Megathread IDW's Sonic the Hedgehog - Megathread

[DabigRG]

In fact, you might wanna hide that in a spoiler tab?

9 minutes ago, Shadowlax said:

 Well most thingsTails being a creep a super creep was also pretty bad

 

Just now, bingboomer said:

a super creep? 

The Fiona thing.

I can't really see it that way, but then again I'm mostly talking from my own read and "Kid has feelings for a treasure hunter under complicating circumstances" is the obvious intent/takeaway.

Also, I haven't properly read Archie in nearly a year.

[Shadowlax]

4 minutes ago, bingboomer said:

a super creep? 

Tails likes robot that looks like person. Real person shows up, Fiona. Tails, a fucking child , is denied by her because he's a fucking child. He gets weird about this feeling as though he has some obligation to a grown ass woman. Grown ass woman then becomes a villain and the comic basically villainized her for not wanting to be in a relationship with a fucking child. She then proceeds to for no determinable reason , get into a relationship with someone if i'm not mistaken might be the only person in sonic history to have commited an assult.  All the while sonic and tails have a bro fight and talk it out and tails...never really learns why that was wrong. The issue is shifted to other things and the whole thing is just fucking weird.

It was not great being a girl sonic character at that point. Yeah I dunno maybe they didn't know what to do with shadow, but at least they let him be a person and not series of tropes defined by his gender.

[DabigRG]

4 minutes ago, Shadowlax said:

Grown ass woman then becomes a villain and the comic basically villainized her for not wanting to be in a relationship with a fucking child. She then proceeds to for no determinable reason , get into a relationship with someone if i'm not mistaken might be the only person in sonic history to have commited an assult.

I thought she was villainized for sneaking around with another villain and having history with other less than lawful characters?

(And also because nobody really thought much with her)

4 minutes ago, Shadowlax said:

It was not great being a girl sonic character at that point. Yeah I dunno maybe they didn't know what to do with shadow, but at least they let him be a person and not series of tropes defined by his gender.

Admittedly, yes. It was the 90s and not the 20-10s, after all.

[Shadowlax]

15 minutes ago, DabigRG said:

I thought she was villainized for sneaking around with another villain and having history with other less than lawful characters?

I feel like you have to look at how a character is portrayed and that context and to think about overarching thematic meaning to the narrative. One of the cheif complaints about that entire thing is that Fiona's jump in characterization feels unjustified and it isn't. It feels like she legit goes from " Lady was mean " to " I guess she's bad now because she was mean " and the thing she was mean about was reasonable. Like the rest of it was tacked on to justify the character change. This in combination with the weird misogyny that existed in that book at that period, one started by penders years earlier putting an emphisis on " characters needing to be tied to some relationship in some fashion to have some perceived value. This theme unfortunately persisted in the book long after penders was gone until it rebooted.

There could be tiny details or whatever, but what it honestly looks was " Oh she doesn't like tails, oh shit she doesn't like sonic. I guess she likes BAD SONIC . obviously  that's what that means" . And that comes across worse in modern context because it reads like some incel shit. She couldn't just been someone who didn't like them, and that was it.

Quote

(And also because nobody really thought much with her)

Not only does that excuse much, it makes it worse? That character was an open slate. Coulda been anything, wanted to make a girl bad guy? Cool build to that. What we got was a weird incel revenge fantasy. And whats worse is after all that her as a character didn't amount to much... so I hope that was worth it I guess

[Rosaleia]

22 minutes ago, DabigRG said:

 Sure, why not? We already have Trolls in New252 and of course the Zeti.

 

Also, don't forget dragons and aliens.

Another loophole Ian can use is perhaps adding the concept Echidna half-breeds. Not hybrids, necessarily. Characters that are technically the species of the other parent but carry substantial echidna genetic features and can likewise share Knux's culture. Of course, the pure-bred parent would need to be deceased per the requirement of the mandate (Of Knuckles being the only surviving pure-bred echidna). I think it'd be more interesting to introduce distantly-related characters of the Knuckles tribe that can expand more on the culture and traditions than a character that has to look completely the way Knuckles does. Extra points if Knuckles and the tribe's remaining descendants are actively being hunted, which explains their low numbers.

 

[SBR2]

9 hours ago, Kellodrawsalot said:

Mandates also confirm that Amy cant be with Sonic "*canon"" but Amy cant be shown to like anyone else either one reason she was excluding from M25yl because it would be weird for a grown Amy to flirt with a married man who has kids, 

Personally I like to imagine Amy moved to the Sol Zone and settled down with Blaze becoming the Queens of the Sol Zone.

[Rosaleia]

18 minutes ago, DabigRG said:

I thought she was villainized for sneaking around with another villain and having history with other less than lawful characters?

(And also because nobody really thought much with her)

 

Fiona dating Scourge was completely OOC considering she discouraged Sonic from being like him and only dated him in the first place because she felt he wasn't like that. I get that perhaps she wasn't as interesting on the team (then again many of them weren't), and that people had other girls they'd rather see with Sonic, but.. Why couldn't she just .. I dunno, join back up with Nic if she felt she didn't belong with the Freedom Fighters?

[Shadowlax]

Its not a loop hole situation, more so like sega not wanting to do it. See there's no legal issue with them using echidinas. At all, they could use them. Anything could use them. You cannot own the legal concept of a thing that already exists in nature. That's just not a thing you can't do generally.

The issue is, Sega doesn't want to do it. See if they put them in the background, and say iizuka isn't around to to parce every page of this issue which he probably often isn't, it can go by unnoticed. The moment you try to put a not echina in the forefront, Sega's gonna come down on you because they specifically want knuckles to be the only one. This isn't just with knuckles however, sega has weird restrictions on a bunch of characters being the only... thing. Though hopefully starline indicates they are kinda getting over some of that. But even with starline his orginal concepts looked more like an echidina and then he was made to look less like one. Even if its an animal that kinda looks like one, if they are of any importance they will be made not to look like one.

Also here's my take? Why do echidinas matter? Sega will never let them be important to the narrative...ever. So  what they are in the background? Like who cares?

[SBR2]

I feel like people forget the real Fiona was introduced as a criminal and just sorta became a Freedom Fighter because reasons. Honestly I feel like her being evil and into Scourge felt more like she was a character than her previous "personality" of existing.

[Rosaleia]

10 hours ago, Kellodrawsalot said:

Mandates also confirm that Amy cant be with Sonic "*canon"" but Amy cant be shown to like anyone else either one reason she was excluding from M25yl because it would be weird for a grown Amy to flirt with a married man who has kids, 

Probably one of the main reasons my fandom for Amy dwindled after awhile. I don't hate her don't get me wrong. And I feel like her more in fan-material because there's more that can be explored with her. But canonically, its harder for me to maintain interest in a character, when they're so defined by a single character. Its a turn-off.

 

12 minutes ago, Shadowlax said:

Its not a loop hole situation, more so like sega not wanting to do it. See there's no legal issue with them using echidinas. At all, they could use them. Anything could use them. You cannot own the legal concept of a thing that already exists in nature. That's just not a thing you can't do generally.

The issue is, Sega doesn't want to do it. See if they put them in the background, and say iizuka isn't around to to parce every page of this issue which he probably often isn't, it can go by unnoticed. The moment you try to put a not echina in the forefront, Sega's gonna come down on you because they specifically want knuckles to be the only one. This isn't just with knuckles however, sega has weird restrictions on a bunch of characters being the only... thing. Though hopefully starline indicates they are kinda getting over some of that. But even with starline his orginal concepts looked more like an echidina and then he was made to look less like one. Even if its an animal that kinda looks like one, if they are of any importance they will be made not to look like one.

Also here's my take? Why do echidinas matter? Sega will never let them be important to the narrative...ever. So  what they are in the background? Like who cares?

Why do most characters matter? After all, many of Sonic's friends have barely been relevant for years. Based on that logic, should we just ditch and forget them too?

Echidna culture can still be relevant to the story, as well as their potential descendants. Regardless of whether or not pure-bred, living echidnas are present in the story.The mystery behind them and the fall of their empire might also be an interesting plot point. Just because SEGA doesn't feel like exploring it doesn't mean Ian or someone else, technically couldn't.

[Shadowlax]

4 minutes ago, Rosaleia said:

 

 

Why do most characters matter? After all, many of Sonic's friends have barely been relevant for years. Based on that logic, should we just ditch and forget them too?

Those characters still get used and the internet is currently having a big argument over one's missuse right now. Also given what might be next for sonic team, a lot of them might be getting some real use soon.Also they were used recently.

What ya'll are talking about is them being in the background and legit being relevant to nothing.

Quote

Echidna culture can still be relevant to the story, as well as their potential descendants. The mystery behind them and the fall of their empire might also be an interesting plot point. Just because SEGA doesn't feel like exploring it doesn't mean Ian or someone else, technically couldn't.

Ian Can't explore it. Sega wont let him. Knuckles is the last echidina, that's it, its done.Technically Ian flynn could make sonic cry all the time, but technically ian flynn likes having a job and has to appease his corporate overlords

[Big Panda]

He’s been able to hint at certain parts of echidna lore in the past.

I mean, Sonic Chronicles and all its concepts are off-limits, but that didn’t stop Ian from introducing Fixit in the post-SGW continuity, who’s backstory is a wink-nudge toward the origin of the Gizoids that the game established.

[DabigRG]

46 minutes ago, Shadowlax said:

I feel like you have to look at how a character is portrayed and that context and to think about overarching thematic meaning to the narrative. One of the cheif complaints about that entire thing is that Fiona's jump in characterization feels unjustified and it isn't. It feels like she legit goes from " Lady was mean " to " I guess she's bad now because she was mean " and the thing she was mean about was reasonable. Like the rest of it was tacked on to justify the character change. This in combination with the weird misogyny that existed in that book at that period, one started by penders years earlier putting an emphisis on " characters needing to be tied to some relationship in some fashion to have some perceived value. This theme unfortunately persisted in the book long after penders was gone until it rebooted.

 

Yeah, that's ultimately where I see the issue coming from as well.

59 minutes ago, Shadowlax said:

 

There could be tiny details or whatever, but what it honestly looks was " Oh she doesn't like tails, oh shit she doesn't like sonic. I guess she likes BAD SONIC . obviously  that's what that means" . And that comes across worse in modern context because it reads like some incel shit. She couldn't just been someone who didn't like them, and that was it.

. What we got was a weird incel revenge fantasy.

Some what now?

46 minutes ago, Shadowlax said:

 

Not only does that excuse much, it makes it worse? That character was an open slate. Coulda been anything, wanted to make a girl bad guy? Cool build to that. What we got was a weird incel revenge fantasy. And whats worse is after all that her as a character didn't amount to much... so I hope that was worth it I guess

I suppose that's true.

It's kind of a shame because Fiona is one of those characters I sorta appreciated for what complications she brought to the story and cast from a side role. 

But unfortunately, part of that arose from two different headwriters having some interesting ideas, but not really building on them and the third one actually trying to do so by fasttracking to focus more on the original.

 

28 minutes ago, SBR2 said:

I feel like people forget the real Fiona was introduced as a criminal and just sorta became a Freedom Fighter because reasons. Honestly I feel like her being evil and into Scourge felt more like she was a character than her previous "personality" of existing.

Yeah, essentially.

The idea was that she became a jaded treasure hunter after Sonic and Mighty unknowingly abandoned her fighting Robotnik and she eventually decided to save herself. Of course, later seeing Sonic seemingly lose his life saving the planet made her consider otherwise and join the Freedom Fighters to do some good in the world. 

The real reason she was later made [back] into a villain is because she unfortunately ended up being kinda nebulous throughout her run as a hero. Her specific place on the team loosely hovered on being a medic to being a part of the Brain Trust and her individual characterization was a bit vague despite her history. And speaking overall, she just got looped into being the new love interest for Sonic.

On that note, I suppose it could also arguably be an example of Mr. Flynn's willingness to honor and/or play up what came before not really panning out well. 

 

21 minutes ago, Forgetful Panda said:

He’s been able to hint at certain parts of echidna lore in the past.

I mean, Sonic Chronicles and all its concepts are off-limits, but that didn’t stop Ian from introducing Fixit in the post-SGW continuity, who’s backstory is a wink-nudge toward the origin of the Gizoids that the game established.

To clarify, SEGA was apparently fine with them using stuff from Chronicles. It was Archie themselves who decided against it because of the potential legal response.

1 hour ago, Rosaleia said:

 

Also, don't forget dragons and aliens.

 

Oh yeah!

1 hour ago, Rosaleia said:

Another loophole Ian can use is perhaps adding the concept Echidna half-breeds. Not hybrids, necessarily. Characters that are technically the species of the other parent but carry substantial echidna genetic features and can likewise share Knux's culture. Of course, the pure-bred parent would need to be deceased per the requirement of the mandate (Of Knuckles being the only surviving pure-bred echidna). I think it'd be more interesting to introduce distantly-related characters of the Knuckles tribe that can expand more on the culture and traditions than a character that has to look completely the way Knuckles does. Extra points if Knuckles and the tribe's remaining descendants are actively being hunted, which explains their low numbers.

So like Little Jon?

1 hour ago, Rosaleia said:

Fiona dating Scourge was completely OOC considering she discouraged Sonic from being like him and only dated him in the first place because she felt he wasn't like that.

Oh did she? My memory of the 140-159 era is pretty spotty.

1 hour ago, Rosaleia said:

I get that perhaps she wasn't as interesting on the team (then again many of them weren't), and that people had other girls they'd rather see with Sonic, but... Why couldn't she just .. I dunno, join back up with Nic if she felt she didn't belong with the Freedom Fighters?

In that specific case, probably because Nic is one of the few characters Mr. Flynn really didn't care for and actually intended to reveal as having been killed off until genuine fan interest (and the unused J Axer redesign) changed his mind.

 

[Shadowlax]

22 minutes ago, Forgetful Panda said:

He’s been able to hint at certain parts of echidna lore in the past.

I mean, Sonic Chronicles and all its concepts are off-limits, but that didn’t stop Ian from introducing Fixit in the post-SGW continuity, who’s backstory is a wink-nudge toward the origin of the Gizoids that the game established.

I mean I guess but ultimately again with out any substantial addition to the narrative its ultimately meaningless, because if sega finds out that anything substantial has been done it will be removed. You bring up fix it , but I don't think sega gives a crap about Sonic Chronicles. Outside of the legal tantrum thrown by penders, it was a game that didn't perform well and was kinda largely not liked , along with being a spin off made by another company and sonic team generally disregarding those. The situation with fiix it is, they probably deem it non canon and irrelevant and just didn't care. As long as it isn't making significant contributions to echidina's existing .  I don't think sonic team cares about any lore established in that game, so having a robot simular to the other robots they made... is kinda just nothing.

But hey that's then, nows now right? Maybe they are less lenient. I don't think so actually. Knuckles and his ancient race associated with him are in what I feel like a very compact box. All the characters right now are in very compact boxes and I don't think that's going to change in the future, and I think the mandates on how characters act and what they are related to are more strict than they ever have been before. I don't think you are even going to get hints now, sega seems to be actively removing context that isn't relevant to their precption of what a character should be. And in the case of knuckles I feel as though that means that everything introduced about echidna's past sa1 , doesn't exist. Ian flynn has been very particular in noting how sega cares a lot more about what is written and the dialog.

One of the reasons for them doing this is to keep him from referencing shit they might not want to be referenced.

[DabigRG]

1 hour ago, Rosaleia said:

Probably one of the main reasons my fandom for Amy dwindled after awhile. I don't hate her don't get me wrong. And I feel like her more in fan-material because there's more that can be explored with her. But canonically, its harder for me to maintain interest in a character, when they're so defined by a single character. Its a turn-off.

 

Amy's sort of a "whatever of the week" type of character anyway, to be honest.

The baseline of Amy's character lies around three(or four in a minute) things: her hopeless infatuation with Sonic, her plucky attitude thereof, and her fury via Piko Piko Hammer. In addition to that underlying thing where writers feel the need to give The Girl character something special to do, it's super common for her to gain new powers and sometimes skills and/or play fairly different roles in spinoffs for the sake of making her standout more as a character(thus maybe giving her the ability of to BS because of imagination or something).

[Shadowlax]

18 minutes ago, DabigRG said:

Yeah, that's ultimately where I see the issue coming from as well.

Some what now?

"This girl didn't like me, she must be bad. She must only like bad guys, she can't just not be interested in not me. She can't just have agency , no there must be something morally wrong with her. See she's with the bad guy right now. So i'm not a creep or uninteresting, she's just a bad person. "

That's how that entire scenario reads.

 

18 minutes ago, DabigRG said:

I suppose that's true.

It's kind of a shame because Fiona is one of those characters I sorta appreciated for what complications she brought to the story and cast from a side role. 

But unfortunately, part of that arose from two different headwriters having some interesting ideas, but not really building on them and the third one actually trying to do so by fasttracking to focus more on the original.

 

While I agree  , I think I dunno maybe you think about how what you are writing is coming off, and write a different story. Like maybe just... let go and it isn't worth it? If i'm mistaken that was flynn yeah? If so , he really needs to learn to just... sometimes its ok to just get rid of a story that ain't working.

1 hour ago, Rosaleia said:

Probably one of the main reasons my fandom for Amy dwindled after awhile. I don't hate her don't get me wrong. And I feel like her more in fan-material because there's more that can be explored with her. But canonically, its harder for me to maintain interest in a character, when they're so defined by a single character. Its a turn-off.

 

I agree , I think a lot of people agree. Because when she's written by not sonic team, generally she's better. But unfortunately, who's in charge... is still in charge so... sighs

[DabigRG]

7 minutes ago, Shadowlax said:

"This girl didn't like me, she must be bad. She must only like bad guys, she can't just not be interested in not me. She can't just have agency , no there must be something morally wrong with her. See she's with the bad guy right now. So i'm not a creep or uninteresting, she's just a bad person. "

That's how that entire scenario reads.

 

From Tails's point of view or Sonic?

 

7 minutes ago, Shadowlax said:

While I agree  , I think I dunno maybe you think about how what you are writing is coming off, and write a different story. Like maybe just... let go and it isn't worth it? If i'm mistaken that was flynn yeah?  If so , he really needs to learn to just... sometimes its ok to just get rid of a story that ain't working.

Which funnily enough is half of what he was doing.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Btw, I seem to recall seeing something about how he regretted what he did with Fiona years ago. When was that?

[Shadowlax]

15 minutes ago, DabigRG said:

From Tails's point of view or Sonic?

Tails and the narrative itself

Sonics version would be " I had a false relationship with this person for purely ulterior motives, and figuratively shat on my friend. In this moment should I do introspection and consider I may be a central cause for the proceedings. Also my friend may be going down a creep path, maybe I should talk to him about why it's bad instead of "it's my woman now". "

No fuck that. She's bad"

15 minutes ago, DabigRG said:

Which funnily enough is half of what he was doing.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Btw, I seem to recall seeing something about how he regretted what he did with Fiona years ago. When was that?

I think he did, dont remember when but I'm sure he did.

[Sega DogTagz]

4 hours ago, DabigRG said:

...I honestly can't tell where you stand with that.

 

No stance. Just pointing out that if they wanted to do it, they could easily do it in a manner that ducks mandates. They've done it before. 

[Shadowlax]

So read the book , its barely a fight and not worth it. And there's barely any reactions to shadow turning. That was uh... that was worth it i'm sure. People will tell me how sega mandates somehow...explains that nothing that occured. And how Ian cares or something.

Anywho when Ian moves on to characters he cares about its interesting and there's a neat thing that may piss people off at the end , depending on how much they hate a thing.

[Red Hot Jack]

Read the issue and loved it. The "formula" is shattered into a million pieces.

Spoiler

I loved seeing the whole cast, sure, no other people were zomboticized, but still, it was refreshing, they actually work as a team here, more so than season 1. 

They will keep doing new things with the book with the simultanous stories. If there are cons to this issue...

Spoiler

It's Shadow. He didn't do much, just a regular zombot, Ian could have used it better. I mean, zombots aren't mind controlled, they are out of control, so he could have literally done whatever he wanted.

The rest was on point. I wish Ian

Spoiler

Didn't spoil the Zeti's involvement like that. I guess we will find out soon if they are still alive. Not sure what to hope to be honest. But it's a good twist because they fit in here.

And Lawrence's art was really on point, I really appreciated it, literally a come back from the first panels we saw in preview.

[caitash]

I loved it. No formula this issue, characters working together, I’ve missed that so much. The surprise at the end really got me, I wasn’t expecting that at all.

Roll on next issue, please!

[Sonic Fan J]

I'll be honest, for this issue my favorite thing was honestly just Omega and his dialog. Otherwise, I don't really see anything to talk about with this issue. I'm probably just done with the zombots now and wanting to get to some adventure and discovery.

[Red Hot Jack]

IMO a lot of stuff happened, besides this issue's cast, they even opened 3 big twists/outcome and mysteries for next issues:

Spoiler

- How will the Zeti control the zombots? Are they even still alive after SLW? And Starline finally betrays the doctor?

- I think I have an idea here, but who is the spy that lets the zombots in the HQ? Ding ding, we have an answer.

- What the hell is up with Silver's future? Why are the zombots completely gone?

This arc is just so good, I don't want to see it end, I want twists and consequences, I don't want it to stay stagnant either. And obviously I need more victims.

By the way, THAT panel really had dramatic timing for that character.

And the game changer for issue 25th, still have no clue what that is, maybe something to do with the fate of the Zombots?

[Sonic Fan J]

Oh things definitely happened, it just wasn't anything that really grabbed me. I think it's just what I like out of the series and this particular arc not lining up with it that is leaving me burned out. There isn't really any sense of adventure or discovery with this story arc to me and the characters are being so pushed outside of what I love seeing them as that I just can't get into it. Outside of Rouge and Omega I just can't get into the characters this arc, and I'm going to open a can of worms with this, but Amy is almost completely unrecognizable to me. I get that it's the story being told, but that story and what it is doing has lost any charm it for me issues ago. I'd say maybe the Tangle & Whisper series will give me more of what I'm yearning, but for as much as I like Tangle, seeing her doing what I like her doing doesn't fill the void that I'm experiencing in the main book right now with the game cast. It's kind of a shame to since I had been enjoying this scenario a lot early on and now just don't feel anything from it.