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[Dr. Detective]

Archie Sonic the Hedgehog - Issue #114: Twice Told Tails!

I’m probably giving somebody I don’t like out there in the world exactly what they want by saying this but I can’t help but really like this cover. It’s such a goofy idea to have the return of Mammoth Mogul celebrated by a cover that’s paying homage to Star Wars. It helps that it also looks really good. I guess with all the other plot points wrapped up, might as well bring him back. It’s been eons since we saw that he got broken out of the Master Emerald at this point.

Spoiler

 

It’s Karl Bollers… whoops, I mean Benny Bollers. I mean Karl Lee… I mean Karl Bollers, back to write another story for us today folks.

So here’s the first image of the issue. As always, as of recent, it’s a nice little gift from Jeff Axer to show us what good art looks like before we get into the usual stuff that’s so graciously provided to us by Ron Lim.

It looks really good eh? Well, it’s actually nightmarishly good. That’s the true reason this happens next.

Yeah, that’s right. Tails was dreaming he looked really good and it scared him. Not to worry. We’re here in the world of arms that look like sticks, bulbous snouts, and eyes that stretch past your forehead for some reason.

No, but the actual dream Tails had was of him seeing some scary eyes in a cave while in the middle of a storm.

It’s not that vivid of a dream but apparently it’s so high tense that it scares Tails and wakes him up every night. Like, it’s been happening consistently for a long time at this point and now is the time to take him to the doctor so that he can… I guess use that weird dream machine that Dr. Quack randomly created and never used again after it’s plot device driven purpose was fulfilled.

Or something.

Either way, this does lead to an amusing moment where we find out just how much Sonic’s got Tails’ back on this.

It’s great.

Though, I will say, I wonder how Sonic’s been taking not having anything to do lately. Nate Morgan is dead. Robotnik is (supposedly) dead. Robotropolis blew up along with the remaining roboticized Overlanders that he tried so hard to save. You’d think Sonic would be a whirlwind of emotions right now but I’m doubting we’ll get something that explores that in this issue about Tails.

Can we at least find out his reaction to suddenly having to go to school and then, all of sudden, no longer needing to go to school? Wanna talk about how much of a waste of time that whole escapade was? 

To Sonic’s credit here, he does wake up ten minutes later, amusingly talking as he wakes up as though he was still in that same conversation with Tails before he dropped out cold. However, he notices Tails is gone and immediately bolts out of there, hearing an engine and seeing Tails flying the Tornado off in the distance.

When he catches up, he finds that Tails just flew himself to that cave in his dreams. Tails is shocked that he just knew where it was and feels like he should go inside. Sonic, true to his word, says he goes with no matter what. Despite the cute sleeping joke earlier, when the going gets serious, so does Sonic and I appreciate it.

So when they reach the inside they find something… interesting.

A flash of Ken Penders’ grinning face floated across my mind when I saw this image.

It taunted me for the mili-second it was in my mind before floating off into the clouds.

This is uh… I’m not sure what to make of this just yet. I’m hoping Karl will supply me with an explanation that’s easy to understand and interesting to boot.

Shockingly enough… I actually do end up getting that.

Mammoth Mogul shows up just as Sonic and Tails discover his secret, looking like a snack… and when I say ‘snack’, I mean a burnt, crumpled up graham cracker. He looks horrible.

However, he comes barring an explanation. When he was released from the Master Emerald he used his power as mystical, magical, floating space dust to hop on over to where Tails was getting his ass beat by Green Apple Knuckles and made a duplicate of him. 

Even better, the one floating in this orb is the real Tails. 

Mogul’s been back for a very short time but already he’s done the most interesting thing the comics have done probably since he stole Enerjak’s power.

This is where the Fake Tails would normally have some sort of existential crisis about being a fake this whole time, which I actually kind of want to see a little bit, but the knowledge that he’s gonna disappear doesn’t stop him from trying to be a hero.

Sonic faces off against Mogul and starts getting his butt kicked. The only taunts Sonic has for him is that he keeps using big words and that means he wants to get into college or that he swallowed a dictionary. It’s a pretty weak set of taunts, in all honesty but I get it. He’s worried. Sometimes the taunts don’t fire on all cylinders.

The two of them wail on Mogul together though. Tails finds his courage and manages to help Sonic break this dude’s concentration so that the ball of energy holding the real Tails disappears. This causes Mogul to disappear and the Fake Tails… dies.

I gotta say, I ended up feeling pretty sad by the end of this. I suppose it’d be best to try not to think too hard about it but I can’t. It’s not one of those things that goes too far, I don’t think. It’s the appropriate kind of sad where the duplicate calls himself a phoney and starts to cry but Sonic assures him that he’s still Tails right before the duplicate says he’ll never forget him and then… poof. He’s gone. 

The real Tails wakes up with no memory of the past… however long he’s been kidnapped and gets held close by a teary eyed Sonic who essentially just witnessed the death of a version of his best friend.

I’ll admit, my eyes got a tad misty. It’s a well done story.

 

Archie Sonic the Hedgehog - Issue #114: Ultimate Power

Ah, but the real tragedy comes when it’s time to read some more of Ken Penders’ stories about Knuckles and his forgetful society of echidnas. You all have no idea how much I can’t wait until they all just die off.

Like, this story begins with a passage explaining to us that Julie-Su and her barely there parents are moving into a new apartment provided to them by Knuckles and I don’t give a fuck.

As much shit as I like to talk, they do transition from this to an actually interesting conversation between Lien-Da and Dimitri.

I think the only reason it is interesting is because both Lien-Da and Dimitri are actually kind of interesting characters themselves. It’s a rarity in a sea of mediocrity when it comes to these echidnas but there’s a reason they end up lasting as long as they do.

I do like that Dimitri’s take over of the Dark Legion seems to be written as though its a thing he did out of necessity and not because he’s cuckoo for cocoa puffs like Kragok, the guy who showed back up literally just to die. With all the Enerjak energy no longer inside of him, he’s regressed back to a science guy with a much clearer and more level head… who’s also on death’s door and is fully aware that he’s lived far longer than any person should.

Dimitri has no idea how humble that statement of his actually is considering the fact that the assholes of the Brotherhood are using artificial means to not only stay alive but look young as hell too. Athair not wanting to deal with their shit has made it so that he looks old as hell but at least he gets to keep his dignity, which matters more to me.

Meanwhile we cut to Harry, who we only seem to cut to when he’s either off-duty or not wanting to drive someone somewhere, so that he can be presented a shiny little golden ball and told to take him to a group of echidnas. Harry seems to know what his deal is as he promptly asks the man to forget he exists, the instant he takes him where he needs to go.

We end on a pointless and kind of infuriating scene where the Chaotix, who don’t matter in this book, talk with Knux about how Dimitri’s been carted off to the hospital. Vector is understandably not concerned with the life of the leader of the Dark Legion and hasn’t been given any reason to be. Instead of properly explaining it to him he’s called an imbecile and beaten up by Julie-Su.

Like it’s genuinely anger inducing, seeing this character I fucking hate routinely beat up and make a fool of this character that I should like but also don’t like because of how awful his portrayal in this comic is. I couldn’t imagine being a Chaotix fan during this time and being stuck with this as my only representation of these characters to fall back on. This issue came out in 2002 so Heroes wasn’t a thing yet.

It won’t get too much better for them when that game comes out unfortunately. Not for a long, long time. 

Which is to say, not until the reboot as far as I’m personally concerned but that’s another kind of opinion all together.

 

This comic was good… however, it very easily could have been great. The first story really got to me in a positive way. I liked the idea behind it and I liked how appropriately bittersweet that ending was. It’s way more effective following the character that’s a fake so that we can get attached to them right before the reveal happens and then they disappear. Being blindsided like that makes for a good emotional shock to the system. Sadly, the thing holding it back from greatness was the art. It just LOOKS awful and that’s a huge shame. I really wish someone from IDW or late Archie Sonic could have drawn this instead. I’d be all over that.

The second story also had some good within it. The only problem was the beginning part that I didn’t care for and the ending part that pissed me off, both scenes involving Julie-Su, this character who can’t seem to not be on my bad side. 

It’s always disappointing whenever one or two things hold something back from being better than what it can be but despite that the Tails story from this issue is definitely going to be one I remember. It hit me right where it needed to emotionally and that usually matters the most.

 

Sonic X - Issue #17: March Madness

We’ve officially entered into a new era of these Sonic X comics. Ian Flynn is now fully on board as the writer for the book as of an issue or two ago except with that other tracing asshole gone, we have Steven Butler taking up the reins as artist for this issue meaning we’ll be getting more consistently good art from here on. Things are looking up. We start with a St. Patrick’s Day issue and cover that is, in all honesty, one of my favorite covers not just for this Sonic X book but for all of Sonic comics. I don’t know how to really explain it but the way this cover is set-up, the way it sparkles, the positions of the characters, the expressions they have, all of it just works perfectly. That image of Tails standing up while bent over at a perfect 90 degree angle so that he can press his ear to the ground to hear the hard digging Eggman is doing to get at that gold is the best thing ever. It’s so delightfully cartoony. 

Spoiler

 

The issue begins with Sonic running back to the mansion with Cheese. As soon as they get there, Cheese hugs Cream but is suddenly, magically green. Cream realizes this in a scene where it looks like she’s happy to see Cheese but then in the next panel after saying that he’s green she’s suddenly concerned about it.

Then we get the explanation for why.

Wow. Nice humblebrag Cream.

Anyway, Chris comes in wearing a green version of his usual shirt, which he honestly should wear more often in my opinion, to explain to Sonic that it’s St. Patrick’s Day. Amy walks in wearing a green headband and says that anyone not wearing green gets pinched and goes to do that annoying thing in elementary school where she attacks you to pinch on your arm or something.

Of course, we cut to Eggman in his lair, observing Station Square setting up a parade for the holiday. His robots, who seem to care more about researching the world they’re literally trapped in, have to explain this to him while we get a scene of Bokkun slipping while he’s painting the side of the base and falling headfirst into a bucket of green paint.

I guess a pretty strong wind blew in eh?

I can kind of see where this is going actually.

Leprechauns are explained to Eggman and he doesn’t doubt the possibility of their existence. Instead, he’s interested in looking up the part about finding one to either have a wish granted or to get their pot of gold. He looks up on the internet how many green slips of paper gold is worth and finds its worth quite a lot.

You know, the thought occurs to me that this whole thing of Eggman not knowing what money is was written during a time where we collectively didn’t know that SEGA didn’t consider money a thing for Sonic characters in their world. I still maintain that it totally is, otherwise, Vector, the Chaotix, his entire business and their goal to make the rent make no sense but whatever.

Anyway, Bokkun shows up and because he’s covered in green paint, Eggman thinks he’s a leprechaun and has Bocoe and Decoe try and nab him even though they seem to clearly recognize that he isn’t one.

I wanna say BEGORRAH at random whenever something disagreeable happens to me from here on in but I don’t think I’ll be able to commit.

The comic ramps up the fun in the “We can do whatever we want with this book and you can’t stop us” department when we cut to the St. Patrick’s Day parade where everyone is decked out in a little bit of green. Amy is even taunting Sonic about holding on to what little bit of green he managed to get on him when suddenly Bokkun shows up, grabs Cheese, and starts to shake the baby in the hopes that he’ll grant his wish not to be green anymore.

Of course he thinks he’s a leprechaun but he’s not so Sonic grabs him only to find out that today, Eggman has gone significantly more insane than usual in the biggest and best reveal possibly in the history of ever.

These comics are better than most things that exist in the world, probably.

The giant Leprechaun robot sends out his evil Shamrocks to go and nab him a leprechaun, convinced one has to be in the crowd because I don’t know. It’s fun.

Cheese and Bokkun allegedly fit the bill so they comically look at each other and go “Ruh roh!” before flying off together. Sonic and the gang then spread out to try and handle the situation.

Sonic calls the robot Darby O’ Gear which is a reference to Darby O’Gill and the Little People, something he should have no knowledge of unless he’s been really into this world’s movies and decided to randomly watch that one of all films.

Cream managed to catch up to Cheese and saves him, assuring her Chao friend that she’ll always be there to protect him.

On the flip-side, we have Bokkun who’s being chased by Tails who just wants to calm him down so he can help but Bokkun is having none of it. He goes rather crazy with his bombs and blows up one of the balloons with way more bombs than it should take to do so. The balloon crashes over the giant Eggman Leprechaun bot while Tails carries the now dizzy Bokkun off to safety.

Sonic uses that time to get up to the cockpit to taunt Eggman who curses the balloon by calling it a “Stupid Infernal Blasted Blankety Blank Balloon” which is a nice and funny way to censor yourself in real time.

Sonic has a bit of a rough time with the robot but it’s a fun fight that even at one point has him homing attack the robot with his normal blue streak looking all red, white, and blue instead. 

Eventually though, it begins to rain. At that exact time, the green of Cheese wears off and Bokkun gets his green washed away along with the obligatory but still delightful reference to Kermit the Frog.

It’s a lot easier being green when you have the delightful taste of Lipton tea by your side though.

Anyway, the rain ends up not being the best thing to happen for Sonic here since he slips while running along the robot and gets battered around like a tennis ball in Eggman’s giant robot monster hands before being grabbed.

It’s pretty embarrassing and even worse is the part where Eggman threatens to pluck out his spines like a four leaf clover. The image that invokes in my head isn’t a pleasant one at all.

This is where the sun shines through and like a vampire, Eggman shrieks about how he hates it and how it burns us. He also says he hates the rainbow that shows up too.

However, this gives Chris an idea.

The boy rushes on up and yells at Eggman that if he’s looking for a leprechaun and its pot of gold, they usually appear at the end of a rainbow.

Eggman, after fact checking with Bocoe and Decoe, just tosses Sonic’s beaten ass away and laughs as he goes to find the much less meaningful and much less fulfilling goal of a non-existent pot of gold. It’s kind of hilarious.

Bokkun laughs and calls Sonic’s friends losers before he flies off, happy that he’s no longer green.

We end on the gang drinking green sodas, which I really, really want, before Amy decides to bully our poor blue boy again.

As for Eggman he’s stuck digging a hole to China, presumably.

Yes, the doctor truly is insane.

 

Ah. That was fun. I remember fun. 

This was a breeze to read and it felt really good knowing that I was getting a story that felt consistent with itself and its tone despite being as goofy as it was. The absurdity of Eggman going to such lengths to find a leprechaun and his pot of gold for reasons he really shouldn’t care that much about does lend itself to a lot of cute shenanigans. This book is a sufficiently nice break from the mystery box of quality that I’m getting from the normal Archie issues, that’s for sure. 

 

Archie Sonic the Hedgehog - Issue #115: Meanie in a Bottle

This is an… odd cover. Even sitting here looking at it, I’m still not entirely sure what to make of it. I guess Muttski is back and he hates speed limit signs. I swear this dog is a very strange character. It’s one thing having a Pluto the dog in the Sonic series but to have one that’s so routinely ignored is strange. Perhaps that’ll change here a bit? Who knows?

Spoiler

 

Benny Karl Bollers Lee is writing this issue with Art Mawhinney on pencil duty. Well, now. Look who decided to return! He was off by just a single issue. If he had been here for that sad story about the duplicate Tails things would have been so much better, so much quicker.

Wow. What a really nice homage to Aladdin indeed. This is a really great picture. 

See, these comics continue to prove that they actually have great talent working under them at times. A lot of what it tries to get away with in terms of art is wholly unnecessary man.

This issue is also a good example of that. It looks really good. 

It begins with Sonic playing fetch with his metal dog. He throws the stick a little too hard and it goes into the water. The dog, not bothering to stop himself, jumps on in after it which, of course, scares the crap out of Sonic. He’s basically a giant anker. 

Sonic immediately pulls a Monkey D. Luffy and jumps on in after his body despite not being able to swim.

It’s always a nice, heart-warming sentiment whenever something like this happens.

He finds a small bottle submerged in the water and grabs it, which magically launches him back to the surface with Muttski. I guess because it’s magic.

What follows is basically Sonic meeting Magic Man from Adventure Time. He opens the bottle and releases the Genie inside of it but instead of a lovely companion who’s here to grant him his three wishes, he meets an ungrateful asshole.

I mean, I guess he’s not obligated to use his powers on you but he didn’t even say thank you. Sonic takes him being dissed and ignored rather well in all honesty.

The Genie says that if it’s a reward Sonic wants then he’ll give it to him and zaps him in the chest, not telling him what he did, before flying off. Sonic calls him a lame-o to Muttski and goes back to playing, trying to head on off for a run… except something’s wrong.

A Sonic who gets winded while running for less than a minute?

Oh no. That can’t happen. How will the book continue with “Sonic the Slow-Ass-Hog that Gets Winded Sitting Up Too Fast”?

Muttski is so far ahead of him though. Sonic goes to Dr. Quack and somehow this doctor can diagnose magic. He’s done that before but I always point it out because it seems like they just have this guy here to diagnose things regardless of whether or not it makes sense for him to be able to do it.

Anyway, he determines that his super speed was stripped from him and given to his dog.

Ruh-Roh.

To Sonic’s credit, once again, we don’t get any scenes of him moping around or pouting about it. Over the next few days, we’re treated to scenes of him trying to cope with it. Muttski manages to help out whenever he can and still plays fetch with a smiling Sonic… but one day they just happen to see the genie again and he sicks Muttski on him.

Muttski eats the genie, acting as another bottle for him. 

Now is when Sonic demands his three wishes.

Nice play.

Sonic punishes the genie basically the same way he punishes Erazor. 

Yeah, fuck that guy.

I gotta say though, it’s interesting how much more bulky and menacing he looks in the Jeff Axer art. In the actual story he looks like he could double as a furry version of Norm the Genie.

 

Archie Sonic the Hedgehog - Issue #115: Ultimate Power - Part 2

The next couple of pages are the Spaz Sketchbook which is a collection of character artwork created by Spaz. It all looks pretty good but it's not the focus of these reviews and there’s nothing too much to say about them so moving on.

Thankfully, that collection of pages made it so the final Penders story isn’t as long. Dawn Best’s art is still really good too. 

The story begins with Lien-Da leaving to go to the mother ship of the Dark Legion while Harry and Mogul arrive just as she leaves. Oh yeah, the mysterious person Harry gave a ride was Mogul. It wasn’t a very well hidden secret. Although, it is intensely amusing seeing Mogul ride in a taxi with shades on.

He waltzes right into what I assume is a hospital. It’s actually surprisingly hard to tell where they are based on the backgrounds but Mogul has a conversation with the man who he jacked his powers from.

I’m not ashamed to say that I’ve completely forgotten what happened back in Sonic #79. Looking it up, it seems it was the start of the Adventure arc. Doing a control F on Mogul’s name doesn’t bring up anything which means he must be talking about when he was freed from the Master Emerald.  

I guess I’m supposed to know how that took his powers from him. I dunno. I could be completely wrong about this. The events of this comic aren’t as memorable as it thinks it is.

Back with Knuckles and the Chaotix, Vector is moving around weirdly. Maybe he’s dancing but it doesn’t look like it. They talk about how Green Apple Knuckles is green now. Knuckles uses his weird powers to create flowers for Julie-Su and then goes to see his dad. Alright.

After a scene with Lien-Da talking to her subordinates to set up something, we cut to Knuckles and the gang heading down the corridor of a technological dump and find Locke, who was about to go seek out Knuckles himself due to having gotten a transmission from Mammoth Mogul. He’s captured Dimitri. 

Dun Dun Dun.

Yeah. Okay.

 

This issue was fun. Honestly, there’s so little to it that it feels like a blip on the radar. I’ll be surprised if I even remember I read this. However, for what it was, it was easy to get through and it served the purpose of momentarily entertaining me. So that’s nice.

 

[Sonictrainer]

It's funny to me that the Archie Comics had Sonic wielding swords and talking to genies way before the Storybook Games came out

[Coz483]

Man I've only read around 30 issues, and they weren't in any order. I've gotta catch up but I don't really know where to start. 

[Dr. Detective]

1 hour ago, Coz456 said:

Man I've only read around 30 issues, and they weren't in any order. I've gotta catch up but I don't really know where to start. 

Since Archie Sonic was cancelled, there's not much to worry about in terms of "catching up". The IDW Sonic comics are a different story since those are new and currently ongoing. Obviously, I'd suggest just going to IDW but if you want to read Archie, I'd honestly suggest reading from 160 onward. Perhaps you'd manage to get some enjoyment out of issues 1 through 50 but it's a war zone of questionable quality after that 50th issue. Not all of it is bad but a good chunk of it is.  

[Silvereyes]

4 hours ago, Coz456 said:

Man I've only read around 30 issues, and they weren't in any order. I've gotta catch up but I don't really know where to start. 

 

3 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

Since Archie Sonic was cancelled, there's not much to worry about in terms of "catching up". The IDW Sonic comics are a different story since those are new and currently ongoing. Obviously, I'd suggest just going to IDW but if you want to read Archie, I'd honestly suggest reading from 160 onward. Perhaps you'd manage to get some enjoyment out of issues 1 through 50 but it's a war zone of questionable quality after that 50th issue. Not all of it is bad but a good chunk of it is.  

Yeah I'd agree with Mike really, if you don't have the time or inclination to read the whole thing. Flynn takes over from #160 and I'd say the book is mostly good from that point forward. Make sure to read the Sonic Universe comics as well in tandem with the main book as well.

Saying that though, going to the effort of reading all of Archie Sonic isn't the worst idea either, even if there are at least 50 issues that are very low quality. Like it or not, Archie Sonic is really a saga with something like 450 issues of continuity altogether. (500 if you include Archie's X and Boom comics too.) And there are some weird and great ideas scattered in Archie Sonic, as well as original characters that you may come to really like.

It really is the kindof thing that despite so many issues of low quality, I would still buy all the issues of an Archie Sonic compilation if they ever got the chance to print something like that... even if the odds of that happening would only be after everyone involved with the comic has died of old age in the far future.

[SBR2]

Spoiler

16 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

 

This cover implies Sonic will murder Tuskan Raiders in blinding Rage and Sally will fall for his dreamy notions of fascism.

 

16 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

.

Tails looks like a Teddy Bear. It's hard to make that not sound like a compliment but it's not.

 

17 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

Though, I will say, I wonder how Sonic’s been taking not having anything to do lately. Nate Morgan is dead. Robotnik is (supposedly) dead. Robotropolis blew up along with the remaining roboticized Overlanders that he tried so hard to save. You’d think Sonic would be a whirlwind of emotions right now but I’m doubting we’ll get something that explores that in this issue about Tails.

It's kinda funny thinking about how different Archie Sonic is from Game Sonic in situations like this. Because Game Sonic would be out hunting for his next adventure while Archie Sonic is perfectly happy dinking around Knothole for the rest of his life.

 

17 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

The two of them wail on Mogul together though. Tails finds his courage and manages to help Sonic break this dude’s concentration so that the ball of energy holding the real Tails disappears. This causes Mogul to disappear and the Fake Tails… dies.

This would be a lot more heart warming if Tails didn't look like a disgruntled Care Bare and Sonic didn't have a wide screen TV in skull.

 

17 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

You all have no idea how much I can’t wait until they all just die off.

Well you got about 120 or so issues to go.

 

17 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

Julie-Su and her barely there parents are moving into a new apartment provided to them by Knuckles

PHENOMENAL COSMIC POWER! To help you Girlfriend move into a ne Apartment.

 

17 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

 

Y'know under a better writer we'd probably be past this shit and while they may not get along they could at least be civil with each other by now.

 

17 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

Ian Flynn is now fully on board as the writer for the book

Eh, A writer. The X book had a rotating set of writers. I believe after this Edkin and a couple fill in writers do everything up until about #23 I want say. Even then Ian isn't the only writer. Tracy Yardley contributes 3 issues and Joe Edkin has 2 hold over stories published before the book ends.

 

17 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

I don’t know how to really explain it but the way this cover is set-up, the way it sparkles, the positions of the characters, the expressions they have, all of it just works perfectly.

Maybe it's the corpses of Alex Kidd and Ristar. Seriously the bones in the dirt on either side of Eggman are the remains of Ristar and Alex Kidd.

 

17 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

Then we get the explanation for why.

Wow. Nice humblebrag Cream.

So I know nothing about Chao (This might get me burned at the stake but personally I find Chao raising dull as shit) so why did Speed Type energy turn Cheese green exactly?

 

17 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

Amy walks in wearing a green headband and says that anyone not wearing green gets pinched and goes to do that annoying thing in elementary school where she attacks you to pinch on your arm or something.

I love how Steven renders Amy's insatiable pinching lust in this issue. She wants to pinch Sonic so bad it's amazing.

 

17 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

 

I once shared this image of Eggman's giant Leprechaun robot with Kyle Kallgren the Brow's Held High guy when he was asking on Twitter for things to declare Art. His response was "A-art?" like a coward.

 

17 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

Sonic calls the robot Darby O’ Gear which is a reference to Darby O’Gill and the Little People, something he should have no knowledge of unless he’s been really into this world’s movies and decided to randomly watch that one of all films.

I mean Chris's mom is an actress so it's very possible during that period of time they were hiding out in Chris's attic they all watched some movies.

 

17 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

Eventually though, it begins to rain. At that exact time, the green of Cheese wears off and Bokkun gets his green washed away along with the obligatory but still delightful reference to Kermit the Frog.

You know Ian loves making this reference (I believe it's done again in Universe's Scourge Arc) and has made a few other Muppets references so I'm honestly kinda shocked he's never actually written any Muppets comics.

 

17 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

Archie Sonic the Hedgehog - Issue #115: Meanie in a Bottle

You gotta rub him the wrong was. God I just mad a Cristina Aguilera reference. I'm old.

 

17 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

I swear this dog is a very strange character. It’s one thing having a Pluto the dog in the Sonic series but to have one that’s so routinely ignored is strange.

Even stranger he was only in the pilot of SatAM and was never mentioned in any of the other 25 episodes. I think he made it into some books though.

 

17 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

 

I can show you the art. Better than what will follow. Mawhinny's good but after this it's a bitter pill to swallow. (I'm not a lyricist ok)

 

17 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

What follows is basically Sonic meeting Magic Man from Adventure Time.

That's an insult to Magic Man. At least he was entertaining.

 

17 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

Sonic goes to Dr. Quack and somehow this doctor can diagnose magic.

Well that's just basic medical training.

 

18 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

Sonic punishes the genie basically the same way he punishes Erazor. 

Yeah, fuck that guy.

He sadly doesn't wish for a mountain of handkerchiefs though which is a shame.

 

18 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

 

Man Mogul is rocking those shades. Kinda wish he kept them.

 

18 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

I guess I’m supposed to know how that took his powers from him. I dunno. I could be completely wrong about this. The events of this comic aren’t as memorable as it thinks it is.

You also also shouldn't know because this is literally the first time it's mentioned. I think it's maybe supposed to be related to Tails using the Chaos Syphon on him back in #56 but IDK.

 

18 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

This issue was fun. Honestly, there’s so little to it that it feels like a blip on the radar.

Honestly I'm not a big fan of it and that's why. Also the Genie's a dick but not a particularly entertaining one. It's a problem with a lot of these "Benny Lee" stories they're just kinda there.

 

[Sonictrainer]

Quote

So I know nothing about Chao so why did Speed Type energy turn Cheese green exactly?

When Chao come in contact with only Speed Type Animals & Chaos Drives, they slowly become green.

If they continue to get more after that point, they start turning blue and start to look like Sonic

[Multikaris]

I now wonder what would happen if, sometime in the future, Archie somehow got the license to Sonic back? What would they do? Would they be able to start the series from where they left off, or would they have to start fresh?

[Coz483]

24 minutes ago, Snowragnarok said:

I now wonder what would happen if, sometime in the future, Archie somehow got the license to Sonic back? What would they do? Would they be able to start the series from where they left off, or would they have to start fresh?

One thing I do want from Archie is Megadrive Overdrive. A big reason is that in early 2018 I heard they had finished it so I feel we deserve it.

[Rabbitearsblog]

2 hours ago, Snowragnarok said:

I now wonder what would happen if, sometime in the future, Archie somehow got the license to Sonic back? What would they do? Would they be able to start the series from where they left off, or would they have to start fresh?

I am curious about what Archie would do if they do get Sonic back.  However, I have a feeling that SEGA will try to be even more controlling with the comics like they are with IDW.

[SBR2]

9 hours ago, Snowragnarok said:

I now wonder what would happen if, sometime in the future, Archie somehow got the license to Sonic back? What would they do? Would they be able to start the series from where they left off, or would they have to start fresh?

Eh I know this is a hypothetical but I doubt they'd ever really bother getting the license back. They seem to have fully moved on from any licensed comics now.

[Coz483]

1 minute ago, SBR2 said:

Eh I know this is a hypothetical but I doubt they'd ever really bother getting the license back. They seem to have fully moved on from any licensed comics now.

Yeah, they really have no reason to when it ended over 4 years ago now.

[Zonic 2099]

17 hours ago, Snowragnarok said:

I now wonder what would happen if, sometime in the future, Archie somehow got the license to Sonic back? What would they do? Would they be able to start the series from where they left off, or would they have to start fresh?

Its far more likely that IDW would continue from where Archie left off than Archie getting the license back. It might happen one day much later down the road but for now it's probably better that SEGA not think about the comic with how many legal problems it had.

[SBR2]

2 hours ago, Zonic 2099 said:

Its far more likely that IDW would continue from where Archie left off than Archie getting the license back. It might happen one day much later down the road but for now it's probably better that SEGA not think about the comic with how many legal problems it had.

I'm hoping for that. If nothing else I kinda hope as unlikely as it might be that Ian repurposes his original Genesis Nexus idea for the third Sonic and Mega Man crossover into a 30th Anniversary story of some kind with Archie Sonic, Fleetway Sonic and IDW Sonic all having to team up. It's almost certainly not going to happen but I can dream.

[Rabbitearsblog]

4 hours ago, SBR2 said:

I'm hoping for that. If nothing else I kinda hope as unlikely as it might be that Ian repurposes his original Genesis Nexus idea for the third Sonic and Mega Man crossover into a 30th Anniversary story of some kind with Archie Sonic, Fleetway Sonic and IDW Sonic all having to team up. It's almost certainly not going to happen but I can dream.

That would be pretty interesting to see, but doesn't BOOM own Mega Man and how can they get Fleetway Sonic into this series?

[CrownSlayers Shadow]

On 12/6/2020 at 4:09 PM, Dr. Detective Mike said:

Archie Sonic the Hedgehog - Issue #114: Twice Told Tails!

Ah, yes. This issue is when I rediscovered the comics in a old Borders Books & Music store. Good times.

I wouldn’t be able to collect every issue after it, but it’s great seeing this piece of memory lane.

Of course, jumping in so late after more than a dozen issues from the last comic I got made for lots of confusion of everything that happened since, such as the robotic echidna whom I discovered was one of Knuckles’ older enemies and why the hell Knuckles was green, but at the same time I gave no fucks over the confusion and was glad to see the comics again.

Not that I’m praising the comics too much at this point, but it’s a good thing I picked it up this early too, as it gave me lots of room for when Ian would later take over.

 

[SBR2]

19 hours ago, Rabbitearsblog said:

That would be pretty interesting to see, but doesn't BOOM own Mega Man and how can they get Fleetway Sonic into this series?

I didn't say use Mega Man I said the idea that was teased at the end of the second crossover. And Like I said it's a wild fantasy but I would hope if they did this they'd negotiate a deal to use STC Sonic for at least the one storyline.

[Dr. Detective]

Archie Sonic the Hedgehog - Issue #116: Operation: Off-Switch

Oh hello Rouge.

I’m not entirely sure what to make of this cover. I guess it’s time we properly included Rouge into the proceedings regarding the book after SA2 came out such a long while ago. It’s odd though. No matter how many times I see characters like Rouge interacting with characters like Bunnie from a TV show I never watched, it never stops feeling surreal to me. I can’t put my finger on why though. 

Spoiler

 

Benny Karl Bollers Lee and Ron Lim have taken on this first story together, as has been the case for what feels like forever now. I’m ready for a new artist to take over.

So, the story begins in a very strange way that makes me wonder if I accidentally skipped an issue or something.

The President calls Sonic and Bunnie over to Station Square to tell them that his satellites have picked up images of an abandoned city on Mobius and he sent his agent Rouge the Bat to check it out but she hasn’t returned. Oddly enough, the blame is laid onto Eggman and the text used to explain this speaks as though he’s simultaneously dead and alive at the same time, despite (currently) both Eggmans being gone.

“The late Doctor Robotnik is constructing a new super-artificial body there” was a confusing sentence. It took a lot of thinking but eventually I remembered that when his body gets destroyed he uses… I dunno, satellites or something to upload to a new one… I think? It can’t be the satellite that blew up. That wouldn’t make any sense. 

I guess the reason the characters didn’t have ANY reaction to Eggman blowing the hell up was because they figured he was alive and just decided not to talk about it ever. 

How exactly does this work again? I need a refresher that stretches further back than Issue 110. Like, did Snively also turn into download pixels that can transfer to new bodies? How is this comic going to explain how he lives? 

This wouldn’t be such a big deal if the comic wasn’t so matter of fact about him just being around again like this. He’s just here and I guess I’m expected to not wonder how or why.

I need a more comprehensive breakdown on how Eggman works now because the guy got nuked and no one spoke up about how he could have potentially survived to reconstruct a new body for himself. Where does his consciousness actually lie nowadays? 

Well, anyway, Sonic asks why the President didn’t call them first and he gets on his knees and begs for forgiveness like they’re going to fucking murder him. It’s a very strange scene but Sonic lets him know he’s kidding and they head to the city.

Probably with the X-Men, Sonic. Either that or Penders kidnapped her to steal her powers for a made-up character of his that no one cares about. You’re supposed to be looking for Rouge though.

Well, anyway, they decide to split up. 

Sonic goes off in search of Eggman and eventually starts getting chased by missiles, meaning that the defense system has kicked in. Then he finally comes across Eggman.

What is happening?

This… weird looking thing and Sonic start to have a fight. All throughout it I was hoping, waiting, and wondering how this even ended up being the situation we were in. It’s happening too fast. You’d think some of the filler stories that were being told before this could have been utilized to properly set this up better but instead it’s just a thing that’s happening as fast as humanly possible in an issue with three stories in it. This book is cramped.

Why would you do this for a story about Eggman’s return? At least have the man properly monologue about how he survived. He never does that and Sonic never asks. Does Sonic even really know how Eggman works now? I don’t remember it being thoroughly explained to him. Does he not care? Even if he doesn’t, it still seems weird that we’ve had literally no conversations about Eggman and where he’d appear next up into this exact moment where he’s shown up again. If Sonic DOES know how Eggman works, you’d think he and the others would show at least a little bit of concern.

Again, I could be wrong about the book not having explained this properly but I don’t know because nothing is being talked about here. Things are just happening and no one’s bothering to question any of it.

The story just ends on a weird note where Sonic just murders the guy again, blowing up the entire fucking base along with him. He does this by jamming a stick of dynamite into Eggman’s mouth.

It’s like… okay?

Apparently, Eggman just sat there with that dynamite in his mouth for MINUTES and let it explode since the caption says "Minutes later".

Sonic’s treating this like he was just sent out to vacuum some ants off the carpet. He didn’t even really ask Eggman about Rouge. What if she was in that base and he just blew it up? She wasn’t, obviously, but again that’s something only the reader could infer. I don’t know why everyone’s just acting like this is a regular, everyday fight against Eggman. Like, no, he was nuked and he’s just back and no one bothered asking what this place is or how it went undetected until now or even what his current plans were. I guess it was literally just him trying to make a new body.

Now that he’s been blown up again, what happens now? Does his consciousness exist as particles in the air that float to other hidden bases to begin reconstruction on a new body? 

I was so frustrated and confused by the lack of an explanation I did what I don’t normally do and had to look it up on the wiki… and that took a while because there’s three different, heavily detailed articles about three different versions of Eggman in these Archie comics.

I typed in Doctor Eggman (Archie) and got an article about just his character from the Post Reboot. Knowing that couldn’t have been all the site had, I typed in Julian Kintobor and got Dr. “Ivo” Robotnik (Pre-Super Genesis Wave) which was an article just about the Eggman that died. So then I clicked on the link provided to me by the page when it mentioned Robo-Robotnik coming to take his place and got taken to the article of Doctor Eggman (Pre-Super Genesis Wave) and had to scroll all the way down to something that resembled where I am now in order to read this single sentence.

“As a robot, Dr. Eggman maintained his ability to transport his consciousness into new android shells.”

Ah. 

So he still has that ability.

Well, thanks for clarifying. 

This wouldn’t have been nearly as big of an issue had that single sentence been mentioned anywhere in the book. This book really underestimates just how long and drawn out its shit is. I knew that he transferred his consciousness to a new body way back when but I don’t REALLY know how it works. Some clarification or acknowledgement of what he’s done would have been nice.

Calling him the late Robotnik but acting like he still lives is a confusing way of putting things man. Also, he transferred his body to a new android shell but was constructing a new android shell for himself? Did he just transfer himself to a computer that did that? I guess so. I would have to assume...

This isn’t as confusing as I’m making it out to be but this information wasn’t delivered properly  and that’s really what’s frustrating here. They sped through this too fast and offered so little context for what’s happening that I had to look up information to properly gauge what was happening.

I guess I could have just made an educated guess and  assumed a lot of this but I don’t really feel comfortable doing that.

 

Archie Sonic the Hedgehog - Issue #116: Bat Fight!

Where’s Rouge the Bat? Here’s Rouge the Bat!

She looks really good. 

She also looks intense and menacing. I do really miss the mystique of her character as someone who skirted the line between good and bad. That still exists in a minimal capacity in a few things here and there but it’s largely been forgotten. 

I don’t know if I’d like her to stay in the all-black color scheme here but as of now, it looks incredible and appropriate for sure.

This story is also by Bollers but, since it looks incredible, it can only be our boy Jeff Axer on pencils for this one. 

Anyway, Rouge is let out and comes across Bunnie who says “Howdy”. Rouge’s response is to punch her into the stratosphere.

She thinks she’s one of Robotnik’s goons, which is a fair enough assumption.

Bunnie, of course, takes a page from Batman V. Superman and gives up on explaining things immediately, instead opting to have a fight. 

This whole thing is an excuse to have a fight, which I’m okay with.

I will say though, some of the dialogue is a bit odd.

For example, there’s a scene where Rouge and Bunnie are exchanging blows and then all of a sudden we get this bottom panel of Rouge saying and doing this...

But it’s like... she didn’t say anything so… what?

Is it a joke about how they’re talking with their punches and kicks?

Well, anyway, it doesn’t matter.

After a few more amusing fight panels with amusing expressions and such, the story just ends.

That’s it. 

This comic is really weird.

 

Archie Sonic the Hedgehog - Issue #116: Ultimate Power, Mid-Logue: The Lesson

Alright, so what the horseshit we’re ending on here?

Oh look. It’s an eight-year-old Knuckles with weird old man forehead wrinkles. 

Yes, just what I wanted from the dream team of Ken Penders and Ron Lim. Together again!

Yeah, so Green Apple Knuckles is reliving a memory of a time when his dad tossed him aside. Some people were walking into a cave and I guess the Chaos Emeralds were in danger (although they talk as though it were just one emerald keeping it afloat. Maybe it was but I could have sworn it was at least two). 

Knuckles asks his dad to explain and Locke condescendingly tells him it makes the island float which naturally prompts Knuckles to ask if people want it to make their own islands float. Locke does a real bad job of explaining why this is a problem so I can’t blame little Knux for the confusion here.

Green Apple Knuckles is back in present day and is, and  I quote, “Watching Mammoth Mogul threaten Dimitri on HD TV.” 

He also says that he and his dad did so many things together that it’s hard to keep track of which I feel has to be a fabricated lie Knuckles convinced himself of in order to make himself feel better.

Knuckles goes back to the flashback and sees his dad confronting some of Robotnik’s robots who are about to steal the Chaos Emerald so that they can power their ship. Little Knuckles jumps down and is immediately smacked aside by one of the robots. Then Locke uses his magic powers to defeat them or something. 

Kid Knuckles finally gets an explanation for how this emerald thing works.

I guess the point of this was to serve as some sort of motivation to save Dimitri? I don’t know why. It seemed like Knuckles was pretty ready to do that anyway. Was it to make Locke look like a good dad? Knuckles starts this story mad at his dad for being a dick and then it ends on yet another, “Oh but he’s got good intentions. Maybe I was wrong about him.” thing that Penders loves to do with these shitty dads. I’m not even sure why this warrants a “With Great Power Comes Great Responsibility” moment. 

We end on the same exact note the last part of this story ended on where they still gotta save Dimitri. So this entire thing was a massive waste of time.

Here’s a Sonic Gram message asking if they’ll include the newest character, Cream the Rabbit, into the book.

Not wanting to add new characters is quite the insanely massive lie.

Cream doesn’t appear until... wait… when does Cream appear? Treasure Team Tango?

 

This wasn’t a very good issue but I honestly came out of it feeling a bit more ashamed of myself. I don’t know if it’s my fault or the fault of the comic but in this particular issue so much information got jumbled in my head because I couldn’t properly remember old details. I know I shouldn’t feel that way when it comes to Penders’ garbage but even the fact that I thought it was two chaos emeralds in that chamber but the comic only shows one messed with my mind. I don’t know when I’m right or wrong here because a lot of the stuff they harken back to has happened so long ago and they’re story details hidden within old as hell story details. I’m pretty sure the thing with Eggman’s consciousness being transferred to a new body was just a thing that happened. I don’t remember it being explained as something he just did when there was no machinery around to activate the ability. The entire city got nuked. How’d he transfer anything anywhere? 

I dunno. I needed so much help with this particular issue and it doesn’t feel like I should have. This might be the worst review I’ve ever done.

 

Archie Sonic the Hedgehog - Issue #117: Cyber Race!

I like the background of the cover. I’m not so much a fan of how Sonic’s drawn here. I’ve seen better work from both these artists. There’s not a ton to talk about here aside from the fact that he looks like he’s tearing off the skin of a rabbit from his face. So there’s that.

Spoiler

 

So… this book begins by immediately addressing the stuff I complained about last issue about how insanely confusing all the Eggman shit was. 

Thank you, Karl Bollers, for deciding you wanted to actually inform me of what was going on.

Thank YOU, Steven Butler, for drawing this story instead of Ron Lim.

I was so confused last time that I actually started to feel like shit. Like, the concept felt obvious and simple but the WAY it was explained was so UNexplained and so ignored that I had no idea how to feel confident about what I thought was happening. I don’t know why the decision to do it like this was made but I’m at least grateful it was done at all. 

I underestimated just how good it felt to know what the fuck was happening in a story.

Snively takes a ride on one of the zeroes and ones and gets a new body.

The story then proceeds to render the entirety of the story I just read last issue completely meaningless in the span of, count them, FOUR pages. 

Just four.

That’s it!

The two of them warp out of Cyberspace in a completely different base and before Snively can look cool, Eggman cuts him back down to size.

Also, his new body looks like his old one.

Also, he didn’t even have to construct a new one. He just zapped into the room and he had a new one immediately.

What the fuck was the point of that last story???

He just comes back, far quicker, far easier, with his normal body AND with an explanation for how it worked to boot. On the flip-side, that other story was a bunch of meandering nonsense that had no explanation despite being three times as long. What the hell?

Maybe this really was just Bollers apologizing for the last issue.

 

Archie Sonic the Hedgehog - Issue #117: The Tortoise and the Hedgehog

We cut to a new story where we have a new writer for this book, Romy Chacon, and Art Mawhinney coming back to provide his usual brand of really good cartoony art.

Strange thing about the wiki here is how it says Romy has only written for five issues of this comic yet the ones they list don’t include this one. Someone messed up but I don’t know who.

Anyway… the first page is rather interesting. 

So, this rabbit, who, based on the cover, is probably Sonic in disguise is here to meet up with his best friend and candidate for God, Tommy the Turtle. 

I’ve only heard about this character’s reputation from other people. I haven’t experienced it yet though. I currently have a more positive opinion of Tommy because he starred in that really awesome story about A.D.A.M.

… You know, the issue where he fucking DIED?

I’ve always, ALWAYS been confused by how bad this Tommy Turtle problem could be. It didn’t seem possible that a character who seemed to only be a turtle and nothing else could be so hated. I wondered, “How?” and “Why?” so much. I guess we’ll find out eventually.

Oh, and the Destructix are here. I don’t think they’re called that yet so I guess it’s just the Fearsome Foursome, Sleuth “Doggy” Dog (Best name), and Drago the Domestic Abuser.

Here, Son--I mean, Juice the Rabbit (Pfft) tells them all about how he’s friends with Tommy because Tommy is “friends” with them so they need to be able to trust juice.

So Juice just tells them the story of the Tortoise and the Hare.

No one there has ever heard that story before. 

It looks like they accept this explanation, though Drago is upset because they’ve got a meeting in two hours. Juice says he’ll stay out of their hair and when they all leave, except for Sleuth, the Doggy Dog in question puts his arm around Tommy and leads him off, suggesting that the two of them (or at least Sleuth) has something in mind that’s a bit off kilter from what the other members of this group are going to do.

When Sonic is alone, he takes off his disguise and recounts the actual story of how he knows Tommy. 

It’s literally the same.

Thus, our title, “The Tortoise and the Hedgehog”. 

They were friends since they were kids, apparently, even though we never saw hide nor hair of him in any of the numerous flashbacks there were of the characters hanging out as kids. That’s fine though. We’ll say he was one of those “sometimes friends”. He's that guy who hangs out with you sometimes but not enough to be a part of “the gang” if you know what I mean.

When Robotnik took everything over everyone was led to believe he died but he didn’t. They just now got word that he’s alive after all these years so that this story could happen.

It’s a little flimsy but I’m willing to go along with it.

Sonic is super determined to save his buddy Tommy though and we learn why.

Except for when it comes to Antoine. Fuck that guy. I bullied the shit out of him when we were kids.

Sonic makes it through this air vent and reaches an area where he spots Eggman speaking with Drago and the others. 

Wow. What a neat way to connect this story with the last one. It’s almost as if Bollers forgot how to write last time and then remembered again for this issue.

Although, the part where Sonic FINALLY acts as though he feels a bit frustrated by the fact that Eggman is still alive kind of felt like a "too little, too late" scenario.

I dunno. 

It still feels like he’s acting like Eggman and Snively are just a pair of flies that won’t go away. Maybe I’m asking too much for Sonic to be surprised or for him to contemplate what Eggman’s deal is a little more. I guess he DOES know they can switch bodies though but I don’t feel like that’s an excuse for Sonic to literally not mention him at all when Robotropolis got nuked. 

Anyway, Drago begins to suck up to Eggman when he offers to give the doctor some terms and Eggman immediately accepts them. He doesn’t at all think that perhaps the tyrannical dictator who ruled the planet might have just accepted his terms because he figured it didn’t matter what they were.

Because, of course, Drago’s terms literally don’t mean jack shit.

It’s moments like these that really exemplify just how good of a villain Eggman is and how you really have to try hard to either make him unappealing or unentertaining. This was a fantastic move by our resident evil dirtbag and I fully endorse it.

Of course, this where villain competency clashing against one another comes into play, for you see, Sleuth reveals his hand, managing to somehow not get caught by Eggman’s wires.

He tells Eggman that he’ll grant him his wish and all he has to do is robotize Tommy. 

When Sonic hears that, he bursts out of the vent. Sleuth then monologues about how he tricked Tommy into bringing Sonic here. It’s great that he didn’t fall for the Juice disguise. I have a ton of respect for that.

Eggman tries to nab Sonic but Sonic dodges, nabs Tommy, and grinds on his shell towards the exit.

Eggman says, “Fuck it” and goes to robotize Sleuth instead but Sleuth whips out a grenade, tossing it and blowing everything the fuck up, including Eggman and Snively’s new bodies, yet again.

The true meaning of friendship is getting blown up by a grenade.

So, I actually didn’t expect this ending. It would seem this is just in Tommy’s nature. He just likes getting blown the fuck up huh?

I kind of wish this didn’t happen here. I know I’m speaking in a matter of hindsight but… this is going to happen again. 

Archie Sonic the Hedgehog - Issue #117: Ultimate Power - Part Three

Every time I get to the next Ken Penders Knuckles story, all of a sudden, a huge weight crashes onto my back and I immediately feel exhausted. This is usually where I try and take a break or I do my absolute best to rush through it. At least Dawn Best is on pencil duty.

This is actually fairly straight-forward yet again though.

Constable Remington sees Knuckles and the Chaotix coming in and takes them to Harry the Dingo, who has been beaten to within an inch of his life and is resting on a hospital bed.

I always, always feel bad whenever a character who explicitly states over and over again that they don’t want any trouble and want to be left out of the nonsense that’s going on with all these dangerous people and their drama ends up getting hurt like this. It’s the most motivated the comic has made me towards wanting the person who hurt him to get their comeuppance in a long while.

Luckily, Knuckles is here and his Green Apple energy has made him Jesus now. So he uses his force powers to manipulate the midichlorians to create life or something. I dunno. He pulls a Rey from Rise of Skywalker, officially doing this incredibly lame thing before it was cool to do this incredibly lame thing.

Thank goodness.

We cut back to Mogul and Dimitri who are having a morality conversation. Credit where it’s due yet again, it’s a good talk. Dimitri actually is showing remorse for what he’s done and Mogul, amusingly, points out that it might be a bit late for that. He’s lived for so long that the idea he’d be thwarted by some angsty teenagers infuriates him though.

If I were Mogul, I’d be upset by that as well.

Back with Lien-Da, she’s basically choosing to wait and see what Knuckles does next. She recognizes that being indebted to Knuckles if he saves the new head of the legion would be something Kragok would never forgive her for. I’d personally say he can go fuck himself but I guess Lien-Da’s mind was warped in just the right way to make it mean a little more to her as opposed to Dimitri who just came into god-like power and went instantly insane. The indoctrination of Lien-Da’s life up to this point seems to be clashing with what Dimitri went through here.

Basically, Knuckles decides to burst into the place where Mogul is keeping Dimitri but Mogul’s got an ace up his sleeve.

I’m genuinely anticipating what happens here and I don’t know how to feel about that.

Also, holy shit, remember this advert?

I do. I saw it all the time. How nostalgic.

 

This was a much better issue than the last one, thank goodness. Not only was my biggest problem from the last issue given immediate clarification but the first two stories connected in a way that made them both stronger. The villainy on display by Eggman was top-notch and didn’t feel like a fly-swatting monster of the week trial of superfluousness. The Penders story is being stretched super thin and it's very ridiculous that we’re still on this plot line, however, he’s miraculously done a fair job of characterizing Dimitri, Lien-Da, and Mogul. All three of them are genuinely good characters and I’m shocked. Penders does stumble into those every now and again. Not often enough for my taste but hey, it’s working on some level at least. I have to be happy about that.

 

Archie Sonic the Hedgehog - Issue #118: Robotnik Returns

There’s a lot to say about this minimalist cover, surprisingly. One, is the fact that Eggman is advertising a story where he’s no doubt going to get his ass kicked again. The second is the fact that it’s seriously suggesting that Geoffrey has anything to teach with regards to love. The third is the fact that this is the beginning of a long string of covers that are just two characters on a white background with a ton of text cluttering all the space. The word “lazy” is a word I use a lot but I feel like that’s not my fault when stuff like this keeps happening. 

The fourth thing is that this first story is called Robotnik Returns when he’s done that already. Like a lot. Does it mean he’s gonna be flesh and blood again? Maybe.

Spoiler

 

My goodness. What’s happening here? I wonder what this is a preview of. Hopefully Bollers and Steven Butler have a nice treat for us today.

We open on Eggman and Snively having just completed reconstruction on their new bodies. It apparently took them weeks to do this and as luck would have it this is the exact moment that Sonic and the Freedom Fighters burst in.

And by Freedom Fighters, I mean all of them except Rotor.

For some reason...

… Again.

I dunno. Maybe he’s still chilling with his family in the arctic but this book has a severe lack of Rotor in it. It’s actually kind of amazing how little Rotor appears in this book. 

Sonic tries to homing attack Eggman but Eggman’s robot shell is too hard and it hurts him. He doesn’t turn into a robot because this new form of Eggman is unable to roboticize people. Why? 

I DON’T KNOW. 

Anyway, the fight gets interrupted when the weird whims of the comic just take hold once more. What is it this time? Random nukes from the sky? Another Zonic plot line?

No, this time they’ve been abducted by aliens. 

Okay.

It’s just Sonic, Tails, Eggman, and Snively that get taken though. I’m not entirely sure why seeing as how the other three Freedom Fighters were there but I guess they only got the vicinity where the fighting was happening. Or something.

Anyway, did you ever want to see what Sonic’s skull looked like? No? Well, too bad. Here it is.

YEEESH.

No thank you.

What happens next is kind of half cool and half “Oh my God, I CAN’T believe THIS is how THIS happens.”

So, what happens is that the aliens spray some gas into the tube and turn Sonic and Tails into Mecha Sonic and Mecha Tails while Eggman and Snively become flesh and blood again. Oh, but that’s not all.

Yup. They’re going to fight for this experiment of these aliens and the winners will be returned to their former state while the losers will be trapped as they are forever. 

Which means, Sonic and Tails are gonna win and return to normal while Eggman and Snively stay flesh and blood again. That’s what’s gonna happen.

Goodness. How lucky is Eggman that he got beamed up when he was in a shell that looked like his Adventure design and not that weird floating Saiyan armor with a head attached thing he was two issues ago?

It’s actually really cool seeing Tails’ robot design here. I especially love the weird design of his tails and how they look like freakish knife propellers. Sonic’s design is impressive as well.

However, I feel rather tickled by the fact that all this time I’ve wondered how Eggman and Snively were going to return to their original bodies and the answer is literally just “Aliens”.

Aliens did it.

Fuck me.

They don't even get a name. They're just some aliens. 

I mean, Jesus.

Also, I know Benny Lee is Bollers so why is Sonic’s dialogue filled with super extra cheesy cringe this issue?

Like, I seriously don’t know what’s up with him. It’s like he regressed an entire decade or something.

Basically, this ensuing fight can be summed up by a single image.

Eggman tries something.

It doesn’t work.

Sonic and Tails easily demolish and tie him up in ropes.

Then the hologram of Robotropolis goes down and we immediately cut back to Knothole where a flesh and blood Sonic is telling the story to Sally in media res with the line “And seriously, THAT’S how it went down.”

Not even he can believe that shit.

What a random fucking way to handle that. You had all this time to build up to a crescendo with a well planned out story arc and instead you farted around for issues on end until this random alien abduction just dialed everything back to the status quo instantly. 

It’s so lazy.

Eggman and Snively somehow got away. Sonic says they DIDN’T sneak away but if he doesn’t know where they went and the random ass aliens didn’t keep them then… yeah, they totally did.

So we’ve got that to deal with now.

 

Archie Sonic the Hedgehog - Issue #118: Heart to Heart

We’re still with Bollers on writing duty but Ron Lim is back to do the art. 

Speaking of Rotor, it turns out he’s actually here in Knothole. He just wasn’t in that last story because he was using that specific hour to create tiny machines that could destroy the nanites infecting Geoffrey and Hershey’s bodies. That's it. He goes and sits in the corner again after his one appearance here.

When they’re let out, Sally gives Geoffrey a little peck on the forehead and tells him that he can finally get back to active duty now that he’s all better. She then heads off to tell her parents the good news but Geoffrey’s got a big old frowny face on. Hershey doesn’t understand why so Geoffrey decides to tell her his life story.

Ah. There’s that little soldier tyke. I had a feeling I’d see young Geoffrey sooner or later.

Either way, Geoffrey recounts all the failures and all the horrible stuff he’s done up to this point, landing with the photo finish of taking up being Elias’ advisor and having everything he tried to teach him end up as completely useless and for him to flee the kingdom in shame. 

Geoffrey admits to being jealous of Sonic and talks about how he wanted to prove he could be every bit as capable as he was but it didn’t shake out that way because his name isn’t on the cover of the book.

Hershey, recognizing that he’s being written by Bollers and not Penders, decides to inexplicably reiterate her love for him and they share a kiss.

Sure.

I would rather this happen then him remain angry and bitter and miserable all the time. Hopefully, now, we can grow past all that gross shit he was doing before. I really hope Penders doesn’t float his ass on in and go “BUT WAIT… THERE’S MORE!” when it comes to Geoffrey and Sally’s relationship. Or even Sonic and Geoffrey. Please God.

The story ends with Geoffrey and Hershey going up to the King and Queen to request a leave of absence. I, at first, thought it was going to be the two of them going on a vacation but no. They want to go and find Elias. Even though Elias told them not to, as Max points out, he figures it’s time for a family reunion and grants the request.

So there we have it.

 

Archie Sonic the Hedgehog - Issue #118: Ultimate Power - Part Four

It’s Ken Penders on the script, letters, layouts, and inks on this allegedly, hopefully climactic fight against Mammoth Mogul. Despite this, the only thing I’m grateful for is Dawn Best on pencils again. Phew.

Anyway, Mogul is standing before Knuckles talking about how he always gets what he wants and also about how super old he is and because of that he knows everything, including how the Chaos Syphon works. How impressive for anyone who cares.

Knuckles doesn’t. He begins glowing green, shooting his Green Apple flavor everywhere in a manner that alerts all the people in Harry’s hospital room and in Lien-Da’s chambers. She specifically decides they should head there because if it’s Knuckles then most likely Dimitri is with him.

However, it would seem shining bright like a (green) diamond isn’t enough to stop Mogul as the mammoth just presses the button anyway. Nice light show Knuckles but you probably should have just hit him instead.

Then, the room starts to glow a bright green, basically meaning that the whole area is acting as a Chaos Syphon now. 

Then we get a horrendously written page that’s the most Ken Penders that Ken Penders has been in quite some time.

I mean, I shouldn’t have to go through why this is written like ass right? It’s pretty self evident right? Your eyes rolled just like mine did when you read “the echidna known as Knuckles” instead of just “Knuckles” right? 

The fuck is with the 4kids alliteration? Pernicious Pachyderm? That reminds me of when the 4kids narrator called Perfect Chaos a “Disastrous Deluge”. Like any kid is gonna know what that means.

So after this most extreme of all extreme light shows goes off, we cut to the outside where things have just come to a stand still. Remington and Lien-Da arrive at the location of the incident and head in together to search for their respective brethren. Lien-Da quickly finds Dimitri, unharmed and strapped to his gurney but he tells her to look for Knuckles. 

We don’t see anything but the shadow of Knuckles’ totally dead arm laying on the ground.

We then cut to the funniest scene in the book. Reading this final part made me actually laugh out loud.

We cut to this ceremony where everyone is celebrating being back and alive. They decide to rename the Floating Island (or rather actually GIVE it a name) to Angel Island, finally, after that idiot Edmund’s mommy. I guess they just now got the idea to honor the first guardian’s name by naming the island after her. Well, they are echidnas and nature says they can’t love so I guess it’s not all too surprising.

Anyway, in this ceremony they get a letter that says Knuckles is fucking dead so he reads out "Knuckles is fucking dead" to everyone and then it ends. It’s like a wonderful punch line. 

Imagine giving a speech to a crowd of students talking about how prestigious the school they're in is and then receiving and reading out a later saying it's going to be demolished today. It felt like that.

So guys. It’s finally over. Knuckles is dead. 

However, Penders will live on because he lives vicariously through his echidna lore. Knuckles isn’t necessary for his story. He’s only necessary so that he has an excuse to create his little universe. One day, they’ll see. They’ll ALL see.

No but, obviously, Knuckles has to come back because right now he’s gotta do what SEGA wants.

 

I don’t know. This was… I don’t know. I guess it wasn’t the worst thing I’ve ever read in my life. So this issue has that going for it. A pretty monumental thing happened this issue in a way that was so incredibly lazy and happenstance that I almost didn’t believe it. Meanwhile, the ending of this Knuckles arc just amounted to a light show where we didn’t see shit and Mogul gets yet another vague disappearance attributed to his name. Ironically, the best story of this issue was the one about Geoffrey admitting his faults and developing as a better person. This is all very strange.

[Silvereyes]

9 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

This wasn’t a very good issue but I honestly came out of it feeling a bit more ashamed of myself. I don’t know if it’s my fault or the fault of the comic but in this particular issue so much information got jumbled in my head because I couldn’t properly remember old details. I know I shouldn’t feel that way when it comes to Penders’ garbage but even the fact that I thought it was two chaos emeralds in that chamber but the comic only shows one messed with my mind. I don’t know when I’m right or wrong here because a lot of the stuff they harken back to has happened so long ago and they’re story details hidden within old as hell story details. I’m pretty sure the thing with Eggman’s consciousness being transferred to a new body was just a thing that happened. I don’t remember it being explained as something he just did when there was no machinery around to activate the ability. The entire city got nuked. How’d he transfer anything anywhere? 

I wouldn't worry too much about it, I definetly had the same issue when reading Archie Sonic. It gets hard to keep track of things, even when Ian Flynn comes on board and decides to start referencing continuity from a hundred issues ago.

[therealfalconpawnch777]

FUN FACT: SEGA Actually wouldn't allow the use of Cream the Rabbit until some time into Ian's run, therefore the Sonic Grams answer was more a really bad deflection than anything.

 

On the matter of Tommy, his character being the most hated mostly comes down to timing and how much focus they forced onto him. He was introduced as an important person in Sonic's life that was supposed to die in a heroic sacrifice. That alone isn't too bad. But then they give 3 issues to rescuing him because he's not dead. He then gets inserted into the group and no one, but no one knew what to do with him. Penders gave it an effort but that only made it worse. Ian's first goal was to kill the character off for good, and that ironically was the action that finally gave the character purpose. It also had the side effect of making one of the most hated characters in the book the Catalyst for The Great Harmony, a Massively Important point in the Pre-Reboot Continuity.

[SBR2]

Spoiler

11 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

Archie Sonic the Hedgehog - Issue #116: Operation: Off-Switch

"How do people become furries?" I mean...this probably doesn't help. :p

11 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

the blame is laid onto Eggman and the text used to explain this speaks as though he’s simultaneously dead and alive

He's Schrodinger's Mad Scientist.

 

11 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

 

My Girl. Look he massacred my girl! Ok in fairness he was probably following how Spaz previously drew her but still.

 

11 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

How exactly does this work again? I need a refresher that stretches further back than Issue 110.

I think the explanation was that it's like what Bomb does when he explodes he just downloads into a new shell. IDK.

 

11 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

I need a more comprehensive breakdown on how Eggman works now because the guy got nuked and no one spoke up about how he could have potentially survived to reconstruct a new body for himself. Where does his consciousness actually lie nowadays? 

Well see he's a cross dimensional computer virus created by a scientist kidnapped by the government as a child who was released when said scientist discovered she wasn't actually allergic to sunlight and...oh, wait...I'm thinking of something else.

 

11 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

 

*Dies of intense laughter* He looks so stupid.

 

11 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

 

I'm kinda surprised you didn't bring up the fact Old Megaoplolis here is fucking New York. Like Sonic straight up says "This Apple is way past small". Just more hinting at what's coming.

 

11 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

Where’s Rouge the Bat? Here’s Rouge the Bat!

She looks really good. 

Yeah she does. *Bonk* Ok I'll keep my Rouge thirst to a minimum.

 

11 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

 

This is...basically the whole story. I wonder if they intentionally had the 2 characters most popular in certain circles spend a few pages wailing on each other particularly to appeal to that crowd or if it was just an innocent idea done for fun? Eitherway the important thing is this is the first appearance of Bunnie's jacket! I like her other designs but they feel incomplete without the jacket.

 

11 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

Mid-Logue

...The fuck is a Mid-Logue? I'm not a writer so if it's a thing I'm sorry but I always thought things like this were called an interlude?

 

11 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

Yeah, so Green Apple Knuckles is reliving a memory of a time when his dad tossed him aside. Some people were walking into a cave and I guess the Chaos Emeralds were in danger (although they talk as though it were just one emerald keeping it afloat. Maybe it was but I could have sworn it was at least two). 

No when Knuckles was guarding the Island they were down to just the one. Knuckles later got a second Chaos Emerald in the Super Sonic vs Hyper Knuckles Special.

 

11 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

Here’s a Sonic Gram message asking if they’ll include the newest character, Cream the Rabbit, into the book.

Not wanting to add new characters is quite the insanely massive lie.

Cream doesn’t appear until... wait… when does Cream appear? Treasure Team Tango?

Yeah around there. I think technically her first appearance is a backup story in #217.

 

11 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

This wasn’t a very good issue but I honestly came out of it feeling a bit more ashamed of myself. I don’t know if it’s my fault or the fault of the comic but in this particular issue so much information got jumbled in my head because I couldn’t properly remember old details. I know I shouldn’t feel that way when it comes to Penders’ garbage but even the fact that I thought it was two chaos emeralds in that chamber but the comic only shows one messed with my mind. I don’t know when I’m right or wrong here because a lot of the stuff they harken back to has happened so long ago and they’re story details hidden within old as hell story details.

That's why I'm trying to sound less IDK smug is kinda how I feel like I was previously coming off because for some reason I have a weirdly encyclopedic knowledge of these comics and feel the need to chime in when I see a mistake. It's something I'm trying to work on.

 

11 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

 

What is it with this book and running backup stories as the first story? Like IDK but to me this is like a 5 pager and that screams second story of the book to me.

 

11 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

We cut to a new story where we have a new writer for this book, Romy Chacon,

Ah, Romy Chacon. A person nobody is entirely certain actually exists. It's never been confirmed but there's a long standing rumor that Romy Chacon was actually the books editor Justin Gabrie. There's some hints that lead to this like she wrote a story that really pushed the Sonic Mina and Sally love triangle which was apparently something Gabrie wanted more than anyone else and one of the later Tossed in Space stories is credited to her and is literally just the Pod Racing season from Star Wars Episode I and Gabrie is a known massive Star Wars fanboy (He dedicated like 3 editorials to it) so it's very probable but nobodies 100% sure.

 

11 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

Juice the Rabbit

I'll give Chacon this that is kinda a cute deep cut reference. In SatAM season 2 Sonic and Sally travel back in time and when meeting his younger self Sonic refers to himself as "Juice".

 

11 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

They were friends since they were kids, apparently, even though we never saw hide nor hair of him in any of the numerous flashbacks there were of the characters hanging out as kids.

And that's one of the major issues people have with Tommy. He's this rando we've never seen before but is apparently super important Sonic and later on all his friends.

 

12 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

 

Thus begins the Magazine covers. I don't get why they went this direction but whatever.

 

12 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

No, this time they’ve been abducted by aliens. 

Three years before Shadow The Hedgehog I should point out.

 

12 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

 

I love that Jason Jensen gave zero shits and just colored them pure silver. He's a good colorist but dear lord you can tell this was a gig and nothing more to him. He did colors on IDW's Angel: After The Fall series and you can tell he was way more invested in that then he every really was in Sonic.

 

12 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

Which means, Sonic and Tails are gonna win and return to normal while Eggman and Snively stay flesh and blood again. That’s what’s gonna happen.

Sooo I have no idea how this works. These are purely robotic bodies. Did the BEM just create Bones and Internal Organs or what?

 

12 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

However, I feel rather tickled by the fact that all this time I’ve wondered how Eggman and Snively were going to return to their original bodies and the answer is literally just “Aliens”.

Aliens did it.

Fuck me.

They don't even get a name. They're just some aliens. 

Oh, don't worry this isn't the last time you're going to see them. They do have a name BTW. I think it's revealed later but it's the Bem. based on the old Sci-Fi nickname for Bug-Eyed Monsters.

 

12 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

Geoffrey admits to being jealous of Sonic and talks about how he wanted to prove he could be every bit as capable as he was but it didn’t shake out that way because his name isn’t on the cover of the book.

Hershey, recognizing that he’s being written by Bollers and not Penders, decides to inexplicably reiterate her love for him and they share a kiss.

Geoffrey under Bollers: A Complex character who admits to his flaws and earns Hershey's love.

Geoffrey under Penders: Lolz James Bond. If he was with Hershey it was just a one night stand because he's such a player who wants to bang teenage princesses.

12 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

We don’t see anything but the shadow of Knuckles’ totally dead arm laying on the ground.

Ladies and Gentlemen...Krusty the Klown...I mean Knuckles the Echidna is dead.

 

[Ryannumber1gamer]

I'll give Ron Lim this much. Despite how awful his artwork is for Sonic, he can knock out a half-decent Knuckles every now and again. That image of Chaos Knuckles in the first page is pretty decent IMO...although having him next to a really terrible picture of eight year old Knuckles with blockhead eyes and old man wrinkles knocks it down a few pegs.

I do imagine it's because Knuckles in general appeals more to his style of drawing. Knuckles has more room for allowing pointed edges on his design, like on his muzzle/nose, and Knuckles having long dreads fits a lot more than Sonic having long spines, or Tails having ridiculously long hair.

[Dr. Detective]

Sonic X - Issue #18: Rouge Goes Rogue!

This cover is brilliant. I always appreciate a commitment to a joke and this one goes all the way without any shame. It looks as though Spaz went crazy on those curves though. My goodness. That priceless gem looks like quite the catch. 

Spoiler

 

Joe Edkin is back to write for this issue and the artist for today is one David Hutchinson. Not much to say about him aside from the fact that the proportions and scaling are a little off in a few places. Other than that it looks alright.

We actually begin with Rouge the Bat in her element who is seemingly stealing what’s being dubbed as the Moon Emerald from it’s safe haven at this museum. However, this display immediately goes from impressive to clunky and suspicious.

Rouge just tossing away evidence (and very useful evidence at that) like this is very much unlike her. However, the idea that she would ever be caught so blatantly on camera like this is super suspect. 

This footage is being watched by the occupants on the couch at the Thorndyke residence which, right now, just consists of Sonic, Tails, and Chris. Sonic is staring at the TV like it owes him money and proclaims that he doesn’t buy that this is Rouge, citing the time these yahoos thought he was Shadow and did a similar thing.

Although, it’s funny that Tails thinks she gave up being a thief when she joined G.U.N. That’s never been the case and if you asked her, she’d deny it outright for sure.

Back in Washington, Westwood is, of course, all too eager to see Rouge arrested, even holding up the lip-stick laser thing that she conveniently dropped at the scene as physical evidence. Despite Topaz’s reluctance she’s given no choice but to acquiesce to the President’s decision to at least keep Rouge restrained until they can sort the mess out. 

Of course, when Topaz goes to do this she’s gone. Naturally.

Where is she though? 

Well, apparently she’s on Angel Island, asking Knuckles to let her stay so that she can hide out from those who want to capture her because she apparently didn’t steal the stupid Moon Emerald… and to prove this, she attacks Knuckles and steals his suddenly, comically smaller Master Emerald.

Uh-oh. Knuckles is out!

Next scene.

Knock-Knock, it’s Crashules. 

Sonic hides behind the desk because a fucking lunatic just burst through the window but comes out when he sees it’s just the red lunatic he’s already used to dealing with. Knuckles says that Rouge stole the Master Emerald and when Sonic asks if that’s true, hilariously, he says that he wouldn’t have crashed through their window if she didn’t.

Like, you didn’t need to crash through their window at all mate.

I love this next scene where Westwood is overhearing this and takes what Sonic suggests they do and twists it to say and mean the exact opposite like a person who truly missed their calling as a politician would.

Flawless swerve.

I love the disgusted, disgruntled look on Sonic’s face when this man touches his shoulder.

So, an entire week later, they’ve set up a trap at the museum for Rouge that consists of announcing that they’ve just randomly discovered a large as hell Chaos Emerald in Alaska and brought it here. Yeah, sure. Okay.

Sonic and Topaz think the plan is shit, because it is, and tell Westwood that Eggman’s more likely to show up than Rouge. Also, Sonic adds that Rouge isn’t going to fall for Cubic Zirconium. The idea that Westwood poses that her and Eggman are working together is largely ridiculed too. Knuckles is there as well but he doesn’t give a shit about any of what they’re saying. He saw Rouge make off with the Master Emerald and, apparently sensing her nearby, goes to the roof to run into her immediately.

What an incredibly strange and quick transition but I guess we only have so many pages in the book.

Knuckles demands his emerald back and naturally, because this is the real Rouge, she’s got no clue what he’s talking about. Knuckles attacks her and the scuffle sees them falling off the roof and landing right on top of Sonic. Then Westwood fires his net and proclaims he’s got three for the price of one so… yeah. I guess he’s figured it’s worthless to pretend being on Sonic and Knuckles’ side now. For some reason.

Rouge uses the lip-stick laser that she still has because she’s not the imposter to break them all out of the net… and Knuckles thanks her by slamming into her back. 

Before the fight can carry on any longer, the fake Rouge swoops in and immediately proves Rouge’s innocence. Why? Because Eggman was behind it.

Shock horror.

Funnily enough, the reason Eggman is acting upon this situation is because he apparently believed the broadcast about the fucking Chaos Emerald. Good God man. Show a little class.

Anyway, he tries to use his Fake Rouge as a distraction while he… sends his giant robot to crash through the roof of the museum and snag the Chaos Emerald. Might as well not even bother with a distraction at that point.

This Chaos Emerald, by the way, is shaped like a spiky star of some kind. It looks absolutely nothing like the ones Eggman is familiar with. The fact that he’s falling for this is amazing, honestly.

Fights ensue with Sonic and Knuckles going after the heavily armed Eggman robot and Rouge facing off against her phony. Westwood, determined to be a dick until the end, readies his net firing gun at the Rouges, not caring which is which. Rouge kicks the fake one into Westwood and all our heroes beat their respective opponents on the same page.

I guess the day is saved. 

Seriously, look at that fake emerald. It looks like those turtles that swim with blocks on their backs.

Even weirder is that when they open the robot up, all the stuff it stole is inside of it meaning they got back the Moon Emerald and the Master Emerald. Eggman just flies off swearing he’ll be back, as usual. He doesn’t even seem all that extra pissed that he just let the Master Emerald go like that.

It’s so strange because I guess I could understand the Master Emerald being used to power this robot but why was the Moon Emerald in there? It doesn’t have any powers right?

Well, anyway, Rouge’s name is cleared and she’s not only reinstated as an agent by the President but he also lets her keep the giant Cubic Zirconium thing. Nice.

 

Yeah, this issue happened. It had an interesting enough premise but the more it went on, the more it felt like it was going exactly where you figured it would. I was a little skeptical that Eggman had just built a Fake Rouge because his metal versions of characters are usually more stylized. It’s probably the smarter move for him to make robot doppelgangers of his foes that look exactly like them to trick other people with their actions but I guess there’s only so much enjoyment he feels that’s worth? I dunno. 

It was fine. 

 

Archie Sonic the Hedgehog - Issue #119: Cater-Killer Is Coming

This cover makes a “Santa Claus is Coming to Town” joke despite it having nothing to do with Christmas in an issue that was released in January 2003. It’s almost as if the cosmos wanted to give me something Christmasy for the season despite me being long past the appropriate Sonic X issue to do that with. How nice. This cover sucks though. We’re in the thick of these magazine covers that just have two characters standing in a white background. I’ve seen Sonic and Tails standing together before. The addition of drunk Rotor on the bottom only elevates it slightly due to being funny but that’s it.

Spoiler

 

Of course we get some fucking awesome looking artwork by our boy Jeff Axer to showcase what this story is allegedly supposed to be about. I only say allegedly because the design of this implies it’s supposed to be really cool but it's hard to make these Ron Lim stories look cool if you know what I mean.

Seriously, look at our boy Tails. He’s so badass it hurts.

Benny Lee, better known to us as Karl Bollers, however, really wants you to think something else is supremely badass.

The Cater-Killer!

No joke, this issue begins kind of like how most Penders stories do, where Sonic (or Knuckles usually) is overlooking a city and talking about what’s about to go down and how really important it is. This place is called Furville so it feels a little silly on principle but it gets even funnier when Sonic runs into the city and wakes everyone up by yelling at them. 

He tells the inhabitants to run and hide before IT gets here. What’s IT? The bloodthirsty HYDRA… no, I mean, the dangerous, railroading CATER-KILLER!

Sonic is acting as though he’s the Cater-Killer’s hype man, literally narrating to us how strong it is and how useless he is against it. He’ll be the biggest wing man the Cater-Killer has ever had before or since this situation took place.

Honestly, the dialogue in this issue is so strangely written, you’d be forgiven for thinking a completely different person actually DID write it. 

Then again, Karl Bollers does sometimes have odd bouts where his dialogue randomly gets overly expository. It hasn’t happened in a while but it’s back here in full force with vengeance. 

For example, this scene of Eggman’s hologram coming out of the Cater-Killer to taunt Sonic is written like complete ass.

“Knothole’s NEXT Sonic!”

“Aww. But all my stuff is there!”

I joke, but that might have actually been a better exchange of words then Sonic literally expositing that all his friends and things he cares about are there.

Eggman’s dialogue is fine but I do question the logic of that little caption box that says “Now that Robotnik’s human again, he remembers the location of Knothole.” I literally don’t know how to fathom the logic of that but okay. It’s fine.

The writing, however, isn’t done being fucking weird though. Tails shows up in his bi-plane and Sonic hitches a ride, asking if his friend has figured out how to beat it. Tails says he has and proceeds to tell us the most basic of basic ways to beat it. For you see, Cater-Killer is strong but its also dumb and by that he means it’s running on a weak as hell computer. So, basically, all Tails needs to do is get inside it and hack it. 

Like, aside from beating it up, how else would we be expected to see this shaking out?

Well, don’t worry. The comic’s got your back as far as surprises go. In a move reminiscent of the really early Sonic comics, Sonic pulls a move right out of his ass that utilizes his speed in a way that will only be used for this moment and possibly never again.

Like what? What the fuck did he just say? What the fuck did he just DO?!

Hey says “If I vibrate fast enough to slip our molecules through Cater-Killers… then we’re in!”? AND IT WORKS?!

Yeah, betcha didn’t know Sonic was fucking Shadowcat.

If these comics weren’t already proof that not having someone look over them to prevent weird shit like this from happening wasn’t a good thing then it pulling out Sonic being able to phase through solid matter by vibrating both his and Tails’ molecules might finally be it. Seriously…

Like, I shouldn’t be this surprised but I kind of am because it’s been a real long time where he’s pulled a power like this out of thin air. I still remember back in Endgame when he was falling and threw an arc of dirt through the air and ran across it because it was technically ground and used that to prevent himself from plummeting to the ACTUAL ground. Well, he still hit the ground on his face but you get what I mean. The move itself was fucking weird and stupid.

I guess I kind of admire the desire to utilize Sonic’s speed in new ways but come on. 

Anyway, Tails hacks into the Cater-Killer and sends it careening off a cliff and into the ocean. 

That’s it.

We end on this page.

Sonic’s jokes not landing are usually my favorite part about his dynamic with other characters. 

As for this story I don’t even know what the fuck… seriously, I’m all for good and fun side-adventures but doing something this basic in an incredibly basic way just feels like a waste of time. We’re in a bit of a lull once again. Aside from Eggman and Snively being flesh and bone again in a story that felt equally as random otherwise, nothing’s happened for a really long time. 

 

Archie Sonic the Hedgehog - Issue #119: Dust Bunnie

I like the title, but will I like the story?

It begins with Bunnie smiling as she’s flying and then immediately getting blown out of the sky. So, neat start.

Karl Bollers is writing for this one as well but the art is by Steven Butler. Honestly, I almost didn’t sense a change in the art but I did by the second page. Butler is able to keep the characters more on model than Lim is but his art still isn’t my favorite. It’s not bad though.

Bunnie ends up crashing and waking up in a cell… that she promptly punches to get out of but it does nothing. I guess the glass is special. She also ends up face to face with our favorite resident of the Sonic statue worshipping cultist group, Jack Rabbit. 

The Sandblasters, despite having reason to be on Sonic’s side, are also uniquely not on his side. He sent out a distress signal to have Sonic get captured but Bunnie came alone instead so he’s just gonna sick his trap on her because why not?

They reminisce about what happened when Sonic and Tails bolted to leave that doomed city to its fate and it turns out they were able to get the invading Robians under control and are using them to play Wabbit Season with Bunnie.

I know Bunnie is Sonic’ friend but Sonic does kind of have a little bit to answer for in terms of how he just abandoned that city of sycophants. Then again, she’s right in that their behavior was definitely over the top and worth trying to stay as far away from as possible.

His endgame is still his fixation on Sonic since he says that Sonic is eventually going to come to save her but Bunnie very quickly and easily fights off the Robians, burrows through the ground, and unleashes them upon the city.

Then she does the same thing Sonic did and just flies away.

I mean… I dunno. 

The nature of how quick this all happened definitely makes it feel like an excuse to just remind us that the Sandblasters are still a thing. So I guess it’s good knowing that they’re alive. However, I’m not sure it being put in a side-story that amounted to nothing other than Bunnie unleashing the Robians to attack the people of this city was worth it.

You know… maybe a Freedom Fighter should probably be more concerned about the well-being of the Robians and perhaps report this so that the people here can get their minds fixed. Maybe, also, the people they’re chasing shouldn’t be left to get mauled to death. They’re assholes, sure, but I’m having trouble seeing this as a thing the heroes would be okay with. Even Sonic wasn’t okay with it when he left. He was freaked out and disturbed but that’s definitely not Bunnie’s state of mind here.

Maybe all of this will be addressed later (fat chance) but right now it’s a pretty sour note to end on.

 

Archie Sonic the Hedgehog - Issue #119: Time Code

Our last story is also written by Bollers. The art is done by the wonderful Art Mawhinney too. That means there’s no Ken Penders in this issue. What satisfaction. Though, that hasn’t stopped the last two stories from being pretty bad or dull in their own right.

Let’s at least see what this final one has to offer before I write it off as a dud.

This story starts off relatively cute. 

Rotor is working on Nicole alone in his lab at night and wants to discover the secret behind her creation. He wants to know where she came from and who made her. Despite all the hacking he’s done and is doing, he hasn’t been able to crack the code. Ever since she randomly fell from the sky and landed in a pool in front of them, she’s been a mystery he’s been itching to crack.

How does the problem solving go?

It goes fairly unwell for him. Though, Nicole being a troll here is really adorable.

Unfortunately, just as I was about to grant this story it's seal of approval for at least feeling like something new and an interesting exploration of these characters and their personalities, it hits me with a bomb that just made me rub my temples in frustration.

Rotor gives up on being able to figure out what Nicole’s deal is and we’re shown a flashback (or rather flash-forward) of what happened. The mystery is immediately ruined and the answer it gave us is so… dumb.

When I first saw this image I thought it might have been Rotor’s dad talking to the former King and Queen of the Acorn Kingdom about this new A.I that he created. That would have been an incredibly lame answer on its own but it didn’t take me long to realize, “Oh wait. No. It makes no sense that the former king would have been Sonic’s ancestor.”

No this is a flash-forward to the future, which I hate even in the best of times, but it literally just shows Rotor creating a firewall that no one can breach and they talk about sending it to the past.

Several things about this makes no sense.

Obviously, if they’re in the future and Sonic’s the King and Sally’s the Queen and everything’s all well and good then why bother sending Nicole to the past? Wouldn’t disturbing the past, even if you felt it was for something positive, risk jeopardizing the future you’re living in now?

I don’t even want to comprehend the idea that Nicole was always in the past and Rotor got the idea to create her and send her to the past so that his younger self could be fascinated by her and create her when he grows up in the future just to send her back to the past and--bleugh. 

If a younger Rotor thinks she was made by someone else, then why would he even bother trying to create her? I could see him trying to create something similar but him having access to Nicole and deciding to one day create Nicole makes no sense. He’d just have two Nicoles in that scenario right?

The only way it does make sense is if Nicole got destroyed between then and now and he re-created her but even then, I don’t see why he’d ever get the idea to send her to the past. 

Secondly, I just don’t want to see the future. Or at least, the future of the characters we’re following within the storyline. Silver is fine, for the most part, because his future is 200 years ahead. He’s so far removed from the lives of these characters that knowing what his future looks like means very little. It can still mean SOMETHING of course. If the future is happy and bouncy than that means Eggman fucking failed in his endeavor to either rule the world or at least make sure his rule lasted long into the future after he died. That’s a trap I don’t want them to fall into.

However, because Silver’s future is always so vague and nebulous (and usually barin and destroyed) the mystery of what happened to it is always there. The fact that his future keeps changing also keeps things from being definitive but it’s also way more confusing. It honestly would be easier just to say he comes from an alternate future with an ever present mystery as to what destroyed it.

When you look into the future of the characters we’re following it just immediately destroys the suspension of disbelief that any of them are in any real danger. Obviously, we know they’re going to be fine but the story acknowledges that itself is a huge no-no. If the story undermines itself and the danger it’s putting the characters through by confirming they’re fine in the future then it’s officially just fired a truck sized cannonball through its own self-worth.

This is going to be quite the problem when the Mobius 20 to 30 years later stories happen too.  Although, I’m still not entirely sure what those are supposed to be. Penders clearly wanted them to be the canonical futures of the characters while it’s latest iteration gave off the feel of a mere alternate timeline, which is the best course of action to take.

It’s not the destination, it’s the journey, true, but a journey is easy to ruin if you already know everything about where you’re going and part of the point was wondering about what it was.

We know that Eggman’s never going to win but do we REALLY know? Not really. We know that the creators are never going to allow the villain to win in a meta sense but within the confines of Sonic’s actual world, no one knows who’s going to win in the end and confirming it within the text itself just sucks.

Anyway, I rambled on for a long time there.

The story ends with Eggman trying to hack Rotor’s computer and being unable to, getting the same troll face from Nicole to close off the story. The end I guess.

 

That issue actually left me with a surprising amount to talk about in the end but only really because it touched a significant nerve within me. No doubt I’ll probably end up detailing all that stuff about time travel and why knowing the future of the characters is a bad thing when more of them happen. The issue itself is a pretty negligible one. None of these stories have any real point. They’re all pointless, baseless filler. The last one technically isn’t because it just casually confirms that Sonic and Sally are the king and queen and they do live and get married in the end which would have ruined the story for me had I read it as a kid but other than that, nothing.

Hopefully, the filler is coming to an end. I also hope we’ll steer clear of the future a little more from here on in. At least for a little while. Call me crazy, but I do generally prefer to find out what happens in the end for these characters at the actual end of their stories.

 

Archie Sonic the Hedgehog - Issue #120: She’s Gotta Have Him

This cover features Mina and Sonic so it’s going to be up in the air whether or not this will be an enjoyable distraction or not. I was rather enjoying the Mina stuff at the start but then it turned into what all these love triangles stories turn into before being swept aside like a mound of dirt on the kitchen floor. The last two stories I have to look forward to don’t inspire much hope that I’ll enjoy them either. Let us see.

Spoiler

 

No Ron Lim for our first story. It’s Karl Bollers working with Steven Butler on this one.

It’s a story about Mina Mongoose and it begins with her being all head over heels for Sonic. It’s not just a feeling in the pit of her stomach now. She’s clearly infatuated and wants him to notice her.

This is her roboticized  mom in her first physical appearance that isn’t super far away. You’d be taken a back slightly just seeing this considering how casual the reveal is. I know we already knew she was a Robian but this comic’s ability to just throw things onto the page without much fanfare will never not be strange.

Anyway, it’s pretty clear that Mina is taking the Amy Rose position in this book, which is funny considering we’re in 2003 now. You’d think Amy would be utilized a bit more but she’s not been around a whole lot. Then again, it feels like a lot of them haven’t been utilized a whole lot. Outside of Sonic and Tails, who HAVE to be there, it feels like we’re only giving Sally and Bunnie focus right now. I mean, aside from that one story where he punched out Evil Sonic, what the fuck has Antoine done lately?

Honestly, the more I see of Amy in these past books the more upset I get by that one story I read way down the line about when she eventually becomes a Freedom Fighter. I called bullshit on a lot of what went down in that story long before I even read any of these earlier issues but now that I have, a lot of what Sally had to say about her is just straight up a giant fucking lie. It’s kind of infuriating she isn’t already a part of the group but we’re not there yet so I’ll save my rant.

This is about Mina wanting to join to catch Sonic’s attention. She tries with a nice looking eastern style dress but it gets quickly ignored the instant Sonic gets a notification on his … I guess on the cuff of his glove that Eggman is about to do something. So Mina follows and decides she wants to join.

Look at this shot of the Freedom Fighters. Amy’s right there, standing in her Sonic X concept art pose. You’d be forgiven for thinking she was already a part of the group. Despite Amy appearing more on this team than Rotor at this point, apparently, she’s not a member. It’s so stupid. 

That’s why I hate this dumb system. I just want them to go around and fight bad guys in the freest way they can. 

Also, yes, Rotor has been making more appearances lately. Hell, he even appears in this issue. I’m just pointing out how strange the lapses in appearances across all characters have been. It’s not been very proportional at all.

So anyway, we get scenes of Mina training with literally everyone.

It’s a cute montage though I do have to question the notion that all well-rounded Freedom Fighters can do this. It seems more like each one of them has their own things to contribute. I know Sonic can also fly the Tornado and he can use a sword but I don’t know about the computer programming thing for instance.

It’s all well and good though. She seems to be doing fine and she heads home to tell her mom the good news. Her mom is clearly worried and the next day, she tries to talk to Sonic about how Mina may not understand how dangerous this is.

At that exact moment, I giant, fuck-off robot attacks and the Freedom Fighters head out to face it. Mina stops before it and then sees the kids she babysits come up to her looking for protection, unaware of where Rosy is. Mina tries to comfort them but sees a giant foot above to crush her.

Her narration tells us that she passed out and woke up in the doctor’s clinic. 

Funnily enough, the robot’s foot stopped mid-step thanks to some hacking Rotor did. That’s when Mina realized she was doing this for the wrong reasons and quit. Despite the mature decision on her end, it most likely still hurts that she won’t get to be around Sonic more regularly. However, she’s got other things that she can rely on to catch people’s attention.

Yeah, she sings good and Sonic decides he wants to chill with her for a bit because of it. 

So hey, he got her attention after all, just doing what she’s good at. It’s kinda sweet, even if you know that her efforts are ultimately going to be fruitless.

Archie Sonic the Hedgehog - Issue #120: Those Were the Days

The good news is that Dawn Best is on art duty here. The bad news is that Ken Penders has returned to continue his echidna fan-fiction as it happens way off to the side, not affecting the main characters of the book one bit aside from the fact that Mogul drove his way into the Knuckles plot only to once again unceremoniously disappear.

This issue begins with Julie-Su sitting and staring at the water, reminiscing about Knuckles. 

I wondered why… 

…

… then the narration caption reiterates that Knuckles is dead.

Then it all came back to me and my reaction was “HOLY SHIT, I TOTALLY FORGOT THAT HAPPENED… I mean… uhh… it was a very memorable, sad scene. Yes.”

No, but seriously, I actually forgot that Knuckles was supposed to be dead. I wonder how. It was such an emotional, not hilarious at all, scene where they announced to everyone on stage that he was dead.

So Mighty shows up and tells her his life story.

For some reason, Sonic’s arms are blue in these flashback scenes. 

The fact that they’re blue in both these panels is SO obvious that you’d forgive me for wondering if it was deliberate and not a genuine mistake. You’d think someone would have caught that but considering someone colored in Sonic’s Mom to look like Amy down the line I guess it’s nothing too shocking.

Mighty, after having been broken out of Prison, is left on his own without any family or friends but then comes across Knuckles in the bushes. The two hit it off in a very awkward but adorable kind of way.

It’s cute although this isn’t exactly what I would call Dawn Best’s best artwork. The bulbous muscles and noticeable joints on their bodies make this look more like an upgraded take on Ken Penders’ style here. 

Still, it gets the job done. It looks really nice when you see them from close up. The faces are all on point, as are the expressions. 

Knuckles is here looking for crocodiles. He gives a description of Vector, leading me to believe that he thinks all crocs are exactly like Vector since he’s the only one he’s ever met. When Mighty explains he was in a prison, Knuckles doesn’t even know what THAT is. He’s very sheltered.

They do eventually find Vector and take the plane he constructed back to the Floating Island but it explodes and crashes. Obviously, they lived but it’s funny that Mighty’s story just ends like that.

Julie-Su asks if he’s ever gotten to see his family again but he says no. He’s not going to like what he eventually finds out, I’ll tell you that much.

So that’s it. It was just the story of how Mighty met Knuckles. It fills in the small gap between him being released from prison when he met Sonic and where and when exactly he meets Knuckles. That’s nice. I’m sure if I cared a bit more about Mighty this would be crucial reading material for me. It’s perfectly fine.

Archie Sonic the Hedgehog - Issue #120: The Royal Signet

All three of these stories were written by different writers it turns out. This last one focusing on Sally was done by Romy Chacon with the art by Art Mawhinney. 

Sally and her mom are getting along really well. They’re bonding here in the forest the only real way anyone can. By making fun of Antoine.

It’s a Knothole pastime. Also, yes, every bit of that was as hard, if not harder, to read as it usually is when it comes to Antoine’s dialogue.

The wind picks up and Sally takes off her vest to give to her mom, emphasizing how naked she is in a way that you can’t look away from now that all girls have been mandated to wear clothes. Alicia notices the ring inside the vest and is surprised to see it there. She gave it to Julayla to give to her and when she wasn’t wearing it she assumed she’d never gotten it. She asks why Sally doesn’t wear it on her finger and Sally doesn’t really answer that. She just says she has a ton of respect for the ring and wears it in her vest instead. Which is fair enough. I don’t like putting shit on my fingers or things on my wrist.

They go to Rosy’s house where there’s a heartfelt scene of Alicia talking about how she considers Rosy family for all she’s done in taking care of her daughter. The three of them head off to Julayla’s grave because it's her birthday.

At first I thought this character may have just been a lost Robian or something but that’s mostly because the complete picture was never really something I was let in on. At least not as far as these comics are concerned. I knew OF her and I’ve seen her in small flashback scenes here and there but nothing too major for this to really hit hard like it wants me to.

That said, it’s not bad.

I do appreciate how genuine this feels compared to a lot of other “emotional” scenes this book has tried to offer up to us. It does follow a fairly predictable set of scenes, including the ending shot where you see the ghostly image of the person they’re talking about in the sky looking down on them. This particular one is a bit funny because Sally actually starts telling a story about Julayla that begins with the line, “Hey Mom, let me tell you this funny story about Julayla trying to CONTROL me when I was like ten years old.”

It’s not exactly what I would call a line to end on when the “person looking down on you from up above” scene is happening. 

 

That was a significantly better issue than the last one. I wouldn’t call any of these stories filler honestly. The focus was on actual character growth or character introspection for all involved. Mina got some character development while Mighty and Sally got some historical and relationship development. That’s all important stuff even if nothing about their situations has really changed in the end. The characters that were focused on weren’t exactly the ones I get too excited about seeing but I can’t knock how genuine all their tales felt. That’s a feat considering what I’m usually dealing with as far as this book is concerned. Good job.
 

[Cuz]

Oh, we're nearing Heart Held Hostage that's one of the big ones I've always been curious how someone would react to. It strikes me as a heavy handed way to cap off the Sally/Mina love triangle. It's practically an special PSA Issue. Looking forward to that synopsis.

Also have you pasted the stage play yet? I don't remember which issue that is, but You'd know it if you read it.

 

Quote

The move itself was fucking weird and stupid.

I like the weird and stupid Flash powers! 

Also first instance of Song Goose doing her songing.

[Silvereyes]

6 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

This is going to be quite the problem when the Mobius 20 to 30 years later stories happen too.  Although, I’m still not entirely sure what those are supposed to be. Penders clearly wanted them to be the canonical futures of the characters while it’s latest iteration gave off the feel of a mere alternate timeline, which is the best course of action to take.

Oh dear. You're not far away from reaching Mobius: 25 Years Later, that starts in issue #131, and basically serves as the next set of Knuckles's stories at the back of the book for a dozen or more issues. It is peak Ken Penders. Mobius: 30 Years Later is Sonic Universe #5-#8, and written by Ian Flynn. It is, unsurprisingly, alot better. Not sure if anything more is done with it after that.

I've said this before but I am enjoying your reviews. Really, it makes me think that I need to get back on reading Archie Sonic, I think I stopped around #225 and I really need to hop back and just finish everything. I don't know if you have done this already, but at some point, I hope you take the time to maybe archive your reviews somewhere so they can be kept safe and easy to find.