Jump to content
Awoo.

Archie Sonic Main Discussion


Toby

Recommended Posts

1 hour ago, Ernest the Panda said:

It’s never going to happen, but that makes me wish all the more that Sega would let IDW do a continuation of Archie Sonic.

"For the annual issue, we though to make big story about Sonic Vs Eggman".

That is enough to hype you up? That's the plot of issue 175, 200, 225, and probably would do all the next anniversaries, ignoring crossovers.

  • Thumbs Up 2
  • Chuckle 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

14 minutes ago, MetalSkulkBane said:

"For the annual issue, we though to make big story about Sonic Vs Eggman".

That is enough to hype you up? That's the plot of issue 175, 200, 225, and probably would do all the next anniversaries, ignoring crossovers.

But in this new game-based setting, it makes me wonder what kind of “turning point” this would have been.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Issue #40 - Court Martial 

image.png.fdcc92e339eb3250eab514fb5c5f9475.png

I actually took a little break from reading these and the reason is because this issue disappointed me so much that it left me feeling a little drained. 

We begin with Sonic in prison. Unlike Adventure 2, it’s not anywhere high security. The bars look like they’re literally being held together with rubber bands. How adorable.

Antoine is there to antagonize Sonic and gloat about his promotion to commander. Sonic lays on the insults thick, saying that Antoine is only in charge because everyone important is out rebuilding Knothole while he’s stuck here babysitting. Antoine claims his job IS important right before leaving to go read a book titled “The Perfect Party by Martha Shrewart”. 

Haha. So funny…

Antoine and Sonic aren’t friends. I’m dispelling the notion that they could be in any way, shape, or form right this instant. 

Sonic hears chanting outside of his cell and it turns out to be Ms. Amy Rose! Long time no see! It’s been so long in fact that when the comic reminded me that she was in Issue 25 I had trouble recalling it. I almost even thought that this might have been her first actual appearance. How embarrassing of me.

Looking back over Issue 25, it’s clearly the Sonic CD adaption, and Metal Sonic’s first appearance. Even stranger is that they called Metal Sonic by the name “Mecha Sonic” which kind of takes some of the fire out of the naming convention I praised two issues ago... but it still works. I'm surprised I forgot reading the Sonic CD adaption. I actually remember liking it.

Anyway, Amy is hoisting up picket signs and proclaiming Sonic’s innocence. She’s the only one doing so too. No one else cares.

Amy starts yelling out “Shawshank! Shawshank!” She’s adorbs.

Rotor shows up with Sally outside of the prison and they talk about how her father’s stash of supplies that was hidden outside of and far away from Knothole came in handy when it was destroyed. How smart of him. I won’t call that out as bullshit since it seems like something that someone would reasonably think of and there’s no reason it would need to have been talked about before now.

Rotor asks if Sonic might be acquitted. Sally says he knows she can’t discuss that. After their discussion, Rotor tells Sally that she’s doing a good job in her father’s place but Sally says IT AIN’T EASY BEING A ROYAL!

She starts crying and runs off blubbering about how the strict by-laws are FORCING her to court-martial the ONE BOY she truly… *lip quivers* Oh Sob! Oh Cry! 

giphy.gif

Oh woe is her! The princess whose in charge and the one who makes the rules in her father’s absence is in such emotional turmoil!

 image.png.606135a62440b28e569e6a0992897d27.png

Yeah, go jump in a lake, alright? Thanks.

Sally doesn’t run off though. Instead she heads over to Amy and says “That’s enough Civil disobedience for one day”. Amy foolishly thinks she’s here to pardon Sonic. 

Sonic tells Amy that Sally’s going to say no. Sally says no and makes the little girl cry. For some reason, all three of these characters are colored completely black and given blood red eyes. It looks scary and I don’t know the reason for it.

Sonic says that him being right about that is checkmate. Sally says that’s enough sarcasm from him and to be more responsible to the girl as she hangs onto his every word. Sonic asserts that she KNOWS he doesn’t belong here. I say that if she did then you wouldn’t be in there, Sonic. She confirms this by shouting that “No one is above the law, Sonic! Not even you! Is that clear?”

Sonic shouts back that this system stinks. I agree. This is some bullshit. 

Sally drags Amy off as the little girl says she still believes in him. Aww~!

Then Sonic screams that the Chili-Dogs are stale! STALE?!  Come the hell on. You’re serving this dude STALE chili-dogs?

I hate you.

Also, again, she’s being completely unwilling to hear him out. I’m assuming she hasn’t actually heard his side of the story because if she had I don’t feel like she’d be THIS angry and THIS eager to get him sentenced. She doesn’t even seem like she wants this to end with him being found innocent. Not really. That one scene of her crying is all we get and it comes and goes so incredibly fast. It's almost like someone remembered that she's supposed to care about Sonic for two seconds.

So we cut to the fucking Kangaroo court where-

“We the Kangaroo court judges, will decide if you are guilty” two literal Kangaroos say.

Oh, now you’re just rubbing the incompetence in my face.

They say that they are only there to say who’s guilty. Pronouncing sentence is pointless since there’s only one punishment, banishment. Sonic asks who the head honcho that decides that is gonna be and viola, out comes Sally the Haughty Princess (BARF) in this gaudy, pretentious royal outfit complete with a crown, staff, and coat that drags along the ground. Sonic’s got this really sad, betrayed look on his face. You, the reader, are left with literally no choice but to side with him from both a logical and emotional standpoint.

These people aren’t even being understandably mistaken. They just look like villains.

Sally says that Bunnie is going to guard “the prisoner” and Bunnie, with the meanest look on her face, produces a goddamn circular SAW on her arm and says that she will. Sonic asks her if this is how she’s gonna thank him for saving his life. Bunnie’s reaction is to very callously say that him saving her fucking life is “old news” and that Rotor outfitted her arm to be a Hedgehog Hunter.

For you see, not ONLY does she have a saw in her hand but she’s been outfitted with a mini-guided MISSILE tuned to SEEK AND DESTROY his unique physiological aura. Then Rotor chimes in that he was just doing his job…!

image.png.7e5019893d4fa87234b80a10d43dc951.png

You guys tried to save this dude’s life last issue and now you’ve outfitted Bunnie with weapons to maim and BLOW him the fuck up! 

… You know. I hope Sonic gets banished. 

No, no, I’m not kidding. I hope he gets banished and I hope he leaves. When he leaves, I want him to not want to come back except for maybe to think about Tails. Then I want Tails to leave and go after him. The two of them head off to be their own tag-team in the fight against Eggman. 

That’ll be the backstory if the Freedom Fighters ever enter the IDW series (which they won’t). It won’t be him reunited with old friends. It’ll be him meeting up with a bunch of psychos who betrayed him because they so easily and readily conspired to get him thrown in prison when the first plausible excuse to do it came up. 

Yeah that’s right. Make them antagonistic towards him. I think this is a great backstory. I wanna see a comic where this happened. It sounds like it’d be awesome and full of drama. Amy wouldn’t hesitate to leave and go after Sonic too. It’s basically just the official cast and Rotor that don’t seem to be gunning for Sonic to be guilty here after all.

Things get heated even more when court finally gets underway. Antoine says it’s an open and shut case but it’s totally not because there’s no fucking EVIDENCE but whatever. Who needs that? Just assume he wasn’t kidnapped. Open and shut case. Fuck you.

Antoine says this while pointing at Sonic and Sonic angrily tells Antoine to get his dirty french sausage finger out of his face before he rips it off his hand. I’m glad Sonic is so angry and deliberately making everything more heated. 

Antoine calls his first witness to the stand and then proceeds to go absolutely buttfuck insane.

He yells at everyone he puts on the stand and we get a lazy “badgering the witness” joke when Antoine hoists a badger up to Amy, demanding to know if she forced it to join her Sonic fan club. Then Antoine calls himself to the stand and starts saying that he saw it all and what not. Sally promptly tells him to shut the hell up because he’s going on and on without actually saying anything other than what they all already think is the truth.

Sonic then stands up and delivers a VERY good point that even I didn’t think of. He outright talks about the fact that the cell next to his was empty when it should have been occupied by Nack the Weasel. Antoine didn’t realize it because he was too busy planning a party for his victory.

Sally asks if that’s true and Antoine throws himself at the mercy of the court. Sonic expects the cuffs to be taken off but Sally says no cause Antoine only misbehaved and the trial is about him.

Misbehaved?! The fucking criminal that was in your shitty prison escaped and there was no follow up on what he did afterwards aside from what Sonic told you happened when he went to the Gym! Even if that oversight is brushed aside as Antoine “misbehaving” that still leaves room open for discussion on Nack’s whereabouts and his actions thereafter. There’s actually MORE evidence to support Sonic’s side than there is to support their own! Sonic being a robot isn’t proof that he deliberately got Robotnik’s help to roboticize himself and neither is him being upset that you guys rejected his admittedly horrid plan. A horrid plan that he wanted to do to HELP everyone by the way. Even if it was disobedience had he actually done it, strapping a saw and a missile that seeks out his aura is a borderline psychotic way to punish him for that.

“The Kangaroo court judges will now cast their votes…”

Cast their votes?! There was no deliberation! Nothing was even discussed! 

Sonic just brought up a bunch of good points and Sally is all like “We’ll talk about it later.” NO BITCH, WE’LL TALK ABOUT IT NOW!

Sonic’s response to this is “Wot?” 

I agree. Wot indeed. 

Then Bunnie has the nerve, the fucking hutspa, to tell Sonic to calm down. No, YOU calm down. 

giphy.gif

Sonic thankfully tells Bunnie to shut the fuck up and shreds his hand-cuffs, proving he could have done so at anytime and was playing along to be fair to this farce. Bunnie is READY to kick Sonic’s ass. She’s excited to do it. She SO wants to see him put in prison. I can’t stress this enough.

Sally comes in and thinks she can be the one to tell people to calm down now but then immediately uses the reasoning of the verdict being IN as a reason why they should.

Sally, if you seriously are planning to allow this to pass, like the court fucking jester you are, than please, promptly banish yourself. 

Sonic makes one last plea to Sally for a chance to prove himself innocent. Sally says okay. She gives him 24 hours and straps a tracker to Sonic’s wrist. Sonic is then off to clear his name.

Meanwhile, we cut to Robotnik who’s lamenting the loss of Mecha Sonic and the fact that he has to rebuild Robotropolis for a second time in the last couple issues. Still, he manages to triangulate Sonic’s position and realizes that he’s soon to be done for. His latest machine is going to doom everyone! Can’t wait to see it.

Anyway, Sonic finds his way to the Robo Hobo yard where a bunch of Robotnik’s obsolete badniks hang out. Sonic gets attacked by Catakiller, Motobug, and the Bat...badnik. Sonic gets knocked around a bit but he beats them and forces the Catakiller to tell him where Nack is. 

He’s at the Bottom of the Barrel Bar ‘N Grill. Nice name.

Sonic heads there and like the one episode of Spongebob is stopped by the angry guard gorilla and tossed away. However, unlike Spongebob, Sonic can fight. He revved his feet up and smashed the gorilla through the door and tells everyone to get out except for Nack.

Nack puts his hands up… but they’re actually not his hands. They were sticks. His actual hands are hidden in his coat and he whips them out to produce a knockout gas gun that he sprays into Sonic’s face.

Sonic gets knocked out by Nack the Weasel for the third time.

image.png.42ed5692179d0c1b1a664e8a7c979817.png

These three have encountered each other three times and Sonic’s lost every single time. Nack is really competent here. I’m lamenting how much less effective he becomes down the line. 

Turns out that it was a bit of a ruse here though. When Nack contacts Robotnik and tries to get money transferred to his account in exchange for info on where the unconscious Sonic is, he gets thumped from behind. Turns out Sonic stowed away on Nack’s bike when he rode off with it. I guess the gas just… ...didn’t work.

...Okay.

So Robotnik is angry and Sonic starts taunting him over the phone line, saying that he’s gonna send Nack’s bike on auto-pilot and set it to self-destruct… because I guess it’s easy to do that.

Sonic does just that too.

So I guess Robotnik is going to have to rebuild Robotropolis for a third time…

… Back at Knothole, Sally and Rotor discover that there was another explosion in Robotropolis and wonder could have done it. Well, Sonic shows up and claims that he did.

He then tosses Nack to the ground and says that Nack is going to confess to ambushing him in the gym and turning him over to Robotnik…

… And Sally’s response, before Nack even speaks a word, is that Nack is gonna do some HARD TIME!

… 

...

… Okay.

So...

...They were already aware of Nack the Weasel.

Sonic already told them that he escaped.

There was proof that he had escaped because his cell was empty.

Instead of choosing to investigate this further they did whatever they could to get Sonic the guilty verdict and only when the verdict was passed down did they give him a chance to prove himself.

All it takes for them to believe him is for him to physically throw Nack the Weasel in front of them and say the same exact thing he said before.

Nothing about the details of the case have changed. The only thing that changed is that Nack is here instead of somewhere else now. 

What about this is suddenly making them believe Sonic?

… So they take Nack BACK to the jailhouse and then Sally’s like “Oh hurray! You didn’t do it after all! I’ll make it a public apology!”

So… he’s off the hook?! Just like that?!

uyNiZO7.gif

This comic’s interpretation of the word “proof” is so blatantly NOT what it thinks it is that it’s kind of amazing. 

Sonic SAID that Nack, the escaped prisoner, was the one who did this to him. They didn’t believe him.

Sonic throws Nack in front of them and says the same thing again. They believe him.

What was the proof? What made them believe him?! Was this just a ruse by them to get Sonic to recapture Nack and put him back in prison? That’s the only thing that makes their behavior make a single iota of sense. 

Also, what was with the Robotnik segment this issue? He just shows up and casually, Sonic sends a single motorbike to his city and creates a huge explosion there again. The pacing of the last part of the issue was so strange. He went to a junkyard to a bar to blowing up Robotnik to tossing his “proof that wasn’t proof but now suddenly is proof” in front of them all in the third part of the issue. 

I don’t think I need to say it but this issue was all around terrible. I don’t know what the point of all this was but talk about a disappointing wrap-up. There’s no way it just ends with a stupid joke about Antoine getting his celebration party going for his reign as commander... oh wait. It does.

I’m… really hoping something more concrete happens soon because I feel like I was just taken for a ride.
 

  • Thumbs Up 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites

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

 

Issue 35 - Ring of Truth

image.png.c94025bee10246dea8d24f727d833d61.png

As I continue down these line of comics I’m starting to notice that the cover art is getting consistently more serious in the tone it’s trying to convey. I’m feeling as though the turning point for the comics is neigh.

So the issue starts and immediately I can tell it wasn’t drawn by Ken Penders simply because it has a really nice looking drawing of Sonic getting zapped by Robotnik on it.

I thought I was in for a fairly normal time at the start… I was wrong.

This entire issue is an acid trip.

 

Sonic also frames his Billionth ring with a plak that says “Over ONE BILLION Served” which was cute.

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. 

Oh yeah, I remember this issue. One big trip indeed, if you know what I mean.

It's been quite a while, but I wanna say the Billion Ring does come in handy at some point, but I'm not sure on that.

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

Issue 35 - A Sense of History Part II

 

We start back with Knuckles and his... incredibly long journey to find the Chaotix and figure out what Archimedes’ deal is.

Yes. We’re still on that story… I’m sure Penders is planning on having something actually happen with it one day.

Until then though, we’ve got more backstory! How fun! Knuckles does what Sonic was doing in the earlier story and starts expositing (from his mouth and not in his head) about the history he learned from his father.

 

As you might've guessed by now, most of the Knuckles back ups were essentially building up to the Miniseries.

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

 

So generations after Angel Island Echinapolis was sent into the sky, two brothers, Edmund and Dimitri, began working on a way to rejoin the island with the planet. They created the Chaos Syphon which, if used correctly, will gradually absorb the power of the 12 chaos emeralds making the island float until it safely manages to reconnect the island with the ground.

They explain this to us, the audience, while having a conversation with one another about stuff they should already know. They go through the Zoot Chute (which sounds kind of dirty) to reach the center of the island where the 12 emeralds are busy defying gravity in the Chaos Chamber, which looks like a room made of porcelain glass, and begin doing science calculations on it.

It’s so sciencey!

The Zoot Chute sounds like they were trying to give Knuckles his own version of the Knothole Slide.

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

 

Basically, it’s just a scene done to show us that Dimitri’s a bit of a secret, unstable psycho who is interested in the emerald’s limitless self-perpetuating power despite the fact that the goal of him and his brother is to absorb the power slowly so that the island can fuze back with the planet. Edmund has to remind him of that and Dimitri’s like “Oh yeah.”

Anyway, they go to the… *sigh* Hall of Learning and give their science presentation. The stereotypical judge with the stereotypical white judge hair (on a red echidna) says NO and bangs his gavel at them. Why? Cause he doesn’t want to risk the safety of the populace on untried theories. 

Which is kind of funny considering, the only way it can stop being untried is if they… try it.

I think the idea is that he was afraid they'd fuck up the Chaos Emeralds or something.

Remember that judge if you can, btw. 

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

 

Dimitri immediately loses his shit and rushes off without Edmund’s consent to just… do it anyway. He takes the Chaos Syphon and starts stealing the energy of the emeralds. Edmund catches up with Dimitri and pleads with his brother to see reason. Dimitri’s response is that he ain’t got time for reason!

In a flash he uses the machine to absorb the powers of 11 of the 12 emeralds into his body. Edmund and the judge (who came too for some reason) observe that they now only have one emerald keeping the island afloat. Then Dimitri's like "I'M EVIL!"

image.png.086ab6d2333fffc4687347bf651070a8.png

 

I made the joke that Dimitri might have been a secret psycho but I honestly can't tell if he was just always crazy under the surface and being rejected just tipped him over the edge or if he was just... contemplating what the power of the emeralds were and then immediately lost his shit. I feel like there's a bit more to this that could be explored so I'll wait.

On the whole, this particular part of the story actually isn't bad. It's an understandable enough foundation for a villain origin even if there's holes in the logic and flimsy explanation behind why exactly Dimitri went off the deep end so readily and quickly. I'm reframing on passing judgement just yet. 

... But seriously, how'd he go from "I want to put the island back on the planet" to "I HAVE ENOUGH POWER TO LAY WORLDS TO WASTE!"?

Uh, not exactly. I'll go into detail with the next story, since it's more relevant there.

I think part of it is a matter of them having to just get this backstory out of the way, meaning any finer details had to be saved for later. Personally, I sorta get the vibe that its a matter of Dimitri being furious that something that could save their civilization is being denied because those above him are too afraid to take action. 

I don't immediately recall said finer details though..

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

It’s like the trial in Alice in Wonderland, except with the White Rabbit (Antoine) being the clinically insane one instead of the Queen of Hearts (Sally).

  • Thumbs Up 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 6/11/2019 at 11:49 PM, Dr. Detective Mike said:

Issue 36 - Heart of Darkness

image.png.02b7da71b78376f0466ac3e3fc692cbb.png

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.

Oh yeah, that cover is pretty metal. Well, if you ignore the cartoon blue hedgehog.

I remember seeing it in Sonic Mega Collection and wondering what in the world are they up against.

 

On 6/11/2019 at 11:49 PM, Dr. Detective Mike said:

 

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.

It was called The Void in SatAM, while the comic calls it the Zone of Silence.

I'm not sure if The Void in the previous issue was truly named without knowledge of the one SatAm, but that's the vibe I've had.

On 6/11/2019 at 11:49 PM, Dr. Detective Mike said:

 

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 ito 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.

image.png.09ed568381274121c94c6d81698509c5.png

Yeah, Rotor among other characters had a tendency to say things like that. Probably a sign of the times[ of the author].

On 6/11/2019 at 11:49 PM, Dr. Detective Mike said:

 

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.

To be fair, Julian was very much fucking up the planet over the course of his career--especially in SatAM.

You should be seeing Kodos soon enough.

On 6/11/2019 at 11:49 PM, Dr. Detective Mike said:

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. 

Huh. Good point.

Either way, Sally is clearly forgoing reason in favor of getting her dad out of there STAT given Robotnik's device could do anything that might harm him.

On 6/11/2019 at 11:49 PM, Dr. Detective Mike said:

 

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.

 

There's a reason for that.

On 6/11/2019 at 11:49 PM, Dr. Detective Mike said:

 

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?

Eh, possibly?

I'm blanking on what the Zone looks like here, but I do know what it was like the next time they go there.

 

On 6/11/2019 at 11:49 PM, Dr. Detective Mike said:

 

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.

Ohhoho, yeah. 

On 6/11/2019 at 11:49 PM, Dr. Detective Mike said:

 

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?

I kinda forgot that, tbh.

I don't know if you remember Enerjak Reborn or not, but he can basically do whatever he wants. This is actually tame. Though it occurs to me that I don't think the Mechanauts show up much after this.

As for the timeframe, that's sort of an hiccup with some of these comics--they tend to be pretty quick about stuff going down over the course of a monologue. In this case, however, I think it's actually supposed to be an indication of what it'll look like once he has control over Echidnaopolis.

On 6/11/2019 at 11:49 PM, Dr. Detective Mike said:

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. 

image.png.8290f1285926e6a2f3b76c8054088c3d.png

It’s hilarious. 

Oh my goodness...! :joy: 

Clearly, the early comic's logic prevails.

 

On 6/11/2019 at 11:49 PM, Dr. Detective Mike said:

 

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.

D'oh averted.

Does it explicitly say they are made of magic or is that just your guess?

On 6/11/2019 at 11:49 PM, Dr. Detective Mike said:

 

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…

:lol: 

But sorta.

On 6/11/2019 at 11:49 PM, Dr. Detective Mike said:

 

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!

image.png.b5209654471b535d9b47d5335f47cfeb.png

What…?

??????????

WHAT?!

Oh man oh MAN, did I forget about this! :joy: 

I wanna say this get retconned, but it doesn't make it any less hysterical.

On 6/11/2019 at 11:49 PM, Dr. Detective Mike said:

 

… 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.

And thus began the Brotherhood of Guardians. Or the Lineage anyway.

 

On 6/11/2019 at 11:49 PM, Dr. Detective Mike said:

 

giphy.gif

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.

 

You know, it's really interesting: Mr. Penders clearly had a good number of his mythos in mind when he wrote this, but inevitably had to clip it down a good chunk for brevity of Enerjak's backstory.

Oh, in case you didn't realize/remember, this is Enerjak. ...Sort of.

As for the Ancient Walkers, I think there is something coming up with them but it's not exactly what you'd think.

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, DabigRG said:

It was called The Void in SatAM, while the comic calls it the Zone of Silence.

I'm not sure if The Void in the previous issue was truly named without knowledge of the one SatAm, but that's the vibe I've had.

Well, no, what was happening there (at least what the dialogue was saying) was that there are two different dimensions. One called "The Void" and another called the "Zone of Silence". Not only that but they would have had to have had knowledge of the one in SatAM to even do this plotline. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

7 minutes ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

Well, no, what was happening there (at least what the dialogue was saying) was that there are two different dimensions. One called "The Void" and another called the "Zone of Silence". Not only that but they would have had to have had knowledge of the one in SatAM to even do this plotline. 

Eh, not necessarily.

Was it mentioned that they were specifically looking for the king?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, DabigRG said:

Eh, not necessarily.

Was it mentioned that they were specifically looking for the king?

Yes. That's the entire plot of the issue. It's the only reason they're going into these different zones in the first place. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 minute ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

Yes. That's the entire plot of the issue. It's the only reason they're going into these different zones in the first place. 

Okay, this is interesting.

Again, you're not there yet, but I believe there are hints that the Archie comic may have been made based off the SatAM Bible due to certain names and concepts it shares that never made it into the show.

I'm not sure when that issue came out in relation to the show, so that may be a factor as well.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Issue #41 - ...and one shall save him!

image.png.4218a057e98af970d2328b62112a066d.png

A very significant thing happens in this issue. Yet, despite that, there's surprisingly little to say about it.

The biggest thing to talk about here is the fact that the art sucks. It sucks really bad.

So this issue is mainly a retread of what happened way back when they tried to save Princess Sally's dad from the Zone of Silence. Except they actually manage to save her dad this time. 

Also, plumpy skunk boy is back. Why? Literally just so he and Sonic can bicker at each other. I seriously don't have a clue why Geoffrey is here aside from giving Sonic someone to bitch at.

The way this issue begins is very strange. It looks and feels as though they cycled through three artists in the span of 3 pages. Both Eggman and Sonic look wildly different from page to page at the start. Sonic starts off looking fairly good before crashing into Robotnik's lair. All of a sudden he looks terrible and Robotnik looks... wickedly detailed to the point of almost feeling gross. However, the next two pages he suddenly shifts back to a more traditional look. 

(THE REST OF MY REVIEW GOT DELETED BY ACCIDENT SO I'M JUST GOING TO SUMMARIZE THINGS AS BEST I CAN)

They go into the Zone of Silence and rescue the King. The end.

The main take away from the issue that the art is really fucking bad.

Here's Sonic with flesh colored legs crashing into a super sized Sally.

image.png.c95d8c4771654ec7544e9d0bee08a0bc.png

I'm kind of pissed that what I typed got erased BUT the issue wasn't really much to speak of anyway.

  • Thumbs Up 1
  • Chuckle 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

19 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

Also, plumpy skunk boy is back. Why? Literally just so he and Sonic can bicker at each other. I seriously don't have a clue why Geoffrey is here aside from giving Sonic someone to bitch at.

Because Penders seems to love him, and it means Sonic and him constantly have dick measuring contests every few issues. Geoffrey (at least before Flynn, havn't read what he is like under Flynn) is the most unlikable character in Archie in my opinion. Rude and arrogant, constantly a dick to Sonic which with Penders recent revelation about him, makes me wonder if we're meant to side with the idiot more than Sonic at times, or if he is supposed to be more like the cooler darker hero like Shadow would eventually be. Not to mention as well he also comes across as a James Bond knockoff, considering how Penders seems to be a Bond fan.

The Knuckles comics often felt like Penders outlet of basically doing what he really wanted to write while under the guise of a Sonic comic, and St John is kindof the same thing really. As much as he looks like a Sonic character, he never really feels like a Sonic character, both with naming convention and the way he acts. Him and Sonic being constantly at each others throats feels like an attempt to make the comic more "mature", were the heroes are constantly arguing with each other, but rather than being interesting, it just feels annoying and unpleasant.

Sadly, St John is going to stick around for a long time. He only fades into being a minor character I think around issue 100? He gets alot of prominence over the next few years, with his spy stuff being the focus of some B stories. I won't spoil any of it (mainly because I think most of it was dull), but again, it feels like an example of Penders writing what he wants to do which has very little to the actual Sonic comic.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Flynn gives Geoffrey an arc wayyy later down the line, around #225. At this point in the series he’s just that dickhead coworker who is waiting for you fail because he thinks he can do a better job. Which is a fine character to have in a cop drama or something, but I don’t recall him doing much but take up space in the Archie comics.

  • Thumbs Up 1
  • Chuckle 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Who remembers those few unreleased Sonic Universe issues that were only drawn?

Who wished that someone inked,  colored and overall finished them?

Who's getting exited?

  • Thumbs Up 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

“Skill and courage will be defeating you, dastard!”

Anyone else do a double-take at that line?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

To be fair, there seems to be general issues with the writing, there's a spelling mistake, and some of the lines don't read particularly well, and the dastard line sounds like a mistranslation, like it was meant to be dastardly or something.

Still a cool idea, but it's very noticeable.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

It is correctly used I think.

Dastard is the noun. Dastardly is the adjective.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Sonic Quest - The Death Egg Saga

Issue #1 - Scrambled

rfSim1XZT_uo_yR5gQohtIju3Rf2ZhZk56Qot2aAAWJ5hW9g72nKMFaeyZMxlv7NdFcRzJp0E-fizvXjT2522vcAZR02fC_RmXdI6DR1jwli--Y7BssA2_xIpzhyUpeOV823AsWo

It’s time for another one hour special/TV movie event! It’s Sonic Quest - The Death Egg Saga, where in I completely thought the Death Egg was some sort of poorly kept plot twist despite the fact that the title is literally called the Death Egg Saga. I am the smart.

We begin with some very unnecessary narration that showcases Geoffrey sneaking through the woods. It talks about how he thinks he hasn’t been seen but shows everyone that he ain’t hot shit when Sonic jumps down from the tree in front of him and calls him a Stinkpot. No way Penders would undercut Geoffrey like that. That’s why this story was written by Mike Gallagher. 

Anyway, I went on and on about Sonic and Geoffrey’s unnecessary pissing contest last issue. Here’s where I’d point you towards the full review of Issue 40… IF I HAD ONE!

Ahem. So Sonic is trying to play gatekeeper but is obviously just using it as an excuse to argue with the skunk. Sally shows up and tells him to knock that shit off because she’s the one who called him here. Turns out she has something to show him, as well as all of us.

The king is in the middle of an extreme horror show. 

He’s staring out into space, stuttering his words, the words he’s actually saying are complete nonsense, and half his body is turning into crystal… or emerald. It’s green so I’m gonna say he’s Emeraldizing. My computer didn’t put a red line under that word so I’m guessing it’s a real word…

Sally goes off on everything that’s happened up to that point. The Mecha Sonic thing, where Sally did nothing. The court martial of Sonic where Sally DID something but it was an incredibly fucking dumb something that made everything worse. And the adventure where they got the king out of the Zone of Silence where Sally was back to doing nothing.

Sally says that they’re keeping the King’s return a secret for now until they can stop the influx of crazy happening to him and asks Geoffrey to stand guard and maintain the secret. Geoffrey says he’ll do it and walks out stating that his lips are sealed. Sonic then asks Geoffrey to seal his stench. 

Seriously, Sonic, stop it. I understand being confused by Geoffrey’s presence but he’s really not said a word to you or instigated anything. You’re just hurling insults at the man. It’s really not endearing.

So now that it’s just the normal Freedom Fighters in the room, we can get on with the plot. Rotor, as the designated bullshit spewer, explains that the King has adapted to the climate of the Zone of Silence and now their air is turning him into a Christmas ornament. I called him a Bullshit spewer (cause that seems to be what his job in this book is) but I actually don’t have a problem with this explanation. The science of the Zone of Silence, I gather, isn’t something that’s possible to calculate after all.

Tails mentions that he looks like he’s turning into a Chaos Emerald (thank you) and everyone GASPS, remembering that they saw no emeralds or rings in the Zone of Silence. They wonder why…

Anyway, Sonic bursts in with his Billionth Ring (the one that does random stuff at random to service the plot) and he holds it up to the King. It manages to magic the Emeraldization away and he plops onto his bed, though they state it might have only worked for a moment. I feel a little dumb, not understanding why holding a ring up to him would fix him… I guess rings just give you healing power? Makes sense since he usually dies in the games if he’s not holding at least one. Rings are so much more powerful in the shows and comics.

So they need to get more of them. Sonic’s Billionth ring is tuned to him so only he can activate it. That’s all well and good but they need MOAR! They talk about the Lake of Rings and yet again it turns out that there’s two different versions of essentially the same thing being spoken about here.

Tails brings up the lake of rings we saw when Super Sonic and Hyper Knuckles had their pointless fight. Their quarrel might have permanently sealed it off. Way to go Sonic, you vile heathen. I’m glad the picture they used to illustrate the fight was Knuckles punching the hell out of Sonic. I wish he’d have hit the ground in a single hit. Would have been hilarious.

Sonic’s a REALLY insufferable guy in these comics sometimes guys.I don’t know what to say. Yet, I still got angry on his behalf during the trial because the Freedom Fighters were being SO much worse there.

Now, about that second lake of rings I was talking about, turns out that was discovered back in Issue 38 when Sonic jumped into a random lake he happened upon to escape the Combots. I remember that and even at the time I thought it was odd that it was just… there. Oh well though. They have two lakes of rings to investigate now.

So Freddy decides it’s time to split up the gang. Bunnie and Antoine will find the lake of rings in the forest. Sonic and Tails will search the grotto where Sonic and Knuckles had their stupid fight. 

And Sally and Rotor will hang back at HQ and do nothing.

Break!

It’s here where I need to point out the designs of the characters in this issue. They’re actually not bad but they’re noticeably proportioned to be more closer to something that feels reminiscent of how Modern Sonic is today. I’m not saying this was intentional, just interesting.

Sally in particular is noticeably taller and has more curves. It really emphasizes how naked she is.

Sonic looks like a mix of his classic and modern self a bit. However, the big thing about him is his eyes. They’ve made the highlights of his eyes brown. He’s got brown eyes here and it… doesn’t look too bad on him. It looks a bit weird but I can’t say it looks bad either. It’s interesting.

5gjN0x7pj8QfVXb7wfG60zlXiZB-Z7zAKCkCUqgRDIqrdSjGfcWU6rCUuIppTpq-GaMIEGuxm42xpzpnlbK7Q0XHmkvfrxh55JY_oX1NGOYylSk3MnmrOQJRPASRTLTc8Q5bPNvS

We cut to Robotnik whose giving Snively a briefing on his urgent new mission. A plan is coming to fruition and Robotnik is about to ascend to the skies about to see it through. As such he’s decided to hand over the reigns of completing the rebuilding of Robotropolis to Snively. 
Yes, Robotropolis is in it’s… I think, third or fourth rebuilding phase in a row. One of those came from when Sonic auto-piloted Nack the Weasel’s bike into a tower to make it explode again. It happens.

Anyway, The Lord of Lard (I love these pet names these minions call Robotnik. Robotnik never gets angry at them when they say things like that which kind of makes it funnier) is in his Egg Mobile and ready to go. He tells Snively as he’s flying away that he’s in charge and for it not to go to his head.

Immediately, in the same exact panel this is said, Snively gets a wicked evil look on his face and says “AT LAST!”

Snively then proceeds to be an incredible, horrendously bad traitor by telling the robots to stop doing what Eggman commanded them to do and to give him a hot bath, manicure, massage, and bon-bons in bed. Also he wants them to do the immeasurably stupid task of writing SNIVOPOLIS on all the signs. Apparently he doesn’t think Robotnik is ever coming back? Or maybe he forgot that Robotnik has eyes?

Meanwhile, Sonic and Tails reach the old grotto where the fabled fight of epic pointlessness happened and discover a metal dome around it. They can’t gain access to the lake now. Sonic brings up a colony of airborne Freedom Fighters whom I’ve never seen or heard of before and says that they’re close enough here that it’s possible they might know what’s going on. I’ll just assume this is the first official introduction of the person he name drops here; Carl Condor.

It’s fine if this is how he’s introduced. It just caught me off guard how sudden it was.

Anyway, Sonic leaves saying “I’ll be back in a FLASH… no copyright infringement intended!”

Oh, but Sonic… I thought no copyright law in the univer-

We cut back to Tails the instant Sonic leaves to see the metal dome opening…! Just… immediately it opens when Sonic leaves. Oops.

Tails heroically dives behind the bushes in fear as a tube from space shoots down and starts sucking out the water and rings from the lake. We are then treated to a very badly written scene where Tails narrates exactly what’s happening in each panel as it’s happening. When he asks where the rings are going he turns around and says he’d better go get Sonic to answer those questions for him. The tube basically says “GET OVER HERE” when it comes out of the water and sucks Tails into it.

Tails, despite supposedly being scared, decides it’s comedy hour and says “No offense, but this situation su--AAAAA~!”

He says no offense so I’m assuming he’s addressing the audience he no doubt has imagined in his head. I could say he was talking to us, the reader, but it’s funnier imagining him imagining an audience that isn’t there.

Sonic eventually reaches the location of these flying Freedom Fighters and finds the sun’s rays to be acting all weird. He looks up and sees a mysterious, floating, egg-shaped, death-y, thing in the sky… then out of nowhere, Carol Condor shows up from behind Sonic, already roboticized!

OH NO! CAROL CONDOR! Our dearest friend! We hardly knew yee! How could this happen to our saint and fan-favorite… Carol Condor…

In the tradition of Sonic being easily knocked out, the scene cuts to captions saying that Sonic was out of his element and also visually impaired by squinting at the sun and thus the battle ended quickly. Last shot of that page is the “lifeless” Sonic being carried off like a broken muppet on the talons of this former Freedom Fighter.

4JNKRnMcVCFuL6ITTm02CK_mmPiwnwzK69HEUGtdK58Pgu7TcdOXI6B6yCrfXbYcA3Njsr820odR-ATsI_9mp0KuBgQ93d37YQCGqqZ-IkM9zNHHa-msX05KFpZAgBALHd3_8UHw

We then see Robotnik observing what just happened with the tube earlier. This scene is an amazing display of how Robotnik’s praise can be won and yet, within the same flow of conversation, flip on a dime to being a crime worthy of being demolished and thrown in the garbage.

He praises the Swat-Bot next to him for doing a good job operating the Intake Tube for getting the magic rings out of the lake. The robot thanks Robotnik for that. But the INSTANT he notices that he failed to discontinue the ingestion after removing it from the water, he finds that there’s access debris aboard the vessel. The access weight and the time it will take to separate it from the rings will delay his schedule.

The robot gets worried and claims he was just trying to be thorough.

Robotnik uses his mechanical arm to smash it’s fucking head in. 

Hk6bUsu_sOxVqLMtvPgusS2_YZB3zKrqPnbMfDZE45coG7YOD31MY3zoxfr6o0kalmhU45MVRN22EP7slw4AidYC2ArQ-ZBc5UBcS5GU2ma0nA9V5d3yVR3CFv_PnxwWto0wqdgi

“You’re not thorough. You’re through!” He says before tossing the poor bot down the garbage chute, calling it trash. 

He then claims that he doesn’t need mindless minions anymore because his ultimate weapon has been completed. He’ll use it to roboticize everyone while perched above the doomed world. 

Yes folks, it’s the Death Egg. 

It looks freakin’ sweet.

So this was a very good introductory issue to whatever this story is going to be. I gotta say, I have no real complaints. It was written very well for the vast majority of it, the art was nice and consistent, and I’m genuinely intrigued by what’s to come. I may finally have gotten over the rut I ran into before.

Let’s find out… right now!

Issue #2 - Poached

Z-B-eDdTVDe9DZOPdCu-C_-zKcA2nE670ssvo9ird6ggingReQcdT6CxUQH4uSZbsWvLlAAzVveC1-Mi06ocMszORNbNW4K54xrVsmYB96HaH9-Znd1mHIVa4OOLhGKg8_U38fhD

We begin with Robotnik gloating about how awesome he is and how awesome it feels to be in his awesome ship above all the not-awesome people. 

He’s gonna use his Death Egg to roboticize the planet by remote control. He cuts in with Snively and asks how the rebuilding is going. Snively is wearing a robe and bunny slippers because he told all the robots to knock off listening to Robotnik and dedicate full time to pampering him.

You know, I’m not against you using this time alone to your advantage Snively but there was a more efficient way you could do this. You didn’t need to have ALL the robots devote ALL their time to pampering you. I’m certain just a few would suffice. How many of them does it take to set you up with a hot oil bath?

Anyway, they have an effective and actually rather impressively written talk about the Death Egg and it’s complications. I was amazed that the last scene from the other issue was brought up again where the Swat-Bot’s mistake of bringing a bunch of access debris onboard was addressed. Snively makes mention that the Death Egg’s orbit is low and Robotnik responds by recounting what happened and saying that once the debris, along with the defective Swat-Bot in the trash chute, is ejected from the Death Egg the base will reach its proper orbit and he can devote his time to securing a Chaos Emerald.

For you see, a Chaos Emerald is all he needs to complete its masterful power supply. The rings he’s gathered have enough energy to create a protective shield around the Death Egg to keep it from suffering damage but in order to bring it to full power… he needs that dern tootin’ emerald!

Speaking of the excess garbage compartment, we cut back to Tails who, if you’ll recall, was sucked into the tube while in the middle of expositing the fact that he was indeed being sucked into the tube.

Tails notices the broken Swat-Bot immediately. Now, in my head, I was kind of hoping the Swat-Bot wasn’t busted just yet and he and Tails would team up or something. But nope.

Horrifically, Tails climbs instead the Swat-Bot’s corpse to puppeteer it around. The poor thing doesn’t deserve this I tells ya.

Another Swat-Bot walks in and is giving a full sweep of the area with a small device, stating that there are no more rings to gather in the garbage chute. Robotnik asks him to check again to make sure, which is good. At least he actually does know what being thorough is. A second check confirms the same thing so Robotnik gives him the okay to purge the garbage.

Tails overhears this while in disguise and has climbed out of the chute and locked that other poor Swat-Bot inside of it while he was talking to Robotnik. This dude notices he’s been locked inside and realizes that he’s about to get PURGED! And Tails gloats about it. 

All this Robot death. It’s so cruel. They’re just doing their jobs. Poor things.

Tails, while in disguise, talks to Robotnik and says he’s done what he’s asked of him. Robotnik most likely didn’t see the huge dent on the robot’s head, which is understandable considering the angle Tails is communicating to him from. It’s all good.

Outside, Condorbot is bringing Sonic to the Death Egg but WHOOPS turns out Sonic was playing possum… again! He’s getting a lot of mileage out of pretending to be knocked out lately. I can’t tell when it actually happens anymore. I was so ready to believe that he sucked so much, he got beaten off panel and dragged to the Death Egg like a wet sack.

Sonic proceeds to get into a very confusingly handled air battle with Condorbot. He gets out of his talons with a Sonic spin and then Condorbot shouts, “AWWK! He freed himself with a Sonic Spin!”

Then Sonic punches the robot while claiming that he can hover in mid-air with his figure-eight running motion… okay? 

Then… I don’t know… he uses the debris that are coming out of the Death Egg to somehow kick the robot underneath the debris while using it to shoot up. It’s still confusing to look at despite the fact that Sonic narrates what he’s doing AS he does it.

“Using my years of experience jumping through zones, I’ll hop my way up the pile and grab the bay doors before they close… UUMMF! Made it!” is what he says as he hops up the pile and grabs the bay doors before they close.

Sonic makes it inside but discovers that something’s jamming his signal back to HQ so he’s gonna have to go it alone. He doesn’t know that Tails is inside, impersonating a Swat-Bot though. This is gonna be fun. I hope.
Also, the signal being cut off gives Sally more of an excuse not to do anything. Hooray!

Speaking of which, we cut back to Sally in a scene that’s fucking hilarious when its clearly meant to be emotional. 

Sally asks Nicole if she can do anything about her scary looking, half emeraldized father. Nicole says NOPE! 

Rotor cuts in by saying that Bunnie and Antoine got lost in the woods but Bunnie grabbed the map from him and now they’re back on track (cute) but says Sonic and Tails’ reports are long overdue and that he’s getting worried.

Smash-cut to Sally crying into Rotor. She’s full on sobbing now. It’s not supposed to be funny but how quick it happened coupled with the shot of her pronounced squirrel ass is just… it just looks so cartoonish. The king crying out of his non-emeraldized eye does kind of off-set it a bit but he’s drawn so weird that it only does that a little bit.

_2rNuS9fVTQPNZ8GKPxvN5XH1oY-vENgmueXdzaTOFyfpj7ifnWi0MmgtYaNkq_zwn_uJBISxLJvhXMxu2wKWIl0Rqej6FWzWouVMS3MKzSOaLaLopPTQMJ91nWRHFLaMzxvwi2G

She’s so naked.

Back in Robotnik’s room, he’s gloating some more. Tails is there, literally standing right behind him, dressed in the corpse of the Swat-Bot that Robotnik bashed the brains of earlier. 

Tails is trying to get a good look at where Robotnik is going and HOLY SHIT, it’s the FLOATING ISLAND!

I mean, it’s not surprising really. He wants a Chaos Emerald and both he and the Freedom Fighters are fresh out of those. Knuckles on the other hand…

Well, we cut to the echidna in question and he’s looking over to see the creepiest shot of the Death Egg perving on Knuckles over the clouds.

dDVhooI2RKmScvRWd_Y2mKpQ45eihoNZQ7nbocPnSOLFwQ1E_O1ougYEl0p5JUIgyWJvQHf_1j25SFYJPVZP_LZD95gp-PRXEvE2NZi0sQccmu_-9S9Bh72lJ85noFKaX58Jb2tk

Knuckles flies after it while explaining how it’s possible for him to fly after it.

“By getting up a head of steam, jumping off the bank of the eternal river and fanning out my Dreadlocks, I can fly up and intercept it!”

… Thanks? 

The exposition is really weird this issue. Even weirder than it usually is. We don’t need the characters constantly explaining to us what they’re doing and how they’re doing it like this. It’s so odd.

Knuckles flies close to it and says he’s not gonna let it stop him. Then the Death Egg stops him by firing a laser from it’s eye and shooting Knuckles down.

It’s kind of hilarious.

Knuckles is caught by Mighty and we get more of that REALLY weird exposition.

Knuckles refers to Mighty by his full name when he’s caught, which is strange enough, but then Vector starts spewing this shit from his mouth after Mighty says the word ‘We’.

“We” meaning ALL the Chaotix-- Espio the Chameleon, Archimedes the Fire-Ant, myself--Vector the Crocodile AND Charmy the Bee here.”

What is with the dialogue? Is the writer under the impression that you’re reading issue 2 of Sonic Quest, a comic book special set between the events of Issue 41 and 42, not knowing what anything is? 

Eggman sends two Burrowbots onto the floating island in an attempt to get them to seek out the two emeralds that are on the island. The Chaotix easily and quickly counteract this by going after them and beating them down with their fists and terrible puns.

“Our buzzword is Victory.” says Charmy the Bee.

We see Sonic has taken out a ton of Swat-Bots and approaches the control room at the same time Tails, dressed as a Swat-Bot, is planning on attacking Robotnik. Sonic makes a comment about there being one more Swat-Bot to demolish which gave me chills.

But before Sonic could horrifically buzzsaw through his best buddy Tails and smear his blood all over the floor, culminating in a Greek tragedy where Robotnik bares witness to Sonic killing his best friend, Robotnik decides to retaliate against Knuckles and the Chaotix for destroying his two robots.

So obviously, the next course of action to take when two of your robots get destroyed is to then STEER YOUR FUCKING DEATH EGG DOWNWARD SO YOU CAN RAM IT INTO THE FLOATING ISLAND!

What… THE FUCK?!

That’s what he does! He RAMS the entire Death Egg against the side of the Floating Island and starts pushing it into the water!

It’s kind of awesome but also WHAT?!

Knuckles makes the comment that hundreds will die from this and… I’m starting to get confused. Is the floating island populated by hundreds of people or…is he talking about the non-anthro animals?

Well, whatever, I’m sure one of guys can tell me. I had to be told that the Chaotix were outright living on the island with Knuckles after all.

Another good issue. The dialogue was considerably worse but honestly, it started to mostly be a little amusing after a while. That doesn’t make it good but whatever. I’m… kind of flabbergasted by Robotnik’s actions. I didn’t expect him to go grand-theft auto on the Death Egg like that. What an odd man.

Issue #3 - Over Easy

wyWXpRTs2kfq60ws1kZsMsoak8mHBh7HvgL6K1sCrM2ZYQDtefA6hd_OUscK8Xd0QJ6oiJRcgXUe4cG9DXJAt5-c7nf_3DAm-XtF_zE3UIKisE8OLaYjhARrUnL4BnurblRAIw_O

I know this is yet another egg pun but it doesn’t service your story well to title the final issue of this legitimately pretty well told arc “Over Easy” like you’ve just done. Some might get the wrong idea and think we were headed for an unsatisfactory conclusion. Also, the cover seems to be screaming “Sonic and Knuckles” adaptation. I guess I should have figured that but I didn’t. Congrats. You made the elements seep into the story so organically that it wasn’t immediately obvious to me that this was a pseudo adaptation of one of the games.

For some reason, Frozen Junkyard’s track music was playing in my head at the start of this. I guess I needed some action music to set the mood.

It starts with Sonic about to attack the one Swat-Bot in his way in order to get to Robotnik… then he does it. Or he tries but he either misses and confuses this for the Swat-Bot being fast or Tails accidentally moves out of the way of Sonic’s attack. It’s not clear and it doesn’t matter because Sonic just kicks Tails in the robotic hide anyway.

He, very loudly, beats the crap out of it until it comes undone and he sees Tails’ butt sticking out of it. That’s when he realizes he’s done goofed. 

The two of them have a very loud conversation about going to beat Robotnik and then for no reason at all, Sonic screams that he’s about to attack Robotnik, right at Robotnik, as he’s attacking him.

Then he smashes head first into a force-field that has him seeing stars. Robotnik turns to Sonic and says that he put up a plexiglass shield because, shock horror, Robotnik has ears and HEARD Sonic doing all the loud shit literally right behind him. 

Robotnik then puts another glass door down behind Sonic and starts filling the area up with gas. I’m going to assume he made this part of the Death Egg on purpose so that it was designed specifically to trap anyone who would sneak up behind him in a glass chamber that fills up with gas. Otherwise I’d have to assume that the entire Death Egg is lined with random walls that come down, wherever, and have mechanisms that can fill the area up with gas.

Either way, it’s a cool scene that makes it look Sonic might just get poisoned to death. However, Tails, whom Sonic had told to let him handle this by himself, bursts through the glass and saves Sonic by randomly firing lasers at the controls.

Turns out this is a bit of a no-no because now the downward thrusters are all confuzzled and are sending the Death Egg shooting into space instead. 

Instantly, the Floating Island fixes itself and Knuckles orders his lackeys the Chaotix to search around the island and give him a damage report yesterday like the maggots they are. He then looks up to the sky and proclaims that he is Knuckles the Echidna, GUARDIAN OF ANGE-oh wait, it’s not called that yet. GUARDIAN OF THE… Floating Island.

So Robotnik jumps down a hole and falls to a control room below deck. He makes it sound like he’s actually escaping by mentioning that he has a contingency plan but no. Actually, he’s just going to sick another robot on them. This one is special though, as he used the data he syphoned from Sonic’s brief tenure as Mecha Sonic to create a super huge robot doppelganger version of him… Silver Sonic.

Sonic gasps, literally saying “Holy guacamole! It’s an oversized robotic version of ME!” as though he’s not seen at least 3 of those before. He literally was one before in fact. Why is that line there?

This is where the “Over Easy” starts to come into play. I guess it’s technically not fair to say that what happens next is “easy” but it happens way too quickly. 

In the span of a single page, Sonic is getting tossed around by Silver Sonic. Then, after Sonic’s head busts into some wires, he grabs it and uses it to completely short-circuit and fry Silver Sonic. 

Just like that. He’s done.

Meanwhile, Eggman is dressing up in his new armor called the Eggs-O-Skeleton. At first I thought he tore off his skin and was revealing himself as Robo-Robotnik but no...it’s battle armor patterned to look like the Death Egg. He’s wearing it, I guess, because he doesn’t trust Silver Sonic to finish the job despite the big deal he made about it.

NLV5lfW3GK5FM2O5mie4g9s27gmHQRukXqIjZ0LIEfRLmD5P8mCs7kryy4YETxjMZP_oY6M0AkSkyA0EF6b4G9rr8jmxNnCn8ijwDl_OuG09GIsz3SoM_QpDpVlNfqFX_haCFjil

He then charges into the room and sees that Sonic is piloting Silver Sonic from within… somehow? He borrowed the idea from Tails, he says… but…

Okay, so Tails getting into the Swat-Bot was negligible. Sure it doesn’t make total and complete sense for him to be able to pilot it from the inside with him being so small and having no real way for him to move its legs but whatever.

However, this is just baffling. There’s nothing but circuitry and bolts inside of Silver Sonic right? Robotnik didn’t build manuel controls inside of him or anything and yet we can see Sonic sitting in the head of Silver Sonic… controlling its movements somehow. I’d probably be able to chalk it up to just cartoonish weirdness but it’s even more distracting knowing that Sonic isn’t supposed to be a technical genius.

Is getting inside robots all you have to do in order to pilot them? Guess so.

Anyway, Robotnik battles Silver Sonic while wearing his Death Egg armor. It’s a very odd scene and one I’d never imagined I’d ever see happen. Sonic flicks Eggman up a few floors with his robotic finger when Tails shows up and says that, somehow, he’s wired the entire Death Egg to explode in 20 minutes but also explains that their fighting has ruptured the inside of it, somehow, so now it could explode at any second.

I’m noticing more and more that Tails is being pushed into being more technical and into mechanical stuff the further we go along. I like seeing the evolution of it.

Sonic, at first, says “NO!” because he wants to finish his climactic battle with Eggman. Tails starts to run and says “Uhm. No. I’m sure it’s totally gonna explode any second now…” so Sonic sighs and follows after him. 

The great escape happens as they reach the exit ramp of the Death Egg. However, they randomly come across a box of magic rings! Oh hooray! Now they can fulfill their original mission. How lucky. I guess just writing it so that Tails stole some rings while he was in the literal garbage chute where the rings got sucked up made too much sense. No, just put a box of them right by the area where they’re going to jump from the Death Egg. Clearly we didn’t forget to include an explanation for how they got them and threw one in at the last minute. 

So they jump out of the Death Egg and upon re-entry into the atmosphere, Sonic climbs out of Silver Sonic and has Tails carry him to safety. He does that weird thing where he narrates what he’s going to do as he does it too. He literally says “Meanwhile, I’ll climb out of this monkey suit!” while doing the thing he says he’s gonna do. It’s so strange. Who uses the word meanwhile when referencing something they’re in the middle of doing.

Meanwhile, I will finish typing this sentence. 

All the characters look up in awe as the Death Egg explodes in a way that’s so hard and epic that it rocks all of Mobius. Sonic wonders if Robotnik survived but of course he did. He parachutes down into Snivopolis, shouts “SNIVOPOLIS?!” when he sees the sign that Snively posted there, and falls into Snively’s new office, landing right on top of him as he sleeps in his chair.

Flattened against his backside, Snively contemplates being stuck to Robotnik’s butt or revealing himself so he could be torn in half for daring to put flowers and a picture of his mom at a desk in his control room.

Then the Looney Tunes logo signs them off with a That’s all folks.

So, this last issue was the worst of the three of them BUT I still wouldn’t say it’s a bad issue. It had a bit of a rushed ending but despite my earlier quams it didn’t feel like it was “Over Easy” like I was worried it would be. Not entirely. There was enough things that happened and set-pieces at play that made the mad scramble more potent and urgent than something like your typical Sonic Universe ending where things would just resolve themselves because it was time for the story to wrap up.

All in all, I’d say this was easily the best special I’ve read so far. All three issues were good despite being of varying quality. Keep this up old comics who’ve long since been finished. Keep it up.

Also fuck Carol Condor, I guess. This dude we’ve never seen or heard of before shows up Roboticized with his entire Freedom Fighter group nowhere to be seen and gets punched in the face and has garbage rained on him from above and is never mentioned again. 

I kind of hope he never shows up again. That’d be a really hilarious way to introduce and abandon a character who used to be an ally to them. 

  • Thumbs Up 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

25 minutes ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

7e_Goaddhz11xwUxTb8ypDXc6qitAVyr1MzbaC5nfxq-MJFr9Qi0Fx1IlMk6Sxam4gCnVRp1JZsjJVMB9_X4UggixVyMzJg0dvfjF-M7hsQM0eZQyyAI-MepaGmuuvYuEziXQCQU

She’s so naked.

I’d react similarly to Rotor if my gay ass got glomped by a naked lady.

  • Thumbs Up 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I'd make them regret being born. No matter what sex or gender.  

Edit: Turns out the Zombot arc was originally meant for post-300 Archie Sonic. 

  • Thumbs Up 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

41 minutes ago, Your Vest Friend said:

Edit: Turns out the Zombot arc was originally meant for post-300 Archie Sonic. 

Wait wait wait. What. Whered you hear that from?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

 

Sonic looks like a mix of his classic and modern self a bit. However, the big thing about him is his eyes. They’ve made the highlights of his eyes brown. He’s got brown eyes here and it… doesn’t look too bad on him. It looks a bit weird but I can’t say it looks bad either. It’s interesting.

 

Cool, IIRC they'll remain relatively consistent until Adventure changes them. I've taken note of them before, but didn't think they first developed this early on. 

Quote

Wait wait wait. What. Whered you hear that from?

Latest Bumblekast Spider-Man Far From Home. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

So I guess that means Ian’s stopped holding out hope of continuing Archie Sonic under IDW at some point.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

ALL OF THAT REVIEW

I’m glad you liked Sonic Quest. This was easily my favorite miniseries during the days of Archie doing miniseries. I feel as though Archie hits a good story stride around 36-50, including the miniseries and early Knuckles series. Everything for this period feels a bit more focused. Later even the simplest of continuity gets all confusing.

I'm a fan of Manny Galan, the artist for this arc. He’s going to do several regular issues and the Knuckles series as well. His characters seem more alive in motion than the other artists. You’re right, his characters do seem a bit more stretched or slim, but he seems to give them personality in expression. Nice review!

(Also yeah we never see Carl fucking Condor again lmao)

  • Thumbs Up 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.
×
×
  • Create New...

Important Information

You must read and accept our Terms of Use and Privacy Policy to continue using this website. We have placed cookies on your device to help make this website better. You can adjust your cookie settings, otherwise we'll assume you're okay to continue.