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

[TideKai]

Thank you for your reply, @horridus. They're always very detailed and well-written and I enjoy reading them. Much appreciated!

Going off on the "stuck in the glory days" part, I definitely feel Penders put Sonic on this weird pedestal. As much as I still love Sonic, I wonder if Penders realizes that the series doesn't have the status it used to have back in the 90's. The sad truth is that Sonic isn't as popular anymore, and as a consequence he doesn't rake in as much profit. That kind of makes it all the more tragic when Penders clings so relentlessly to him. The comics (and arguably Sonic as a whole) is pretty much an end of an era. He's no longer the powerhouse he used to be, and the fact that Penders is clutching onto something that has long since passed on and moved on really tells of his current "achievements" and things like that. It's like that one guy you know who constantly reminsices and worships his high school days despite being out of high school for along time, because that's where he peaked.

I don't know how much of the love drama was Bollers or how much of it was Penders, but good God am I glad that it's all over with and done. Those were some of the worst issues with the comics. I don't mind a tiny bit of romance drama (even if I prefer that there'd be none at all), but man did it go way overboard. I remember being a kid and reading the infamous issue where Sally slaps Sonic after he comes back from space. 

And I admit, I do like some of the concepts that Penders introduced...he was just awful at executing them. That's something that's always too bad when it happens. You can have an amazing concept, but if you suck at actually making it work than well, tough luck I guess. When I was younger, I loved the idea of Knuckles belonging to this long lineage that's basically royalty, and seeing all the potential things his ancestors have done that led up to Knuckles's current situation. Seeing how Flynn writes them out, you can see these concepts do have potential and can be interesting. It took an entirely different writer though, haha.

Reading more information about the Penders and Bollers feud...yikes. Really, yikes. I may not have liked Bollers writing too much more than Penders, but I still prefer him over the Knuckles stories that Penders was cranking out. It especially helps that Bollers seems to have moved on from his Sonic days and went on to do other things while Penders is still clinging on to those glory days. I'm going to be honest though and say that I can't help but feel this is partially the editor's fault as well. At the very least, he should be able to sort of strike some sort of balance. Or at the very, absolute least, he should make sure things are consistent. That should be the bare minimum. Instead of letting things wildly contradict each other, though I know that's also because Penders was adamant that the 25YL stories were the absolute real future of the characters. Slight tangent, but that's why I think the 25YL segment shouldn't have gone as long as it did. I can't help but feel that it's too tiring to constantly double check to make sure things line. Eventually, something's going to get messed up, especially on a ship that's as sloppily run as the Archie comics.

The Knuckles movie is one of my favorite things about this whole mess. Like, part of me secretly wishes that Penders won the lottery just so we could see this trainwreck come to life. There's so many things wrong with this. The fact that he thinks he can have complete creative control over a mascot that he doesn't own a single part of. The fact that he thinks a Knuckles movie would generate enough of a profit for SEGA to be on board. This is one of those projects that I really wish got concept art and other things like his other Sonic movie pitch. I would just love to see his vision for a Knuckles movie.

[horridus]

13 minutes ago, TideKai said:

Going off on the "stuck in the glory days" part, I definitely feel Penders put Sonic on this weird pedestal. As much as I still love Sonic, I wonder if Penders realizes that the series doesn't have the status it used to have back in the 90's. The sad truth is that Sonic isn't as popular anymore, and as a consequence he doesn't rake in as much profit. That kind of makes it all the more tragic when Penders clings so relentlessly to him. The comics (and arguably Sonic as a whole) is pretty much an end of an era. He's no longer the powerhouse he used to be, and the fact that Penders is clutching onto something that has long since passed on and moved on really tells of his current "achievements" and things like that. It's like that one guy you know who constantly reminsices and worships his high school days despite being out of high school for along time, because that's where he peaked.

The worst part of all? It's not really Sonic he puts on a pedestal. It's Sonic-As-Envisioned-By-Penders. The comparison to the guy who obsesses over his glory years in high school is pretty apt, because it's pretty clear that Penders has based a deeply unhealthy amount of his identity and his own personal worth on his days in Sonic and ESPECIALLY Knuckles. Sonic represents a time when he was successful, had a fandom, was allowed a great deal of creative freedom... the only time in his entire career where he was actually somebody with a bit of fame and clout. NOTHING else ever panned out for him- his career in Star Trek before he came onto Sonic ended in under a year, and before Sonic he kinda languished. Nor was he ever able to branch out into anything else, which is especially astounding (And telling) given how long he spent on Sonic and the kind of connections he SHOULD have been able to build because of that.

The Archie Sonic Comic also brought him as close as he could ever get to making an actual movie, something he deeply, deeply craves... and that lost opportunity is something he STILL can't get over.

Especially because... he threw it all the way. That's the biggest tragedy/irony in this entire sordid tale. He wasn't fired from his job- he LEFT. Because it got too hard for him, and then sat back and watched as someone else came on board to much, much more critical acclaim and praise then he ever got. 

20 minutes ago, TideKai said:

 I don't know how much of the love drama was Bollers or how much of it was Penders, but good God am I glad that it's all over with and done. Those were some of the worst issues with the comics. I don't mind a tiny bit of romance drama (even if I prefer that there'd be none at all), but man did it go way overboard. I remember being a kid and reading the infamous issue where Sally slaps Sonic after he comes back from space. 

The two kinda ping-ponged responsibilities for that one. Ken basically got things started with the introduction of Geoffrey as a serious contender for Sally's affections, under some... INCREDIBLY dubious, creepy logic. Around the time Knuckles was introduced he also revealed that he and Sally had been childhood friends that, naturally, Sally never mentioned before Because Of Reasons, and hinted at the idea that Knuckles had a crush on her. That one never really went anywhere, thank mercy, but still. Anyway, eventually Penders got to move on to do the Knuckles series, and so those particular plot points as he focused his efforts on Knuckles. 

Enter Bollers. Bollers would re-ignite the relationship drama with his addition of Mina Mongoose, which would last for a multitude of issues until finally coming to a close with the story arc of Heart Held Hostages, wherein Mina would eventually move on from being a love interest of Sonic's. Though in the meantime, the shipping wars got really NASTY in the fandom during this time, and the relationship drama wasn't to end. While the aftermath of One Year Later would try to close the Mina thing once and for all by giving her a boyfriend, the relationship drama didn't end there, as we were then treated to The Slap. Interestingly enough, The Slap wasn't done for the sake of pairing Sonic up with anyone, but it was still a poorly conceived, poorly executed mess of an idea that added to the tangle of relationship plots in the comic.

And then, Bollers would leave, and Ken Penders would take over once again and oh my... THIS is where we hit rock bottom. We are treated to things like Evil Sonic retroactively impersonating Sonic and engaging in relationships with several girls (including Bunnie), and then Sonic would come back and get with Fiona (in a relationship initially started by Evil Sonic) and ruin his friendship with TAils and then SAlly would almost get married off to Evil Antoine and oh dear GOD this period of the comics was just the worst...! 

...so, yeah, they both hold responsibility for it. As does Justin Gabrie for allowing it to get to the point that it did. 

56 minutes ago, TideKai said:

 And I admit, I do like some of the concepts that Penders introduced...he was just awful at executing them. That's something that's always too bad when it happens. You can have an amazing concept, but if you suck at actually making it work than well, tough luck I guess. When I was younger, I loved the idea of Knuckles belonging to this long lineage that's basically royalty, and seeing all the potential things his ancestors have done that led up to Knuckles's current situation. Seeing how Flynn writes them out, you can see these concepts do have potential and can be interesting. It took an entirely different writer though, haha.

Tell me about it. The Knuckles series was something I loved dearly as a kid, even as I got older and realized it wasn't as good as I remembered... and then I saw Penders talking about how Locke wasn't meant to be viewed as in the wrong for his actions, and it kinda all unfurled to me that the execution of his ideas were garbage, and much of what I had liked was either stuff I had come up with or had seen done well in fanfic. Even to this day, I'm still kind of attached to it all, despite all the crap that happened. 

1 hour ago, TideKai said:

 Reading more information about the Penders and Bollers feud...yikes. Really, yikes. I may not have liked Bollers writing too much more than Penders, but I still prefer him over the Knuckles stories that Penders was cranking out. It especially helps that Bollers seems to have moved on from his Sonic days and went on to do other things while Penders is still clinging on to those glory days. I'm going to be honest though and say that I can't help but feel this is partially the editor's fault as well. At the very least, he should be able to sort of strike some sort of balance. Or at the very, absolute least, he should make sure things are consistent. That should be the bare minimum. Instead of letting things wildly contradict each other, though I know that's also because Penders was adamant that the 25YL stories were the absolute real future of the characters. Slight tangent, but that's why I think the 25YL segment shouldn't have gone as long as it did. I can't help but feel that it's too tiring to constantly double check to make sure things line. Eventually, something's going to get messed up, especially on a ship that's as sloppily run as the Archie comics.

Aye. For whatever it's worth, Bollers managed to get an Eisner nominated series in the aftermath of all of this and is a well regarded professional for his efforts. Penders by contrast is still hyping up a product that does not and likely will never exist while getting into slap fights on the internet over a cartoon hedgehog. It really, really says nothing good about Penders that out of all the people who used to work on Sonic, he's the only one who has never moved on from it. 

And you would indeed be absolutely correct about the Editor being a big part of why things got as bad as they did. You know I mentioned that Penders had a few editors who never gave him proper oversight? The most infamous of these was Justin Gabrie, who was the editor on the book for a VERY long time, and was pretty much the guy responsible for things getting as bad as they did in the Pre-Flynn era. See, Gabrie was a very 'hands off' editor and, more or less, pretty much left the writers to their own devices, and I get the feeling that he just didn't want to deal with things. A LOT of the dysfunction of the old days ties back to him, and the 25YL incident is a pretty good illustration of that- he likely told both writers what they wanted to hear and allowed things to proceed. Tellingly, once Gabrie left, Penders eventually left as well... due to having to put up with an Editor who actually tried to instill a bit of discipline. 

And oooh yes, 25YL DID go on for far, far too long. Before the storyline was forcibily ended it had already lasted over a year, and in all that time the plot had only BARELY moved forward. It's especially ludicrous given that initially, 25YL was planned as a single Super Special called "Knuckles: 20 Years Later". How a 48 page special was bloated out into the monstrosity that it became is beyond me, but there was no excuse for it to get as bad as it did, nor for Penders to believe that it would be the One True Future of the comic. 

1 hour ago, TideKai said:

 The Knuckles movie is one of my favorite things about this whole mess. Like, part of me secretly wishes that Penders won the lottery just so we could see this trainwreck come to life. There's so many things wrong with this. The fact that he thinks he can have complete creative control over a mascot that he doesn't own a single part of. The fact that he thinks a Knuckles movie would generate enough of a profit for SEGA to be on board. This is one of those projects that I really wish got concept art and other things like his other Sonic movie pitch. I would just love to see his vision for a Knuckles movie.

You know, the ironic thing is? Even if Penders HAD gotten a real greenlight, I don't think he'd have gone home happy. In all likelihood the project would have been handed over to a director with actual experience, the script would be re-written several times, and Penders would likely have little to no real input or influence. By the time it was over it would no longer really be his movie, and Penders would STILL be bitching and ranting and obsessing over how 'those hollywood FOOLS' ruined his 'dream' and insist on how much better his TRUE vision would have been. 

[King Scoopa Koopa]

No, you see, if they'd just listened to him and followed his direction, Sonic would be bigger now than he's ever been!

The whole reason Sonic isn't the biggest thing is because they didn't heed his advice.

[Silvereyes]

2 hours ago, horridus said:

We are treated to things like Evil Sonic retroactively impersonating Sonic and engaging in relationships with several girls (including Bunnie)

I love the fact as well that storyline happens during the landmark 150th issue, and the B story of the issue has Tails fighting Mammoth Mogul, who has managed to destroy every universe in the multiverse and has to stop him from eradicating existence. I love the fact the storyline about all of reality about to be destroyed is second banana to the storyline of Evil Sonic trying to get laid, and the pretty funny implication that he may of slept with Bunnie.

[SBR2]

22 minutes ago, silvereye27 said:

I love the fact as well that storyline happens during the landmark 150th issue, and the B story of the issue has Tails fighting Mammoth Mogul, who has managed to destroy every universe in the multiverse and has to stop him from eradicating existence. I love the fact the storyline about all of reality about to be destroyed is second banana to the storyline of Evil Sonic trying to get laid, and the pretty funny implication that he may of slept with Bunnie.

I'm not even sure him and Bunnie having sex was even an implication. I think he straight up intended for them to actually have fallen asleep for a couple hours after banging under a tree.

Robotnik-Mun I think it was pointed it out on his Tumblr sometime ago that the speech bubbles look hastily rewritten so it seems as if the dialogue might have originallymade it clear that Bunnie and Evil Sonic did it.

Or John Workman's letters were just weird there I don't know. 

[Moody]

I don't really care about Penders and his work anymore, I am however confused by his negative attitude when it comes to IDW by questioning if they pay their staff royalties or not.

 

What does he hope to gain from it?

 

https://mobile.twitter.com/KenPenders/status/1084918955674820608

[Kellodrawsalot]

He cant let Sonic go...I kinda hope for his own sake that he stops holding onto Sonic and focus on his own project

[horridus]

13 hours ago, SBR2 said:

I'm not even sure him and Bunnie having sex was even an implication. I think he straight up intended for them to actually have fallen asleep for a couple hours after banging under a tree.

Robotnik-Mun I think it was pointed it out on his Tumblr sometime ago that the speech bubbles look hastily rewritten so it seems as if the dialogue might have originallymade it clear that Bunnie and Evil Sonic did it.

Or John Workman's letters were just weird there I don't know. 

In fairness, given the truly shoddy quality standards of the book, it IS a possibility. 

And hey, let's not forget the part where you pointed some of this stuff out to Penders, and his subsequent answer made us all feel unclean!

 

 Yep. According to Penders, being deceived twice over is HER transgression. 

If any of you wonder why I harp on Penders about the feminism thing, well, this is it riiiiiight here. 

4 hours ago, Moody said:

I don't really care about Penders and his work anymore, I am however confused by his negative attitude when it comes to IDW by questioning if they pay their staff royalties or not.

What does he hope to gain from it?

He gets to play Crusader for Creator's Rights while basically trying to spoil the good mood anyone might have about IDW handling the Sonic IP at the moment. It's not a coincidence that he started up on this when he first heard IDW was picking up the book. He doesn't care about IDW's practices, just that they are handling Sonic and he isn't. 

[Tenko]

Long time no see Stadium gang, I've been saving my sanity by staying away from old Penders for a while now. I decided to pop onto his Twitter the other day tho and saw this gem.. 

So.. from what I heard he was talking up getting it launched in Nov/Dec stay tuned for news. But here hes basically admitted that he hasn't even finished drawing the panels for the 1st volume.. 

Nice to see things haven't changed one bit in my absence. 

[horridus]

Yeeah, this is kind of a thing with Penders. 

 

One thing I've noticed about Penders over the years is that he is far, far more into TALKING about the process and his (shoddy) 'craft' than he is about actually getting any of it done, let alone in a timely or efficient manner. He basically wants praise and accolades for DOING something without actually having to put any of the effort into finishing it, to be listened to and regarded as some kind of Great Creator espousing his insights to the masses. 

It's really just an incredibly elaborate form of procrastination, and one more sign that this is never going to be finished, let alone within this decade or the coming one. 

[SBR2]

Y'know I'm not a Comic writer or anything but like shouldn't you have your plot planned out before you start drawing it?

[horridus]

20 minutes ago, SBR2 said:

Y'know I'm not a Comic writer or anything but like shouldn't you have your plot planned out before you start drawing it?

Honestly it kinda depends. Some writers are in fact really good at figuring out stuff as they go along, while others work better by planning ahead. Thing of it is, Penders isn't particularly good at either... he's too driven by changes in fancy and having to fixate on his latest interest. 

[Rabid-Coot]

I see we have an old favourite back for 2019.

 

[Razule]

It's just an app, how amazing could it be..

[horridus]

23 minutes ago, Razule said:

It's just an app, how amazing could it be..

Significantly less amazing than what he's hyping. 

Like, even if we were to give him the benefit of the doubt that whatever he's got is legitimately well made and high quality? It wouldn't 'mesmerize' or 'amaze' people. He's attaching a level of hyperbole to this that no product on Earth could begin to fulfill, and all he's doing is inviting people to point out how it ISN'T stupendous, amazing and all the other crap he calls it. 

And let's face it, whatever he's got isn't going to be of any real quality. Quality is anathema to Penders. 

[Tenko]

Clearly all these people have never seen or heard of a motion comic before, or a motion comic housed in an app. Because the things he describes basically sound like just that. A motion comic, but housed in an app, with extra crud like the character bios etc.

I mean besides the voice acting and motion part most comic apps are exactally what he described his amazing project as. I mean the free apps you can use on your smart phone to load up downloaded comics have all the same features. Menus, bookshelves, covers you click on to open and flip through the comics page by page, filters for colour or black and white, retaining where you left off in each comic etc etc. It ain't a new concept, and adding the voice acting and motion to it isn't going to make it an amazing new thing that the industry hasn't seen or tried before.

Plus his mock images looked like a 90's webpage, far cruder than any of the free offerings on the app store. I just don't get what he thinks is so groundbreaking. Or what these people he shows apparently see in it. Is he putting words in their mouth or what? 

[horridus]

8 minutes ago, Tenko said:

Plus his mock images looked like a 90's webpage, far cruder than any of the free offerings on the app store. I just don't get what he thinks is so groundbreaking. Or what these people he shows apparently see in it. Is he putting words in their mouth or what? 

Oh, I don't doubt that Penders is making this up wholesale or, at the very best, GENEROUSLY interpreting basic politeness as being far, far, FAR more significant and grand than it is. You know how Penders occasionally mentions his 'friends who run comic stores' who have a weird tendency to say things that are EXTREMELY complementary or otherwise fits the narrative Penders wants to push super perfectly? Same deal here. 

[Kellodrawsalot]

Penders also often says people at conventions love what hé has to show but other eye withness and con-gogers say his Booth would often be empty.

[SenEDDtor Missile]

7 minutes ago, Kellodrawsalot said:

Penders also often says people at conventions love what hé has to show but other eye withness and con-gogers say his Booth would often be empty.

Maybe he has a illusion Penders, like how Amy made a delusion Sonic in Sonic Battle :D.

[SenEDDtor Missile]

Returning to the internet after it disappeared, here is Ken Penders' "The Lost Ones" Trailer to see just how bad it is IN HD!

The Thumbnail and Endscreen are my partial creation. I do give credit to the website http://www.patrickluque.com for making it easier to get them though, as I probably would have spent way too much time trying to make new ones from scratch.

[horridus]

I still remember the time that Penders claimed that this was actually on-par with a hollywood made film. His precise logic seemed to be that using greenscreen effects at all, even as incompetently and poorly done as this, was enough to make it qualify as being Hollywood-tier. 

[Kellodrawsalot]

3 hours ago, SenEDDtor Missile said:

Returning to the internet after it disappeared, here is Ken Penders' "The Lost Ones" Trailer to see just how bad it is IN HD!

The Thumbnail and Endscreen are my partial creation. I do give credit to the website http://www.patrickluque.com for making it easier to get them though, as I probably would have spent way too much time trying to make new ones from scratch.

Its always a bad idea just to film a trailer instead of making the movie first and then making a trailer, (and dont tell me otherwise this deff looks like Penders first filmed a bunch of random scenes that dont connect to make a trailer)

and when you have to use greenscreen to have your character walk arround in a airport...

[Moody]

18 minutes ago, Kellodrawsalot said:

Its always a bad idea just to film a trailer instead of making the movie first and then making a trailer, (and dont tell me otherwise this deff looks like Penders first filmed a bunch of random scenes that dont connect to make a trailer)

and when you have to use greenscreen to have your character walk arround in a airport...

Ah, but you do make a trailer first if your goal is to sell your idea to a bigger studio or optain the needed monetary funds from a sponsor.

Granted, knowing how Penders acts and thinks, he most likely torpedoed the whole thing by demanding total creative control over everything, on top of getting the biggest slice of the money pie as well.

If you pay attention to Penders, you will notice that he often brings up money when @ SEGA, IDW or when saying the future of Sonic lies in reprinting his old Sonic comics.

He does not care about the product, only how much he can make off it.

 

[Ryannumber1gamer]

1 minute ago, Moody said:

Granted, knowing how Penders acts and thinks, he most likely torpedoed the whole thing by demanding total creative control over everything, on top of getting the biggest slice of the money pie as well.

If you pay attention to Penders, you will notice that he often brings up money when @ SEGA, IDW or when saying the future of Sonic lies in reprinting his old Sonic comics.

Tbh, If I had to guess why this was torpedoed, and this is in regards to the Lost Ones movie...

I mean, just look at this. It looks like the most low-budget, amateur sci-fi crap. What do you think this unproven creator's pitch was? "Oh hi, I'm Ken Penders, famous writer of a Sonic comic that was only really widely sold in the US, and I want to make a movie based on my one-issue comic that totally isn't taking anything from X-Men, and wasn't cancelled straight away".

Obviously, that's exaggerated, but to be absolutely frank, I'd imagine any movie studio would downright laugh this pitch off and that's it. There's no way that a movie studio would be insane enough to give this man a budget to make a movie based off an awful one-issue failed comic from decades ago that's basically a X-Men rip-off. Granted, even if any kind of movie studio were to give him a shot, I'd imagine you'd be correct that he'd still kill the project by demanding total creative control and a lot of money too. But if this pitch was anything like the lackluster Sonic Movie pitch he gave SEGA years ago, it's no wonder this was never made.

[Kellodrawsalot]

5 hours ago, Moody said:

Ah, but you do make a trailer first if your goal is to sell your idea to a bigger studio or optain the needed monetary funds from a sponsor.

Granted, knowing how Penders acts and thinks, he most likely torpedoed the whole thing by demanding total creative control over everything, on top of getting the biggest slice of the money pie as well.

If you pay attention to Penders, you will notice that he often brings up money when @ SEGA, IDW or when saying the future of Sonic lies in reprinting his old Sonic comics.

He does not care about the product, only how much he can make off it.

 

that's not done with trailers anymore that's done with concept art, mentioning the names of big-named actors on board, script. director's experience ect