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The Satam connections are interesting, mainly because for me I havn't watched Satam in over a decade and really remember very little from it. I think somewhere around issue #45, Lupa and the Wolf Pack are introduced into the comic, with Sonic and Sally already having met them before, with a caption saying Lupa was introduced in Satam, which would imply Satam is canon within the comic, despite issue #50 and Satam's last episode contridicting each other. What's even stranger is, sometime between issue #50 and issue #100, there is an issue which is just a retelling of the Satam episode that introduced Lupa. It's the only time they do that, I dunno what happened there, they didn't have a script for that issue and just retold a Satam episode so Lupa was introduced properly into the comic?

It is interesting how Archie does touch upon the 5 Sonic shows. Early Archie is basically Adventures but with the Freedom Fighters, issues #40ish to Ian Flynn taking over is like an extremely long continuation of Satam, Sonic X and Sonic Boom each got their own books, and Sonic Underground would get featured in one of the Sonic Super Specials.

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1 hour ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

Well, I appreciate it all the same. Although guys, if there's something you wish to say, please do so. I prefer these be discussions and not just reviews after all. 

 

 

Indeed. That's what this is for, generally speaking. 

1 hour ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

 

That would explain why I had never heard of him before I randomly stumbled across them playing with a dog in a issue I read. When I made mention of him by referring to him as a "random dog", the reaction I got from one person was "What? You've never heard of the Mutt, Muttski before?"

No. I haven't. 

 

Oh?  I vaguely recall something like that. 

But yeah, I think he was in the pilot episode. Which, incidentally, also had Uncle Chuck on a photo with him and Sonic. 

1 hour ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

 

Though, to be fair, I've only seen a handful of SatAM episodes. I binged all of Sonic Underground, the worst of the Sonic cartoons, though. 

Oh man, seriously?!

I mean, I have the Satam box set, but still. 

 

18 minutes ago, Silvereyes said:

The Satam connections are interesting, mainly because for me I havn't watched Satam in over a decade and really remember very little from it. I think somewhere around issue #45, Lupa and the Wolf Pack are introduced into the comic, with Sonic and Sally already having met them before, with a caption saying Lupa was introduced in Satam, which would imply Satam is canon within the comic, despite issue #50 and Satam's last episode contridicting each other. 

Yeah, it was either 45 or 46. Since that was right before End game, fittingly enough. 

It's Lupe, btw. 

20 minutes ago, Silvereyes said:

 What's even stranger is, sometime between issue #50 and issue #100, there is an issue which is just a retelling of the Satam episode that introduced Lupa. It's the only time they do that, I dunno what happened there, they didn't have a script for that issue and just retold a Satam episode so Lupa was introduced properly into the comic?

 

Oh no it isn't, as the ghost story short with Tails and Antoine was also adapted in a different issue. For some reason. 

 

21 minutes ago, Silvereyes said:

The Satam connections are interesting, mainly because for me I havn't watched Satam in over a decade and really remember very little from it. I think somewhere around issue #45, Lupa and the Wolf Pack are introduced into the comic, with Sonic and Sally already having met them before, with a caption saying Lupa was introduced in Satam, which would imply Satam is canon within the comic, despite issue #50 and Satam's last episode contridicting each other. What's even stranger is, sometime between issue #50 and issue #100, there is an issue which is just a retelling of the Satam episode that introduced Lupa. It's the only time they do that, I dunno what happened there, they didn't have a script for that issue and just retold a Satam episode so Lupa was introduced properly into the comic?

It is interesting how Archie does touch upon the 5 Sonic shows. Early Archie is basically Adventures but with the Freedom Fighters, issues #40ish to Ian Flynn taking over is like an extremely long continuation of Satam, Sonic X and Sonic Boom each got their own books, and Sonic Underground would get featured in one of the Sonic Super Specials.

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9 hours ago, Silvereyes said:

It is interesting how Archie does touch upon the 5 Sonic shows. Early Archie is basically Adventures but with the Freedom Fighters, issues #40ish to Ian Flynn taking over is like an extremely long continuation of Satam, Sonic X and Sonic Boom each got their own books, and Sonic Underground would get featured in one of the Sonic Super Specials.

I'll always say Archie's greatest strength was in finding ways to harmonize the elements of the shows and games into one, like a melting pot. 

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So here's an interesting question: Given his connections, do you think Mr. Penders wanted to bring Naugus in for a while?

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On ‎6‎/‎9‎/‎2019 at 3:55 PM, Dr. Detective Mike said:

Issue 35 - Ring of Truth

If anyone knows what the point of this was or what they were trying to do, can you please be so kind as to let me know? Just in case it actually doesn’t lead to anything which… it very well might not. 

Yay! Someone else made it to #35. Gotta love how trippy it is. If nothing else that One Billionth ring turns out to be a nifty McGuffin on occasion. 

On ‎6‎/‎9‎/‎2019 at 6:15 PM, DabigRG said:

oh, is this where they come from? I thought they were introduced much later, for some reason.

Combots? I want to say they're more commonly employed by Robo-Robotnik rounds about issues 75 to 100.

 

27 minutes ago, DabigRG said:

So here's an interesting question: Given his connections, do you think Mr. Penders wanted to bring Naugus in for a while?

What connections? and bring in what way? He never struck me as a character Ken had any interest in... 

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29 minutes ago, Cuz said:

 

Combots? I want to say they're more commonly employed by Robo-Robotnik rounds about issues 75 to 100.

 

Yeah, that's what I'm thinking of.

29 minutes ago, Cuz said:

What connections? and bring in what way? He never struck me as a character Ken had any interest in... 

With Ben Hurst.

As you may recall, Naugus wasn't in the comic until Issue 53, though a character named Ixis is mentioned by issue 40 something.

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Depends when that connection was established? I'd kind of like to know.

I know he worked with Hurst on a movie pitch, the SatAM box art, and I'd speculate they may of been working together as early as Underground given Athair made the cut. 

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31 minutes ago, Ernest the Panda said:

Athair was a Mike Gallagher character, not Penders’.

I'm aware, but it puts Hurst in Penders' vicinity as early as Underground's production that's '98-9'ish.

Unless the movie pitch was earlier it's the furthest back I can track Hurst working with *anyone* with Archie!Sonic connections. 

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When did Archie start to directly reference characters "getting laid", or having intercourse?

It's bizarre to me that this stuff was going on while I was playing my SEGA Genesis, obliviously running Sonic through loops and destroying badniks. 

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Ben Hurst and Ken Penders did not end their partnership on the best of terms, and its still shameful of Ken whenever he badmouths Hurst on Twitter knowing dam wel he cant defend himself anymore and with Ken's art on the Satam box it all Just leaves a bad taste in my mouth.

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Issue 36 - Heart of Darkness

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Holy moly. What a cover. Jesus. 

Yeah, as far as the covers are concerned, we're out of the AoSth tone zone. 

The books themselves still have that flare about them though, but things are ramping up bit by bit. I'm literally bearing witness to the comic's transformation towards something more serious. This is surreal.

I say that but immediately the comic begins with the lame "It's not a bird or a plane" Superman joke when this horseman of the apocalypse is shown riding through space on their monitor. Although, things quickly get serious when Rotor explains that this isn't space but the Zone of Silence. He explains that he sent a camera in there and when Sonic points out that he's been there before and that it didn't look like this, Rotor tells him that he actually wasn't in the Zone of Silence but a different dimension that's different from the dimension that isn't the zone of silence... so another, another dimension, basically. Robotnik called it The Void when Sonic was trapped in there so they figure there has to be a reason for the different name. 

Now, again, I haven't seen but a few bits and pieces of SatAM but I'm aware of King Acorn (voiced by Tim Curry) being banished to the Zone of Silence and Sally's quest to recover him. So this thankfully didn't confuse me.

Sally correctly asks what this has to do with the Horseman guy and Rotor says "That's the Million dollar question all by itself!"

... Just say you don't know. Just say you saw a cool dude riding a horse, went "DUUUHHH!" and called everyone over to look at him.

Anyway, magnetic fields or whatever from Robotropolis start to make everything shake and Rotor deduces that Robotnik is doing something that's having an effect on the Zone of Silence, where King Acorn was stashed. Sonic asks Sally if he can go check it out. Sally says yes on the condition that he doesn't rush into anything but Sonic's left a cloud of dust behind, having rushed off the instant he heard the words "Permission Granted". Which is good. I like the idea that he'll fuck up.

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When he gets to Robotnik's lair he does the Sonic Lost World thing of destroying Eggman's machine because it's something Eggman wouldn't want destroyed. A leeway of thought is necessary for a villain who doesn't want to outright destroy the world Sonic... just saying. Anyway, Robotnik calls Sonic names and then we get a very... complicated explanation of what he was trying to do.

So... Robotnik found some old plans from his old mentor, Kodos who was going to overthrow King Acorn. Robotnik eventually did that himself by tossing his ass into the Zone of Silence. But oh-no, turns out that a mysterious zone of mystical energy is unpredictable and it'll start spewing magic kamehamehas at you when you're in your lab. So, Eggman fires an energy freeze ray at it to calm it down and then was in the middle of trying to destroy the zone entirely when Sonic burst apart the machine that did it. He says the only way to fix it and stop the zone from destroying Mobius is to use his patent pending Zone Inhibitor, which looks like a mix between a grenade and a can of mountain dew.

Also, he was totally planning on leaving the King there so he could die when the zone is destroyed but tells Sonic that if he helps him, the king will be brought back. Now, he's clearly lying but what gets me is that he doesn't ever explain what the Zone Inhibitor actually does. And to be honest I'm still not sure what it does even after Sonic uses it but we'll get to that in a bit.

Robotnik tells Sonic that he needs to fix this for him. Sonic doesn't trust him but then Robotnik is like "But I like totally would never rely on you normally" and Sonic's like "Good point." Thankfully, he's not that fucking stupid as when he brings the inhibitor back to Sally he suggests they chuck it out... which isn't exactly smart either BUT it shows that he didn't just blindly believe Eggman there.

Now here's really where I get confused because the actions of these characters start to... bother me a bit? 

Sally says they have no choice but to go into the Zone of Silence and rescue her dad. Now, this is said to be something they've tried and failed at doing plenty of times before. Earlier, they made it seem like Sonic getting out of the Zone of Silence was extremely hard to do by having it be revealed that the zone he was trapped in during an earlier issue (The Void) was too easy to escape... so... I'm assuming this is like... a big deal that they're going in there right?

The reason I'm confused is because they make it seem like exiting the zone is super hard to do but have made multiple trips regardless. So, do they just mean it's hard to do when you don't have someone staying on the other end to fire a grappling hook at you? Cause that's what happens. 

They go into the zone and fucking immediately come across the Horseman dude. He attacks them (as you do) and then Sonic makes quick work of his men. Then he gets ready to strike at Sonic but Sally (for some reason) is like "NOOOO~!" and jumps at the guy which knocks his helmet off and SURPRISE, it's King Acorn himself!

I legitimately didn't see that coming but at the same time I didn't care so...

BUT, it must have been quite the surprise for those reading it back then. King Acorn clearly doesn't know who they are and in a really dramatic moment is about to skewer Sally when Sonic swims to Eggman's soda-can grenade and sets it off.

Now, this also confuses me. Robotnik said that this thing was supposed to fix the problem of the Zone of Silence going haywire and, possibly, destroying the entire world. All it looked like it did was blow all the Freedom Fighters away from the crazy squirrel riding a horse. Then Rotor shows up at the Zone's entrance and fires a grappling hook that pulls them back into their home dimension.

We end on them lamenting the fact that they failed like a bunch of failures who fail. 

The last panel is the king's mask floating in the Zone of Silence. 

So, to be honest, I'm really confused on quite a bit here. Robotnik was trying to destroy the zone, said that his energy inhibitor would fix the problem and told Sonic to set it off, Sonic sets it off, and it just blows them all back. I'm guessing the effects of what that thing does will be revealed in a later issue... I think? I hope so. Otherwise it feels like a weird thing for Robotnik to lie about. He clearly was lying about it being able to help them get the king back but you'd think his alternative to that would be something horrible. Maybe it still is and I'm jumping the gun a bit?

Issue 36 - A Sense of History Part III                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                             

This was stupid. 

Knuckles… is STILL… looking… for the… god... damn… Chaotix. He’s still telling this story to nobody and saying it out loud as well. We’re back to Penders drawing this so obviously the art got worse. Though, to be honest, the art for the other story wasn’t a ton better either.

Anyway, the bulk of the story is the fallout from what happened with Dimitri and I gotta say this is some looney tunes, Elmer Fudd shit right here. Except unintentionally funny.

So Dimitri is completely green energy now and he’s got Edmund and the judge chained to the walls of his new fortress in Mount Fate. Yup. Mount Fate wasn’t just a pillar of rock but an entire evil villain lair he created with the wave of his hand. Impressive.

He goes off about how he’s gonna conquer the world and the two shackled echidnas are like “You’re MAD! MAD I TELL YOU!” and Dimitri’s like “Cool story bro. Anyway, I’m the mightiest echidna in the universe. A living Chaos Emerald if you will.”

He then tells the two of them that he’s somehow already just taken over Echidnapolis. He literally says “Already, Echidnapolis has fallen” and we’re treated to a scene of robots enslaving everyone and making them push minecarts full of, what looks like, cocaine.

One of the robots even has a whip. And it’s funny as hell.

He said that this happened because of a “Subtle re-programming of our mecha-nauts command code”. When he did that? I dunno. I guess he’s so powerful he can re-program robots with the flick of his hand too. Why not? Even still, that doesn’t explain how the city was overthrown so fast as to have his new regime already established. You’d think they’d cut to the BEGINNING of chaos unfolding over there but nope. They’re already in chains and being forced to work. If a time skip happened then how long were Edmund and the judge chained to the wall up to this point?  And why would Dimitri just now be explaining all of this to them and doing so in a way that makes it seem like his turn to evil literally just happened?

But wait, it gets dumber.

Dimitri plans on using the island to travel around the world to spread his new world order to everyone. The image used to depict this isn’t of him using his awesome new power to make the island move. No, no. 

Instead, two echidna workers are shown tying sails and masts to the island so that it resembles a ship! 

When I made the comment about “steering” the island earlier I was joking! He’s actually making an evil villain speech about tying sails to the island and riding it around like a pirate ship to spread enlightenment. 

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It’s hilarious. 

Yes, it gets dumber.

For no reason, Dimitri fires a blast at the wall where Edmund and the judge are hanging and cackles saying “SEE?! ONLY MY FORTRESS CAN WITHSTAND MY POWER BECAUSE I MADE IT WITH MY POWER!” which is the perfect reason to explain why you fired an energy blast at the walls of your own lair.

The wall crumbles and then breaks apart the hinges of metal keeping Edmund and the judge strapped to the wall and they break free. At first I thought Dimitir was SO stupid that he was the reason the wall cracked but no… apparently it was fire ants.

Fire ants ate through the foundation of the tower and THE ENTIRE THING COLLAPSES AND DIMITRI GETS CRUSHED!

For some reason his power doesn’t work against fire ants… I think? I’m not sure. Apparently these fire ants are made of literal magic because they’ve managed to ruin the foundation of this entire tower in a manner of… I don’t know how long. It couldn’t have been very long.

Again, if a ton of time has passed then this scene of Dimitri speaking to Edmund and the judge makes little sense. If this is happening immediately after then… literally how?!

Is this another thing I’m going to have to wait for the reveal of? Edmund and the judge treat it as though they were just normal ants. I’m guessing the point was that… nature saved them? 

… Oh God… THAT was the point wasn’t it… oh my… oh my God…

Th-The fucking judge is like, “Yeah Science sucks. It turns your brother evil and made us arrogant and stupid Edmund.” So… they do the UN-stupid thing of completely returning to nature. I mean… I suppose learning to bring nature back into your lives is… I mean… the way this was explained to me was that the Echidnas were just always super smart and highly advanced for their time. They weren’t in tune with nature at all so… this decision is quite the LEAP when it comes to the status of life that they’ve been accustomed too for so long. If they’re going to do this they’re going to have to calmly and carefully ease into it by mulling over what about their science they deem necessary to keep and what to leave behind. The convincing it’s going to take to have the people wean themselves away from science to fully embrace a primitive nature life-style is going to take careful-!

OR  WE COULD JUST USE TNT TO BLOW UP OUR FUCKING CITY!

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What…?

??????????

WHAT?!

… S-So then… Edmund like… he takes a pledge to watch over the last emerald they have and that has led to… I’m seeing 17 Echidna heads on this page so 17 Generations of Echidna guardians watching over this one Chaos Emerald.

I wanted to give points for creativity for Penders making it so that generations ago, the echidnas were actually way MORE advanced than the stuff we saw on Angel Island but… no. This… this makes no sense. I do largely feel that troupe is silly in the best of times so I just can’t…

So we cut back to the present where Knuckles is remembering The Grand Conservatory. It’s a place full of the leftover technology that his ancestors couldn’t part with (because OF COURSE they couldn’t) and they buried it under Mount Fate. So Knuckles heads there while Mount Fate smiles and laughs at him, looking like that creepy grandma that wanted chocolate from that one Spongebob episode.

So... that's the issue.

Holy fuck, this was bad.

Like... I'm... actually kind of at a loss for words right now. A part of me wants to wait and see if what I just read will have some sort of explanation or something that'll make that make sense but I feel like... it won't.

The amount of ellipsis I'm using is probably too damn high but it's appropriate because I have no clue what that was. Was this a first draft? It had to be, right?

Minor Tails Mini-Series Thoughts

I just re-read Issue 3 of the Tails mini-series to get a refresher on the young boy's meeting with the Ancient Walkers. I completely forgot about Knuckles' great grandfather Athair and the prophecy surrounding Tails. It's... going to be interesting seeing where that leads me when I get to it. I'm only familiar with Turbo Tails from the A.D.A.M storyline but I'm guessing the first one is the fabled Titan Tails I've seen memed to death. 

Also, Tails gets humiliated and kicked to shit in that too. I really like how the old comics just liked beating up the characters for easy slapstick. 

Anyway, I decided to do so because the Ancient Walkers have been becoming more and more prominent lately and I think we're nearing some sort of plot development involving them. Not too sure though. Also, Athair spoke about how dumb the echidnas were for abandoning the land, building sky-scrappers, and barely catching that a white comet was going to destroy them. It was also stated that the emeralds have power in them enough to drive a person mad which might explain the Dimitri situation a tad more. Just a tad though.

 

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On 6/10/2019 at 10:22 PM, Cuz said:

Depends when that connection was established? I'd kind of like to know.

I know he worked with Hurst on a movie pitch, the SatAM box art, and I'd speculate they may of been working together as early as Underground given Athair made the cut. 

Fair point.

It's just interesting that not that long off SATAM being cancelled, Mr. Penders was working towards a finale for the comic that involves the Wolf Pack right before and mentions both Naugus by his original name & the Void as a separate thing before that.

21 hours ago, Ernest the Panda said:

Athair was a Mike Gallagher character, not Penders’.

Athair is just a mystery in general.

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14 hours ago, BaronGrackle said:

When did Archie start to directly reference characters "getting laid", or having intercourse?

It's bizarre to me that this stuff was going on while I was playing my SEGA Genesis, obliviously running Sonic through loops and destroying badniks. 

Most of the infamous stuff rolls in with Ken's Mobius 25 years series. That's like #131. So, not until the early 2000's.  It's more the Dreamcast and Gamecube's generation. 

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23 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

When I made the comment about “steering” the island earlier I was joking! He’s actually making an evil villain speech about tying sails to the island and riding it around like a pirate ship to spread enlightenment

Funny thing is, there is a 70s Doctor Who story written by Douglas Adams about a pirate using a planet like a space ship to blow up planets for their rare minerals. Ofcourse in that story, it was meant to be deliberately absurd, whereas with Penders writing, it always comes across as everything is meant to be taken super seriously, regardless of how utterly daft the story is.

I think you'll enjoy the Knuckles solo series. The thing with the Knuckles solo series is that every story does try to add a bit of lore to the Knucklesverse of Archie Sonic, with more details about Knuckles' various ancestors and the history of the Floating Island. The problem is, every new revelation just adds more and more questions. The revelations don't create plot holes, so much as constantly making every Echidna who isn't Knuckles look like an idiot.

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Mini-Series: Sonic's Friendly Nemesis Knuckles 

I've decided to just do all three of the Knuckles mini-series issues in one post since I don't want to waste time giving them all their individual posts anyway. I'm on the cusp of reaching the 40s, which means the infamous Endgame I've heard so much about is just over the horizon. I'm rarin' to get to it but first, more convoluted Knuckles nonsense. Or maybe it'll be good. We shall see.

Issue #1 - Rites of Passage

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The issue starts and immediately I was impressed by the art. It's the best this book's ever looked up to this point, bar none. Same goes for the coloring. I quickly checked to make note of who it was and the credit for Pencils goes literally to a person named Art Mawhinney. Inks go to Harvo and coloring goes to Kyle Hunter. The script was written by Ken Penders and Mike Kanterovich. Oh boy.

The issue begins with a surprisingly well-written passage detailing what's going on before we jump into our story. It's still interesting to me that Knuckles is guarding just a single Chaos Emerald. It was the same in Sonic Underground too, where he had that pet dinosaur. I still don't get why. I know the emeralds were in the first two games and the Master Emerald's appearance was played up as a big deal when Knuckles made his debut. This is still very odd.

Anyway, Knuckles has gone underneath Mount Fate to discover the chamber where the old stashed away Echidna technology was stored. It's surrounded by booby traps both ridiculous and exotic (the book's words, not mine) reminiscent of Indiana Jones except way more high tech. Knuckles goes through it with ease, spewing nonsense from his mouth that doesn't match the well written passage from before.

"They've thrown in everything but the kitchen sink! But the one thing I won't throw in... IS THE TOWEL!"

Blegh.

He spews puns to himself then asks himself why he's there. Then he recounts the story of why he's there to nobody, once again speaking out-loud to himself right after asking himself a question he knew the answer to.

After being chased by the Indiana Jones boulder, he makes it into a room where he finds a plasma gun and decides to take it with him because why not? Turns out Knuckles was packing long since Shadow did. It's probably why he tossed Shadow's gun away in LEGO dimensions. He knew better. Either way, he uses the gun to burn through a steel door and continues on to the sound of a voice that's seemingly taunting him. However, it turns out it wasn't a taunt but a hardy welcome! He enters the next room and wouldn't you know it, Archimedes is there with Charmy, Espio, Mighty, and Vector. They're all happily eating food and being treated as guests! What a shock. (I'm not shocked at all.)

Knuckles demands answers and the fire-ant provides them by showing off his powers of teleportation with blue smoke and fire breath. Well now. The fire-ants from the Dimitri origin weren't shown to be quite like this. Had they been this way I may have believed they could take down Mount Fate.

Speaking of which, during all of this, Mount Fate just randomly explodes and a glowing green figure exits from it. While these pages went on, the bottom panel would show the glowing green figure hovering through the area until it reached the room where everyone was and revealed himself as Dimitri, now referring to himself as  ENERJAK!

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I've reached the first appearance of Enerjak! Wow! My first Archie comic was the one where Knuckles took off his helmet and he himself was revealed to be the new Enerjak. I almost want to be nostalgic about it but unfortunately, that's being bogged down by how I'm unable to process how this sequence of events makes any sense whatsoever.

I have SEVERAL questions.

1. Knuckles says that Dimitri was done in when Mount Fate collapsed on him. Why the fuck would Mount Fate collapsing on someone who absorbed the power of 11 chaos emeralds and dying be something that ANYONE believed?

2. Dimitri himself states that it's ridiculous that Mount Fate collapsing on him could get rid of someone who absorbed the power of 11 Chaos Emeralds. So then why the fuck did it take this dude 17 GENERATIONS before he randomly blew apart the ruins of Mount Fate and floated his way into this chamber?

3. If all Dimitri wants is conquest of the planet then why did he break out NOW? Could he do that at anytime? If so... why NOW?! 

4. He's got a new suit and a his echidna hair looks like really harsh looking coils. It looks cool and menacing but... I gotta ask... why does he look like this now? Where did he get that outfit? Was there a evil energy echidna Demi-God shopping mall underneath all those boulders? Did he...make it himself somehow?

So much of this doesn't make sense.

Anyway, Dimitri freezes everyone and banishes Knuckles and Archimedes to the Shadow Realm some random desert. 

Issue #2 - Rites of Passage Part II

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Actually, its Sandopolis. Neat.

Some props are in order here actually. Not a lot but some.

Turns out the ants tearing apart Mount Fate actually did have more merit to it than previously thought... though the explanation is still silly, it's at least a plausible explanation by the standards of a goofy Sonic the Hedgehog comic. Archimedes explains that those fire-ants from the past were his people and the flashback now shows them with a more dignified, anthropomorphic look. The ants have looked after the asses of the echidnas for generations. Why? I dunno. I guess they're just that nice. They not only helped lift the ground so that the island could help float off from Mobius properly (badass) but they tore apart Mount Fate on purpose and got the rocks to crush Dimitri when he went all psycho-crazy.

Now, this doesn't answer any of the other questions I asked about the situation at hand but ONE question from an older post was indeed answered. For that I give props. Well done when it comes to that. 

Anyway, Archimedes, because ants look after echidnas, was actually testing Knuckles to see if he was smart enough and good enough to find the Chaotix. Then Enerjak showed up and did his evil bad stuff. Still no explanation on why he waited THOUSANDS of years to break out and do this. Is the comic trying to suggest that when Mount Fate collapsed, it killed him but it took generations before he rose again? What a sucky all-powerful being. He didn't even come close to beating Jesus' record of 3 days.

The rest of the issue is just Knuckles and Archimedes trekking through the desert while Enerjak goes off and creates an evil dark version of the old Echindapolis. He calls it Nekronopolis.

Despite the weird name, the concept of Enerjak creating his own city that's supposed to be a dark reflection of history off the heels of the collapse of Echidnapolis  is actually pretty cool. I like it a lot. I could even see it as an unsettling level in a video game. Imagine traveling to Silver's future and visiting the ruins of Station Square and Tails Workshop on a dark and hazy night. Wouldn't that just send chills up your spine?

Knuckles and Archimedes defeat the giant blue sand worm from Sonic Lost World, are guided by Mufasa the Echidna to an Oasis where they get some water and food in them before it mystically disappears, find Nekronopolis, sneak into the city, and immediately get ambushed by robots. Archimedes is chewing Knuckles out a lot through all of this, fancying himself Knuckles' teacher no doubt. They manage to crush the robots under a stone door and reach a chamber where Knuckles gets socked by GASP... the Chaotix? They've been hypnotized and now work for Enerjak. Oh noes~!

Meh. Seen it too much. Mammoth Mogul does something far more interesting with hypnotized minions down the line than simply sicking them on the hero of this arc.

Issue #3 - Rites of Passage Part III

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One thing to note right off the bat is that the Chaotix are hypnotized to be Enerjak's mindless minions but unlike the end of the last issue, their eyes don't reflect that anymore. They look normal now which threw me off a bit but I do kind of appreciate it. It's not often I see evil hypnosis presented in a way that sees no obvious change to the way the characters look. 

Anyway, they fight and Knuckles and Archimedes easily win. So then Enerjak just comes in and pulls a Caesar Clown by taking the air away and making them pass out. It's AFTER he does this that he decides to explain to him, and the audience, what happened to the floating island all those years ago. You see he and his brother Edmund created a machine called the Chaos Syphon to extract the energy of the- wait. You know all this already? Well, of course you do because this is the fifth time it's been re-explained. It's the third time within this mini-series that this same history lesson has been explained! WE GOT IT!

Also Enerjak explains the manner of his death. "But I did not die! For untold generations I lay in utter blackness--until the time was right for my rebirth and with my renewed life-force I emerged free to conquer a world and beyond!"

So, it actually does sound like they ARE going for the whole death and rebirth thing... I think. This is... a little better but the fact that a bunch of falling rocks 'killed' or incapacitated a dude who absorbed the power of ELEVEN chaos emeralds (four more emeralds than seven!) for GENERATIONS is still too much of a stretch. It really does make his power seem almost infantile. That said, it does somewhat justify the new look. If this is supposed to be a rebirth than I guess I can see why his echidna hair looks like coils now. It doesn't explain where he got the outfit from but I guess it's not important. Maybe eleven chaos emeralds gives you the powers of Piccolo's clothes beam.

Anyway, Enerjak, like the power-hungry idiot he has become, just rants at Knuckles and Archimedes through bafflingly superfluous gloating and flings energy at the two of them a couple times to get them to flop onto the floor a bit. He's straight up attacking them but he's not killing them, all the while ranting about how uber powerful he is. This gives Archimedes ample time to use his ant feelers to contact his brethren. Enerjak is busy monologuing and isn't finishing them off with his supposed limitless power because, I guess, he really wants to see Knuckles cry or something.

So then Archimedes just makes Knuckles and himself disappear with his teleportation powers.

Fucking oops.

We cut back to the Chaotix who are playing poker with one another when they overhear Enerjak commanding them to capture Knuckles and Archimedes. This scene again tricked my mind into thinking the Chaotix were un-hypnotized by this point. Their eyes are not only normal but they're doing something as mundane as playing poker with each other. But then Charmy's like "The Master Commands!" and flies off to do his bidding while the others follow. It's very interesting how this hypnosis is being portrayed. I like it.

Knuckles and Archimedes sneak around the base before bursting through a vent and literally landing right on top of Enerjak. Archimedes tells Knuckles not just to stand on him, but to cuff him. Cuff him with what? I dunno. Either way, Enerjak gets up and knocks them back. His mouth looks like that of a chicken going "BUCKACK!" so that's funny.

They're literally right back where they started from which means the only point to escaping was most likely to give the ants that Archimedes called time to create a hole in the ground for the two of them to escape through. Enerjak, with limitless power at his disposal, idiotically decides not to use any of it like he was before and instead engages in a fist-fight with Knuckles... which he pretty much loses.

I mean, he gets knocked back and then Knuckles and Archimedes escape. Then some rockets latch onto the evil tower and it launches into space, carrying Enerjak off into orbit and beyond. Knuckles lands on the ground safely. The Chaotix are no longer hypnotized. Everyone's happy... but wait? Where'd that mysterious oasis come from? Also, the dark evil city just disappeared. Also, the ants didn't latch those rockets to the evil tower and make it fly into space. What gives?

Well the heroes say "Fuck it. Who cares?" and walk off into the distance.

We then cut to Knuckles' father, Locke, in a robe, watching this all on an advanced computer monitor. He talks about how great it is that Knuckles is friends with a fire-ant, how his quick thinking allowed him to latch the rockets onto the evil lair and send Enerjak to space, and of course, he was the one who somehow made that mystical oasis appear. With technology... somehow.

The last shot is of Enerjak's evil lair flying through space while evil laughter from inside rings out. Apparently Enerjak's god-like powers allow him to carry the sound of his laughter through space but not the ability to simply fly his dumbass out of the tower when it starts blasting off. Real impressed with these shitty powers so far, I gotta say...

So, did I enjoy that? Actually, yeah.

It was a nice enough story that actually did it's best to cover a good number of its bases and also had a point. The standing of Knuckles' character here tells a story of a guy who was tested by Archimedes and watched over by his father to see if he could break out of being a loner and adapt to new situations. Enerjak thought Knuckles wouldn't be able to but he did. Enerjak couldn't break away from who he was and thus wasn't able to experience victory. And who he is, is a huge fucking idiot.

I gotta say, the one thing that disappointed me a bit was how some of the Enerjak stuff panned out. I feel like for his first foray into these comics, he'd have something a bit more impressive and devastating to do. In my mind, I always imagined the first coming of Enerjak to be something that could bring about the apocalypse or something considering the way future stories with Enerjak go and how much the original one's legacy was spoken of with such reverence. He's just a big oaf here though. 

Oh well. I still had fun. Plus, maybe that comes later. He's still Dimitri-Enerjak and not an Echidna head in a ball.

Onward.

On 6/12/2019 at 2:28 AM, Cuz said:

Most of the infamous stuff rolls in with Ken's Mobius 25 years series. That's like #131. So, not until the early 2000's.  It's more the Dreamcast and Gamecube's generation. 

Yeah, I definitely haven't gotten to any of that stuff yet. I'm witnessing the transition though. The covers especially are giving off the vibe of something increasingly sinister and gritty.

 

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On 5/27/2019 at 4:43 PM, Dr. Detective Mike said:

Issue 34 - A Sense of History - Part One

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This shit is hilarious. 

So the actual story that Penders wrote for Issue 34 is this one and it should come as no surprise that it's foppish, strange, weird, blatant echidna wank but there is a bit of an adorableness to it too, if I'm being honest. Seeing the primitive foundation behind the Echidna shit after all these years of being aware of the nonsense but never fully experiencing the nexus from whence it came puts this in a very interesting perspective for me.

I was kind of under the impression that it started off simple and over time it got more and more complicated until it folded in on itself but looking at this... no, not really. Right out of the gate this is bonkers. It's so at odds with what Knuckles is and turned out to be today that I almost can't comprehend it. 

I know this was before Sonic Adventure but would this really be the expected trajectory of Knuckles' story just looking at his situation from Sonic and Knuckles? It's hard getting into the mind of someone from a time where I was too young to even comprehend what a Sonic was but I'm having trouble following the flow of logic. Maybe it's supposed to be a situational irony where they ended up being known for the exact opposite of where they began... I think?

The story is that badly drawn, weirdly proportioned, lanky Knuckles is looking for Archimedes; the ant guy with the hat. There had been a few interludes with the Chaotix and this guy for a couple of issues but they weren't worth mentioning because they get brought up for no reason and nothing happens. They exist just to make sure the reader knows that this is a story that's indeed happening in the background. This time they're telling an actual full-fledged story though.

 

To be just a wee tad fair to Mr. Penders here, I think that the Echidnas were always said to be a civilization that was prospering for it's time before suddenly vanishing for reasons no one accurately remembers. He just ranaway with that and fell into "ancient technology is better than modern technology" territory, among other things.

Granted, I realize the American and Japanese manuals for Sonic 3 & Knuckles might say completely different things about them, but I seem to recall that being the general idea.

On 5/27/2019 at 4:43 PM, Dr. Detective Mike said:

 

Also, they're the Jedi Council.

Image result for jedi council gif

The Council has decided. We're fucked.

 

Holy shit. And you haven't even gotta to what came after that.

Which makes me realize...did he actually predate the prequels?

 

Also, gotta love the still image of alien monks in clunky little chairs with hundreds of flying cars in the background.

On 5/27/2019 at 4:43 PM, Dr. Detective Mike said:

 

The island used to be in the ground, which is fine. Should the island have a history before it became the floating island at all, that's the easiest and simplest explanation. The next scene shows two echidna scientists talking in the worst written scene of the issue where one female science girl is bemused that all they learned about space is that there's nothing there and that she wishes something spectacular would happen. Then, in a not so subtle bit of extreme, in your face foreshadowing, the weird male doctor says the ancient echidna proverb of "Be careful what you wish for... you just might get it."

And then, for no reason, he turns to her, grabs her by the arms, leers into her eyes and shouts, "OR EVEN WORSE...IT MIGHT GET US!"

Echidna-Doc is a bit of a psycho. 

 

 

Next the echidna's gather together where in the... ... "Hall of Learning" (Bleh...) the dire announcement is made.

Oh shoot, I actually do remember that.

And yes, that name makes no sense.

On 5/27/2019 at 4:43 PM, Dr. Detective Mike said:

The brilliant plan that they propose is a massive search for the rarest of gems, Chaos Emeralds. All of them are green and there are a dozen of them. Now this is something I had a bit of knowledge about because of the A.D.A.M story that happens later but the full details of it elude me still. I'm sure I'll learn the whole story eventually but for now, I'm left wondering why this was the course of action taken concerning the emeralds in the first place. There weren't a ton of them in the games. The difference between then and now was that there was one less emerald. 

Whatever though. It was probably just a spark of creative liberty... I guess.

I think it came about because the games didn't really emphasis there only being the same 7 each time and having to account for them showing up in two different locations.

Them being all green is likely just a coloring error that stuck.

On 5/27/2019 at 4:43 PM, Dr. Detective Mike said:

 

Well, that... happens and the island floats off as the comet strikes the ground where the island used to be. I suppose she calculated that as the planet rotated the comet would strike their city at the exact moment they were in its way. So I guess it just floats away? If it doesn't then how do they steer the island? Does the city have a giant wheel in the mayor's office?

They don't, as far as I remember.

The Floating Island's just about always just orbitted wherever it wanted in any continuity.

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1 hour ago, DabigRG said:

I think it came about because the games didn't really emphasis there only being the same 7 each time and having to account for them showing up in two different locations.

Them being all green is likely just a coloring error that stuck.

That's silly if that's at all true. There were only six at the start anyway and as video games centered around cartoon animals, providing an explanation for why they would show up in different locations by saying there's just a ton of them when it feels like it'd be obvious they're the same ones sounds like a level of overcorrecting that just wouldn't happen. 

I have a hard time believing it was a coloring error that stuck and not something done deliberately. That's way too strange a way to handle an oversight like that. Especially considering why the emeralds go in terms of the story. I recall during the A.D.A.M story that the other colors of the emeralds are indigenous to their own planets and apparently only Mobius has green ones. I'm not sure where in the story this becomes prevalent as I haven't gotten there yet (and I also might be remembering wrong) but if all that stemmed from a coloring error then I don't see why they couldn't have just fixed it. Why would it need to stick?

Also, it doesn't really explain why the choice was to switch it to Knuckles guarding a Chaos Emerald. I know the Master Emerald wasn't something that came about in Sonic Adventure. It had to have been that in Sonic and Knuckles right? 

I'm not saying they're wrong for going this direction, I'm just confused by why they did. I don't know if I believe it was because of a coloring error. 

 

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On 6/5/2019 at 1:11 AM, Dr. Detective Mike said:

Finding all the Chaos Emeralds in the above comic cover was a fun little scavenger hunt. Giving one to Eggman was basically a freebie.

Special - Super Sonic Vs. Hyper Knuckles - Crash of the Titans

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Interlude - Sonic Triple Trouble

A brief summary of that special shows a Chaos Emerald having been split in half (PPPFT! Yeah this was the past alright) and crash landing like a meteorite in two different locations. Sonic goes after one while Knuckles ends up seeing one land near his island. Both Sonic and Knuckles end up getting knocked out in hilariously pathetic ways. Knuckles purposefully smashes his face against the side of the mountain (because that's what he did in the 2D games at the time) and then a rock falls on his head and he falls to his doom. Sonic finds his half of the Chaos Emerald but gets shot with a "Neural Disruptor Gun" by Nack the Weasel and then gets tied up. It's funny because Nack brings Sonic along and treats him like a stiff wooden board or like some kind of luggage. Also, this is Nack's first appearance. 

 

 

On 6/5/2019 at 1:11 AM, Dr. Detective Mike said:

Oh and the Ancient Walkers stole the emerald. Dun Dun Dun. Whatever.

Now back to your regularly scheduled program.

So yeah, nothing in there indicates that he'd think Knuckles would willingly cut a deal with Robotnik. The two of them worked together to stop Robotnik in the very issue he's referencing and Sonic himself states that he never leaves his island. I don't mind them hating each other but I need an actual reason. This just feels contrived.

Then the book IMMEDIATELY ruins it when Sonic shows up, out of nowhere, and again FOR NO REASON, just PUNCHES KNUCKLES IN THE FACE!

FOR NO REASON!!!

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WHAT THE FUCK IS WRONG WITH YOU?!

This isn't even a "This is a different version of Sonic" kind of problem. He's just being a tremendous asshole!

They try to make a joke out of the fact that he deliberately went against what Princess Sally asked him NOT to do by having Sonic take out a piece of paper and read off a decree where he promises to engage in civil discussion and Knuckles rightfully punches Sonic in the face through the paper. So that was good.

As for this special... its okay? Honestly, it's a pretty shameless excuse to have Sonic and Knuckles fight each other but Knuckles was clearly the protagonist of this whole thing. He had a mission of sound mind and reason and he set out to accomplish it. Had the two of them actually TALKED then Knuckles could have explained to Batman Sonic that his island was in danger of falling should the one emerald he has crack in half. However, Sonic didn't want to listen and instead just assumed Superman Knuckles was up to no good and rushed to the scene specifically to beat him up like a bully. But they both stopped fighting when they found out their mommies had the same name.

Despite Knuckles never crossing paths with Robotnik or doing anything to elicit proof of Sonic's extremely irrational assertion that Knuckles was evil, he turns Super and tries to brutalize him. Sonic's the fucking villain of this issue. At least Knuckles, as the hero, technically accomplished his task. Though, it's still kind of suckish that Sonic had SEVEN emeralds and basically got the zone to explode due to their pointless fight. 

You know, maybe this issue isn't okay. Maybe it's just outright bad. 

 

Yeah, I don't know what it is (outside of maybe a weird carryover from SATAM), but Sonic was often really quick to get aggressive in early Archie.

Like, I know people give the character guff nowadays because of Mr. Penders, but at least Geoffrey generally warranted what conflict or disagreements came with him.

On 6/5/2019 at 1:11 AM, Dr. Detective Mike said:

Sally tells Sonic to go after him and makes a weird comment about spending time with Knuckles in the summer. Sonic gets concerned and she tells him to not worry about it. Secretly they're both thinking "He cares"/"She cares" which... is kinda cute I guess. It's a little hard to care though when Sonic's being such a bitch.

Also there's this really... kind of stupid, narration box underneath the part where Sally is telling Sonic not to ask about her past with Knuckles. It says "I'll bet you want to know more about this tantalizing tidbit! Write "Sonic Grams" - Scott

I'm glad this Sonic Grams thing changed because this continued idea of introducing stuff in your story and then... not following up on it unless people write in asking for a follow-up is dumb. Apparently, Rotor's family is still floating on that ice-block, hypnotized, at this very moment...

 

On 6/5/2019 at 1:11 AM, Dr. Detective Mike said:

Special - Super Sonic Vs. Hyper Knuckles - Father and Sons

The end of this issue has a story about Knuckles spending time with his father, Locke. I'm familiar with Locke due to them having him around a great deal where I started in my comics journey so seeing him drawn so beefy is weird.

 

Anyway, it's basically just Knuckles recounting the times he spent with his dad. It's fine. It's just one big introspective conversation he's having with himself. His dad left him when he wanders into The Forbidden Zone, claiming it's him answering the calling of his forebears. It just looks like he leaped into a wall of fire to me though.


 

Not to spoil anything for you, or tell you what you might have already figured, but those get explained/elaborated later.

On 6/5/2019 at 1:11 AM, Dr. Detective Mike said:

Sonic gathers 50 rings and seven chaos emeralds (all of them green which... STILL baffles me. I know there was never a time where the emeralds were all green in the games but I'm sure there's a reason...) and Knuckles does pretty much the same. 

Sonic turns into Super Sonic and Knuckles turns into Hyper Knuckles and the two of them fight.

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Now, admittedly, this is actually a rather entertaining fight. I do actually really like the way it's drawn. There's a really metal moment where Knuckles literally rips off a piece of the special zone and smacks Sonic in the face with it. The two then collide and the narration states that "The walls containing the Zone's reality begin warping wildly! The zone can no longer contain itself--it swells--it cracks--IT EXPLODES!!"

That's just what happens. The zone explodes and ejects the two brutes. 

Yeah, I vaguely recall that fight being pretty cool.

 

On 6/5/2019 at 1:11 AM, Dr. Detective Mike said:


Anyway, Knuckles returns to his island and Mighty informs him that SOMEHOW, I don't know how, the fight between Super Sonic and Hyper Sonic is the talk of the primitive, secluded island with no technology. Knuckles holds up a single Chaos Emerald and says the mission was a success.

Yeah, Angel Island actually is fairly populated before the Knuckles comic proper. You may seen this in the Knuckles Chaotix special among other things already, but The Chaotix, Renfield T Rodent, and Catweazle are just among the named denizens.

Which, to be fair, was sorta the case in Sonic & Knuckles anyway, technically.

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1 hour ago, DabigRG said:

Yeah, Angel Island actually is fairly populated before the Knuckles comic proper. You may seen this in the Knuckles Chaotix special among other things already, but The Chaotix, Renfield T Rodent, and Catweazle are just among the named denizens.

Which, to be fair, was sorta the case in Sonic & Knuckles anyway, technically.

I don't remember coming across these two. Did I skip over something?

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9 minutes ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

That's silly if that's at all true. There were only six at the start anyway and as video games centered around cartoon animals, providing an explanation for why they would show up in different locations by saying there's just a ton of them when it feels like it'd be obvious they're the same ones sounds like a level of overcorrecting that just wouldn't happen. 

I have a hard time believing it was a coloring error that stuck and not something done deliberately. That's way too strange a way to handle an oversight like that. Especially considering why the emeralds go in terms of the story. I recall during the A.D.A.M story that the other colors of the emeralds are indigenous to their own planets and apparently only Mobius has green ones. I'm not sure where in the story this becomes prevalent as I haven't gotten there yet (and I also might be remembering wrong) but if all that stemmed from a coloring error then I don't see why they couldn't have just fixed it. Why would it need to stick?

Also, it doesn't really explain why the choice was to switch it to Knuckles guarding a Chaos Emerald. I know the Master Emerald wasn't something that came about in Sonic Adventure. It had to have been that in Sonic and Knuckles right? 

I'm not saying they're wrong for going this direction, I'm just confused by why they did. I don't know if I believe it was because of a coloring error. 

 

Honestly, I think it's due to most of the artists only have loose reference for the games themselves.  Like, they clearly saw some things from the games at the time, but didn't see or maintain them accurately enough.

As for the Master Emerald, it was indeed in Sonic & Knuckles, but much like Angel Island being the collective name, I don't know if it was specifically called that initially.

A fair bit of that was happening at the time. It's easy to look back and say "well obviously," but ya gotta remember that the people working on the comics back then sometimes had sparse reference material and extra wiggle room when making these things depending on both their personal situations and what SEGA actually provided for them.

 

Don't know about the different planets thing being established beforehand, as I admittedly breezed over the Sonic in Space stuff as far as I can remember.

1 minute ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

I don't remember coming across these two. Did I skip over something?

Renfield debuts in the Knuckles Chaotix special, which is also where the Chaotix besides maybe Vector are introduced if I'm not mistaken. So probably.

Catweazle...I don't remember, but he shows up from time to time as just a random talking bird that bothers Knuckles in earlier stories.

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1 hour ago, DabigRG said:

Honestly, I think it's due to most of the artists only have loose reference for the games themselves.  Like, they clearly saw some things from the games at the time, but didn't see or maintain them accurately enough.

As for the Master Emerald, it was indeed in Sonic & Knuckles, but much like Angel Island being the collective name, I don't know if it was specifically called that initially.

A fair bit of that was happening at the time. It's easy to look back and say "well obviously," but ya gotta remember that the people working on the comics back then sometimes had sparse reference material and extra wiggle room when making these things depending on both their personal situations and what SEGA actually provided for them.

But I am keeping that in mind though. I'm just confused by the follow-through here because I'm not sure how these emeralds in particular ended up incorporated the way they were when I haven't come across anything else that doesn't have a clear and obvious explanation for why it's different. If they were given reference to the Chaos Emeralds, which they had to have been for them to be in this book, is it being suggested that they only saw the green one as a reference? It's also fine if the Master Emerald wasn't called the Master Emerald. I did take that into consideration. What's confusing is the fact that they have the floating island set-up but it's just a regular dinky Chaos Emerald that doesn't match the size of the Emerald from that game and also there's a dozen of them for seemingly no reason. 

If they did this because they deliberately wished to be different, than that's fine. However, I don't know if I believe they knew about the floating island, the way Knuckles guards it, but didn't take into account the other stuff because they couldn't gain access to that info. 

I'm still leaning towards this being a conscious decision they made for whatever reason. 

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6 minutes ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

But I am keeping that in mind though. I'm just confused by the follow-through here because I'm not sure how these emeralds in particular ended up incorporated the way they were when I haven't come across anything else that doesn't have a clear and obvious explanation for why it's different. If they were given reference to the Chaos Emeralds, which they had to have been for them to be in this book, is it being suggested that they only saw the green one as a reference? It's also fine if the Master Emerald wasn't called the Master Emerald. I did take that into consideration. What's confusing is the fact that they have the floating island set-up but it's just a regular dinky Chaos Emerald that doesn't match the size of the Emerald from that game and also there's a dozen of them for seemingly no reason. 

If they did this because they deliberately wished to be different, than that's fine. However, I don't know if I believe they knew about the floating island, the way Knuckles guards it, but didn't take into account the other stuff because they couldn't gain access to that info. 

I'm still leaning towards this being a conscious decision they made for whatever reason. 

...oh shit, you did mention there being a dozen, didn't you? 

In that case in particular, the only thing I can guess is that the story revealing that was made before Sonic & Knuckles actually out. 

Otherwise, I earnestly have no clue and creative liberties is the only answer that makes sense. 

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54 minutes ago, DabigRG said:

The Floating Island's just about always just orbitted wherever it wanted in any continuity.

Tad off-topic but I recall Knux could steer the thing in Fleetway. Assaults the Death Egg with it at some point.

 

27 minutes ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

I recall during the A.D.A.M story that the other colors of the emeralds are indigenous to their own planets and apparently only Mobius has green ones. I'm not sure where in the story this becomes prevalent as I haven't gotten there yet (and I also might be remembering wrong) 

(I kind of feel bad talking about events so far a head of your reading, if you'd like me to shut up and wait for you to get there do say so. That said...)

It, practically, never is prevalent to anything to be honest... it only comes up once before the A.D.A.M. story. Sonic chances upon a planet with red emeralds and... funny enough, channels a psycho Super Sonic separate from himself a la Fleetway,  but there's no explanation for them and why they work the way they do is left ambiguous. The revelation of five other colors on five more planets only happens as they're melted down. Outside of that one off, we've just got green chaos emeralds that are about as rare as actual gem stones for most of the book. Ian's "Infinity Crisis" events tend to work that way, take a detail that everyone's written off, or taken for granted, and finally give it some context... and destroy the concept in the very same swoop. Want to know what silly affects those other colors might of had on Sonic? So would I...

That kind of reads like I'm hating on Ian's writing, so let me just clarify that I really do love how he tears down the status quo in suitably epic ways, but it's a double-edged sword when the shakes up start happening too frequently. 

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Issue #37 - The Day Robotropolis Fell

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Oh dear. That's... quite a cover. It's going to be hard to refrain from making jokes about how Sally is naked.

Right off the bat, I have to say that the writing in this issue is very weak. It's so loose it feels like its held together by silly string. This feels like an issue where things are just happening to the characters and they're reacting based on what the plot is calling for. It's not infuriating or anything but these little ticks in the set-up were getting to me after a while but I'll explain that in a bit.

Anyway, the issue starts with Sonic and Sally waiting in a junkyard for Uncle Chuck, who if you'll recall, is an undercover robot dude stuck in Robotropolis. We get our traditional Sonic slapstick moment when Chuck opens the secret door that Sonic was sitting under and launches Sonic into the air where he then lands hard on his butt. It's great.

Chuck leads them to his hidey-hole and shows them seismic waves on a screen. Then this exchange happens.

Sonic: If that's your heart rate unc, you should see a mechanic!
Uncle Chuck: I wish it were, Sonic...

I know what they were going for here but it really does sound like Uncle Chuck just wished he had a heart attack.

So it turns out that Robotropolis is about to suffer an EARTHQUAKE! Robotnik knows this and is evacuating himself, Snively, and all his SWAT Bots into a spacecraft that'll hover over the city until it passes. During that time, the city will be defenseless and crumble.

Boy howdy~! That sure is lucky! I couldn't help but think how much it would suck had that Earthquake hit Knothole instead. Or if it turned out Robotropolis was so advanced that a regular earthquake did nothing to it. Or if a random Earthquake didn't randomly happen at all. All of those would have sucked. Phew~!

Robotnik is shown evacuating and we get a scene where Snively shows concern for the roboticized people they left behind. Robotnik's response is "Who cares, you idiot! They're just MACHINES!"

Most of the ones left behind were roboticized people which infers that they are indeed no longer mortal because of his cruel actions. How very sad. Not to worry though because Uncle Chuck has a plan. See there's a De-roboticizer in Robotropolis (???) and Uncle Chuck plans to lure all the robots in the vicinity to it. Then, in his own words, he says that he's going to override the De-Roboticizer's circuits and when it explodes he's counting on it to have a blanket effect...

So they do that. They reach the city, a tremor happens, they get lucky when a hole opens up that allows them to get through (Boy, so lucky this issue) and then Uncle Chuck deliberately sends a signal to all the remaining robots that tells them to head right where they are. Then he pulls the lever on the De-Roboticier, it explodes, and shoots a blanket effect out at all the robots... except him... apparently? 

Sonic points out that Uncle Chuck is still a robot and Uncle Chuck says that he'll get his chance one day and that it's better for the cause that he stay like this. Then a regular Southwest Airlines plane arrives, out of nowhere, all of a sudden, at that very moment, and lands with Rotor coming out and saying he's gonna fly all the people away. Interesting. We didn't SEE them contacting Rotor and telling him to show up with Southwest Airlines but I guess that's something the audience is expected to just assume happened.

It's here where I have to stop and ask... What even?

There's so much about what I just wrote that doesn't make any sense or just seemingly comes out of nowhere. I need to stop and analyze this for a bit.

THINGS THAT DON'T MAKE SENSE ABOUT WHAT JUST HAPPENED:

1. Why is there a De-Roboticizer in Robotropolis? What does he need one for aside for it being something to eventually be stolen and used against him by the Heroes? I understand that you never know when a tyrannical monster whose goal is to roboticize everyone to do his bidding might need to do the opposite of that but I gotta admit, I can't think of a scenario where he would. Robotnik still has a metal arm. He hasn't even used the De-Roboticizer on HIMSELF. Why does he have it?

Maybe it was brought up before and explained then but I seriously have no recollection of that. I'm sure one of you guys could tell me.

2. Uncle Chuck says that re-wiring it to explode when he activates it will create a blanket effect that will De-Roboticize all the Roboticized people... okay. So, I actually don't care that much about the fake pseudo science there and whether or not that would actually work. Trying to figure out the logistics and functionality of an already fictional device is pointless and a bit too nitpicky for a Sonic comic. No, my issue is the fact that it works on all the robots ...except him. Even though he was standing right in front of the machine and was literally the one who pulls the lever. In the massive BLANKET explosion that happened across everyone there, he was somehow the ONLY one not changed back. HOW?! This isn't even a problem with the science or whatever, it's just obviously not possible. The machine exploded right in front of him and all the robots behind him and yet he wasn't affected by the blast???

3. Rotor shows up out of nowhere and says that he didn't expect there to be so many people to save. I'm left to assume he brought a huge ass Southwest Airlines plane to cart away three people, I guess. They never show us how he knows what's happening or how much about the situation he was told. Uncle Chuck doesn't even tell Sonic and Sally about his De-Roboticization plan until they GET to the city which means he had no means of getting OUT of the city when this was done. Everyone reacts to Rotor showing up like it was a huge surprise and Rotor didn't expect there to be so many people. Neither were aware of the other's situation. If Chuck had just told them his plan BEFORE they went to the city, Rotor might have been able to accommodate everyone because as it stands, Sonic and Sally get left behind because the plane can't hold everyone. They also might not have had to worry about how they were going to get out of the city too. 

It's all, once again, VERY lucky that this happened. I guess not for Sonic and Sally because, as I say, they get left behind because there's not enough room on Southwest Airlines. I'm going to set aside whether or not I buy that the plane could fit literally everyone they had with them except for those last two people. Maybe it's a weight thing. I dunno. The comic never says.

Anyway, they have to escape the city themselves now. Sonic tells Sally to keep moving and stay vigilant.

Sally proceeds to not do that at all, instead opting to stand still while the city is literally crumbling around them because of an Earthquake, while yelling into her mobile flip-phone for Nicole to respond.

She appropriately gets crushed by a rock for this bout of extreme stupidity.

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Nicole comes through with the information Sally requested though. That's good. Sonic's only got 10 seconds to use the fastest route out of there. Sonic makes it after jumping through a hole in some fallen debris and then we immediately smash cut to a ceremony celebrating the awarding of a golden acorn to Uncle Chuck and Sonic, who gives his Golden Acorn to Nicole. Wow. That was abrupt! We didn't even see Sonic escape the city or bring Sally back home or anything. He jumps through some debris and the next panel (not even the next page) we're somewhere else during the aftermath.

Weird.

Then Robotnik comes back down from space and says he's going to rebuild the city but there's nothing to worry about in terms of attacks because he's going to put up a force-field around it while it's being done.

Okay. Go fuck yourself Robotnik. If you could DO that then why the fuck didn't you have a force-field up before? Maybe Dulcy the Dragon wouldn't be able to easily sneak in and overhear your plans if you kept that force-field up all the time. They just infiltrated your city! How can you-?! Jesus...!

I have a feeling this issue is going to be more significant going forward but the structure of this tale was really odd and it feels like some things could have been ironed out a lot smoother than they were. The amount of convenient things that happened and how quick the resolution was leads me to believe this was something done to just quickly de-roboticize all the people in Robotropolis without any fanfare...

... Wait a minute. HOLY SHIT! ALL THE PEOPLE IN ROBOTROPOLIS WERE DE-ROBOTICIZED! THAT'S A THING THAT JUST HAPPENED?????!!!!

No joke, I was editing this review and was about to post it when it literally just hit me that THAT happened! What the fuck...? THIS is how it happened? In one issue? Because of a random Earthquake that took place? It was so understated and fast that I didn't even process it. Are things being rushed? 

Also, the art in this issue was very odd as well. For some reason everyone looked stilted and significantly unanimated. There were points where you could tell you were looking at a drawing of a character rather than a believable panel of a specific action moment frozen in time. They looked like mannequins basically. Sometimes their expressions didn't even match. There was a point where Uncle Chuck tells Sonic that the De-Roboticizer is going to explode and Sonic responds by shouting "EXPLODES?!!" in a way that seems like he should be worried but for some reason he's got a doofy smile on his face.

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Not the best art. Not the worst though. 

Issue #37 - Bunnie's Worst Nightmare!

The second story is a solo-story about Bunnie having a nightmare that she eventually becomes fully roboticized. It's such a convincing nightmare that she even dreams up convincing techno-jargon to explain why it's happening. 

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It's actually a little creepy and unsettling, especially witnessing how she looks with a complete robotic sheen. Her eyes being black but her pupils remaining blue while the rest of her is this purple-ish looking metal is significantly scary to look at. 

I will say that if Robotnik did create something like this, it really would mean that there was no hope. I'm assuming he can't, otherwise he would have. 

The title was a spoiler of course. She runs away because she doesn't want to endanger everyone and sleeps under a tree only to wake up the next morning completely fine with Sally not having a clue what she's talking about when she brings up what happened. It was all a nightmare. 

We're getting closer to the fabled Endgame and I'm starting to notice a significant change in the dynamics of the story. THAT was an incredibly rushed way to fix all the roboticized people. Again, it happened so fast that my mind didn't even process that it did happen and I had to edit in my reaction to it. I'm assuming this is where the comic started preparing for the end. It's starting to feel like it.

 

 

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