Sonic the Hedgehog IDW #69 - Prerelease Discussion Topic

[Sonictrainer]

We’re getting an Extreme Gear Charity Race

IDW Sonic #69 Covers

• Cover A by Min Ho Kim
• Cover B by Bracardi Curry
• Cover Retail Incentive by Nathalie Fourdraine

IDW Sonic #69 Solicitation

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On your marks!

Get Set!

RACE!

Welcome, Extreme Gear Fans to the qualifier for the Clean Sweepstakes race around the world, sponsored by the Restoration and Clean Sweep Inc.!

And look at the starting line!

It's Sonic, Tails, Amy, Surge, Kit, the Diamond Cutters, and the Babylon Rouges!

Hold on to your tails because we're in for one heck of a race!

• Expected Release Date: May 2024

 

Edited April 6 by Sonictrainer

[Slashy]

This being tied to the current Restoration storyline ruins any hype for me.

[Cayenne]

Great covers as always (I absolutely love the ones made by Min Ho Kim and Nathalie), but, yeah, put me on the list of people who aren't feeling these last arcs too. Sonic/Blaze moments in Misadventures, Fang the Hunter and Winter Jam aside, I haven't been hyped for anything since issue #56.

[ShadowForever]

Hooray, Extreme Gear races are back! And Diamond Cutters will join? AND SURGE AND KIT, TOO??? BEST ISSUE EVER!!!

[Kuzu]

A Riders centric arc but no Knuckles is pretty funny.

[Lorekitten]

The concept of Surge and Kit being part of this race amuses me greatly. (Calling it now, Surge cheats.)

[ChaosCTRL]

These covers look sick! The second one looks like something straight out of Riders! 

[LongcrierCat]

2 hours ago, Lorekitten said:

The concept of Surge and Kit being part of this race amuses me greatly. (Calling it now, Surge cheats.)

Would overpowering your board with your electricity powers be cheating? Asking for a friend.

[Ryannumber1gamer]

A Riders arc and the Riders artstyle being brought back, completed with designs for Tangle and Whisper is really damn cool, but I do have to concur that this being tied to the absolutely disastrous Restoration arc knocks it down quite a few pegs. 

[Silvereyes]

I know the Restoration arc hasn't exactly been riveting, but considering they have teased that the next mainline issues will be leading to the milestone issue #75, I am hoping we are going to start seeing things ramp up in terms of stakes and conflict. The story concept sounds fun anyway, I adore extreme gear and the Riders art style and costume design.

As a side note, I adore Nathalie Fourdraine's RI covers, the fact that they've been doing them for the mainline IDW comics is great and almost all of them are great to fantastic. I love Tails' wink.

[MetalSkulkBane]

10 hours ago, Slashy said:

This being tied to the current Restoration storyline ruins any hype for me.

Just wondering, how much of Restoriation stuff was THAT bad? For me it's mostly 2-parter with Mimic and Silver.

I'm more annoyed that things are still so low-stakes.  It's been almost a year sine Urban Warfare ended. I'm not saying story must involve Wold Ending to matter (looking at you MCU), but so far IDW didn't razzle-dazzle me with stealing candies from kids or Vanilla's ruined dinner.

[Kaotic Kanine]

It's the 69th issue and they don't even have Rouge involved? 

Spoiler

In all seriousness though, the covers are awesome, and it'd be neat to see the Extreme Gear designs for the IDW exclusives.

[Kuzu]

9 hours ago, MetalSkulkBane said:

Just wondering, how much of Restoriation stuff was THAT bad? For me it's mostly 2-parter with Mimic and Silver.

I'm more annoyed that things are still so low-stakes.  It's been almost a year sine Urban Warfare ended. I'm not saying story must involve Wold Ending to matter (looking at you MCU), but so far IDW didn't razzle-dazzle me with stealing candies from kids or Vanilla's ruined dinner.

None of it has been particularly bad per se, I just think people are sick of it getting so much focus and not the main characters.

[Red Hot Jack]

I'm more concerned that Knuckles is not part of the adventure yet again, why is SEGA obsessed with Knuckles being on duty only in the IDW comics, when he's literally part of any adventure in other media?

The Restoration as a concept is boring and it's tied too much to the heroes, if it's to stay in the canon, just have it be less important. Although I admit my favorite part of this arc is Tangle, Whisper, Surge etc. being part of a Riders grand prix with Riders designs. It's also funny they got Riders-fied before Big, Omega, etc. 

The Restoration may be boring, but I'm totally here for the IDW original characters.

Edited February 16 by Red Hot Jack

[Kuzu]

11 minutes ago, Red Hot Jack said:

I'm more concerned that Knuckles is not part of the adventure yet again, why is SEGA obsessed with Knuckles being on duty only in the IDW comics, when he's literally part of any adventure in other media

Because fans complained about him not doing his job, so now that's what he does.

[Red Hot Jack]

1 hour ago, Kuzu said:

Because fans complained about him not doing his job, so now that's what he does.

Yes and I am kinda tired of Sega (in general with Sonic) taking feedback to the extreme and creating opposite problems.

[Lorekitten]

5 minutes ago, Red Hot Jack said:

Yes and I am kinda tired of Sega (in general with Sonic) taking feedback to the extreme and creating opposite problems.

Yeah, that's not great. It doesn't help that the feedback is often delivered so strongly that it seems to necessitate the extreme all-or-nothing false duality.

[Kuzu]

In this particular instance, I don't really see an ideal solution. Knuckles' nature and role as a character within the series necessitates that he will not be around often unless it involves him in some way.

Knuckles is a reactionary character by nature, which means he's not going to do anything unless something forces it.

There's a reason other continuities kind of force him into different scenarios to get more use out of him.

[Sonictrainer]

11 hours ago, Kaotic Kanine said:

In all seriousness though, the covers are awesome, and it'd be neat to see the Extreme Gear designs for the IDW exclusives.

If all of the Extreme Gear shown on the A Cover, is one for one what our Characters are using in the Story, then that means that:

• Sonic is riding his personal Extreme Gear, the Classic Blue Star from Sonic Riders, which is a Board Type Extreme Gear. It's not the Blue Star 2 because it doesn't have the white sections.
• Tails is riding his personal Extreme Gear, the Classic Yellow Tail from Sonic Riders, which is a Board Type Extreme Gear. It might be the Yellow Star Turbo we saw him testing out in the last issue.
• Amy is riding her personal Extreme Gear, the Classic Pink Rose, from Sonic Riders, which is a Board Type Extreme Gear.
• Jet is riding his personal Extreme Gear, the Classic Type-J from Sonic Riders, which is a Board Type Extreme Gear.
• Wave is riding her personal Extreme Gear, the Classic Type-W, from Sonic Riders, which is a Board Type Extreme Gear.
• Storm is riding his personal Extreme Gear, the Classic Type-S, from Sonic Riders, which is a Board Type Extreme Gear.
• Tangle is wearing the Grinder from Sonic Riders, which is a Skate Type Extreme Gear. Not only do they match her outfit color perfectly, but they allow her Grind on Rails. It appears Tangle is a Speed Racer of the Diamond Cutters.
• Whisper is riding the Classic Angel-Devil from Sonic Riders: Zero Gravity, which is an Air Ride Type Extreme Gear. In Japanese, it's called the Angel Whisperer-Devil Whisperer which is probably why she has it. If it has the same abilities as in Zero Gravity and Free Riders, it will either enter Angel Mode, which will allow Whisper to collect better offensive Items, Rings, and GP Boosts, Devil Mode, which disables regular functions for a short period of time and makes it harder to collect GP Boosts, and she'll be able to switch modes if she gets Devil Mode. Not to mention, she still has her Wispon and her Wisps with her. It seems Whisper is the Flight Racer of the Diamond Cutters.
• Lanolin is riding the Heavy Bike from Sonic Riders, which is a Bike Type Extreme Gear. It's supposedly the heaviest Extreme Gear in existence and will ignore any turbulence created by opponents. With this, Lanolin is the Power Racer of the Diamond Cutters.

I am curious if Surge and Kit will get their own exclusive Extreme Gear or pick from the existing variety. (I'll have to go through and see if any match them in terms of type, style, and color)

I'm also curious if Eggman and his Riders Badniks will crash the race.

Extreme Gear talk aside, we have some other info

Textless Covers and Thumbnails for IDW Sonic #69

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Min Ho Kim: Here's the full logoless cover for IDW Sonic #69! Hope everyone is excited for the new arc!!!

aaaand thumbnails!

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Bracardi Curry: Here's the clean cover of IDW Sonic 69! 

I really wanted to hit that early 2000s nostalgia with this one. Hope you all enjoy!

Thumbs and initial sketch

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Nathalie Fourdraine: Here's my logo-less cover for #69! Nice!

 

Also, we have this

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Evan Stanley: We're gonna have some fun

 

Edited February 16 by Sonictrainer

[PC the Hedgehog]

That Uekawa-style cover gives me life. Wish we had more of those.

[Eskana]

Okay, full disclosure, I haven't been keeping up on any Sonic news lately, and was annoyed that my LCS didn't have my Sonic subscriptions over the last few months. But I figured it was an oversight... but when they STILL didn't have anything the other week, I was starting to get bad vibes. Then I come on here... and it seems like #69 isn't out yet?

Did I miss something? Was it on "hiatus" while they are doing "Fang"? Is there a reason that they couldn't do two books at once? Or is it just that something is going on with my LCS?

... just trying to figure out what's going on!

Edited Saturday at 10:16 PM by Eskana

[Sega DogTagz]

@Eskana They indeed put the main series on hold while the Fang series ran it course.

I don't think we ever got an official reason as to why, but if I was a betting man its because they took stock and realized they were stretching the manpower a bit too thin. The books are already prone to delays, so piling on mini-series and specials alongside the main books without adding new artists to go with the additions is a recipe for disaster.