scientist you're referencing to give Finitevus a relevant backstory.

Thank you for correcting that. I had thought that was a Penders creation.

As far as his work on the Knuckles books, I was never a fan of the "last of his kind" trope and getting other echidnas was nice but making it so sci-fi and a giant family feud made the title over complicated and many characters uninteresting. If that carries over to his new work without the core character of Knux then it all seems pointless.

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[DabigRG]

15 minutes ago, Atharun said:

If that carries over to his new work without the core character of Knux then it all seems pointless.
 

To be fair, I believe Mr. Penders has said that some of the stuff he did with Knuckles was based on stuff he'd been wanting to do for a while.

[Tenko]

Sometimes it makes me wonder if perhaps Penders wouldn't have turned out as bad as he has, and perhaps could have refined himself more, if he wasn't under the editors he had. You hear tell that one or two of them coasted and didn't seem to do their jobs to a satisfactory level for a licenced work. That almost anything was given the go ahead as long as it filled a book. Granted Sega should have been keeping a closer eye on Archie and any other licensors better that it did as the blame isn't solely on one person, but you do hear the same editors names pop up again and again when people are discussing it. 

[RedFox99]

1 minute ago, Tenko said:

Sometimes it makes me wonder if perhaps Penders wouldn't have turned out as bad as he has, and perhaps could have refined himself more, if he wasn't under the editors he had. You hear tell that one or two of them coasted and didn't seem to do their jobs to a satisfactory level for a licenced work. That almost anything was given the go ahead as long as it filled a book. Granted Sega should have been keeping a closer eye on Archie and any other licensors better that it did as the blame isn't solely on one person, but you do hear the same editors names pop up again and again when people are discussing it. 

Did Penders quit after a new editor told him to improve on his work?

[Tylinos]

10 minutes ago, RedFox99 said:

Did Penders quit after a new editor told him to improve on his work?

If I recall, what happened was that in #137, Mike Pellerito replaced Justin Gabrie, who had been editor on the book for over 8 years and just let Ken do his own thing.  Pellerito, however, started taking a more active role in the book, by actually doing what an editor is supposed to do: Edit things.  After a year and a half or so of that, Ken quit around the same time that Pellerito started insisting that Shadow be given a larger role in the book (since Shadow was extremely popular at the time), and wanted Ken to make him part of his then-upcoming M25YL conclusion.  It seems Ken really didn't want anyone messing with his beloved future.

[horridus]

15 minutes ago, Tenko said:

Sometimes it makes me wonder if perhaps Penders wouldn't have turned out as bad as he has, and perhaps could have refined himself more, if he wasn't under the editors he had. You hear tell that one or two of them coasted and didn't seem to do their jobs to a satisfactory level for a licenced work. That almost anything was given the go ahead as long as it filled a book. Granted Sega should have been keeping a closer eye on Archie and any other licensors better that it did as the blame isn't solely on one person, but you do hear the same editors names pop up again and again when people are discussing it. 

I recently made a very lengthy post about this precise subject. I really do believe that working at Archie as he did damaged him, as well as spoiled him. He was in a very unique circumstance for anyone in comics- brought on board thanks to a friend, able to operate with very little oversight for years, and then given the reigns to essentially write his own comic and play in his own sandbox. Penders grew incredibly complacent thanks to this, and as such he never had to really improve or hone himself- not when things would be published regardless of quality and when fans sang his praises anyway. 

It's telling because while Penders has worked on other stuff, he hasn't done a year's worth of work on anything else, nor has he ever headlined his own series in the way he had done with Knuckles. Archie was the only place that allowed him to thrive, but in doing so it completely destroyed his ability to improve himself or to actually work within a real hierarchy. If he wasn't such a raging jerk it'd be sad. 

[Tenko]

The only earlier editor I remember without actually consulting a list of them would be the ol' Fredator, he was pretty early on from memory. Did he start the downward spiral or was most of the hands off attitude due mainly to Gabrie?

[horridus]

7 minutes ago, Tenko said:

The only earlier editor I remember without actually consulting a list of them would be the ol' Fredator, he was pretty early on from memory. Did he start the downward spiral or was most of the hands off attitude due mainly to Gabrie?

Scot Fulop was another one, akay Kent Taylor, the guy who brought us Furry Vandal Sava- er, I mean, Mammoth Mogul. Evidently he was pretty buddy-buddy with Ken, and may or may not have allowed him to slide during his time there. Evidently they maintain the friendship despite the fact that, according to Penders, Fulop would have been instrumental in the exploitation of himself and score of other writers and artists. 

[Harkofthewaa]

You know, I was thinking about it, and I had a thought. If you take the logic Pender's used to get the rights to his characters in the first place and apply it to someone else, it makes no sense. Imagine if Stan Lee decided he wanted to make the Spider-Man and Hulk Chronicles, then going by Pender's logic of "I made those characters, therefore I own them" he should just be able to waltz into Marvel's HQ and make them hand the rights over, right? Yeah, no, that wouldn't fly. So either: A.) The judge presiding over the case was rock stupid. B.) Archie's Lawyers are rock stupid. C.) Archie drew up a bad contract (although that falls into B.) D.) All the above.

[Your Vest Friend]

12 hours ago, DabigRG said:

Mind explaining that a little more?

I'll try to.

-As much as Penders didn't really stick with the ideas presented already (like he didn't really do anything with the concept of him being the last of his kind, nor the lore presented to use in HPZ), he still built up the Dark Legion back when there was relatively little story built up overall for the games. We can criticise it in hindsight (and it is worth criticising), but there wasn't a whole lot there to contradict either, and a lot of the convolutions that came later were because games kept popping up with new information (underground Station Square, anyone?).

-This was not the case in 2008. We already had a good idea of what the ancestry of Knuckles was like, we had Gerald explain the entire backstory of Emerl (he was created by the Fourth Great civilisation, but he ended up wiping them out). In it's infinite wisdom and attempt to shove the concept, it decides that the Fourth Great civilisation has to be linked with the Knuckles tribe (despite the fact that makes no sense when the Knuckles Tribe has no reason to be linked to a super-techno faction here and Gerald never specifies anything about the nature or age of the Fourth Great civilisation), that there are multiple existing Gizoids which were just the army grunts of said Echidna super-techno faction (again, wouldn't really make too much sense given the nature of Emerl described in Battle), and then outright contradicts what Battle said by deciding that Emerl didn't wipe out the civilisation (which diminishes the threat he was supposed to put which drives the stakes of Battle at the end), but summoned a random god to put the Nocturnus Clan in another dimension because they held so much power despite never doing that for anyone else (that was just dumb). Doesn't help that Eggman already had the technology abuse market cornered for, say, 15 years up to that point. 

Basically, the Nocturnus Clan were ham-fisted in there without much regard as to how it made sense. Which is bad considering an RPG is more about the story than most other game genres. 

[Atharun]

7 minutes ago, Harkofthewaa said:

You know, I was thinking about it, and I had a thought. If you take the logic Pender's used to get the rights to his characters in the first place and apply it to someone else, it makes no sense. Imagine if Stan Lee decided he wanted to make the Spider-Man and Hulk Chronicles, then going by Pender's logic of "I made those characters, therefore I own them" he should just be able to waltz into Marvel's HQ and make them hand the rights over, right? Yeah, no, that wouldn't fly. So either: A.) The judge presiding over the case was rock stupid. B.) Archie's Lawyers are rock stupid. C.) Archie drew up a bad contract (although that falls into B.) D.) All the above.

Actually, Stan Lee has had legal disputes with Marvel over the years to varying degrees of success. Same with others such as the families of the gentlemen that created Superman and Batman

[Zaysho]

1 hour ago, RedFox99 said:

Did Penders quit after a new editor told him to improve on his work?

Adding on a bit to Tylinos's post. Penders himself stated that he didn't like Pellerito inserting himself into the creative process, (I remember this line vividly from his forum, but I don't know if it's archived--when I used to rant in this thread all the time, I spent a lot of time trying to piece together his history at Archie from his own statements so I'm sure something like this is buried in this thread) nor did he like being told to use the game cast. It's odd because this doesn't exactly undermine his own work, and it was a licensed product anyway, but he simply didn't want to do it.

As I recall, Future Mobius was basically set up to be his personal playground while Bollers handled the main part of the book, but when Bollers made some extreme changes that could affect whatever Penders did, and eventually left the book, it forced him to have to deal with the present timeline and try to rebuild and reconnect it to his own stories. Editorial oversight wanting him to move into incorporating elements he didn't care about made him call it quits.

[RedFox99]

16 minutes ago, Zaysho said:

nor did he like being told to use the game cast. It's odd because this doesn't exactly undermine his own work, and it was a licensed product anyway, but he simply didn't want to do it.

Even though that was supposed to be his job?

It is kind of sad because it makes you wonder if maybe how the editors be more strict, Ken would be better off today. 

[horridus]

28 minutes ago, Harkofthewaa said:

You know, I was thinking about it, and I had a thought. If you take the logic Pender's used to get the rights to his characters in the first place and apply it to someone else, it makes no sense. Imagine if Stan Lee decided he wanted to make the Spider-Man and Hulk Chronicles, then going by Pender's logic of "I made those characters, therefore I own them" he should just be able to waltz into Marvel's HQ and make them hand the rights over, right? Yeah, no, that wouldn't fly. So either: A.) The judge presiding over the case was rock stupid. B.) Archie's Lawyers are rock stupid. C.) Archie drew up a bad contract (although that falls into B.) D.) All the above.

Marvel has repeatedly been in conflict with a variety of creators over the years regarding rights and payments, namely that various creators made their stable of characters but didn't see much of anything for their efforts while the company itself raked in massive profits using their works- same deal over at DC. Creators rights is a very serious issue, particularly given the mistreatment that many of their major moneymakers have suffered as a result. It was these things that led to the creation of Image Studios, and is also a major contributor to the things plaguing a lot of mainstream comics now- namely many would be creators are unwilling to give their best ideas over, and so, rely on older material almost constantly. 

Penders' case however is unique in that the circumstances that allowed it to occur are almost unheard of. Penders characters and concepts were never a unique creation done at the behest of Archie, but rather were made for a licensed work owned by SEGA while the book itself was published by Archie. In particular, in the past Penders had made it clear that he understood this, but has since claimed that he was 'mislead'... despite not being a newcomer to such books by that point and despite his past statements. Penders was only able to make any legal claim due to Archie's truly astounding stupidity in not keep track of their paperwork and the screwups of their lawyers in the subsequent trial. 

6 minutes ago, Zaysho said:

As I recall, Future Mobius was basically set up to be his personal playground while Bollers handled the main part of the book, but when Bollers made some extreme changes that could affect whatever Penders did, and eventually left the book, it forced him to have to deal with the present timeline and try to rebuild and reconnect it to his own stories. Editorial oversight wanting him to move into incorporating elements he didn't care about made him call it quits.

Adding to this- PENDERS believed Future Mobius was his own personal baby and the One True Future, while Bollers was under the impression that there were multiple futures 25YL was just one of many. In fact, his declaring this fact is what started the infamous feud between the two, with Penders even going so far as accusing Bollers of trying to undermine him... from what I've heard, Gabrie told Penders one thing and Bollers another. 

[RedFox99]

5 minutes ago, horridus said:

In particular, in the past Penders had made it clear that he understood this, but has since claimed that he was 'mislead'... despite not being a newcomer to such books by that point and despite his past statements. Penders was only able to make any legal claim due to Archie's truly astounding stupidity in not keep track of their paperwork and the screwups of their lawyers in the subsequent trial. 

So in summary, he probably knew that he had to right to own the characters and exploited a mistake on Archie to get what he wanted. Ok, I'm seriously wondering if one of us should try facing him in person and questioning him on all this mess.

[horridus]

3 minutes ago, RedFox99 said:

So in summary, he probably knew that he had to right to own the characters and exploited a mistake on Archie to get what he wanted. Ok, I'm seriously wondering if one of us should try facing him in person and questioning him on all this mess.

Dude, don't bother. The contracts are either lost or gone and he's not going to say anything that could potentially incriminate him at this point. Nobody can technically prove or DISPROVE anything. Just leave it be. 

[RedFox99]

Just now, horridus said:

Dude, don't bother. The contracts are either lost or gone and he's not going to say anything that could potentially incriminate him at this point. Nobody can technically prove anything. Just leave it be. 

Okay. I mean we can still call him out on his egoism.

[DabigRG]

1 hour ago, VEDJ-F said:

I'll try to.

-As much as Penders didn't really stick with the ideas presented already (like he didn't really do anything with the concept of him being the last of his kind, nor the lore presented to use in HPZ), he still built up the Dark Legion back when there was relatively little story built up overall for the games. We can criticise it in hindsight (and it is worth criticising), but there wasn't a whole lot there to contradict either, and a lot of the convolutions that came later were because games kept popping up with new information (underground Station Square, anyone?).

-This was not the case in 2008. We already had a good idea of what the ancestry was Knuckles was like, we had Gerald explain the entire backstory of Emerl (he was created by the Fourth Great civilisation, but he ended up wiping them out). In it's infinite wisdom and attempt to shove the concept, it decides that the Fourth Great civilisation has to be linked with the Knuckles tribe (despite the fact that makes no sense when the Knuckles Tribe has no reason to be linked to a super-techno faction here and Gerald never specifies anything about the nature or age of the Fourth Great civilisation), that there are multiple existing Gizoids which were just the army grunts of said Echidna super-techno faction (again, wouldn't really make too much sense given the nature of Emerl described in Battle), and then outright contradicts what Battle said by deciding that Emerl didn't wipe out the civilisation (which diminishes the threat he was supposed to put which drives the stakes of Battle at the end), but summoned a random god to put the Nocturnus Clan in another dimension because they held so much power despite never doing that for anyone else (that was just dumb). Doesn't help that Eggman already had the technology abuse market cornered for, say, 15 years up to that point. 

Basically, the Nocturnus Clan were ham-fisted in there without much regard as to how it made sense. Which is bad considering an RPG is more about the story than most other game genres. 

Ooh, yeah, that does sound pretty screwy. I never played Battle personally and didn't really pay that much attention during a Charity playthrough, nor did I make it far into a Chronicles playthrough, so I didn't really think about it too much.

Thanks for elaborating!

Also, underground Station Square?

[horridus]

1 minute ago, DabigRG said:

Also, underground Station Square?

One of the pecularities that emerged from ARchie due to them having to suddenly do a tie-in adaptation for Sonic Adventure- Station Square was initially billed as 'The Hidden City of the Ancients', with humans a distinct species from the humanlike Overlanders. Part of what made it hidden was the fact that it was located underground, with an artifically generated sky. It was a.... very confusing time in the comic. 

[DabigRG]

18 minutes ago, horridus said:

One of the pecularities that emerged from ARchie due to them having to suddenly do a tie-in adaptation for Sonic Adventure- Station Square was initially billed as 'The Hidden City of the Ancients', with humans a distinct species from the humanlike Overlanders. Part of what made it hidden was the fact that it was located underground, with an artifically generated sky. It was a.... very confusing time in the comic. 

Oh yeah. I thought she was referring to an underground locale under Station Square.

[King Scoopa Koopa]

1 hour ago, horridus said:

Penders was only able to make any legal claim due to Archie's truly astounding stupidity in not keep track of their paperwork and the screwups of their lawyers in the subsequent trial. 

Can't help but wonder if it wasn't one of those "do what you want" editors who caused the whole contract mess.

[antyep]

1 hour ago, KingScoopaKoopa said:

Can't help but wonder if it wasn't one of those "do what you want" editors who caused the whole contract mess.

Oh no doubt. I doubt it was that fire they claimed.

[RedFox99]

1 hour ago, KingScoopaKoopa said:

Can't help but wonder if it wasn't one of those "do what you want" editors who caused the whole contract mess.

How so?