Megathread IDW's Sonic the Hedgehog - Megathread

[SBR2]

47 minutes ago, Celestia said:

Or they took a portal off-screen!

Yeah honestly I don't think it's ever going to be addressed. Well just be in locations from various games without any real explanation. 

I don't really think it matters all that much. Sonic just runs from place to place anyway. I mean don't get me wrong I'd love a more concrete explanation I just don't think it's a major thing.

[DabigRG]

Just now, SBR2 said:

Yeah honestly I don't think it's ever going to be addressed. Well just be in locations from various games without any real explanation. 

 

That's pretty much how Mr. Flynn plans to get it airborne, for the time being.

[Razule]

1 hour ago, Earnest-Panda said:

>points out the Final Egg location several posts ago

>one person acknowledges it with a like but nobody else talks about it

>someone else points out Final Egg location

>everyone starts talking about it

But anyway, either this means Mystic Ruins is on the animal world somehow, or “two worlds” does, in fact, not mean “two different planets”.

Didn't he kinda already address that?

Quote

A: Ya, because Modern Sonic is set with two worlds, that’s where the comic is going to be. When the reboot happened in the old comic, had I known about the two-worlds things, that’s where we would have been to begin with because that’s the standard the game set, that is what they have. The whole reason why we got away with it being just one planet is because we never really specified where we were when we were getting those scripts approved. It’s like, ya, now we are over here with GUN. Where are we again? Where over at this place, we don’t really need to worry what planet it’s on.

He's referring to Archie, but main thing is that they go places and it doesn't really matter how they get there or what planet they're on. And he said "planet", so.. two planets. Unless something has changed.

Dr. Starlight is a science guy, isn't he? Maybe he has a portal. Maybe everyone has a portal, and it's just normal. It's a thing, it's just not going to be talked about. Just like the games!

[Shadowlax]

Wasn't the base in SA1 right beside the forrest?

That could easily just exist in animal world, and not need any explanation

[Big Panda]

5 minutes ago, Shadowlax said:

Wasn't the base in SA1 right beside the forrest?

That could easily just exist in animal world, and not need any explanation

Except it clearly has a train service connecting it to the human-inhabited Station Square.

[Shadowlax]

13 minutes ago, Earnest-Panda said:

Except it clearly has a train service connecting it to the human-inhabited Station Square.

Its not connected to station square anymore, its connected to " Animal City "

Also its an eggman based, he literally could have just moved it

[Diogenes]

Well if you're just going to declare that it's wherever you want it to be, then sure, it's there.

[DabigRG]

12 minutes ago, Shadowlax said:

Its not connected to station square anymore, its connected to " Animal City "

They never really establish where it is in the comic. Like everything else.

Also, the Final Egg was located to the Mystic Ruins, which in turn had a train service connected to Station. The portion that was actually where Angel Island  landed is limited to the mountain, from what I understand.

12 minutes ago, Shadowlax said:

Also its an eggman based, he literally could have just moved it

True. In fact, you kinda have to wonder when he set up shop there .

[SBR2]

6 hours ago, DabigRG said:

That's pretty much how Mr. Flynn plans to get it airborne, for the time being.

It's probably for the best. When you try to explain these things you risk it either being overly convoluted or it later being contradicted. Such is the way of doing licensed comics. 

[DabigRG]

16 hours ago, Kazhnuz said:

Same for Sticks. Her basic story is simple enough to be integrated. They could even play more on the "wild" side of Sticks, making that they didn't have many contact with civilisation before Eggman's invasion, and use that as a cause of her paranoia. If the first thing you see of the civilisation is a megalomaniac conqueror, it might be some normal reaction.

That was sorta implied to have been the case in Boom.

[Razule]

11 hours ago, Earnest-Panda said:

Except it clearly has a train service connecting it to the human-inhabited Station Square.

Ah, but maybe the train service has a portal that connects it to the Animal World.

[Dr. Detective]

I'm actually just working with the same old idea that everything is set on one world still. I know that's not actually the case according to Iizuka's ever changing headcanon but I feel as though the relevance this two worlds thing is going to have on the games and comics is tantamount to the same effect it's had up until this point.

Which is virtually nothing. 

The Classic Sonic being from another dimension was acknowledged but this human world and animal world bullshit hasn't. In fact, Shadow and Rouge carry on in Forces as though they're still agents on a mission working for GUN despite the organization not being named at all. I suppose it could be a new organization. Like the Animal Guardian Unit of Nations or "A-GUN".

Call me crazy but I feel like the games and comics are gonna carry on as though it's not even a thing that exists. Or better yet, do something that actively contradicts it like having City Escape with the GUN truck reappear in a game where Green Hill and Chemical Plant exist. 

Figuring out how this makes sense is mental gymnastics that I don't need to do at this point so until it's actually acknowledged within the games I'm not going to. 

I feel like this is going to be a rather successful experiment. You all should try it out with me. See just how much this knowledge actually affects what's going to happen going forward. After all, it's not like I had no reason to suspect other animal characters weren't around in games like Unleashed and the Adventures because, hey, Sonic's friends were there. I also had no reason to suspect other human characters weren't around in Forces because, hey, Eggman was there.

The only way I see this being relevant is if the games outright acknowledge it and seal the deal. Showcase them moving to and from the two worlds or even just bring it up in conversation.

But in a world where we can only find out why Knuckles is leading the resistance and why Silver is in the past again through supplementary material they post on their twitter, I'm not holding my breath. 

[Cuz]

I'm fond of the theory that the whole thing is a result of mistranslation. Like two worlds was meant figuratively as in different cultures or regions.

[antyep]

1 minute ago, Cuz said:

I'm fond of the theory that the whole thing is a result of mistranslation. Like two worlds was meant figuratively as in different cultures or regions.

I'm hoping that's the case. It does seem like it cuz they don't give enough detail that the two world thing is literally.

[Heckboy]

I've started to embrace the whole two worlds idea because I like the notion of Sonic being such an adventurer that one world isn't enough for him. It's unnecessary, sure, but I don't think it causes as many contradictions as people think. If I had my way with the franchise I'd go all out and have Sonic constantly go to new worlds.

That said I am curious to see if the comic is going to finally shed some light on the whole thing in any way.

[SBR2]

26 minutes ago, Cuz said:

I'm fond of the theory that the whole thing is a result of mistranslation. Like two worlds was meant figuratively as in different cultures or regions.

That...is unfortunately super possible.

[Your Vest Friend]

If Ian has been explicitly told it's two worlds by higher-ups, it's not a mistranslation. 

[Multikaris]

28 minutes ago, VEDJ-F said:

If Ian has been explicitly told it's two worlds by higher-ups, it's not a mistranslation. 

Why? Why can it not be a mistranslation? Sega is fairly ill-organized, which means a mistranslation is indeed possible.

[Your Vest Friend]

Just now, Miragnarok said:

Why? Why can it not be a mistranslation? Sega is fairly ill-organized, which means a mistranslation is indeed possible.

Because they wouldn't mistranslate orders in-house. 

[KoDaiko]

13 minutes ago, Miragnarok said:

Why? Why can it not be a mistranslation? Sega is fairly ill-organized, which means a mistranslation is indeed possible.

12 minutes ago, VEDJ-F said:

Because they wouldn't mistranslate orders in-house. 

I'm sure the rule was stated in several sentences/a paragraph. There are also several interviews that mention the two worlds. I'm sure they can't keep mistranslating something important like that, especially with this much public attention.

I mean, if it WAS a mistranslation, wouldn't Ian (or anyone else who's close enough to correct the public) figuring it out by now? Especially Ian, since Sega would want him to follow the rules, and he'd want to clarify as much detail to find loopholes and creative ways to interpret. 

[Cuz]

Why ask the higher ups to clarify something if none of your immediate pitches touch on, or incorporate it?

I mean, Ian's a master at tap dancing around these situations where he can.

 

[Dr. Detective]

It ain't no mistranslation. Ian's talked publicly about it multiple times now. They'd surely stop him from spreading misinformation if that were the case. 

Unless, of course, literally every time they try to speak to the man it gets mistranslated. The idea that they'd be that incompetent tickles me in a morbid kind of way.

[Salamander]

I do actually agree with the premise that "two worlds" is not actually meant to be taken completely literally.  The games have never acknowledged it, and for that matter the Japanese developers have never acknowledged it; literally the only people who ever acknowledge it are western representatives of the franchise.  We only know about it at all because of a leaked series bible, correct?  And Webber, at least, has as I recall given the impression of not really understanding it; while Ian Flynn clearly thinks it's idiotic, no matter how much he has to play nice with his employers, and is doing his level best to ignore it.  Somebody should press Iizuka on the details sometime; I strongly suspect that he'll give as non-committal an answer as possible.

What I think is actually the case is that Sonic Team wants to segregate two different interpretations of the franchise: Human-dominated, and anthro-dominated.  It's reasonable to suggest that these correspond to different audiences; or at the very least to different themes and aesthetics.  Sonic Team have decided that they don't want to have both depicted simultaneously, and that instead each game should follow and dedicate itself to one interpretation only, without worrying about the other.  It's a bit like how Mario and Bowser are sometimes bitter enemies, and sometimes they play sports or race together; they're different interpretations of the franchise and they aren't meant to interact (which is a large part of the reason why Daisy and Waluigi don't appear in mainline games).  Likewise, Sonic Team has decided to put the human and anthro interpretations of the franchise each in their own little bubble.  But series bibles aren't the sort of places where you can just say "the canon doesn't really matter," so they handwaved in a nebulous and unseen portal ostensibly linking the two, in order to preserve the fiction that there's just one Modern Sonic whose adventures share continuity.  (This is completely arbitrary now that Classic Sonic is a separate character, but that decision didn't make sense either so we can abandon the fiction that Sonic Team's ideas make sense.)

You can't "world-build" with two worlds because it is literally an excuse to avoid world-building.  I strongly suspect that if Ian Flynn pitched a comic storyline which explicitly acknowledged two worlds and the portal, it would be rejected.

[Marco9966]

1 hour ago, FFWF said:

You can't "world-build" with two worlds because it is literally an excuse to avoid world-building. 

This x1000

 

[Your Vest Friend]

Iizuka's answer to where Elise was in an interview from last year was that she was still in the human world. The Eastern side acknowledges it too.