Megathread IDW's Sonic the Hedgehog - Megathread

[StaticMania]

1 hour ago, CrownSlayer’s Shadow said:

Yeah, I don’t know where you’re hearing that from.

How dare you...

I want Sonic to lose and never come back, it's only natural right?

[Shadowlax]

41 minutes ago, Kuzu said:

Ken actively tried to push Sonic & Eggman out of the spotlight to focus on his own original story and characters lol.

hey man once his magnum opus is released upon the world. We will understand his genious

[DabigRG]

56 minutes ago, Jack at Home said:

What I was saying in the status, is that Infinite actually had more going on and still he didn't leave a mark, the Deadly Six are used in veeeery small doses outside of their debut game, they way offer less than Infinite, and somehow work better as antagonists, maybe as bosses especially.

I still need that Deadly Six cartoon that succeeds in making them funny, for real.

Part of the reason for that is that they aren't really context sensitive and/or defining like he is. Just about any of them can be just slotted into something else without that much effort. Even Zavok--hell, especially Zavok. 

Infinite on the other hand was very much an overwhelming powerhouse--good for an eventual epic confrontation, not so much for repeat appearances.

1 hour ago, Shadowlax said:

No I stand by that. If you read this sonic and his morality stance its selfish and self serving at best. At worst sociopathic.

It would actually be a fascinating what-if take on sonic if it wasn't unintentional

Errr, I mean I can sorta see it if we're looking at an aspect of what Sonic is generally about, but certainly not in a situation like this.

[Fire-N-Space]

I don't understand how Zeena got tangled up in her own nonphysical energy beam or why losing the emerald makes her lose her powers for some reason moving over to Zomom who just spins until he gets hit by the gate and that somehow pins him down?  Why are these fights so bad why did they have to team up for this Amy didn't even do anything in her team. 

[Ryannumber1gamer]

Just now, Fire-N-Space said:

why losing the emerald makes her lose her powers

It doesn't make them lose their powers, the Chaos Emeralds were the only thing allowing them to amp up their powers enough to control that many Zombots at once with little to no effort. In Lost World, all six of them needed to be together, concentrating and coordinating their abilities to take over one section of Eggman's Badnik Army.

Without the Emerald, Zeena (or any other member of the D6) might've been able to take over one or two Zombots at once, but not only would they not have good concentration when they're surrounded, but even if they did manage to control a few, they all had a metric army of them in each town/village/area that they doomed themselves by surrounding themselves in a crowd of them.

[DabigRG]

7 minutes ago, Fire-N-Space said:

I don't understand how Zeena got tangled up in her own nonphysical energy beam or why losing the emerald makes her lose her powers for some reason moving over to Zomom who just spins until he gets hit by the gate and that somehow pins him down? 

I kinda wondered that for a second, but then she was flinging it around quite a bit beforehand, so it's fair game.  

Onto the emeralds, I'm pretty sure they could use their powers, its more than they were in compromising situations due to the sudden loss of the Emerald's amplification. Zomom was pinned on his back with a Zombot already pretty close to him, while Zeena was pretty swiftly grabbed & slammed into the claws of them before she could adjust.

7 minutes ago, Fire-N-Space said:

 Why are these fights so bad why did they have to team up for this Amy didn't even do anything in her team. 

Yeah, there wasn't much going on there. Not that it was that interesting a matchup to begin with.

10 minutes ago, Gentle Criminal said:

It doesn't make them lose their powers, the Chaos Emeralds were the only thing allowing them to amp up their powers enough to control that many Zombots at once with little to no effort. In Lost World, all six of them needed to be together, concentrating and coordinating their abilities to take over one section of Eggman's Badnik Army.

Without the Emerald, Zeena (or any other member of the D6) might've been able to take over one or two Zombots at once, but not only would they not have good concentration when they're surrounded, but even if they did manage to control a few, they all had a metric army of them in each town/village/area that they doomed themselves by surrounding themselves in a crowd of them.

Zavok claimed they should be able to control a few dozen on their own, but I don't remember if he meant all six of them.

[Ryannumber1gamer]

2 minutes ago, DabigRG said:

Zavok claimed they should be able to control a few dozen on their own, but I don't remember if he meant all six of them.

Even a few dozen alone wouldn't make a much of a difference. The Deadly Six were so vain and egotistical that they were literally controlling whole villages to do as they please, and that would've counted for at least hundreds, and the emeralds were stolen from Zeena and Zomom so quickly that they didn't even really have a lot of time to realise what happened before the Zombots were grabbing them. Even with control over a few dozen, Zomom was trapped, and Zeena was surrounded, there was no way for them to concentrate enough to take control before they were ultimately turned.

[Fire-N-Space]

4 minutes ago, Gentle Criminal said:

It doesn't make them lose their powers, the Chaos Emeralds were the only thing allowing them to amp up their powers enough to control that many Zombots at once with little to no effort. In Lost World, all six of them needed to be together, concentrating and coordinating their abilities to take over one section of Eggman's Badnik Army.

Without the Emerald, Zeena (or any other member of the D6) might've been able to take over one or two Zombots at once, but not only would they not have good concentration when they're surrounded, but even if they did manage to control a few, they all had a metric army of them in each town/village/area that they doomed themselves by surrounding themselves in a crowd of them.

That's really underselling the Zeti, in SLW they don't brake a sweat when taking over Eggmans whole army and the robots still obey them in there own levels. Zeena already had energy beams before she had the emerald so why did it brake when she lost the emerald?  

[DabigRG]

Just now, Gentle Criminal said:

Even a few dozen alone wouldn't make a much of a difference.The Deadly Six were so vain and egotistical that they were literally controlling whole villages to do as they please, and that would've counted for at least hundreds,

Yeah, they really wouldn't.

 

1 minute ago, Fire-N-Space said:

That's really underselling the Zeti, in SLW they don't brake a sweat when taking over Eggmans whole army and the robots still obey them in there own levels.

You know, I was thinking of too. But then it occurred to me to ask if they were controlling/reprograming them or did they just take advantage of Priority One?

1 minute ago, Fire-N-Space said:

Zeena already had energy beams before she had the emerald so why did it brake when she lost the emerald?  

I'm sure she in particular was tapping into the Emerald's energy specifically to amp herself up, given the change in color and texture.

[StaticMania]

18 minutes ago, Fire-N-Space said:

Zeena already had energy beams before she had the emerald so why did it break when she lost the emerald?

In Lost World...Zeena during her boss fight only used her energy beams to swing around an inanimate robotic Snow-man head and the beam itself Sonic has to jump over.

In this comic she's using this amped up beam to control G-merl like a literal puppet, if the beam broke because they pulled the emerald out...then it should stand to reason that she can't normally do that.

[Ryannumber1gamer]

1 minute ago, DabigRG said:

You know, I was thinking of too. But then it occurred to me to ask if they were controlling/reprograming them or did they just take advantage of Priority One?

It was never specified what the situation in LW was. Regardless of breaking a sweat - we still see all six of them having to use their power together to take over the initial wave of robots that they used against Sonic. 

However, whenever we do see them take over a robot, it's almost always requires them to be concentrating to do so - you can see it here:

First take note - Eggman specifically states he "homed their abilities", meaning he powered them up - likely via the power he'd been draining out of the Earth, and the power the Zeti later try to suck dry to boost themselves to unstoppable levels.

0:47 - Watch carefully - before the badniks shift to aiming at Sonic, Tails, and Eggman - you can specifically see in the background that all six of them are concentrating hard to take control of the mechs, including Zik, Zor, and Zeena in shadow because they weren't introduced to the player yet. All six of them had to work together to take control of Eggman's army and coordinate them, and this is after Eggman specifically stated he homed their abilities.

We can't say for certain if the D6 are either controlling the badniks, or relying on Priority Number 1 - destroying Sonic - what we do know is what the game shows us - that the D6 had to work together to take control of the army, and this required both concentrating for a few moments, and coordination. 

Taking this into account for the arc - how the hell do you expect Zeena, Zomom or any of the Deadly Six to achieve this? They're being surrounded by Zombots - Zomom was trapped under a gate, making it less likely he could concentrate to take them over, and Zeena was immediately grabbed and held down by her hair.

Instead of trying to assume things about the comic, take into account what the comic is specifically telling you - which was in whatever case - the D6 could not concentrate quickly enough, discern their targets quickly enough, or flat out was too surrounded that taking control of the Zombots wouldn't make a difference.

There's no contradicting information present here - Lost World showed the six needing to be together, concentrating for a few moments, and coordinated to take over massive numbers, like the hundreds surrounding Zomom and Zeena alone. Lost World implies they were juiced up on stolen energy from the planet, Worlds Unite had their abilities being boosted by Sigma's suits, and here - they were boosted by the Chaos Emeralds. That's what was shown here - they lost the emerald, immediately lost their hold on the Zombots, and were either too incapacitated. or had little to no time to concentrate to try take control of them again.

[Shadowlax]

1 hour ago, DabigRG said:

Errr, I mean I can sorta see it if we're looking at an aspect of what Sonic is generally about, but certainly not in a situation like this.

I say this situation is exactly that. Sonic with tinker in the games has the general sense of right and wrong, he's fighting for something a bit bigger than himself generally. Sonic's grievance with eggman and metal sonic is personal, Sonic is uncomfortable. Its not about some larger thing interms of the morality question. Its his comfort. He's uncomfortable with eggman being just bad.

Its almost an interesting an angle. Its not capitalized upon at all. Because its unintentional , the morality situation is kind of a strait forward shade of gray situation. " murder is bad, but dictator" . However due to the writing it has now kind of framed this around sonic needing to believe in eggman to feel comfortable.

The idea of just resigning to the notion that eggman is just an asshole, makes him uncomfortable. Shadow's ideas , makes him uncomfortable. And he is willing to but future suffering of his fellow animal people that eggman will reform in some way. Once this stopped being about tinker and started being about eggman, it became kind of sociepathtic.

Its actually kind of fucking creepy. Mr Tinker is a different guy, Mr. Tinker required removal of everything that makes eggman...eggman. Outside of IQ. For sonic to want tinker back , its own brand of unethical creepyness. He would see this man get his personality removed so he can feel comfortable. Shadow is ok with eggman being eggman and has come to terms with he's gonna have to kill him at some point. Sonic is at least fine with his memories being removed if eggman becomes something less evil. And this is some gerald robotnik territory.

Its accidentally an interesting twits on the " they can change " motif. Eggman didn't willingly changed. And sonic's desire for him to go back to that is trying to force him to be someone he never really was

Long shot. But it would be fucking wild, if this was Ian's Intent in some way. Or at least he realized it, and shadow calls sonic out on it in future. Because the current goings on , have framed sonic's motivations in a way that are a lot more self serving than they may initially seem.

[Sonic Fan J]

You know, as I read a lot of this back and forth on Sonic's actions and whether or not morality should have been addressed, I think their is a different angle that could be looked at. Namely, Sonic was not created as a "[HERO!]". Specifically, his character is that of an adventurer who helps out when he can and when his own sense of right and wrong is challenged. That is a very important distinction and one that completely paints the whole is Sonic a good hero crisis here in a different light. The bottom line is, he isn't a good hero, because he's not a hero. the hero worship Sonic receives both in and out of universe is a misconstruing of his intentions for his actions, which is to satisfy his own sense of right and wrong. It's part of what makes Sonic an antihero, the whole he acts off of his morals and not society's. In that regard he is not so different from Shadow and that shouldn't be surprising since Shadow is supposed to be Sonic in a darker and more extreme context. So perhaps if one steps back for just a moment and realizes that Sonic is typically a small picture kind of guy who lives in the moment, this whole morality thing starts to get a little clearer in both it not being handled right here, and whether or not in universe people need to realize that Sonic is not a hero, but a guy who acts on his own sense of right and wrong. That doesn't make him sociopathic either, just shortsighted and naïve, which again works since it is supposed to be hard to tell at times that Sonic is as old and experienced as he is.

Just a thought if you will.

[Fire-N-Space]

42 minutes ago, StaticMania said:

In Lost World...Zeena during her boss fight only used her energy beams to swing around an inanimate robotic Snow-man head and the beam itself Sonic has to jump over.

In this comic she's using this amped up beam to control G-merl like a literal puppet, if the beam broke because they pulled the emerald out...then it should stand to reason that she can't normally do that.

Lasers or energy tend to be searing hot but not physical. Zeena can swing a snow ball with a beam and she can control more then one robot at a time all without the emerald so her even losing the emerald in that way is hard to believe.

[Sonictrainer]

Without the Emeralds' power, I don't think the D6 could control the Zombots for long since the the virus is mutating.

We've already seen Eggman lose command of them and Shadow lose his immunity to it.

[Big Panda]

1 minute ago, Sonictrainer said:

and Shadow lose his immunity to it.

He wasn’t immune to begin with tho...?

[DabigRG]

Ooh, nice research and explanation here.

1 hour ago, Gentle Criminal said:

It was never specified what the situation in LW was. Regardless of breaking a sweat - we still see all six of them having to use their power together to take over the initial wave of robots that they used against Sonic.

0:47 - Watch carefully - before the badniks shift to aiming at Sonic, Tails, and Eggman - you can specifically see in the background that all six of them are concentrating hard to take control of the mechs, including Zik, Zor, and Zeena in shadow because they weren't introduced to the player yet. All six of them had to work together to take control of Eggman's army and coordinate them, and this is after Eggman specifically stated he homed their abilities.

We were actually talking about the ones in the levels.

And honestly, I just assumed they had to do that there because Eggman just got through using the Conch on them. Orbot and Cubot freaking out in the background suggests they were spending Sonic & Eggman's brief argument charging back up.

1 hour ago, Gentle Criminal said:

However, whenever we do see them take over a robot, it's almost always requires them to be concentrating to do so - you can see it here:

First take note - Eggman specifically states he "homed their abilities", meaning he powered them up - likely via the power he'd been draining out of the Earth, and the power the Zeti later try to suck dry to boost themselves to unstoppable levels.

We can't say for certain if the D6 are either controlling the badniks, or relying on Priority Number 1 - destroying Sonic - what we do know is what the game shows us - that the D6 had to work together to take control of the army, and this required both concentrating for a few moments, and coordination. 

I did wonder what the sequel hook and now that line was about.

 

2 hours ago, Shadowlax said:

I say this situation is exactly that. Sonic with tinker in the games has the general sense of right and wrong, he's fighting for something a bit bigger than himself generally. Sonic's grievance with eggman and metal sonic is personal, Sonic is uncomfortable. Its not about some larger thing interms of the morality question. Its his comfort. He's uncomfortable with eggman being just bad.

Its almost an interesting an angle. Its not capitalized upon at all. Because its unintentional , the morality situation is kind of a strait forward shade of gray situation. " murder is bad, but dictator" . However due to the writing it has now kind of framed this around sonic needing to believe in eggman to feel comfortable.

The idea of just resigning to the notion that eggman is just an asshole, makes him uncomfortable. Shadow's ideas , makes him uncomfortable. And he is willing to but future suffering of his fellow animal people that eggman will reform in some way. Once this stopped being about tinker and started being about eggman, it became kind of sociepathtic.

Its actually kind of fucking creepy. Mr Tinker is a different guy, Mr. Tinker required removal of everything that makes eggman...eggman. Outside of IQ. For sonic to want tinker back , its own brand of unethical creepyness. He would see this man get his personality removed so he can feel comfortable. Shadow is ok with eggman being eggman and has come to terms with he's gonna have to kill him at some point. Sonic is at least fine with his memories being removed if eggman becomes something less evil. And this is some gerald robotnik territory.

Its accidentally an interesting twits on the " they can change " motif. Eggman didn't willingly changed. And sonic's desire for him to go back to that is trying to force him to be someone he never really was

Long shot. But it would be fucking wild, if this was Ian's Intent in some way. Or at least he realized it, and shadow calls sonic out on it in future. Because the current goings on , have framed sonic's motivations in a way that are a lot more self serving than they may initially seem.

Not really? It's overall about Eggman NOT terrorizing the world and instead using his talents to help people.

Call it a sorta selfish wish for things to be just better, but still not seeing the leap to sociopathy.

[DabigRG]

1 hour ago, Fire-N-Space said:

Lasers or energy tend to be searing hot but not physical. Zeena can swing a snow ball with a beam and she can control more then one robot at a time all without the emerald so her even losing the emerald in that way is hard to believe.

Its worth noting that they were more like bars in Lost World, never actually changing change after Zeena finished casting them.

1 hour ago, Sonictrainer said:

Without the Emeralds' power, I don't think the D6 could control the Zombots for long since the the virus is mutating.

We've already seen Eggman lose command of them and Shadow lose his immunity to it.

I think Starline was banking on them being able to adjust their control at will, but it is worth asking if the Zombots could just build up an usual immunity to magnetic fields as well.

[Shadowlax]

 My friends and family to your wrath

1 hour ago, DabigRG said:

Ooh, nice research and explanation here.

We were actually talking about the ones in the levels.

And honestly, I just assumed they had to do that there because Eggman just got through using the Conch on them. Orbot and Cubot freaking out in the background suggests they were spending Sonic & Eggman's brief argument charging back up.

I did wonder what the sequel hook and now that line was about.

 

Not really? It's overall about Eggman NOT terrorizing the world and instead using his talents to help people.

Call it a sorta selfish wish for things to be just better, but still not seeing the leap to sociopathy.

"I will keep you around even though you will most likely continue to be a murderous dictator. Subjecting potentially my friends and family to your wrath. Because you got bonked on the head and was good for two seconds. Because I'm more comfortable with idea that despite all the havoc and literal deaths you may cause , you might not kill more people one day even though you have demonstrated you infact very much enjoy the negative behavior.  And cannot mentally deal with idea you want to be an asshole and will continue to do more shit because we allow you to"

Is kinda sociopathic. Once it stopped being about tinker. Sonic's ideals carrying over to eggman was more so sonic's need to believe everyone is deformable. Context be damned.

Heck if we read it your way " he wants him to use his talents" comes off even more so because that implies he only sees him as potential skills.

This is how it comes when the object of the argument is an extradimesional genocidal dictator.

[DabigRG]

2 minutes ago, Shadowlax said:

 My friends and family to your wrath

"I will keep you around even though you will most likely continue to be a murderous dictator. Subjecting potentially my friends and family to your wrath. Because you got bonked on the head and was good for two seconds. Because I'm more comfortable with idea that despite all the havoc and literal deaths you may cause , you might not kill more people one day.  And cannot mentally deal with idea you want to be an asshole and will continue to do more shit because we allow you to"

Is kinda sociopathic.

Heck if we read it your way " he wants him to use his talents" comes off even more so because that implies he only sees him as potential skills.

This is how it comes when the object of the argument is an extradimesional genocidal dictator.

Well here's another important question: Does that mindset even apply now that he's Eggman again? 

[Shadowlax]

2 minutes ago, DabigRG said:

Well here's another important question: Does that mindset even apply now that he's Eggman again? 

If you mean sonic's desire for reformation? Yes he outright states in and argues for it multiple times. That plot thread is still about and being used.

 

[DabigRG]

1 minute ago, Shadowlax said:

If you mean sonic's desire for reformation? Yes he outright states in and argues for it multiple times. That plot thread is still about and being used.

 

I mean, "Should we be rid of Eggman if this is what he's gonna keep doing?"

[Diogenes]

3 hours ago, Shadowlax said:

Its actually kind of fucking creepy. Mr Tinker is a different guy, Mr. Tinker required removal of everything that makes eggman...eggman. Outside of IQ. For sonic to want tinker back , its own brand of unethical creepyness. He would see this man get his personality removed so he can feel comfortable. Shadow is ok with eggman being eggman and has come to terms with he's gonna have to kill him at some point. Sonic is at least fine with his memories being removed if eggman becomes something less evil. And this is some gerald robotnik territory.

Or, y'know, not that at all, actually.

[Shadowlax]

23 minutes ago, DabigRG said:

I mean, "Should we be rid of Eggman if this is what he's gonna keep doing?"

Yeah? Depending on if the story has lasting effects. It might come up more often

21 minutes ago, Diogenes said:

Or, y'know, not that at all, actually.

Yeah that's kinda cruel in a weird way. No one has any obligation to be someone they aren't. And the expectation for him to do that because he had some mental damage is weird. That scene I think is followed up by eggman saying he's legit gonna just be a dick anyway because he can. And even after all that comics later sonic is drumming away at that argument. Even after eggman is only helping to save his own ass. Sonic could not say a dang thing and it would be fine. His desire to continue bringing up that argument is for his own confort, he wants eggman to be someone else because that's what he wants. But he isn't thinking that maybe eggman doesn't want to be that. Because that idea makes him uncomfortable.

I'm not saying sonic isn't a completely manipulative emotionless weirdo

Sonic much like many of the sonic characters is very strong willed. He has a very specific view of the world. Sonic is in a position where that view is being questioned. Because its running up against who another person simply is. And in this instance, he kind of at the very least comes off as kind a manipulative douche. Its weird to be saying this about eggman. But I don't think for sonic, this kind of behavior is actually usual. To the degree in which it doesn't seem out of character. You could even suggest why he and shadow has continuous beef. Because shadow does not act in ways that make sonic comfortable. And he can't deal with that.

He's a free spirit. And eggman is in this situation is just kind of cold reality. And its fucking him up. Eggman's morality is uninteresting as hell. But this little situation that came out of it. Its kinda neat. Even if it isn't the intended outlook on the situation

 

 

[SBR2]

6 hours ago, CrownSlayer’s Shadow said:

Yeah, I don’t know where you’re hearing that from.

Most complaints towards the “Sonic can never lose” center around the thought that the mandate would reduce tensions and stakes, and that Sonic would risk becoming a boring invincible hero as a result as they criticize in cases like Generations and Colors. No ones asking he permanently lose, just that he not always win lest he be seen as “perfect”.

But that fear is baseless because we've seen several times in Comics and I'd even argue in the games that raising the stakes isn't a no no to Sega it's just that by the end if the game or story arc he has to win.

This idea Sega wants him to be completely invincible is honestly baffling to me.