Megathread Archie Sonic Main Discussion

[Heckboy]

I thought it was pretty good. I felt the art was the stronger part of it. Curious about The Next Level.

[Big Panda]

This may sound weird but I've really been wanting for a Sonic comic title to sell out and warrent a second printing (with a different cover).

But anyway, the comic was fantastic. I wish it could've been longer!

[Ellipsis-Ultima]

Hang on what could it be?

[Dejimon11]

Summer of Sonic. Calling it now.

[PC the Hedgehog]

Made Mega Drive my first digital Sonic comic. And I'm sure glad. It was great. Much better than Genesis.

Man, I'd love for Archie and Sonic Team to surprise us and reveal this as a surprise adaptation of the 25th anniversary Sonic game. It'd make for a great one.

[Ellipsis-Ultima]

Spoiler'd cause huge

 

I don't know which is more hilarious, Sonic's face in the second panel or the fact he said, "You Dun Goofed Knucklehead".

With that said, I WANT TO READ THIS THING SO BAAAD. DX 

[Marcello]

I really love how expressive the characters are in this. It was a fun read all the way, through. I really hope there are more after part 2, though I expect there to.

[kadybat]

So, okay, I have a ton of opinions about Mega Drive, but I'm gonna give it a few days before posting them in full. For now, I'll say this - this is my favorite Sonic comic in years. It's expressive, fun, full of character, and oh my goodness the faces. Like for real there's expressions for days. 

November is way, way, way too far away, and I'm very excited for us to get to the Next Level. 

Also, if you're not a physical books sort of person, know that Archie lets you buy downloadable CBZ/PDF backups through Comixology. If you're like me and want to keep all your Sonic comics in one convenient place (like Comic Zeal for iOS!) after getting the Humble Bundle, that's absolutely the way to go!

[blade57331]

I didn't read the comic yet. But for first impression from what I saw, I will say that I kind of don't like art style, too much ... well, over the top I suppose. I mean I feel like I'm reading one of those fan-parody comic done by Tyson.

[Tails spin]

52 minutes ago, blade57331 said:

I didn't read the comic yet. But for first impression from what I saw, I will say that I kind of don't like art style, too much ... well, over the top I suppose. I mean I feel like I'm reading one of those fan-parody comic done by Tyson.

I respect your opinion. But in my opinion the art is beautiful. It's vibrant and doesn't look out of place 

[MetalSkulkBane]

Okay, I have few complains but over all I would like a story. It's simple, but jokes are cute and art is wonderful..

BUT!!!

It's not finished. Not a full story. That means "Next Level" is not a sequel, it's ending to the story, And that BLOWS. And putting #1 on Next Level is a dirty lie. About nitpicks

Spoiler

- I do like the bosses. They all original... except for gardener. Why it looks so much like that mini boss with an axe from S3&K ?

- "Weak spot" line. I'm not a fan of this humor

- Also, I'm not fan of making Knuckles getting tricked again. I though classic era was time when Knuckles wasn't an idiot.

Rings caught me by surprise. Wasn't this story meant to be canonical with main book?

[Adamis]

1 hour ago, MetalSkulkBane said:

  Hide contents

- Also, I'm not fan of making Knuckles getting tricked again. I though classic era was time when Knuckles wasn't an idiot.

Sonic 3 & Knuckles, Sonic Triple Trouble...

 

[MetalSkulkBane]

3 minutes ago, Adamis said:

Sonic 3 & Knuckles, Sonic Triple Trouble...

Being tricked once is being tricked. Being tricked again with the same trick, is being stupid.

And TT doesn't count. It was pretty much adaptation with different layout, a homage story  feeding on popularity of more popular one, arguably not even canon.

....Okay, same things can be said abuot "Mega Drive", but I was expecting a little bit more from Flynn, especially since he always fought with notion that Knuckles is a moron.

[Toby]

In Archie's continuity however, Triple Trouble IS canon. This is still young, naive very much trickable Knuckles if you'll remember.

[SBR2]

This is tops Knuckles third encounter with Eggman and Sonic at best. Of course he's still in his super Gullible "I'll  believe you without question" phase. Also Knuckles has always been an idiot but that's neither here nor there.

[Marcello]

Knuckles isn't dumb, he's just very naive and gullible. It's a trait I miss in him.

[Dejimon11]

Plus in Sonic 3 he had a reason to be gullible since he has never met anybody outside of Angle Island so seeing somebody from the outside world is jarring. The problem with it now is that they just need a reason for Knux to fight Sonic. 

[DabigRG]

2 minutes ago, Dejimon11 said:

Plus in Sonic 3 he had a reason to be gullible since he has never met anybody outside of Angle Island so seeing somebody from the outside world is jarring. The problem with it now is that they just need a reason for Knux to fight Sonic. 

You would think the obvious jealousy and dislike for each other would be enough...

[SBR2]

47 minutes ago, Marcello said:

Knuckles isn't dumb, he's just very naive and gullible. It's a trait I miss in him.

I don't know he believed a guy with a Death Star was on the up-in-up. Seems pretty dumb to me.

[Dantemustdie00]

"You done goofed Knucklehead" needs to be a thing forever.

[Celestia]

On 7/7/2016 at 11:02 AM, SBR2 said:

I don't know he believed a guy with a Death Star was on the up-in-up. Seems pretty dumb to me.

To put things in perspective: he lived alone on an island for his entire life with only little animals and a giant rock for company. Knuckles didn't have social interaction with anyone, let alone books or movies or TV shows that would make someone like your or me think, 'Jeez, this really suspicious guy with a robot army is probably untrustworthy.'

[DabigRG]

46 minutes ago, SBR2 said:

I don't know he believed a guy with a Death Star was on the up-in-up. Seems pretty dumb to me.

If I remember corectly, the SOnic 3 manuel has him think its a Phoenix Egg or something and EggmanRobotnik tells him he is a researcher of it.

[Tara]

So I've expressed a brief sentiment in the statuses, but I thought I might as well take a moment to give my full thoughts on Mega Drive.  Simply put, it's a beautiful piece of work and something I've been wanting from the series for the longest time.  It's not perfect by any stretch of the word, but it's definitely the most fun I've had with Sonic since this whole Sonic Boom debacle started at least.  Where to start?

Okay, the art style is adorable.  Like, probably some of the best art to have ever come out of Archie comics.  Now, bearing in mind, Archie Sonic's track record when it comes to aesthetically pleasing art is... dodgy.  It all depends on the era of the comics and who is drawing at the time, which means it can be beautiful and enjoyable to look at one issue and... well, really bad the next.  Or in some instances, it will be badly-designed characters superimposed atop low-resolution stock photos.  Of course, a lot of this has been remedied in the post-reboot continuity, so as far as I've seen, this is something that doesn't really need to be addressed in great detail anymore, but still, I can't help but be amazed at just how high quality the art is.  Absolutely gorgeous and cute.

Onto actual plot, it was a pretty novel idea for Flynn to decide against completely recycling the plot of the Genesis games (though there is admittedly plenty of that as well) and give us a break from the typical Chaos Emerald race that we've come to expect.  It's a relatively simple plot with little emotional nuance, but it works very well in its favor and does a spectacular job capturing the essence of the classic games.  It has definitely made me curious to see the sequel in November.

The characterization and comedic delivery is also leagues ahead of what Sega has been doing with Sonic Boom, in just my opinion.  Knuckles' stupidity, for example, was brought up here, and while I definitely do see him as not exactly the sharpest knife in the drawer, I feel like it really works here for a multitude of reasons.  For one, Knuckles takes himself seriously and the characters, while flustered at his blunder, do see it in an empathetic light.  Secondly, and most importantly in my opinion, the "stupidity" as it were stems from a specific character trait.  This is to say, he's well-meaning, but more than a little naive and gullible.  That's a nice contrast to Sonic Boom's Knuckles, who is intrinsically too stupid to live, even though I think the TV series does a good job painting him in an empathetic light as well.  Furthermore, the way the characters respond to his mistake is a refreshing change of pace from Sonic's recent "tired of your crap" attitude.

Also, can we all agree that the crayon drawing of Hidden Palace is the most adorable thing ever?  I was in tears at that point because I just loved it so much!

If there is one problem I would have to point out with the story is its pacing.  It feels like the story went maybe a little too fast.  But to be fair, this issue was largely a proof of concept, which makes it a little harder to be a cohesive and interesting story, especially given that it has to fit within a very restrictive page number quota.  So while it still is a bit of an issue, I don't know how I would fix it myself, and I feel Flynn and the crew did an excellent job with what they were given, despite of all that.  There also is the issue that the story really doesn't offer much in the way of emotional nuance or character depth.  All the characters are relatively simple, which actually may be a good thing if you're into that, but I do think those that grew up with the Archie comics and expect more intertwining stories and internal struggles will be disappointed.

Overall, though, I am extremely hyped for November now.  I'm actually contemplating ordering a physical copy of this issue if I can ever find one by the next time I have money in the bank.

[Zaysho]

I read "Mega Drive" three times last night. I read through it once just to get a look at it, and I enjoyed it greatly. Then I read it a second time a couple hours later, and started noticing little details such as the badnik in Flower Park Zone being the mini-boss from Mushroom Hill Zone in Sonic & Knuckles and catching little references and foreshadowing. The third time was to just soak in the artwork and look at how the characters behave and complement one another. Each time, I grew more and more charmed with this comic, now I'm considering buying a second physical copy and keeping it in a bag forever. I don't need a repeat of what happened to my copy of "Mecha Madness" all those years ago and have this one go damn near pieces on me.

While I'm thinking about jotting down some more detailed thoughts on my old, dead Sonic blog just to liven it up, I can say, in short, "Mega Drive" was fantastic on just about every note. Even if I didn't particularly like how goofy Hesse made Knuckles look in relation to the script, I also think it works wonderfully with his characterization (especially the little crayon-illustrated flashback sequence) because he's never portrayed as out-and-out stupid, just incredibly naive and trusting, well-intentioned, but hopelessly misguided, and coming right off of Sonic 3 & Knuckles, it fits perfectly. I was also amused at Tails meeting Amy for the first time; he's so cute and innocent, wowed at the sight of Amy's Piko-Piko Hammer, as if it's the coolest thing he's ever seen, and it just puts a smile on my face because this is Tails to me. Curious and intelligent for his age, but very much a kid at heart. Amy as well, as I think this builds up nicely to her appearance in Sonic Adventure, as she's learned from her previous experience and is taking steps to be more independent (even if those steps are ultimately just to get Sonic's attention).

Everything is just so spot-on in this comic, and it goes beyond attempting to bank on classic nostalgia, it's really trying to take something from that era and make something new out of it. Even the way the story flows as if it's another game in that line works well. Sure, the battles are over quickly, but the character bantering and interacting with each other is exactly what I want to see out of the games. Honestly, I want "Mega Drive" to be the basis of a game. I love seeing how Flynn makes use of everyone's unique personalities and abilities, and show how they complement Sonic's standard set--Tails can fly, Amy's hammer allows her to tackle obstacles Sonic can't, Knuckles is a powerhouse and is honing his treasure hunting--and I can see a game that allows you to switch off with each character to find new secrets or do things Sonic can't do on his own.

So, yeah, "Mega Drive" was gud. Much better than I expected, by a huge margin.

Also, I made Sonic and Knuckles being homies my sig image.

[SBR2]

58 minutes ago, Celestia said:

To put things in perspective: he lived alone on an island for his entire life with only non-anthro animals and a giant rock for company. Knuckles didn't have social interaction with anyone, let alone books or movies or TV shows that would make someone like your or me think, 'Jeez, this really suspicious guy with a robot army is probably untrustworthy.'

Eh, fair enough. I don't want anyone getting the wrong idea I like Knuckles but I honestly don't think his current portrayal is as off the mark as everyone likes to make it out to be.