Foreign releases of English Sonic comics

[Big Panda]

I love learning about and/or collecting international versions of English Sonic comics.

I want to find out about as many different versions as possible, and to be able to add to the list below:

ARCHIE SONIC THE HEDGEHOG

Country of origin: America

IN THE UK:

-Jetix Official Magazine

The official companion magazine to the Jetix TV channel began publishing snippets of Archie’s Sonic X comic in issue 24 (early 2006) and continued until the magazines discontinuation at issue 68 (summer 2009). In total, the entirety of Sonic X issues 1-9 were printed, with half of issue 10 being printed at the time of discontinuation.

-Sonic Interactive Annual 2014

Published by Pedigree Books, it contained the story “Lost in the Moment” from StH#231 within the book itself, while “Sonic Generations” (#230) and “Sonic Colours” (#219) could be obtained digitally via the books interactive pages.

-All About... #73

This monthly magazine from Egmont focuses on a different subject each month. Issue 73, published in early 2014, was all about Sonic! Along with the various puzzles, games, and stickers, it contained two Archie comic strips: “Sonic Colours” (StH#219) and “Sonic Unleashed” (StH#193).

IN FRENCH:

-Sonic X

Published by Jungle Kids, this four-book series collected stories from Archie’s Sonic X. The issues printed across the four books:

Book 1: #1-#2

Book 2: #?-#? (don’t own this volume, info needed!)

Book 3: #38-#39

Book 4: #33, #40

-Sonic the Hedgehog

Published across 7 books from 2012-2015 by Delcourt Jeunesse, this series collected various stories from the final stretch of Archie Sonic’s original continuity, to be precise: #226-#234, and #242-#246, plus some of the game tie-ins.

IN GERMAN:

-Sonic Das Comic Magazin

This four-issue quarterly magazine from Panini Comics collected the first eight issues of Archie’s Sonic Universe. It ran from July 2012-January 2013.

-Sonic the Hedgehog

After the cancellation of the above magazine, Panini moved onto a 9-issue quarterly comic series that printed the entirety of Archie Sonic issues from #226-#244 (only skipping #242). It ran from March 2013-May 2014, after which it was prematurely cancelled (a tenth issue was scheduled but never released). Each issue came with a free poster, and contained a puzzle page, and sometimes even character profiles.

-Sonic Sonderband

This single book, released by Panini, was a combined version of the first two Sonic Archives volumes.

IN FINNISH:

-Sonic the Hedgehog

Early Archie Sonic comic stories (including those from the original miniseries) were published in Finland by Semic, and were around from as early as 1994. It apparently had a short run, only lasting for a year. They had their own letters pages, and even a game hint corner of some kind.

IN BRAZIL:

-Sonic X

Sonic X issues published in two comics by On Line Editora.

-Sonic

Magazine by an unknown publisher. At least one issue featured content from Sonic Universe’s “30 Years Later” arc.

——————————

SONIC THE COMIC (FLEETWAY)

Country of origin: UK

IN FRENCH:

-Sonic Mag (B.D. & Jeux Video)

Published early STC stories. Publisher unknown. French editions of the early graphic novel compilations were also released.

IN GERMAN:

-Sonic Der Comic

The most well-known of STC’s foreign versions. STC strips are printed alongside film reviews, wrestling articles and, most bizarrely of all, a Mr. T comic strip. Publisher unknown.

IN ITALIAN:

-Sonic videogame & fumetti

STC strips in Italian. Publisher unknown.

IN DUTCH:

-Sonic magazine

Said to be largely the same as the UK edition. Publisher unknown.

——————————

IDW SONIC THE HEDGEHOG

Country of origin: America
 

IN FRENCH:

-Sonic the Hedgehog

Beginning in 2018, Mana Books has been releasing French translations of IDW Sonic’s graphic novel collections. They seem to contain largely the same content as their American counterparts. The most notable difference is that these books have been released only in hardback.

IN SOUTH AMERICA

-Sonic the Hedgehog
IDW will be releasing their own Latin Spanish translation of the first graphic novel in June 2020.

IN JAPAN

-Sonic the Hedgehog
Set to be released sometime this year by Wise Publishing.

Do you know of any other releases, or have any more info on the ones mentioned? Let me know!

[Solister]

I think I can help with some Brazilian stuff:

There's at least 2 Sonic X comic books here in Brazil. The first one is the traditional comic book, can't say for sure how long it lasts, but they seems to be the exactly comics from this video (Can't say for sure which country this is, likely USA or UK), including numeration. Here it were published by "On Line Editora". The comics also counts with nearly 10 puzzles pages which aren't listed in the video.

From this same publisher as the 2nd Sonic X book, it is a story only book with a few images from the anime. Apparently, it's just a translated version from this one. This one doesn't count with puzzles.

Third one, as you also mentioned, we had the Sonic Universe series. I think only two editions were published and I have both. The way the choose to present them was a bit confuse, I'll try to do my best. First, for unknown reasons as I know, they were published with a more than a year time split. It covers the 30 years in future series, from issue 5 to 8 (In the "normal" system). Each of the Brazilian comics means 2 in the "normal" system. So, here number 1 are the 5-6 from the "normal" and number 2 are 7-8. For some reason, the cover from number 6 is used as the Brazilian #1 cover and number 8 is used as cover of the Brazilian #2 cover. Meanwhile 5 and 7 are the back-cover from Brazilian 1 and 2 respectively. However, the story is told in order. Despite that, as the Sonic X stuff, it's translated to Portuguese as well. Both also include a double sided poster, which I'm not sure if the original one also includes. These one were published by "Alto Astral" (Which literally means "High Spirits".)

Last, and likely the least too. We received 2 puzzle books from the same publisher of Sonic Universe. They likely were meant for kids until 5 years so the puzzles are ridiculous easy. I'm not sure if this is Brazilian exclusive, but I feel it is.

Aside that, from what I've, just lacks the articles in gaming magazines about further releases or talking about a specific game which they think it's important.

[Rabid-Coot]

I remember this from an old issue of STC but I don't think it covers anything you don't know.

[Polkadi~☆]

There is apparently a Japanese release of IDW Sonic, unless I am mistaken in some way, as Yuji Uekawa has said he's happily following the series in the letter pages of the 2019 annual, despite him living in Japan. Maybe it's an import of the English books, or there really is a Japanese release, but I cannot find anything.

[BlueSky]

On 6/12/2019 at 11:21 PM, Ernest the Panda said:

I love learning about and/or collecting international versions of English Sonic comics.

I want to find out about as many different versions as possible, and to be able to add to the list below:

Oh, this topic is a thing, interesting, let's see if my hunch is right...

On 6/12/2019 at 11:21 PM, Ernest the Panda said:

IN FINNISH:

-Sonic the Hedgehog

Early issues of Archie Sonic (including at least one issue of the original miniseries) were published in Finland by an unknown publisher.

Well, don't mind if I butt in, I can tell you the little I know about this stuff...

 

So, by no means claim I to know a lot, but I suppose I can fill at least few blanks since I ended up borning up here anyway.

The run in Finland was a pretty short one, only couple of years or something I've heard. I've seen few early issues couple of years back in one book event of sorts and I managed to buy one, sadly most of them were like 10€ per issue which was a bit too much for my wallet but I managed to buy one anyway, I think I've mentioned this sometime before in the forums...

Okay, the comics were published in Finland, by Semic (which was around and published other translated comics as well, like Spirou albums, until Egmont bought it or something like that, I'm not too sure but Egmont publishes some stuff they did back when they were around) around mid 90's, which was probably a bad time considering the economy of Finland back then, depression was still a thing back then I think. Anyway, the issue I have is dated to 1994, cost 12 marks, was labeled as issue 3 but had the cover of mini-series issue 2 while having stories from issue #3 (the 2 longer ones), and smaller ones about Tails going to his "first solo adventure" (from original issue #4)where he overheard stuff from the picnic Robotnik threw outside with the robots, and the one-page ones where Sally used Sonic's quills as an info board, and where they took the group picture. Kind of a mixture isn't it... 

Needless to say the translation is pretty... hilarious, like, you remember in that bomb story Rotor said he could make a James Cagney impression (that brings my mind that Nik Kershaw song "James Cagney"), well, in Finnish version the name was localised into this one Finnish singer (Kaija Koo) and in one part he was pretty much citing the lyrics of this one song, I suppose this was used because it kind of fits in the context considering the rough translation to that part would be "oh yeah, come closer baby come closer baby" or something... that's pretty much the only logical answer I can come up with about how James Cagney transformed into a female singer. This becomes pretty interesting as you can see... Sonic was "that darned hedgehog" or something akin to that... Another person whose name was changed was from that Tails story, Michael Jordan became Antti Kasvio... who is an ex-swimmer it seems, and it seems he was pretty good, go figure, these comics teach me stuff I should prolly know since my home country and stuff.

There was this small reader corner as well, where readers could ask about stuff, and there were even some kind of game hints thing in it. One kid was sad because their family couldn't probably afford to order the book (but they could still buy the individual issues) since that depression, and the corner holder was trying to convince the kid to try and get them to order it anyway since it's Sonic. The kid actually puts it best; when reading your book one cannot read without laughing, the thing is even, you know, not in the bad way, cheesier than in English come to think of it.

I've been checking out whenever it's possible if I could get other issues as well, but I'm not that good at buying on the internet so it's mostly on the events where I get any chances... but yeah, I have this one, where one reader asks who Scott Shaw is since he draws like an artist...

Oh geez, it says in here people have asked to get Sonic visit their birthday parties trough the reader corner...

 

Fun fact, our market magazine stands actually imported the English Archie Sonic until it ceased to exist, I'm not too sure when they started but I recall seeing some forum discussions about it and if I remember them right they were talking about things that happened around the 200's or a bit later.

Haven't seen the IDW ones anywhere though, cough cough...

 

I can try to answer for more questions if you get any, I'm not sure about how much I can help but with questions about that one issue I think I can help the very least.

And this was just something quick I made as quickly as possible, I prolly forgot a lot but I'm in a kind of hurry and I'll get back to it if needed, as you can see this is what happens when I get a possibility to talk about anything, everything gets long when I write...

[Big Panda]

@BlueSky awesome!

[Big Panda]

https://www.amazon.com/dp/1684057493/ref=mp_s_a_1_6?keywords=sonic&qid=1574015364&rnid=2941120011&s=books&sr=1-6

There’s a Latin(?) Spanish version of IDW Sonic coming next year.

[Ryannumber1gamer]

I never realised it before, but good lord it must've been weird for German fans to open up a few of these issues and being greeted with Tails and Mina's children, evil dickhead Shadow, and so on so forth.

[Big Panda]

Added information on the JAPANESE release of IDW Sonic!

[DryLagoon]

On 11/18/2019 at 10:42 PM, Ryannumber1gamer said:

I never realised it before, but good lord it must've been weird for German fans to open up a few of these issues and being greeted with Tails and Mina's children, evil dickhead Shadow, and so on so forth.

Sometimes I hear people talk about it and I'm wondering "how did we get from Freedom Fighters to kingdoms and various offspring? what is light Mobius?".
 

55 minutes ago, Big Panda said:

Added information on the JAPANESE release of IDW Sonic!

I had been curious if they had brought over the western Sonic comics before, but that's cool that it's the first time. I hope that means we might see some of the characters appear some day, even if it was only as a minor role. Tangle looks like she'd be really fun to play as. I'll have to catch up so I can join in the thread.

[StarWarsSonic]

On 6/12/2019 at 10:55 PM, Rabid-Coot said:

I remember this from an old issue of STC but I don't think it covers anything you don't know.

Hmmm I wonder how different the contents were of these compared to the original UK comics?? I also wonder how long they lasted?

would be cool to add some of these variants to the collection (I have the complete UK collection) but have never seen any of these country variants listed on EBay

[Big Panda]

6 minutes ago, StarWarsSonic said:

Hmmm I wonder how different the contents were of these compared to the original UK comics?? I also wonder how long they lasted?

would be cool to add some of these variants to the collection (I have the complete UK collection) but have never seen any of these country variants listed on EBay

The German issues show up on eBay from time to time. There are at least two listings up right now, in fact.

[Polkadi~☆]

9 hours ago, Big Panda said:

Added information on the JAPANESE release of IDW Sonic!

From the small preview we got on Sonic Station LIVE, the strangest thing is that these books are untranslated. It's all English! The only thing in Japanese is the title on the spine. You'd think they'd be translated, but no.

The book comes out 8th of May, 2020.

[Big Panda]

26 minutes ago, Polkadi~☆ said:

From the small preview we got on Sonic Station LIVE, the strangest thing is that these books are untranslated. It's all English! The only thing in Japanese is the title on the spine. You'd think they'd be translated, but no.

The book comes out 8th of May, 2020.

We’ve seen no indication yet that the book won’t be in Japanese.

[Polkadi~☆]

4 minutes ago, Big Panda said:

We’ve seen no indication yet that the book won’t be in Japanese.

I hope it will be, because I'd love to use the book as a learning tool. Maybe the preview on stream was just a prototype (if such a thing even exists for books).

[Adamis]

There were only six issues of "Sonic Mag", the French STC. I still own #1 and 6, and used to have 3. 4 and 5 yeaaaars ago.