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[Dr. Detective]

Sonic X - Issue #26: La Layenda del Gran Gordo! (The Legend of the Great Big Guy!)

Here he comes to save the day! It’s the grand entrance you’ve all been waiting for! The luchador of lard himself, El Gran Gordo has finally come to wrestle for our sins, cure all disease, and end world hunger! It’s like I’m dreaming!

Spoiler

 

Writer: Ian Flynn
Pencils: James Fry
Inks: Terry Austin
Letters: Phil Felix
Colors: Josh Ray
Editor: Mike Pellerito

Ah man, it feels good covering more of Flynn’s stuff. Just ten more issues of the main book to go and I’ll be doing it almost full time, give or take the times Tracey and Evan have something to contribute to the main book as well.

Enough about that though, let’s all BOO and HISS at Sonic for committing sacrilege!

Where’s Elmur Fudd and his double barrel shotgun when you need him?

Not to worry, Chris has got me covered.

Fuck yeah! Powerbomb the non-believer. It’s time we dined on Hedgehog Soup!

Again, I love it whenever Chris acts like an actual child. It happens so rarely but it’s so much fun. Of course, Grandpa has to break up the play wrestling but he does so by saying that he’s got tickets to an up close and personal, real life show of the great hero, El Gran Gordo.

Sonic outright said it was Eggman in disguise earlier so there’s no mystery he needs to solve. That means we can get right to the asskicking.

We cut to the man of the hour who is on his way to his dressing room via the red carpet and signs a bunch of autographs before sauntering inside to boast about how well his plan is going. Bocoe and Decoe are not happy.

They feel as though their master is too caught up in his own hype and they go on about how a bunch of mini-robots with negative charges attack the opponents he’s up against while a positively charged magnet under the ring pins them to the ground. However, the great El Gran Gordo has no time for foolish fantasy like that. He’s got a fight to win.

Also, Bokkun’s got a sea of cotton candy to swim in and apparently, the dumb-bots and his boss were too loud for him to it peacefully.

Now, we’re left with an example of what happens when you drown in a sea of things you’re too excited about.

For Bokkun it’s cotton candy.

For our wrestling hero it’s… well, being a hero. You can tell by the way he cradles his mask with a wanting, sad look in his eye. 

These robots just don’t get it. How dare they try to thrust the irresponsible nature of a villain onto this wonderful man.

Luckily, Scarlet Garcia shows up and tells the man about his latest challenger.

As such, we get hit with a very well made and impressively authentic looking poster.

This is a magnificent poster. Print this out and hang it up in your room, why don’tcha? You’ll always rue the day you missed the chance to see two legends go at it.

Chris is positively ecstatic about this. He’s bouncing around his living room, cheering about how his two greatest idols are going to fight. 

As an aside, I doubt Gran Gordo has been around for too long so it’s quite something that he’s already his second biggest idol. That’s just how powerful the man is. He could look at you and your head would fucking explode.

Sonic says the match won’t last too long. He must be realizing his mistake and accepting his fate. Poor bastard.

Knuckles, literally comes out of nowhere, and blasts a megaphone into Sonic’s ear, telling everyone the goddamn truth about how he’s seen this Gordo guy in action (Knuckles watches professional wrestling with his shit reception on Angel Island eh?) and that he’s the real deal.

So, Sonic’s got some training to do.

We then get the Rocky training montage from both our dueling legends. 

The robots managers are trying their best reverse psychology on El Gran Gordo but it seems fruitless considering he totally doesn’t need it. 

Knuckles leaves Sonic when he thinks he’s had enough. Our blue hedgehog just watches him go, a waterfall of sweat pouring down his face. 

As this happens, Gordo asks where Bokkun is with dinner and we cut to him overlooking Station Square on a high rock, grinning evilly at it while saying that the city looks delicious and that it’ll be all his.

Okay. 

This whole thing where Bokkun is doing nothing but endlessly eating sweets and foods is starting to reach levels of extreme obsession and creepiness. He wasn’t anywhere near this crazed about it on the show.

We cut to the ring in Station Square Gardens where the fight is ready to begin. Chris and Chuck are decked out in El Gran Gordo merch. Knuckles is by the corner as Sonic’s Doc. Then finally, El Gran Gordo comes out and the fight begins. 

Sonic charges and immediately gets all the shiny, tiny robots on him that pulls him to the ring's ground. Sonic realizes the match is, quote un-quote “rigged” and decides he’s going to expose him for being a fake athlete too.

Guys, Sonic’s the bad guy here. He is. There’s no arguing this.

Knuckles finds Bocoe and Decoe and demands to know what the flindangle they’re up to. However, Bocoe notices that the wire connected to the positively charged magnet underneath the ring has been eaten through. One guess as to who’s fault that was.

Anywho. That means Sonic isn’t pinned anymore and he and Gordo have a right tussle in the ring before things get SUPER serious when the vile heathen threatens to unmask him in front of the teary eyed, starry eyed children!

It’s almost too cruel folks. Will this villain stop at nothing to wreck our fun?

No, he won’t. Of course not.

Before Sonic can embrace his inner heel, he backs off and let’s Gordo keep his mask. As such, Gordo happily grants Sonic the win.

All is well, another day saved.

Oh but what’s this?

IT’S ME GORDO! IT WAS ME AAAAAAALL ALONG!

 

Yes! Hell yes! The hero of legend came through in the end. Though he did not win the battle with the villainous heel of a hedgehog, he kept his dignity, his identity, and his love and respect of the people. Why, I believe he may have even caused the heart of the Blue Grinch to grow three sizes that day. We shall see what becomes of this new development when Bokkun Whiplash here takes the stage next time. I can’t wait.

 

Archie Sonic the Hedgehog - Issue #150: Hero To Zero In No Time At All

So apparently this is the worst issue of all time or whatever so I better get a mountain of likes for suffering through it. Pay me, you ingrates.

No, but seriously, we’ve hit another milestone issue. Why, it feels like yesterday that I covered the epic that was 125. This cover leaves a lot to be desired though. I get why it’s like this. A big close up of Sonic’s well-drawn face kind of gets the point across but it’s such a basic idea with a basic look. It almost feels like an excuse to be lazy. At least it’s easy on the eyes though. The title reminds me of Hercules, which is a good thing for me since I adore the movie but I can’t help but be cynical about it since I have a sneaking suspicion we’re about to go into something that’s about to wreck Sonic’s reputation in a way that’ll most likely be disgusting and vile to the point of exhaustion. I guess I’d better stop stalling then. Via 150.

Spoiler

 

Writer: Ken Penders
Artist: Art Mawhinney
Inker: Jim Amash
Letterer: John Workman
Colorists: Josh & Aimee Ray
Editor: Mike Pellerito

Ken Penders is always a bad sign but Art Mawhinney is definitely a welcome one. Although, seeing his name there I’m starting to get a clearer picture in my head as to what’s about to happen in this issue. Oh God, I think the memories ARE in there somewhere and they’re coming back. 

We begin on Sonic being a dick to robots. That’s nothing new. In fact, it’s encouraged.

He knocks the Swat-Bot he’s fighting into a fountain and makes it short-circuit. This earns him a free chili-dog. Mina, Amy, and Ash are all watching with the two girls admiring his heroics and Ash getting upset and calling him a showoff. 

Sonic’s eyes narrow and he immediately gets the idea to introduce Ash to the world of cuckoldry.

So, if you haven’t caught on to what’s happening here by now I don’t know what to say. It’s not going to make what happens any better I suspect. That hopeful look in Mina’s eyes concerns me greatly.

We graciously cut away to an outside eatery where Nack the Weasel is arguing with some human, err, “Overlander” about being given supplies to pull off a heist where he can steal Chaos Emeralds from Angel Island. They call it Angel Island and how Nack knows it’s been renamed Angel Island, I haven’t a clue. I’m guessing that’s just something everyone is going to know now going forward so we’ll pretend a formal announcement was made to the entire world and move on.

The chump that Nack is talking to doesn’t want to listen to him so he refuses. He’d rather test his luck with the weird black emerald in the Cat Country than risk being swarmed by echidnas.

Rouge the Bat is overhearing all this though and goddamn does she look good.

This is the first time Rouge has looked like Rouge since J-Axer drew her way back when. I can’t believe this came out in 2005. Time keeps on slipping, slipping, slipping into the future.

Anyway, Rouge sees this as a call to action and flies to the island to go nab her some Chaos Emeralds.

Back with Sonic and Mina, we see our girl testing the waters of faithfulness and she manages to pass with flying colors, thank goodness.

Mina says she can’t do this to Ash and rushes off, leaving Sonic bewildered. So, because he’s ultra mega-horny he just lays eyes on the literal next girl he sees, which happens to be Amy.

Not gonna lie, it’s a little creepy seeing Sonic scout out Amy, call her “babe” of all things, and try to solicit her literally only for physical intimacy. The fact that she’s an aged up little girl is also a little off-putting. Just a tad.

Penders, I swear. You’re already on thin ice and the issue just started.

The ice shatters on the literal next page.

Yeah, despite the previous page ending with Sonic asking if Amy was busy, on the next page we cut to Tails looking for Sonic since he was supposed to come over to his place. He pushes back the bushes and Bunnie is fucking making out with Sonic…!

HOLEEE is right. 

Uhm… okay…

So…

I guess what Penders wants me to believe is that Bunnie is like, super desperate and is willing and ready to make out with Sonic of all people because Antoine’s gone. Not only that but somehow Antoine leaving her made her think no one else would be interested in her which… I mean, okay. I guess I can see the self-pity through-line there but I don’t see it well enough to buy her making out with Sonic behind the bushes.

The idea of Bunnie being interested in Sonic seems so fucking weird.

However, there’s an added level of scum-fuckery to this considering what “Sonic” here is doing but I’m probably going to rant about the implications of that when the “reveal” happens. 

An incredibly uncomfortable feeling is welling up in the pit of my stomach, the likes of which I haven’t felt in quite some time.

YUP!

There it is. 

The famous cursed image.

Oh God. Barf bag. I need one. HURP!

*Sigh*

Okay, so… here’s the “reveal”. “Sonic” here gets into it and he basically explains that, shock-horror, he’s Evil Sonic. 

He explains that one day Patch came up to him and was all, “Zut alors, I’m zee evil French stereotype’s evil twin here to smite you” and Evil Sonic knocked him out, tossed him onto Mobius, and switched him with the real Antoine. 

An elaborate punishment but whatever. We’ve finally got our reveal of what Antoine’s deal is. Yes, yes, I’m aware this wasn’t the original plan. I don’t care. I knew this was coming because it was one of the biggest things I remembered from my original readings of these stories. It’s a better idea than what I heard was being considered so hurray I guess. I can't even finally dwell on this reveal because I care way less about it than the next thing I have to talk about. Fuck.

Then Evil Sonic was like, “Oh hey, I can do the same to the real Sonic” so he Surprise Motherfuckers his way behind Sonic, knocks his ass out and switches places with him.

So, there you have it. The most vile and disgusting thing you’ve probably seen in this book’s run.

I had heard about this and I wondered what I would feel when I eventually got to it and I’m not joking when I say that I’m at the edge of feeling a little sick. Honestly.

Let’s start with the fact that it’s night time now. Like, the caption up top with Bunnie and Evil Sonic said HOURS LATER and they’re going on about having a NAP.

NAP is another word for SLEEP.

SLEEP is another word for SLEPT.

SLEPT is a word that designates a certain action between two people who commonly wish to engage in--They slept with each other, alright.

Evil Sonic slept with Bunnie Rabbot and it’s gross and disturbing and awful and literally HOW, she's half robot down there and also WHY is this in a Sonic book, dear lord what the fuck Ken Penders you weird alien man you--!

Obviously, the mere act of implying they did the nasty isn’t the real issue here. The real issue is the fact that Bunnie THOUGHT this was the real Sonic. However, it’s not. It’s an entirely different person. 

Bunnie was essentially tricked into sleeping with someone without consent. I don’t want to type out the “r” word but… you know… that’s what it is!

I mean, I can’t really articulate it in any other way. This IS what Penders insists happened here. It’s not me overthinking it. The man bragged about his creepy, James Bond skunk doing the nasty with underage Sally in a way that was much less telegraphed then the direct and obvious correlation this book is making right here. 

Bunnie was tricked into sleeping with someone that she thought was someone else. 

Even worse, our pretend author will later go on to say it's BUNNIE'S fault that she got r-worded. 

Anyone who says a single moment can’t ruin an entire issue probably didn’t have too strong an imagination. It no longer matters what else happens in this story or how well Mawhinney’s art is. Honestly, it’s a shame Penders’ horrible, ugly art isn’t being used on this garbage instead. 

I don't even know how to properly articulate how bad this is. There are no words I could possibly type that could do the intense level of disgust I feel justice here.

We cut back to Rouge, thank God, who is seeing the city on Angel Island for the first time, literally shocked by everything around her. She’s looking for someone who knows what’s what around here and I guess she’s super skilled at that because she blows off the first person that offers to help her and she ends up sauntering on over to Locke of all people.

I don’t appreciate how she refers to him as a “tall drink of echidna” though. Figures Penders would want Rouge to go after Locke. Yeesh.

A pointless scene happens where Sonic accidentally sets off one of Rotor’s landmines and Sally runs out to yell at him. I guess this page is here to establish that Evil Sonic was looking for yet another girl to mack on and realized Sally sucked here as well. Great. Glad to know that’s all the woman in this issue are good for.

Back with Locke and Rouge, the two of them are trying to play each other when Archimedes has enough and teleports Rouge, somehow, back to Knothole Village.

Locke reveals he was just trying to get information out of her but Archimedes doesn’t care because Locke is SO fucking terrible with woman that even him knowing she was up to something would still have gone badly with him.

Not even nature and it’s godforsaken soul touch can save this lout.

Rouge teleports right by Evil Sonic’s line of sight, by the way. Rouge is in need of a stool pigeon to distract Locke so she can get at the gems she wants and Evil Sonic just wants to have sex with the hot bat lady.

That shower I took earlier already feels like it’s worn off. 

Christy Christ Christ Christ.

What the fuck man?

I have no clue how this was received back in the day but this book might as well be oozing fecal matter here in the year of 2021, especially. The values in this thing are beyond gross. The women in this book are all just literal trophies that Evil Sonic hippity hops to and from and it’s not endearing or fun to watch. The only excuse that could possibly be offered up in defense of this is the fact that he’s a villain so it’s “okay” if he tricks them into sleeping with him without proper consent. 

To that I say yuck. It’s bad enough that shit like SAO and other garbage use that nonsense as a crutch for not knowing how to make a likeable despicable villain but I couldn’t imagine being in a position where I defended this showing up in a Sonic the Hedgehog book of all places. 

Fuck this.

 

Archie Sonic the Hedgehog - Issue #150: The Chosen One - Part 2

Story: Romy Chacon
Penciler: Art Mawhinney
Inker: Andrew Pepoy
Letterer: Jeff Powell
Colorist: Jason Jensen
Editor: Mike Pellerito

We bring you back to your regularly scheduled story that’s only reason for existing is to give a pay off to something that was set up a really long time ago and has long since been forgotten and ignored because no one really cared.

I love how the opening narration box says “in our last EXCITING episode--” as though it really wants to tell you how to feel about what’s happening here. Oh you sweet Summer child.

Anyway, we begin with the Tails' kind of arguing against one another about who the Chosen One is. One of the more badass looking Tails' proves to be the ultimate loser of the group when he tries to assert dominance and gets his ass beat with a single hit. 

Well, we know who it’s not.

I love the line “So many little buddies, so weird” from Sonic. Like, he can’t help but see all these Tails’ as his little buddies. It’s the only cute thing in this entire issue.

Tails, the real one, decides he wants to be a little dumbass and goes out to shout at Mogul. Mogul, having made mincemeat of all the Zone cops, spots Tails and tries to fry him before Sonic runs in and saves him.

Tails’ plan was apparently to just get blasted by Mogul in the hopes that it would turn him into Turbo Tails and Sonic rightfully points out that it could have just turned him into “Toasted Tails” instead. I seriously don’t know how Tails thought that was a surefire thing to expect to happen, given the circumstances of who they’re dealing with.

This honestly shouldn’t even be a challenge for Mogul. I have no idea why he’s here personally when we saw him big enough to crush an entire universe in the palm of his hand. Can’t he just do that and be on his way?

Well, apparently not. We even see him struggle a bit to rip the roof off of a room where all the multiple Tails’ are stashed. Sonic’s follow-up plan after rescuing Tails was, I guess, to lead him to the room of all the Tails’ and let them attack him.

Yeah. So, I guess this is supposed to be epic or whatever. 

Well, here they all are, attacking Mogul. I guess, except, the one that got knocked out earlier. He’s busy voiding his bowels all over the floor or something. The others don’t fare too much better though. Mogul just swings his arm and knocks them all down. Sonic desperately tries to save them but he gets blasted too. Or rather, the ground in front of Sonic gets blasted and it knocks Sonic off his feet.

Even though Sonic clearly didn’t get hit with the blast, Tails shouts about how Mogul killed his best friend.

I want Sonic, in the distance, to just shout “Uhm… no he didn’t.”

Then Mogul says, “As I will NOW kill you!”

Then Sonic would say, “Yeah, still not dead guys…”

Anyway, the floating disembodied head of Athair shows back up. He straight up tells him that his destiny was to merge with all the other versions of himself and become Titan Tails.

THIS…! 

I’ve been waiting for THIS!

Ever since I began this entire retrospective, one of the earliest thoughts on my mind was, “when the hell am I going to get to the hilarious, ultra ridiculous part where Tails becomes the hulk?”

It’s here! IT’S FINALLY HERE!

Oh my God, YES!

It almost brings a tear to my eye.

It’s SO AWFUL you guys! It belongs in a museum.

It’s like a painting. A masterpiece of ridiculous stupidity, the likes of which can’t but be exemplified by the sheer magnitude of bulky, “Do you even lift, bro” Tails shooting magic eye beams at a giant, glowing, green mammoth with a magic emerald jammed into its stomach. 

You can’t make this shit up ladies and gentlemen. I feel like a huge weight has been lifted off my shoulders.

What a miraculous shit show. 

Guys.

GUYS.

His ass gives him super strength.

His butt literally has the power to suck in magic. 

I don’t know how all the Tails’ across the multiverse merging into a single being gives Tails this power but it does.

He can just suck out the energy of a god who’s crushed multiple universes with the palm of his hand.

How? Why?

Because he’s the Chosen One or whatever.

That’s it.

Tails merging with multiple versions of himself just gives him the ability to do this. It’s just a thing that he can do now. 

I know you can’t see it but I’m shrugging as hard as I possibly can. The Seinfeld music is on blast right now.

In a flash of light, we return to Sonic and Tails’ game of tag. The two of them go off as though nothing happened, although, Merlin and Athair are special, somehow, so they remember what took place.

Tails had all the power of the cosmos and he used it to restore everything to the way it used to be. I’m assuming that means all the universes Mogul killed are back to normal too, which is a cheeky way of backtracking but him just killing all those universes like that was a bit much anyway.

Also, once again, Mogul is trapped within an Emerald.

I wish him all the best in his meditative state of eternal hatred.

 

HOLEEEE~! WOW! You know, I thought that there might have been some exaggeration as far as how bad this issue was going to be going into it. Considering all the crap I’ve read from this book up to this point, I had a hard time believing it. I still think some of the earlier issues, especially some of the Knuckles comics, rival this in terms of badness on a purely technical level but I’m not going to mince words. This was utter gutter trash of the highest order. Like, it can't get any worse than implying (and then later confirming) something THAT disgusting and awful.

It’s not often I desire any and all who worked on something to be ashamed of themselves but I kind of do, honestly. There’s no looking at this from six ways to Sunday and not leaving with a gross burp threatening to exit your mouth from holding back your sick. The first story was terrible and elicited disgust in a way that I don’t want to get into again. There’s only so much I can talk about uncomfortable misogyny before I get the cold shivers. 

Meanwhile, the second story was legendary in it’s badness. It was hilarious in contrast to the first one, sure, but I couldn’t even fully enjoy the sheer audacity of it’s desire to try and pass itself off as a thrilling conclusion to this thing that’s been set-up for over a hundred issues and counting. THAT was all that Chosen One bullshit was leading up to. A side-story at the BACK of the fucking book that only lasted two issues that pulled sheer nonsense out of it’s ass (in an almost literal sense) and capped itself off as though it wanted to ignore it even happening. I don’t even know if Tails made it so that he even remembers what he did. I wouldn’t blame him if he didn’t. Why would he want to? How embarrassing!

Wow. Issue 150 huh? Yeah, this one is going on the list. Holy shit, guys.

I mean, Jesus Christ.

 

Archie Sonic the Hedgehog - Issue #151: Chaos Emeralds Are Forever

I kind of like the title of the issue. It’s a play on the whole “Diamonds are forever” thing. It’s cute. I also, actually, really, really like this cover. The water has always been really nice to look at and the distorted effect is neat. I don’t recall the issue itself having anything to literally do with him being stuck in water so I’ll take it as a metaphor for Sonic just being in trouble.

Spoiler

 

Writer: Ken Penders
Artist: Art Mawhinney
Inker: Jim Amash
Letterer: John Workman
Colorists: Josh & Aimee Ray
Editor: Mike Pellerito

God. Everytime I read the credits, I just get a weird sinking feeling now. It’s too early to call this the worst era of the book but man… there’s very little holding me back from jumping the gun after 150.

I mean, seriously, read the narration box at the top here.

Penders wrote this. He called them “bad-ass”. You know, I guess since he “created” the very idea of evil doppelgangers from another dimension as it pertains to Sonic he’s got a lot of misplaced pride concerning them. 

I’ll bet he had a great time writing the real Sonic the Hedgehog getting the shit beat out of him too. 

Like, Rotor tazes him for god’s sake.

I can’t even joke though. I love seeing Sonic get his ass beat too.

It’s fun seeing any version of Tails eager to beat him up too, honestly.

I’m doing whatever I can to forget what I witnessed a mere issue ago. The allure of seeing Sonic get beaten up is only helping to mitigate things slightly. 

Back on Mobius, the actually super-hateable Evil Sonic is trying to court Rouge. He goes up to her and says it’s her lucky day. Rouge, of course, thinks this is the real Sonic and when Evil Sonic remembers that he plays it like he’s actually Sonic and listens to what she wants. Then, he just immediately agrees to what she wants in the hopes of more possible sex.

Rouge, blinded by easy gems, carries Evil Sonic off to Angel Island to go get her reward. 

As an aside, I appreciate Rouge being in her Sonic Heroes outfit here. It's easy to see that outfit being the one she wears when she's not in the middle of doing some shit for G.U.N... which is why it only appears in Heroes. I just wish the outfit itself was drawn and colored better.

Back with the real Sonic, he’s been strung up by rope and dangled over open water only to immediately have his ropes cut so he can fall into the drink. Not sure why it was necessary to suspend him from a branch when you could have just tied him up and threw him in but maybe I missed a scene where they took turns beating him with a bat like a pinata.

Back with Evil Sonic and Rouge, they make it to the island where Evil Sonic is explaining to Rouge about the big emerald stored here and how to get to it. Apparently he knows all this because of Issue 44. The issue tells me to go back and check but I’m not going to because I don’t really care.

Zipping back to Sonic, the Anti-Freedom Fighters, especially Tails, really want to know if Sonic’s dead now… but he shows up behind them, so nah.

Antoine, who we know now is the REAL Antoine, has an inner monologue about how this Sonic is going to pay for trapping him here. Although, he does briefly consider that there’s something in his voice that seems more like the Sonic he knows from back home but he easily rebukes that and takes a sword slice at him.

So we’ve landed ourselves in a position where two hero characters from Mobius are fighting one another, thinking the other is an opposite version from Moebius.

Sonic apparently can’t fight well in Evil Sonic’s leather boots so he slips out of them and knocks Antoine away before grabbing Evil Sally and Evil Bunnie and throwing them into the water.

Evil Tails attacks Sonic with his butt as per the M.O of our favorite fox but Sonic kind of… just makes him dizzy.

I guess he ran around him so fast that the momentum of the wind made him spin too.

Also, Tails with pierced ears. That looks extra painful on fox ears. Geez.

After this, he slams onto Evil Rotor’s back and stomps on the thingy he has that makes lasers before telling him straight up that he’s not Evil Sonic. That’s apparently all he needs to hear too.

So, back with Evil Sonic and Rouge, they’ve found Locke and Rouge has now approached the man who is, in this comic’s own words, notoriously bad with women. This should be easy.

Evil Sonic is hiding in the bushes to watch her put the moves on him so he can sneak into the chamber while she’s distracting him. Locke knows something is up with Rouge but, I guess, it’s a little forgivable that he wouldn’t necessarily think she’s suddenly got a partner.

What isn’t forgivable is Evil Sonic being so ignorant to the existence of homosexuality.

I know he’s EVIL Sonic so he’s going to say shit like this but it still sucks seeing it. When he becomes a completely different character later he's going to prove to us that you can be evil and still likeable. There's no defending how he's being written currently. Although, why would you want to?

My personal headcanon is that he’s super gay himself and just uses this gross, unnatural, constant courtship of woman to try and convince himself and others around him of the opposite due to his extremely low self-esteem.

Rouge basically grabs Locke by the face and tells him that she’s looking for someone to love. I know Rouge doesn’t actually want that but imagining her being interested in him still sets off the gag reflex. Penders just loves creating and infesting this comic with gross characters. She'd be better off kissing a greasy black banana peel than Locke.

Evil Sonic makes his way down the chamber, literally saying the line “time to grab the booty” before he hears Sonic’s voice. The normal Sonic, of course. He was sent back to Mobius thanks to Evil Rotor's devices. 

The two face one another and then have a fight in front of the Master Emerald.

Locke, who is literally in the middle of sucking face with Rouge but doesn’t look too interested in doing it, senses something is wrong in the chamber and… falls through a random hole in the ground…?

I dunno. I guess he’s got a supply of those cartoon ACME holes from 'Who Framed Roger Rabbit?' stored in his… feet?

Either that or he was standing over that hole this whole time and willed cartoon physics to stop when he sensed something was wrong.

To Locke’s credit, when he gets down there he quickly deduces which of the two Sonic’s he sees is the real one by noticing the one on top brandishing a fucking rock while he’s about to bash Sonic’s brains in. 

Also, he calls him a simp. 

No, really.

Anyway, Locke uses his magic bullshit echidna powers to send Evil Sonic away and then tends to the real Sonic, who totally wants to assure us he was just about to get his second wind and win.

Locke’s portrayal in this issue is strange in how non-douchey it is. Even the scene with Rouge is strange considering she thrust herself onto him and he doesn’t even really seem like he gives a shit… but then again, the fact that he was just letting it happen rather than stepping away says something about his innate desires.

After all, if some girl just came up to me and tried to kiss me I’d back the fuck away. I can’t even imagine letting it happen were I actually into dating. It’s such an incredibly weird thing to just let happen to you.

Penders is a huge fan of this method of kissing for some reason. He did it all the goddamn time with Geoffrey by having him just show up, turn around, and plant his lips onto Sally’s without her consent. It’s really gross. I don’t know why he likes having this be the go-to method of kissing but I wish it would stop.

Meanwhile, Rouge is overlooking Evil Sonic as he groans on the grass after having been tossed out. She calls him pathetic and, again, because she’s being written by Penders, makes the fact that he lost all about which gender he is and turns to leave. 

However, Evil Sonic brandishes a tiny gem he snagged from the Master Emerald altar and this is enough to entice Rouge into giving him a second chance. She then carries him off.

Thus, a new partnership was born. Evil Sonic wants the hottest “babe” he’s ever seen to stick with him because he really wants that bat sex. Meanwhile, Rouge isn’t interested in him or his body but will gladly play around with it if it means free gems. 

I’d actually really like this set-up had I not read Issue 150. These two, as they are here, work well together and their selfish motivations make for seeing them work off one another something to behold. I would honestly say that Penders bumblefucked his way into something with a bit of promise if not for the fact that Evil Sonic doing this purely because he wants to play naked Twister with Rouge is the stupidest thing ever.

This problem will get rectified way down the line when someone who isn’t insane starts writing for the book. For now though, Evil Sonic’s motivations being so incredibly base and pathetic makes this union hard to get into, unfortunately.

Like, yeah, Rouge’s motivations aren’t technically any more important to the grand scheme of things but a major crux behind the point of her character is based on jewels and treasure hunting. It’s easy to get behind her quest for them, even when they end up inconveniencing the heroes because of how her character is written. 

Sonic is given a friendly ride home by Locke and as he’s wondering what Evil Sonic could have gotten out of pretending to be him, he’s immediately greeted by the girls that Evil Sonic courted.

Amy, who hasn’t really tried to court Sonic all that much in this comic to this point, just waltzes up to Sonic, kisses his cheek, and asks if he’s doing anything tomorrow.

I’m left with the gross notion that even though Amy had an interest in Sonic before this, the thing that propelled her towards being more outgoing in pursuing him was the little fling she had with Evil Sonic the other day. Holy Hera… I can’t…!

Then Bunnie… oh god… fucking hell…!

SONIC’S ANGELS?! 

UGGGGHHHHHH!

FUUUUUUUUCK!

*HEAD DESK*

My brain is scrambling. Like, I was trying my best to ignore all the gross stuff and focus on the things about this one particular story that was fine. You know, the fight with the Evil versions of themselves was all fine. It doesn’t offend me.

However, literally everything else surrounding it is so terrible. It’s just really nasty. The part of me that’s hesitating to call this shit the worst this book has to offer due to what I had to suffer through back when I read those Knuckles comics is breaking down. Hell, I’d have called it already had I not read those god forsaken books. Those almost drained the life out of me for being so frustrating and boring and painful to read but this just makes me feel slimy and dirty.

Oh God, and there’s an adorable ad for a Kirby game next to this page. How dare you stick Kirby next to this filth.

Archie Sonic the Hedgehog - Issue #151: Stargazing

Words & Pictures: Tania del Rio
Inking: Jim Amash
Coloring: Jason Jensen
Lettering: Jeff Powell

So… I know what this story is about. 

Right off the bat, I’ll say that I don’t like the character art. Everything else looks good though. 

On top of that, however, I’m not really the kind of person to go to when or if you wish for an opinion on Sally or Nicole’s characters. As such, I can only take this at face value and be as fair to it as possible. 

It’s nothing special. I’m just wired this way, for one reason or another. 90% of the Sonic characters out there, I either like or care about but for some reason this comic is chock full of the 10% I don’t. I can’t even articulate why properly. It’s just how it is unfortunately. 

I’ll still try my best though.

This story begins with narration talking about what it’s like to be alive. Normally I’d hate this but it’s so brief and better written than the stuff Penders does so I’ll let it pass.

The important thing here is how Sally thinks she sees a ghostly figure by the little Nicole tablet that’s been plugged into the wall socket when it goes BEEP and wakes her up.

Sally goes outside and comes face to face with the form of Nicole that I’M most familiar with. The animal form she’s taken is outside soaking in the air on her face. Sally, after realizing this is Nicole, asks if this is a hologram and grabs her arm. Turns out it isn’t.

So yeah, I could go over the usual guff. I could talk about how this makes no sense and how strange it is that a computer can just create an organic body (or complex simulation) that feels and breathes… somehow…

However, I think the how doesn’t REALLY matter in this context and it shows. The important thing here is the emotion on display and I think it works. They look at the stars together, then Nicole’s power runs out and she fades away. Then we end on a note of Sally saying this was the first time she’s really looked at the stars too.

So that’s good. I’m glad Sally and Nicole fans managed to get something in this garbage dump of an era that’s being helmed by the Echidna Lord.

 

This issue wasn’t as bad as the one before, obviously, but as a direct continuation of the previous one it has no choice but to be deemed awful to. I’m afraid that’s just how it has to be. I will say that I was entertained by the fight Sonic had with the evil versions of the Freedom Fighters as well as the one he had against his evil self. I’ll also acknowledge that the Sally and Nicole story was well-written and did a good job carrying across what it wanted to in a small amount of pages. It’s just unfortunate that the miniscule amount good to okay stuff is surrounded by so much trash. 

 

[Sonictrainer]

I remember reading 150 when it first came out and thinking..."This is an Anniversary Issue?"

I think this was also the same month when the teaser trailer for Sonic 2006 first appeared online...

[Cuz]

1 hour ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

 

 

An elaborate punishment but whatever.

 

and it just donned on me that this whole thing with Patch is literally just revenge on Antoine for #112, how petty can you be?

[GOAT]

Can anyone help me understand exactly what went down with Penders and the lawsuit when the 2nd Genesis wave hit? Like, how the hell did he get away with this shit...

[VO.SUPER]

27 minutes ago, GOAT said:

Can anyone help me understand exactly what went down with Penders and the lawsuit when the 2nd Genesis wave hit? Like, how the hell did he get away with this shit...

In short.

Penders wanted royalties for Archie using his characters after the Bioware game used similar concepts from the comics. Archie understandably refused and he sued them. 

The initial suing failed, but then Archie sued him back and when asked to produce evidence that Penders was working under contract for them they couldn't find it. They lost the case and Archie fired their entire legal team. Penders got to keep the rights for the characters and was now owed royalties for their use. Archie rebooted the whole series to not do that. 

This is all despite the fact this is a licensed comic, so every character automatically should belong to SEGA.

[Zaysho]

32 minutes ago, VisionaryofSUPER said:

Penders wanted royalties for Archie using his characters after the Bioware game used similar concepts from the comics. Archie understandably refused and he sued them. 

I'm a little hazy on the exact timeline of events and certain details (I gave up following this stuff all that intently a few years ago) but there is a bit of a misconception on who sued who.

Penders had requested old contracts and artwork to be returned to him a little after the Bioware game came out. He discovered Archie didn't have the contracts so he went behind both Archie and Sega's backs to file copyrights on all of his creations and then sued Sega (and I think EA got wrapped up in it since this was 2010). Archie stepped in and sued him thinking it was an open and shut case, but they couldn't prove a contract of any kind existed that could be accepted as evidence.

The case was dismissed with Penders effectively retaining the copyrights simply because he already had them. Due to several other creators affirming they didn't have contracts either, several other Archie originals defaulted back to their creators as well (notably Scott Fulop, whose case against Archie concerning reprints in 2016 was likely the last straw for Sega). The Bioware suit was also dismissed though I don't think Sega is barred from using the Chronicles stuff per se but I could see them not bothering (though Ian was using that stuff as a loose backdrop in the reboot and simply just putting Chronicles as some indefinite later event that doesn't actually affect anything).

Penders's ultimate goal was to get royalties and a new licensing agreement, and he's stated his own terms and conditions before, but this didn't jive with the agreement Sega and Archie had so it was decided to reboot from there. Late 2012, Penders's characters specifically were completely off-limits after the case with a few things wrapping up loose ends like "Secret Freedom" or outright having characters hastily replaced or storylines being heavily changed from their original plans like "Chaotix Quest" and "Endangered Species."

[Ryannumber1gamer]

1 minute ago, Zaysho said:

notably Scott Fulop, whose case against Archie concerning reprints in 2016 was likely the last straw for Sega

Fun fact about Scott Fulop, he's now attempting to springboard his own "TL-SC" of sorts with COMIC BOOK SUPERSTAR: MAMMOTH MOGUL(TM) AND THE FEARSOME FOUR:

https://thankskenpenders.tumblr.com/post/637060530466586624/thankskenpenders-okay-so-penders-and-the-lara-su

So congrats, Archie fans. If you ever wanted a comic about mammoth Kingpin who was one of the most useless and worthless characters in the entire series until Ian finally got his hands on him and wrote him decently, you're in luck because here's a whole series.

[Zaysho]

1 minute ago, Ryannumber1gamer said:

Fun fact about Scott Fulop, he's now attempting to springboard his own "TL-SC" of sorts with COMIC BOOK SUPERSTAR: MAMMOTH MOGUL(TM) AND THE FEARSOME FOUR:

I uh

I blocked this out lmao

[Ryannumber1gamer]

Just now, Zaysho said:

I uh

I blocked this out lmao

C'mon Zay, how on Earth could you block out fan-favourite comic book and graphic novel superstar: MAMMOTH MOGUL(TM)? Y'know, fan favourite character who did nothing for about 150 issues beyond claiming he has ultimate power and then getting his ass kicked by a eight year old fox?

[CrownSlayers Shadow]

Which sucks, because I actually liked Mammoth Mogul as a Sonic character.

[Kuzu]

Well issue 150 sure was a milestone.....

[Mangoaxe5]

9 hours ago, Ryannumber1gamer said:

Fun fact about Scott Fulop, he's now attempting to springboard his own "TL-SC" of sorts with COMIC BOOK SUPERSTAR: MAMMOTH MOGUL(TM) AND THE FEARSOME FOUR:

https://thankskenpenders.tumblr.com/post/637060530466586624/thankskenpenders-okay-so-penders-and-the-lara-su

So congrats, Archie fans. If you ever wanted a comic about mammoth Kingpin who was one of the most useless and worthless characters in the entire series until Ian finally got his hands on him and wrote him decently, you're in luck because here's a whole series.

Fiona Fox Chronicles when?

Good god Mammoth Mogul and the Fearsome Foursome were some of the worst Sonic villains. Mogul got his ass kicked all the time, and they always had to find a way to explain it.

The first time that he appeared the Choatix kicked his butt they explained it by saying that he wasn't at full power due to just recently have wokening up.

The second time he was defeated it was all part of the plan so that he could replace the Sword of Acorns with a fake.

 

[SBR2]

Spoiler

On ‎3‎/‎21‎/‎2021 at 1:44 AM, Dr. Detective Mike said:

Sonic X - Issue #26: La Layenda del Gran Gordo! (The Legend of the Great Big Guy!)

It means great fat guy and you know it Flynn! Anyway fun weird possibly not trivia recently WWE wrestler Otis took on a Luchadore disguise and wrestl;ed under the name El Gran Gordo. I don't know if it was an intentional reference to this or just one of the several thousand "Otis is fat" joke WWE likes to beat into the ground.

 

On ‎3‎/‎21‎/‎2021 at 1:44 AM, Dr. Detective Mike said:

Ah man, it feels good covering more of Flynn’s stuff.

An actually interesting fact according to Ian he wasn't originally going to write this one. It was apparently going to be like that Transformers homage and be written by someone associated with the WWE but they had to drop out so Ian took up the job.

 

On ‎3‎/‎21‎/‎2021 at 1:44 AM, Dr. Detective Mike said:

 

Man never took Chris for such a mark.

 

On ‎3‎/‎21‎/‎2021 at 1:44 AM, Dr. Detective Mike said:

They feel as though their master is too caught up in his own hype and they go on about how a bunch of mini-robots with negative charges attack the opponents he’s up against while a positively charged magnet under the ring pins them to the ground.

You just gotta love the silly Bugs Bunny logic of Eggman using Magnets under the ring to win.

 

On ‎3‎/‎21‎/‎2021 at 1:44 AM, Dr. Detective Mike said:

As such, we get hit with a very well made and impressively authentic looking poster.

I give the Ray's a lot of crap because I think their coloring is way to muted and dark but I will say they nailed this poster. At least I assume the worn look is them. Maybe Fry did that IDK. Either way it looks awesome.

 

On ‎3‎/‎21‎/‎2021 at 1:44 AM, Dr. Detective Mike said:

This whole thing where Bokkun is doing nothing but endlessly eating sweets and foods is starting to reach levels of extreme obsession and creepiness. He wasn’t anywhere near this crazed about it on the show.

I think one episode of the Emeral Saga had everyone bribing him with sweets but that's about it. I honestly do kinda like it here though because they are trying to go as over the top and silly as they can.

 

On ‎3‎/‎21‎/‎2021 at 1:44 AM, Dr. Detective Mike said:

Sonic charges and immediately gets all the shiny, tiny robots on him that pulls him to the ring's ground. Sonic realizes the match is, quote un-quote “rigged” and decides he’s going to expose him for being a fake athlete too.

Guys, Sonic’s the bad guy here. He is. There’s no arguing this.

Would Sonic be the Chris Jehrico of this match...what am I saying of course he would!

 

On ‎3‎/‎21‎/‎2021 at 1:44 AM, Dr. Detective Mike said:

 

There's something very funny to me about how Knuckles understands all the Luchador rules. Like he apparently is aware that unmasking on is a shameful act for them and means they have to "Leave the sport". How much Wrestling has he been watching on Angel Island?

 

On ‎3‎/‎21‎/‎2021 at 1:44 AM, Dr. Detective Mike said:

 

Oh, boy. Funs over.

 

On ‎3‎/‎21‎/‎2021 at 1:44 AM, Dr. Detective Mike said:

Sonic’s eyes narrow and he immediately gets the idea to introduce Ash to the world of cuckoldry.

Oh, the R34 this inspired.

 

On ‎3‎/‎21‎/‎2021 at 1:44 AM, Dr. Detective Mike said:

They call it Angel Island and how Nack knows it’s been renamed Angel Island, I haven’t a clue. I’m guessing that’s just something everyone is going to know now going forward so we’ll pretend a formal announcement was made to the entire world and move on.

They have a good PR office.

 

On ‎3‎/‎21‎/‎2021 at 1:44 AM, Dr. Detective Mike said:

Rouge the Bat is overhearing all this though and goddamn does she look good.

Art has trouble with Sonic's design but he friggin nails both Rouge and Tails Adventure design in this story. Though him doing Tails so good makes me wonder what exactly happened with the Chosen One backup then.

 

On ‎3‎/‎21‎/‎2021 at 1:44 AM, Dr. Detective Mike said:

The idea of Bunnie being interested in Sonic seems so fucking weird.

However, there’s an added level of scum-fuckery to this considering what “Sonic” here is doing but I’m probably going to rant about the implications of that when the “reveal” happens. 

An incredibly uncomfortable feeling is welling up in the pit of my stomach, the likes of which I haven’t felt in quite some time.

YUP!

There it is. 

The famous cursed image.

Oh God. Barf bag. I need one. HURP!

*Sigh*

Oh, boy it's something I'm famous for. So a couple years ago I took to Twitter asking because I was curious if Antoine and Bunnie ever talked about this and Ken Penders responded that "Antoine would forgive her for her indiscretions." Antoine would forgive her. Lets not even get into how gross the idea that a guy would have to forgive his girlfriend for having sex with someone else while they weren't together but this is way worse because honestly...this is rape. Evil Sonic deceived Bunnie and had sex with her (Ian Flynn later tried to say they didn't in an Ask Ian on Bumbleking in character as Bunnie but the intention is clearly there) so yeah Evil Sonic straight up raped her and Antoine forgives her for being raped. Go to hell Ken.

 

On ‎3‎/‎21‎/‎2021 at 1:44 AM, Dr. Detective Mike said:

So, there you have it. The most vile and disgusting thing you’ve probably seen in this book’s run.

I had heard about this and I wondered what I would feel when I eventually got to it and I’m not joking when I say that I’m at the edge of feeling a little sick. Honestly.

Let’s start with the fact that it’s night time now. Like, the caption up top with Bunnie and Evil Sonic said HOURS LATER and they’re going on about having a NAP.

NAP is another word for SLEEP.

SLEEP is another word for SLEPT.

SLEPT is a word that designates a certain action between two people who commonly wish to engage in--They slept with each other, alright.

Evil Sonic slept with Bunnie Rabbot and it’s gross and disturbing and awful and literally HOW, she's half robot down there and also WHY is this in a Sonic book, dear lord what the fuck Ken Penders you weird alien man you--!

The worst part is it was probably more explicit at one point. Look at the word balloons in the "Nap" panel again. They've clearly been altered. Ken Penders wanted it to be a known fact that Evil Sonic fucked Bunnie.

 

On ‎3‎/‎21‎/‎2021 at 1:44 AM, Dr. Detective Mike said:

Even worse, our pretend author will later go on to say it's BUNNIE'S fault that she got r-worded. 

Again thanks to my dumb ass. I thought he would just give a simple answer but no he went all victim blaming. Such a feminist I tells ya what.

 

On ‎3‎/‎21‎/‎2021 at 1:44 AM, Dr. Detective Mike said:

We cut back to Rouge, thank God, who is seeing the city on Angel Island for the first time, literally shocked by everything around her.

I would be too! The City was fucking destroyed in Return to Angel Island and the Echidnas had no resources to fix it this fast. I know Ken loves to return to the status quo but this is just silly.

 

On ‎3‎/‎21‎/‎2021 at 1:44 AM, Dr. Detective Mike said:

A pointless scene happens where Sonic accidentally sets off one of Rotor’s landmines and Sally runs out to yell at him. I guess this page is here to establish that Evil Sonic was looking for yet another girl to mack on and realized Sally sucked here as well. Great. Glad to know that’s all the woman in this issue are good for.

Eh, not to give Penders too much credit but Evil Sonic's thought bubble does make it sound like he's going to torment Sonic's parents.

 

On ‎3‎/‎21‎/‎2021 at 1:44 AM, Dr. Detective Mike said:

Rouge teleports right by Evil Sonic’s line of sight, by the way. Rouge is in need of a stool pigeon to distract Locke so she can get at the gems she wants and Evil Sonic just wants to have sex with the hot bat lady.

"I'd like to see some Sonouge in official media." *Monkey's Paw curls*

 

On ‎3‎/‎21‎/‎2021 at 1:44 AM, Dr. Detective Mike said:

To that I say yuck. It’s bad enough that shit like SAO and other garbage use that nonsense as a crutch for not knowing how to make a likeable despicable villain but I couldn’t imagine being in a position where I defended this showing up in a Sonic the Hedgehog book of all places. 

Yeah that's why I can't watch Sword Art Online. I tried when Toonami started airing it (I think it was the season before Aliceizaion but IDK) and it was just so gross and unpleasant I couldn't stand it.

 

On ‎3‎/‎21‎/‎2021 at 1:44 AM, Dr. Detective Mike said:

 

Pictured: Darth Maul getting knocked the fuck out by Neo.

 

On ‎3‎/‎21‎/‎2021 at 1:44 AM, Dr. Detective Mike said:

 

DESTINY! Also I this is not what the prophecy said in the Tails Miniseries. It said the Chosen One would Gather the Chaos Emeralds and bring about the great harmony.  This is not the end of the Chosen One story and Ian at least later remembers what it actually was and uses it to make things closer to the games.

 

On ‎3‎/‎21‎/‎2021 at 1:44 AM, Dr. Detective Mike said:

 

Hey on the plus side we get our first appearance of Evil Bunnie and her...weird leather cowgirl outfit.

 

On ‎3‎/‎21‎/‎2021 at 1:44 AM, Dr. Detective Mike said:

Back on Mobius, the actually super-hateable Evil Sonic is trying to court Rouge. He goes up to her and says it’s her lucky day. Rouge, of course, thinks this is the real Sonic and when Evil Sonic remembers that he plays it like he’s actually Sonic and listens to what she wants. Then, he just immediately agrees to what she wants in the hopes of more possible sex.

Rouge, blinded by easy gems, carries Evil Sonic off to Angel Island to go get her reward. 

Rouge...why are you being so stupid? You know Sonic wouldn't be all "Hell yeah I'll help you steal gemstones!" I mean they're not close but They've worked together a lot that you'd think the super spy might pick up on some weirdness here.

 

On ‎3‎/‎21‎/‎2021 at 1:44 AM, Dr. Detective Mike said:

before grabbing Evil Sally and Evil Bunnie and throwing them into the water.

Well...guess they're dead.

 

On ‎3‎/‎21‎/‎2021 at 1:44 AM, Dr. Detective Mike said:

What isn’t forgivable is Evil Sonic being so ignorant to the existence of homosexuality.

Ok even without the possibly unintentional homophobia I want to just make special mention of how the term "Babelicious Bat" is awful and I hate it.

 

On ‎3‎/‎21‎/‎2021 at 1:44 AM, Dr. Detective Mike said:

Locke, who is literally in the middle of sucking face with Rouge but doesn’t look too interested in doing it, senses something is wrong in the chamber and… falls through a random hole in the ground…?

Y'know Penders claims this is an art mistake and Mawhinny misread his script. I don't buy it. He says that about something similar next issue but I'm gong to save that for then.

 

On ‎3‎/‎21‎/‎2021 at 1:44 AM, Dr. Detective Mike said:

Also, he calls him a simp. 

No, really.

I mean TBF it juat meant Simpleton until last year. Still funny though.

 

On ‎3‎/‎21‎/‎2021 at 1:44 AM, Dr. Detective Mike said:

Meanwhile, Rouge is overlooking Evil Sonic as he groans on the grass after having been tossed out. She calls him pathetic and, again, because she’s being written by Penders, makes the fact that he lost all about which gender he is and turns to leave. 

However, Evil Sonic brandishes a tiny gem he snagged from the Master Emerald altar and this is enough to entice Rouge into giving him a second chance. She then carries him off.

Thus, a new partnership was born. Evil Sonic wants the hottest “babe” he’s ever seen to stick with him because he really wants that bat sex. Meanwhile, Rouge isn’t interested in him or his body but will gladly play around with it if it means free gems. 

So like...they absolutely fucked after this right? Like Rouge totally jumped Evil Sonic's bones over a single tiny gem. I'm sure Rouge faked it for that whole minute of Evil thrusting too hard just keep him complacent.

 

On ‎3‎/‎21‎/‎2021 at 1:44 AM, Dr. Detective Mike said:

I’d actually really like this set-up had I not read Issue 150. These two, as they are here, work well together and their selfish motivations make for seeing them work off one another something to behold. I would honestly say that Penders bumblefucked his way into something with a bit of promise if not for the fact that Evil Sonic doing this purely because he wants to play naked Twister with Rouge is the stupidest thing ever.

They were going to be a continuing thing but I'm sue you're going to talk about Ken's unused ideas when we get to his last issue so I'll save it for then.

 

On ‎3‎/‎21‎/‎2021 at 1:44 AM, Dr. Detective Mike said:

So… I know what this story is about. 

Right off the bat, I’ll say that I don’t like the character art. Everything else looks good though. 

Admittedly while I do like Tania's style myself it's very devisive. She has the faux Manga style she started with her Sabrina The Teenage Witch run that's just kinda her thing and it's not for everyone.

 

On ‎3‎/‎21‎/‎2021 at 1:44 AM, Dr. Detective Mike said:

 

How did this beautiful story come out of that dumbass bodyswap backup!? It's amazing.

 

[Guest]

Dangit. All I want now to to see El Gran Gordo stuff in games XD Imagine going  to Eggman's lair and just seeing the costume and mask hanging on a wall somewhere haha!

Seriously though, I like seeing that part of him. He just wants to be loved by the people there.

[Cuz]

On 3/21/2021 at 6:11 PM, CrownSlayer’s Shadow said:

Which sucks, because I actually liked Mammoth Mogul as a Sonic character.

Yeah, I generally like him as a villain myself. That Archie has a healthy rogues gallery that can give Robotnik a rest every now and again is one of my favorite aspects of the book, and they manage that without really tripping over or otherwise undermining him either. The doctor takes the main stage doing his own thing, and the others just kind of wait in the wings to strike while he's on the downturn. 

[Guergy]

On 3/22/2021 at 8:17 PM, Cuz said:

Yeah, I generally like him as a villain myself. That Archie has a healthy rogues gallery that can give Robotnik a rest every now and again is one of my favorite aspects of the book, and they manage that without really tripping over or otherwise undermining him either. The doctor takes the main stage doing his own thing, and the others just kind of wait in the wings to strike while he's on the downturn. 

The same cannot be said of the games where the main villain is either Eggman or some variation of Eggman. 

[Dr. Detective]

Archie Sonic the Hedgehog - Issue #152: Engage!

No! I DON’T WANT IT! No more of this harem shit! I just want to go on adventures again!

It sucks that this cover is drawn and colored so well too. Dammit. 

Spoiler

Writer: Ken Penders
Penciler: James Fry
Inks: Al Milgrom
Letterer: John Workman
Colorists: Josh & Aimee Ray
Editor: Mike Pellerito

It’s the Ken Penders show until the light at the end of the tunnel when I finally reach #160. For now, I’ve gotta watch this book flop like a dying fish on the boardwalk before it falls back into the water.

He keeps doing this “down to the exact second” thing and I seriously believe he wants us to be impressed.

Eggman is sitting in his chair, wondering how to account for constantly losing to teenagers all the time. A.D.A.M chimes in asking if maybe Eggman should focus on the stated objective instead. You know, the plan that we’ve yet to be properly clued into about.

This numbers thing isn’t impressive. It’s just annoying. Please stop.

Eggman basically just yells at A.D.A.M to improve implementation of the plan so long as he’s left to handle Sonic. Then he walks out of the room and talks about going to get something to eat. Only, he refers to it as seeking out his “daily nourishment” because Eggman talks like a robot now.

A.D.A.M interprets this as him being granted permission to do whatever he wants.

STOP!

Anyway, A.D.A.M releases the Nano-Technology onto the world. A mountain of machinery rises from the ground when Lupe’s group (still with those two young girls from that story from long ago) comes across it and they have to run away.

A.D.A.M has officially made his plan engage, as it were.

*Sigh*

 

Archie Sonic the Hedgehog - Issue #152: Sonic’s Angels

Writer: Ken Penders
Penciler: Jon Gray & Al Bigley
Inks: Al Milgrom
Colors: Josh Ray
Letters: Jeff Powell

Oh boy. I can’t wait to read the continuing adventures of Sonic the Fuckboy.

Sonic shows up late to the bunker in Knothole where a debriefing is happening. Sally is pissy at him for being late and Sonic, rather sadly, doesn’t know if it’s because she’s mad at HIM or his double. Both are possible. I can understand him not bothering to tell her because literally what would that change at this point?

Rotor breaks down the plot for us with his handy dandy presentation.

Eggman invented the Anti-Life Equation and is going to terraform the Earth in the name of Unicron. 

I’m actually a little astonished A.D.A.M just let this loose all willy nilly but who am I to judge? Something cool is happening, finally.

They split into two teams and Sonic is paired with all the women except Sally. 

Surprisingly, things go rather well at the start. They’re working together, figuring things out, and being respectful of one another’s company. Amy does have a little comment about it being weird that Sonic’s leading their team and not Charles but seeing as how Charles is in charge of the second team, doing something only that group of smart alecks can handle, I’m really confused by her statement there. 

Anyway, Sonic, Amy, Bunnie, Fiona, and Mina all make it to the spot where they see the matter materializing out of thin air before them. 

Amy says she’s scared and wonders why more people didn’t come with them. Sonic doesn’t really answer that and instead just says he’s with them through thick and thin and they all smile, put their hands together, and shout “Let’s party” as if the question Amy just asked… wasn’t just asked. Amy is immediately okay after this too. Not sure if I follow the emotional through-line here.

They hoist Sonic down by a rope so that he can inspect what’s happening under the surface of this central area where the evil is spreading out from. 

There’s this slimy moment where Rotor asks if Amy has anything to report and Amy says that she has no clue what they’re even looking for, and adds in a thought bubble that she also has no idea why Sonic hasn’t asked her out since they KISSED.

They KISSED huh? 

A caption underneath her says “See Sonic #150, Amy Rose is still unaware who she really kissed” like that’s a neat bit of trivia or something. Yeah, isn’t it cute that the aged up little girl is unaware that she was tricked into kissing someone without proper consent? What rich lore this comic has.

I’m at least grateful this part of the story has Jon Gray’s art for me to admire. All of this looks really good, even if the Ken Penders dialogue keeps making me raise my brow a bit too often.

It’s funny that he’s all “We’re a team!” when speaking directly to them but here, in his head, he’s bemoaning the fact that he got stuck with all the girls. Also, I’m not entirely sure how it would make sense to tempt fate by sticking you with all the girls, Sonic. Unless Sally’s plan is to see if you mack on one of them in front of the others and see if they get all upset because he’s been playing around but to my knowledge Sally isn’t aware that Evil Sonic was playing around with the other girls so…?

Anyway, some creepy, slimy green hands somehow creep up all around Bunnie and we get her standing there like a dolt, wondering if she’s in danger before they grab her and confirm that, yes, she’s in danger.

They all lose contact with Bunnie and Sonic rushes off to find her. He worries he won’t be able to do so in time but he manages it after a NINE PAGE LONG Bionicle story interrupts our program. I didn’t read it.

He eventually comes across someone we haven’t seen in fucking ages; Snively.

Yeah folks, he’s back. He’s been gone for so long that I’ve honestly forgotten when the last time he was around even was or why he left. I think he was just… gone when the Xorda attacked or something.

Also, we’ve got a little Bunnie body-horror going on here with the unleashed Nanites trying to assimilate Bunnie into them like the Borg.

It’s really gruesome looking. I don’t blame her for crying here. Not one bit.

I was going to make a huge comment about how it looks like they're violating her, especially with one of the metal prongs sticking to one of her breasts... but I don't want to. So I won't.

Sonic attacks Snively because he’s Snively but Snively says that him being Snively isn’t the problem here. The nanites are at fault here and if they don’t stop them, they're going to be the new dominant species.

It’s here where we switch from Jon Gray to Al Bigley and the art becomes significantly worse. It’s not straight up awful yet but it gets there. 

Snively explains to Sonic that he was setting up EMPs to take out the nanites before Sonic arrived and stopped him. So it’s Sonic’s fault that shit’s fucked up now.

No, not really. Even Snively says it’s not Sonic’s fault. Instead, they’ve got to set off the detonators at the three flashpoints manually now and that’s all. 

Sonic can’t be in three places at once so the girls that haven’t been taken by the nanites volunteer to handle it while Sonic goes to save Bunnie. If the EMP goes off with Bunnie still melting into those things then… well, they don’t know what’ll happen but it’ll probably be more Cronenberg shit.

Snively volunteers to stay behind to man the master generator to ensure the maxim surge is provided. Fiona and Mina get to their respective spots while Amy is left to follow Snively after some much needed assurance of trust.

The only way to do that, of course, is to assure Amy that Snively is definitely still a scumbag. Like you do.

Meanwhile, Sonic finds Bunnie. The ghostly green visage of Eggman’s logo that I guess is supposed to personify the nanites is trying to absorb her into itself but Sonic tells it to stop since Bunnie isn’t robotic but bionic. 

Uncle Chuck then gets the idea to use The Ship of Theseus a thought equation to confuse the Nanite Oogie Boogie. Basically, Sonic is like “Yo, you can only absorb silicon-based matter not organic tissue.” Then Nanite Man is like “Yeah.” Then Sonic is like “Bunnie is both!” Then Nanite Man is like “Oh shit? Fer real?”

Then he let’s her go.

It makes sense probably. I dunno. I stopped caring.

The book’s art has deteriorated more and more as this part has continued on. We’re now at the point where it’s at its absolute ugliest and as such the ugliest thing it could do comes next.

This next set of panels belongs in a museum. There’s SO MUCH wrong with this.

Jesus Christ, look at that. It’s been a long ass time since I’ve seen something THIS badly drawn while containing material this gross and badly written. Every time I think about a new implication and thing to point out, the problems keep growing! In fact, this deserves a list.

Number 1: The first thing to point out, obviously, is how awful the drawing of Sonic on the first panel is. He’s melting. Not just that but his spines are drawn so badly that they almost look like bird feathers at the sides. His arm is super wrinkly and twisty in a way that makes the bile rise to my throat.

Number 2: Bunnie’s not only immediately fixed but she’s suddenly in super model pin-up mode here. It’s weird. This happened to some of the other girls when the art style changed too but it’s way more noticeable here and I don’t know why this decision continues to be made when we’re in an era past Sonic Heroes at this point.

Number 3: The true masterpiece of WTF and incompetence comes in the second panel, of course. I struggled with what to talk about first here, the drawing of the kiss itself or the fact that they’re kissing at all. I guess I’ll just point out the thing that’s REALLY bugging the shit out of me and that’s the fact that Sonic’s got a literal hole in his face! Like, that’s NOT a mouth! Someone cut out a section of his mussel and he’s got a gross vacuum hole right there in his face and it’s sucking Bunnie into Sonic’s head! He’s a weird looking alien monster in this panel and it’s really not sexy.

Number 4: For some reason, Sonic’s lower half is cut off in the second panel. I don’t exactly know why. It doesn’t seem like an artistic decision that makes sense.

Number 5: The story reason for why this is awful is the fact that these two are kissing at all, of course. I, at least, know the reason why Bunnie is doing it. It’s a terrible reason and it’s hard as billiard balls to swallow but I know why she’s doing it. Why the fuck, in the name of Captain Planet’s shiny red underoos, is SONIC kissing Bunnie?

The instant I saw this panel, I was like, “Ah dammit. Sonic’s still macking on Bunnie… ... wait a minute. That was Evil Sonic that did that… … wait… WHY is Sonic macking on Bunnie?????”

SERIOUSLY?! WHY?! WHAT’S GOING ON?!

This makes no sense. Did I miss an issue? Did I skip something? I must have right? I fucked up somewhere during this retrospective. Ken didn’t just have Sonic willingly suck face with Bunnie Raboot for no reason right?

I don’t even know if Sonic knows that Evil Sonic had sex with Bunnie. This is bad either way though.

If he DOESN’T know that Bunnie and Evil Sonic had sex than that means he’s doing this completely independent of the knowledge of Bunnie’s feelings for him. Since he displayed literally know interest in her before this point, it’s just a spontaneous thing that’s happening for the sake of keeping this weird, random love drama alive...yet the person who would care the most, Sally, isn’t here soooooo.. what?

If he DOES know, however, than that means Sonic is aware that Bunnie was tricked into having sex with his evil self and instead of telling her, he’s decided to take advantage of the rape that happened by making her believe it was actually him she had sex with so that he could hook up with her.

That second possibility is the most vile and disgusting and hateable thing that I’ve ever written and if it were true it’d be the absolute worst thing any character has ever done to another character on a personal level before in the history of this book.

I really hope it’s just a matter of it happening because Sonic just randomly decided to kiss her here. I mean, I wish this didn’t happen at all but… 

Oh God. I can’t believe I’m still talking about that bullshit. Fuck it. These are the worst issues of the comic. Yeah, the Knuckles issues drained me of my life to the point where I almost contemplated giving up but this is a case where the events being more “interesting” does not supersede being boring. This is just nasty. 

I was almost considering giving the issue a pass but those two panels happened and it drudged up those memories. 

I still feel like I have to be missing something despite this. Like, there was a hidden scene where Sonic and Bunnie had a conversation at the very least… my brain can’t process Sonic just kissing her like this…!

So anyway, they escape. The art is really bad. Like, super model Mina here is disturbing as hell.

This isn’t right. It’s just… not… right…

They leave and Fiona says some shit about how the nanites did something that will take decades, nay, centuries to restore. Sure thing Ken. Your shit is so cool. It spreads a little bit and suddenly we’re looking at CENTURIES to fix it because it’s just that dangerous a thing. It’s so impressive it only took a single issue to happen too. God, you’re such a brill-aaaaaugh. I gotta stop with the sarcasm. It’s making my mouth bleed.

Lupe and her group are safe by the way. I’m sure you guys wanted to know... so they are. Hurray.

Also, Snively’s just randomly a part of the gang… it’s an amusing end I guess.

I don’t mind the idea behind this. In theory. I don’t desire it to be anything permanent, which is what Penders wanted before he would decide to kill Snively and have Sonic grief over his death, turning him into a more hardened asshole to his team… but that won’t come to be seeing as how he’ll leave the book and never return (save for a lettering credit down the road I think) which is a moment I’m practically dreaming of right now.

The only good thing I can say that this issue has going for it is Jon Gray’s art. It’s always a good time looking at the way he draws the Sonic cast and even in the darkest pits of darkness, it’s a shining light that I always treasure whenever I can. Unfortunately, it’s in service of more hog slop. The nanites thing is actually a cool, interesting idea but so much of it is put on the backseat for a ton of talking and eventual reminders of the gross, gross, gross bullshit that happened before this point. Yeah, I know Sonic’s Angels is supposed to be some sort of Charlie’s Angels thing but it doesn’t really work in THAT context or this one. Also, the second part of the second story was drawn like complete ass. It’s comforting knowing that stuff like that would never make it into IDW. 

 

Archie Sonic the Hedgehog - Issue #153: Songoose, Part 1 of 2

This cover is almost really good. For some reason though, I can’t get over Sonic’s distorted face. Everything else about it looks great and appropriately dynamic but that wild, almost feral, look on Sonic’s face is the kind of distorted that doesn’t quite feel right to me. I also have a sneaking suspicion that this cover is a depiction of something that’ll be way lamer within the pages, if it happens at all. I suppose I must find out.

Spoiler

Writes: Karl Bollers
Pencils: Ron Lim
Inks: Jim Amash
Letters: John Workman
Colors: Jason Jensen
Edits: Mike Pellerito

So, I was told that there were old backup stories that got shuffled about and placed at later points in the comic, which explains the credits for this one. Karl Bollers and Ron Lim have not been around for a while so the sudden “return” would definitely raise some eyebrows were I not certain this wasn’t one of those cases. Then again, I've been wrong before so who really knows? Not me.

Well, at the very least, there’s a chance I’ll get a break from the routine disturbing nonsense Ken’s been foisting onto me.

So… uh… first thing’s first.

DID RON LIM JUST GET A MILLION TIMES BETTER OR SOMETHING? THIS LOOKS FANTASTIC!

Yeah, I even checked the credits again to make sure. It says Ron Lim did this. 

Damn.

The story begins with Eggman offering Nack the Weasel an assassination job in the Acorn Kingdom. Nice. A promising start with a fun villain. Good. Please, stay on this track.

We then get an explanation for the little fight scene above. It’s a training exercise to avoid the inappropriate nature of what happened in 150-151. 

I’m not kidding. It literally says that in the yellow caption.

“Check out Sonic #150-151 for all the inappropriate-ness” is such a divine statement for the book to give that it feels planned.

This next scene is a great display of why the designs of a lot of these old characters are really bad. They’re way too samey. Look at this page and see where I may have gotten confused by what was happening.

The entire time I was reading the top three panels, I thought the person talking was King Max. 

So when King Max shows up on a monitor in the bottom panels, my brain was full of question marks.

The guy at the top was talking about wanting Sally and Antoine to marry and apologizing for putting pressure on Sally. He was also talking about how Sonic may never grow up. These are all familiar King Max talking points. Then the subject of his health came up and when he said it was in decline with no idea as to what’s been affecting it, I wondered, yet again, why he even got better when he was supposed to be wheelchair bound. 

Then the King and Queen showed up and I momentarily considered that perhaps they left behind a body double at the kingdom. I also thought it was possible that they had just returned home off screen because who cares, right?

The very LAST idea that came to mind was that this was General D’Coolette, Antoine’s father.

I don’t even blame Ron Lim for this. Too many of these characters have similar colors and similar designs. This problem will arise again when Elias and Amadeus have their little scuffle down the line. They’ll both be brown colored furred animals dressed in regal blue clothing. There’s not even enough distinct differences in the shade of brown used for their fur. 

Anyway, the King and Queen say they’ll probably have to cut their world tour short because of this. When the question of HOW he became sick arises General D’Coolette says that they may have been… poisoned on the battlefield YEARS ago and it’s only just affecting them now. I don’t know what he means by “them” and “us” here seeing as how only the General seems to be sick. 

Sally does bring up that her parents are showing similar symptoms but Max doesn’t care and then Alicia says not caring is dumb because they’re no use to anyone dead. Also, we get reminded that Max was once in a wheelchair thanks to the captions and the Queen saying his legs have been shaking lately. Still no explanation for how he can stand again but whatever.

That shitty, plot-contrived poison that we’ve never once heard talked about from a battle that’s never been mentioned before takes its disastrous effect on General D’Coolette who we didn’t know was sick until right the fuck now.

It's so bad, you'd swear it was Penders' idea. Honestly, even if Karl Bollers wrote this, it wouldn't surprise me if it still was. It wouldn't surprise me if Penders meddled with the story so that he could have another excuse to kill off another dad character.

The General falls flat on his face. He’s dying from… I’ll call it Penders-itis. Because why not? The man deserves to be named after a fake disease. 

We cut to a later point in time where Tails is also about to fall flat on his face but in a different way due to the fact that he’s about to ask Fiona on a date to Mina’s concert. Sonic sees this and immediately tries to get that awkward shit to not happen by suggesting they all go together. Tails says it sounds great and they all agree. 

Then, the first real bout of what you could call character development happens for Fiona, sixteen billion issues after she randomly became a character again.

It’s not much. She just has a small chat with Sonic about how selfish he is and how despite being mad at him for abandoning her when he and the SegaSonic crew left her captured so long ago, she knew that after his big sacrifice in #125 that it couldn’t have been on purpose… BUT he’s still a dick sometimes.

She also says that if he was trying to spare Tails’ feelings back there then he shouldn’t have made a move on her back in #150 but we all know that was Evil Sonic… and…

...Oh shit. I know where this goes. 

I mean, I already knew where this goes but now I’ve got almost the full context for how it happened. Although, I did before but I only read these issues once before locking them away forever. I guess a combination of being older and more observant is at play here then.

They go to Mina’s dressing room. Her and Sonic hug. Ash shows up and ushers her away so that she can perform while making it super obvious he doesn’t like Sonic. Sonic still is left wondering what his problem is though.

His problem is that he doesn’t like you. That’s it. Also, he doesn’t have to. Not sure if I find this to be an actual conflict of any kind myself.

We see Mina perform on stage. Because this is a comic and I can’t hear any music, whenever stuff like this happens I can only read the lyrics and imagine that she’s just screaming a badly written poem at the crowd. There may only be a few murmurs of someone plucking on a guitar string in the background but that’s usually it. As such, the song sounds really awful in my head.

The only way to really make this work is to substitute the music in your head with a song you like and try to shoehorn the lyrics on the page into it so that it works right. Which it won’t.

Honestly, if the music was somehow listenable, this song would still be terrible. Thank God Nack showed up to end this awful charade. 

Oh dear God, the horror…! 

Those lyrics. Jesus.

I’m utterly baffled by his aim. Turns out he sets a palm tree on fire. Like, he just completely misses the lone rockstar on stage. I’m not… sure why? He seemed happy to assassinate someone and she was wide open. 

Also, for no reason, he tosses the cloak he was wearing away and completely exposes himself to everyone so that Sonic sees him. Then Bunnie kicks the burning tree in the water and Sonic just immediately races in front of him and punches him out.

It’s such a miraculously shit plan. What the hell dude? You were actually way more competent back when the book was more of a joke.

Welp, Nack wakes up in a cell. Sonic says that with a rap sheet like his, he’s going to be in it for a really long time. 

Spoilers: No he won’t.

Sally says this is going to happen unless (not sure why she would bother saying “unless” here honestly) he tells them why he tried to make an attempt on Mina’s life.

So that WAS an attempt at Mina’s life? I had hoped it would have been some kind of distraction or signal flare. I was making fun of his bad aim earlier but I wasn’t completely sure but now that it’s been confirmed he was trying to kill Mina, what the hell dude? Shoot AT Mina. Why would you fire at the tree?!

Nack isn’t threatened by being in prison. He makes a good point about how much better it would be to not sell out his employer, ruin his credibility, and get three square meals a day on top of that.

Sally then points to the outside where the other weasels from that other story involving Mina are, lifting weights in orange jumpsuits, and they glare back at Nack when he looks out at them. She threatens to reunite him with his former accomplices who went to jail while he got away scott-free.

He immediately rats out Eggman.

This is strange. I wouldn’t necessarily be more afraid of my former accomplices than I would of Eggman finding out that I ratted him out. Also, seeing those weasels again really reminded me of just how much I’m bothered by the fact that they have a prison.

I dunno. It, of course, makes sense. This is a kingdom and Sally’s the Princess and shit. It’s a society and all that junk and they run it. I know. That’s just another reason why I’m not a fan of this particular set-up. 

I like that Sonic is usually portrayed as a free agent, doing his own thing. In the context of something like this, however, where he’s a soldier working for this kingdom he and the rest of the Freedom Fighters no longer come off as rebels. They just feel like cops.

They’re going to feel way more like cops as this comic goes along too. It always bothered me and the amount in which it bothers me has only been increased thanks to current events. I just really hate seeing Sonic this tied to an establishment of authority. 

That’s a personal thing though.

The other weird thing, aside from how easy it was to break Nack, is the reasoning Eggman did this whole thing in the first place.

Yup. Turns out he’s the Shredder from the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Out of Our Shell Tour. You know, the special where the guy dressed up in a cheap Shredder costume is on stage at the Turtles concert and he comes out to talk about how much he hates music. He then proceeds to talk about how much he hates music… in song.

Eggman also hated music in Sonic Underground. Perfectly understandable. The songs in that show were unbearable. Except the opening. The opening is fucking awesome. 

Then again, Eggman might just not hate music. He might just hate awful Kids Bop, MTV Choice Awards music.

It's also a little funny how Sonic just instantly claims Nack is lying. To be so forceful about getting him to talk only to immediately accuse him of lying when he gives you an answer just feels funny to me. I mean, I get it but still.

So, because of this, Sally decides to replace Mina's security detail with Sonic as the personal bodyguard. Ash doesn’t like that but acquiesces shockingly fast. 

Back with Eggman, he’s (somehow) found out that Nack has failed so he unveils his Plan B.

It’s Heavy and Bomb, remade in their actual canonical designs several thousands issues after Knuckles’ Chaotix was anywhere within the realm of relevance.

They were done really dirty by this comic. They had faces and were good guys on Geoffrey’s team before Eggman captured them and turned them into spies. Then, instead of being sympathetic about it and fixing it, Sonic just destroyed them. He didn’t really know who they were, sure, but the fact that the comic was so relentlessly cruel left a bad taste in my mouth.

I don’t think these guys are the same robots either so it probably means nothing. If they are, that’s honestly even stranger since Eggman would have had to go to the Kingdom to scoop up their remains and rebuild them himself. Not sure why he would so they’re completely new, most definitely.

 

Archie Sonic the Hedgehog - Issue #153: Fairy Tale (or the Adventures of Pirate Sally)

Writer: Romy Chacon
Pencils: Art Mawhinney
Inks: Rich Koslowski
Letters: Vickie Williams
Colors: Josh Ray

Snaggle, Sasha, and Rory are three children sick in the same bed and in need of some comfort from the painful cruelty that comes with the everlasting, universal curse upon mortality known as the gross iron grip of disease… so Rosie tells them a story.

She doesn’t want to. She says she sucks at it but the children insist so she has no choice.

Right off the bat, the story she tells uses people she knows in real life. If I were a kid, I’d find that strange. Being told fanfiction about people I know in real life sounds awkward as hell.

Also, look at this cast list.

Does she even know who Mogul and Rouge are? Why did she cast Antoine as the fool? Even Rosie is dunking on Antoine? My God.

Rosie’s story starts off strange immediately when Pirate Sally and her First mate sees Tails just falling out of the sky. 

When he’s saved the conversation instantly turns to his butt.

Rosie was like, “I’m gonna tell a story about Tails getting one of his tails ripped the fuck off. That’s wholesome, I’m sure. To somebody.”

Rouge the Rogue stole one of the Elfen Fox’s tails and works for the Evil Wizard Kintobor. Funny how Naugus is like the Headless Horseman equivalent in this story rather than the wizard. Also, for some reason, Rosie decided to refer to Robotnik as Kintobor. I’ve no real idea as to why she of all people would but okay. Rolling with it.

They want to reach the castle and immediately come across Ant the Foole. He’s just IN the forest for reasons that aren’t explained and then he makes the dangerous decision to lead a bunch of strangers he just met to the castle where Kintobor is. He leads them down the wrong way and Rosie calls him an idiot for doing it, right in front of the children.

So harsh. Why does Rosie hate Antoine?

The Naugus Rider gets knocked out by the Blue Knight, who just shows up. They all go together to the castle and Sally challenges Mog the Troll to a game of chicken and wins. Okay.

Then they go inside and demand Eggman give up the tail. I mean, surrender the booty. I mean… give back Tails’ other butt appendage, please.

The Blue Knight bashes into Kintobor’s stomach and the tail just lands back onto Tails’ butt and then the Knight and the Pirate just randomly fall in love and decide to kiss and then it ends.

The kids admonish Rosie for how bad she is at story-telling.

No Rosie, you were right at the start.

You suck at telling stories.

It may have even shocked the children out of being sick.

This is sadly the best issue I’ve read since we’ve reached the era of Penders as lead writer. His name, I just realized, isn’t anywhere in this issue which might be the reason. Still, it was also better drawn. I mean, it looked really good. Ron Lim shocked me here and Art Mawhinney continues to do great as well. The conflict here is ridiculous but it’s also kind of amusing. Eggman wanting to kill a teenage girl over something so dumb feels out of place at this moment in the book's narrative but at the same time I want to welcome the change of pace. Perhaps I’ll be granted a little mercy as I claw my way to #160.

Didn’t really see a ton of Sonic dodging lasers though.

 

Sonic X - Issue #27: Conquest is Like a Box of Chocolates

That’s a great title. I don’t know why I love it so much but I do. Also, this is another really good cover. It’s got that wrestling poster vibe down alright. I might even be scared were I not familiar with “The Cape” as it were. 

Spoiler

El Gran Gordo, our glorious hero, starts us off by addressing the crowd, which includes the excited President, of how awesome the day’s show is going to be.

He then starts trying to take down his opponent. Apparently, there’s no magnets at work here so Eggman is actually just kicking the ass of his opponent.

His opponent is Decoe by the way and he’s failing to get Gran Gordo to listen to him while Bocoe is off at the Thorndyke’s house, also failing to get at Sonic so that he can listen to him too.

Bocoe proceeds to fail.

He dresses as an assortment of different things to trick Ella into letting him into the house. Even as a Girlscout Bot selling Thin Mints. I might have let him in had he been selling the lemon cookies. I don't know which is funnier; this whole sequence or the fact that Decoe thought that an appropriate professional wrestling gimmick was to go as a chicken nugget.

Either way, it doesn’t matter. He tells the truth and she lets him in.

It feels great how non-threatened by the right hand men of Eggman the characters are. This goes for them as well as Orbot and Cubot.

An Egg Pawn? PFFT! Fuck him up! Leave the hench-bots alone though. They’re literally less than harmless. It’d be like feeling threatened by an unopened bottle of water compared to a hail storm.

Bocoe warns Sonic that there’s a trap at the wrestling venue. Sonic doesn’t believe him because he and Eggman called a truce. Sonic also says that Eggman gave up the evil villain thing which would be miraculous if it were true. Eggman just gives up being evil because he loves being a professional wrestler? Holy shit guys.

Bocoe corrects Sonic and says that the person he’s actually worried about… is Bokkun.

He’s shown up now, sporting his evil mustache and cape and has locked the doors, trapping people inside. 

He also has all the world leaders here, who’ve shown up for this wrestling event because that’s totally something that would happen, and he starts making demands of them that SOME would say are childish but I dunno, they all seem rather reasonable to me.

I mean, he’s got a point. Like, what the fuck does fun-sized even mean? Fun for who? The dentist. Get that shit out of here.

I also like that he’s decided that cavities are just things that are being allowed to exist. I guess so that all the adults can kick the fun out of enjoying candy so that they can torture the children. We need to get the Kids Next Door on this shit. It’s all a conspiracy.

Then Bokkun shows them what fun-sized should mean and has a pair of robots literally rip the ceiling away.

This is almost too good. I’m resisting the urge to just post the entire thing because I’m spinning in my chair from excitement right now. It’s a giant set of Rock-Em Sock-Em Robots!

Sonic is seeing all this on the TV and is surprised like I am that Bokkun had this in him. He then grabs Bocoe and they race off to the stadium. 

Back with Bokkun, he’s using his robot to literally reach down and pluck the President from the stands while proclaiming, “Now gather up the world leaders my funsizors! So says Emperor Whatever-I-Called-Myself” right as El Gran Gordo makes a glorious leap to belly bounce the robot hand away.

Guys, El Gran Gordo can belly bounce the hand of a giant robot away. How am I just now finding this out?

The president, humorously, says that Bokkun is worse than Eggman and El Gran Gordo shouts into the president’s face that Eggman was a mad genius and that he’d be honored to do battle with him.

The president’s reaction is “...Okay?”

That’s when Bokkun shows up.

The writing in this issue in particular has been stellar.

This is all so much fun. I don’t even know why this one in particular is getting to me so well. I just love it when the absurd is treated with such intense vigor and seriousness by the characters participating in the madness. It's the kind of stuff that would make me bounce around my room in excitement as a kid. Everything is just crazy and everyone's acting insane but they're taking it so seriously as well. It's my kind of fun.

But of course we were all waiting for Sonic to make the heads of the robots go UP--!

As you do.

El Gran Gordo then challenges The Emperor Whatever-He-Called-Himself to a match in the ring.

Bokkun easily beats the crap out of him and he has to be woken up by Bocoe and Decoe later. The two of them tell him that he’s not going to be able to beat one of his robots as a hero. To that I say, “DID YOU NOT SEE El GRAN GORDO BELLY BOUNCE A ROBOT’S HAND AWAY EARLIER?!”

But no. Gordo agrees and immediately changes into his normal Eggman outfit. Also, yes, he changed clothes with a flick of the wrist by whipping his cape off and around his body in between panels. The robots even say that’s literally what happened and ask how it’s possible. The answer is because he’s MAD. I guess, therefore, physics and logic only semi-regularly apply to him.

God, it’s gotta be way more fun to be Eggman than Eggman gives himself credit for.

I love that the President calls this a heel turn. The shocked look on all the faces of the children was nice as well.

Sonic doesn’t like this. Now that Eggman is back he admits to knowing his standing as a hero would never last. Still, they decide to team up to resolve the situation. Eggman has an idea and sicks Sonic on Bokkun to distract him while he takes care of things off to the side.

While Sonic and Bokkun are fighting, Bokkun compares the hedgehog to a cough drop. I immediately get the comparison because I to have faced the unfortunate reality of the amount of disappointment cough drops bestow upon the young. They look sweet and delicious on the outside but they’re full of nose clogging wholesomeness. Bleguh!

Sonic gets tangled up in Bokkun’s cartoonishly long cape and as Bokkun gloats, Sonic lets him realize he’s fucked before spinning about the place and slamming him all across the ring by his cape. 

Eggman then finishes doing some equally cartoonish math in his head before yelling at Sonic to toss Bokkun to him. Sonic does so and Eggman catches then pins him with his ginormous body.

After that comes the long awaited Sugar Crash.

If Eggman didn’t explain that one would be forgiven for thinking Eggman’s fat muscles choked the life out of him.

Eggman then turns to the crowd and shouts that he fooled them and let himself get close to their hearts. Apparently now this means he knows everything about them. It doesn’t but hey, I guess crushing the dreams of children and adults the world over when your favorite wrestler goes beyond turning heel is victory enough for the man. Eggman gets the win here.

Sonic and Eggman have a handshake, delighted that the truce is off, and then Eggman and his cronies escape in the giant green head of one of the Rock-em Sock-em Robots, ending the Legend of the Great Hero El Gran Gordo… for now.

Sonic then teases me by suggesting he'll be a masked wrestler next and then tossing the mask away, acting like that’s not something I’d want.

Do what to me Sonic? Make me a happy boy?

Oh you’re gonna wear a ridiculous wrestling outfit. Mark my words. I’ve foreseen it.

Literally.

That was chair spinning levels of fun. I loved that soooooo much. I don’t know what it is about these books but they just cause my excitement levels to spike. The ridiculous nature of this premise coupled with how seriously the characters take it just makes for a nice little recipe of nonsense. You can tell that Ian loves being able to spread his wings and do whatever he wants with this book. It’s such a nice palette cleanser. I want more Sonic characters wrestling. 

[Silvereyes]

Enjoying the reviews as always Dr. Detective Mike. So close yet so far. The story after Songoose is pretty atrocious I reckon, the last final awful Penders story. The actual last Penders story, #157-#159 I think, isn't too awful actually, just very mediocre I'd say. A very unmemorable way for his era to end.

[Ryannumber1gamer]

A couple things worth noting:

• Jon Grey's likely reason for only doing half of #152 is even he despises it. He's gone on point saying that #152 is one of his biggest regrets, and he wishes he never drew it. There is in fact only two pages he's happy with (which are the ones with pencils up on his Devientart): 

https://thankskenpenders.tumblr.com/post/188287438135/fun-fact-jon-hated-doing-this-issue-to-this-day

• Either Ken or the editor's done work on #152. We know it 99% cannot all be Karl, because Karl never planned for the Patch twist, he wanted it to be a battle-hardened Antoine who'd eventually be corrupted by the Source of All. Yet some of the script is edited to show Ant's father's health is in decline (an effect caused by Patch poisoning his father). Given that plot point was seemingly all Penders, it stands to reason either Penders or the editor included that. The poisoning plot was a Penders idea, and was used in #154-155 a lot, it makes no sense that Karl would write it when we know Penders later went behind his back and altered Karl's plans.

[Sonictrainer]

2 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

  Hide contents

Oh dear God, the horror…! 

Those lyrics. Jesus.

I’m utterly baffled by his aim. Turns out he sets a palm tree on fire. Like, he just completely misses the lone rockstar on stage. I’m not… sure why? He seemed happy to assassinate someone and she was wide open. 

 

One of the people in the audience bumped into him while dancing.

[Dr. Detective]

5 hours ago, Sonictrainer said:

One of the people in the audience bumped into him while dancing.

Goddammit. That shit is so hard to see. I wish the impact was stronger. Well, at least its an explanation.

I guess he also just couldn't take a second shot. It was apparently much faster to take off his entire outfit and then run away.

[SBR2]

Spoiler

12 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

 

*The deepest of all possible sighs* Let's get through this. Fun Fact this was literally the first issue I got when I subscribed. And yet I stuck around.

 

12 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

He keeps doing this “down to the exact second” thing and I seriously believe he wants us to be impressed.

Yeah I have no idea why he loves that or where he picked it up from.

 

12 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

A mountain of machinery rises from the ground when Lupe’s group (still with those two young girls from that story from long ago) comes across it and they have to run away.

I'm...honestly a little shocked Penders included them at all. Also Sonic was in space for a whole year. They haven't found their homeland yet?

 

12 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

Sonic shows up late to the bunker in Knothole where a debriefing is happening. Sally is pissy at him for being late and Sonic, rather sadly, doesn’t know if it’s because she’s mad at HIM or his double. Both are possible. I can understand him not bothering to tell her because literally what would that change at this point?

I can kinda understand why he wouldn't tell Sally since things are still bitter between them but why didn't he tell the other girls? Like I know he eventually does Off-Panel but Penders never does a scene where Sonic's like "Yeah that guy you were playing Tonsil Hockey with? That was Evil Sonic not me. ...Wait how did you guys not tell us apart!? I'm not that much of a jackass."

 

12 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

Anyway, Sonic, Amy, Bunnie, Fiona, and Mina

Mina? Why are you here? You're a popstar. This is a great example of just how little Ken Penders cares about anything he didn't create.

 

12 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

There’s this slimy moment where Rotor asks if Amy has anything to report and Amy says that she has no clue what they’re even looking for, and adds in a thought bubble that she also has no idea why Sonic hasn’t asked her out since they KISSED.

They KISSED huh? 

A caption underneath her says “See Sonic #150, Amy Rose is still unaware who she really kissed” like that’s a neat bit of trivia or something. Yeah, isn’t it cute that the aged up little girl is unaware that she was tricked into kissing someone without proper consent? What rich lore this comic has.

Hell even if we take Amy's magic age up out of the equation it's still really fucking skeevy. What the absolute fuck is wrong with you Penders? Also again I ask Sonic knows all the girls are coming on to him and Bunnie is acting like she wants to ride a blue wave and he knows Evil Sonic must have done something so why didn't he make a public announcement about this or something?

 

12 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

 

So recently I asked Jon on Twitter if the process was like he was drawing page by page and when he got here said "Fuck this noise" and dropped it. He said it was more complicated than that and that he'll almost certainly never talk about what actually caused him to leave this issue half way through. I do respect that but I'll be honest there's a part of me that kinda wishes he'd spill the beans. What happened on this one issue that makes him despise his name being attached to it? I'm nosey like that.

 

12 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

Meanwhile, Sonic finds Bunnie. The ghostly green visage of Eggman’s logo that I guess is supposed to personify the nanites

I...think it's A.D.A.M. but I'm not entirely sure. Also I find the fact Al Bigley continues to write "Egg?" on it's forehead when Jon very clearly did that as a joke absolutely hilarious. Also the fact he seems to think the dramatic shading on Bunnie's face meant her fucking eyeball was removed!

 

12 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

 

Ok. According to Penders this was Al misinterpreting the script. Bunnie was supposed to kiss Sonic but Sonic was supposed to look surprised by it. Instead Bigley drew it as both of them being into it. It doesn't help the fact that she's kissing him because she still believes they slept together and doesn't realize the awful awful shit that happened to her that Penders clearly didn't think all the way through. God I hate this fucking issue.

 

12 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

Number 5: The story reason for why this is awful is the fact that these two are kissing at all, of course. I, at least, know the reason why Bunnie is doing it. It’s a terrible reason and it’s hard as billiard balls to swallow but I know why she’s doing it. Why the fuck, in the name of Captain Planet’s shiny red underoos, is SONIC kissing Bunnie?

The instant I saw this panel, I was like, “Ah dammit. Sonic’s still macking on Bunnie… ... wait a minute. That was Evil Sonic that did that… … wait… WHY is Sonic macking on Bunnie?????”

SERIOUSLY?! WHY?! WHAT’S GOING ON?!

This makes no sense. Did I miss an issue? Did I skip something? I must have right? I fucked up somewhere during this retrospective. Ken didn’t just have Sonic willingly suck face with Bunnie Raboot for no reason right?

The worst part for me is while Sonouge may be my number one I do ship other pairings. Sonic and Bunnie is another one of those. I don't have a particular reason I just think they're cute together. So there goes the second finger on the Monkey's Paw.

 

12 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

If he DOES know, however, than that means Sonic is aware that Bunnie was tricked into having sex with his evil self and instead of telling her, he’s decided to take advantage of the rape that happened by making her believe it was actually him she had sex with so that he could hook up with her.

Considering that Ken Penders has said that he doesn't think Sonic is all that different from his evil counterpart that's a very real possibility. Every day I wish Mike Kanterovich had gone with another option as co-writer. I think Penders said on a Podcast once that Mike considered Marvel legend Tom Defalco but thought he was to big a name to be slumming it on Sonic The Hedgehog but boy so I wish he had.

 

12 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

Also, Snively’s just randomly a part of the gang… it’s an amusing end I guess.

I don't necessarily hate the idea but making Snivley a part of the team could have ben set up way better than this.

 

12 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

but that won’t come to be seeing as how he’ll leave the book and never return (save for a lettering credit down the road I think)

I think it was Lettering and Inking. Apparently he was offered to stay on in an artistic capacity but that's all he ever did. Probably for the best he'd have tried to weasel his way back into writing somehow.

 

12 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

So… uh… first thing’s first.

DID RON LIM JUST GET A MILLION TIMES BETTER OR SOMETHING? THIS LOOKS FANTASTIC!

Eh...I guess it looks ok in places but IDK a lot of it's still pretty bad IMHO. I'm just not a big fan of his style in general.

 

12 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

It’s a training exercise to avoid the inappropriate nature of what happened in 150-151. 

I’m not kidding. It literally says that in the yellow caption.

“Check out Sonic #150-151 for all the inappropriate-ness” is such a divine statement for the book to give that it feels planned.

I'd bet Mike Pelleritto actually added that bit because he was getting sick of Penders BS at this point. I also love how since this was obviously a story written to be slotted in just about anywhere Sally is being super vague about the "Recent mission". Like no details are given just "After that recent mission I want to reinforce teamwork."

 

12 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

Then, the first real bout of what you could call character development happens for Fiona, sixteen billion issues after she randomly became a character again.

It’s not much. She just has a small chat with Sonic about how selfish he is and how despite being mad at him for abandoning her when he and the SegaSonic crew left her captured so long ago, she knew that after his big sacrifice in #125 that it couldn’t have been on purpose… BUT he’s still a dick sometimes.

"Yeah I totally forgive you for that time I was stranded in a cell for weeks if not months if not a year or two. I totally am not considering stabbing you in the back and running off with your evil counterpart. Why would you even think that!?" Also I love how despite her talking about being left behind when she was a kid a foot note adds that Evil Sonic made out with her off panel. Jesus Christ how horny was he?

 

12 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

His problem is that he doesn’t like you. That’s it. Also, he doesn’t have to. Not sure if I find this to be an actual conflict of any kind myself.

I mean for me the fact he hates Sonic so much for Mia having been attracted to him that he'd rather she be left unprotected than have Sonic as her bodyguard is something that makes me not like Ash all that much. It makes him come off as petty and kinda toxic. Like there's nothing in the text that says this is a bad relationship he just falls into the "Jealous controlling boyfriend" archetype  and I'm not sure that was the intention. It also doesn't help that I really just like Sonic as a character (I know a lot of people don't but I do) and seeing this guy be a dick to him for no good reason kinda paints my view of him.

 

12 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

We see Mina perform on stage. Because this is a comic and I can’t hear any music, whenever stuff like this happens I can only read the lyrics and imagine that she’s just screaming a badly written poem at the crowd. There may only be a few murmurs of someone plucking on a guitar string in the background but that’s usually it. As such, the song sounds really awful in my head.

Personally I read it in kinda a slow poppy tone akin to like "Quit Playing Games With My Heart" and I read Mina in Emma Lahana the actress who played Kira on Power Rangers Dino Thunder mostly because I'm a dork with 2 major interests. XD

 

12 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

I like that Sonic is usually portrayed as a free agent, doing his own thing. In the context of something like this, however, where he’s a soldier working for this kingdom he and the rest of the Freedom Fighters no longer come off as rebels. They just feel like cops.

Yeah as much as I do enjoy the comics it's stuff like this why I prefer the post-reboot material. You can argue Sonic still has heavy connection to the Kingdom of Acorn there but it felt that while he's still referred to as a Freedom Fighter it's more like he's a part-timer like he's got his freedom to do whatever he wants like in the games but the FF are just more of his friends that he'll help out when the adventure crosses their path. 

 

12 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

The other weird thing, aside from how easy it was to break Nack, is the reasoning Eggman did this whole thing in the first place.

I honestly kinda love this. It feels so...Eggmanish. He hated Mina's music so much, but got the song stuck in his head, that he put a hit out on her. It's that wonderful Eggman pettiness that is missing in Penders stories because he hates him so much.

 

12 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

Eggman also hated music in Sonic Underground. Perfectly understandable. The songs in that show were unbearable. Except the opening. The opening is fucking awesome. 

That was a characteristic of his in a lot of media in the 90's. In the early comics no music was one of his rules in AOSTH there was an episode where he tried to ban all music because a song about Sonic got popular. I think it was just an easy way to sell a dictator to kids honestly.

 

12 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

Snaggle, Sasha, and Rory are three children sick in the same bed

We all remember them right? The three orphans regularly seen in Rosie's care? Yeah we all remember them and don't instantly forget about them the moment they vanish at all. XD

 

12 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

Right off the bat, the story she tells uses people she knows in real life. If I were a kid, I’d find that strange. Being told fanfiction about people I know in real life sounds awkward as hell.

Just be glad it's not Tina Belcher's Erotic FriendFic.

 

12 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

 

Hi Rouge! Bye Rouge!

 

12 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

So harsh. Why does Rosie hate Antoine?

I mean...considering the current status quo who wouldn't?

 

12 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

 

Is this Romy Chacon taking a shot at people being critical of their stories? Personally I chose to believe it is.

 

12 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

 

Sonic is very accepting of Bocoe's nonconformity to gender norms.

 

12 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

I mean, he’s got a point. Like, what the fuck does fun-sized even mean? Fun for who? The dentist. Get that shit out of here.

This guy gets it!

 

12 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

Then Bokkun shows them what fun-sized should mean and has a pair of robots literally rip the ceiling away.

The Rock-Em Sock-Em Robots are great but I also love Eggman literally can't help himself. He can't stand for seeing Bokkun do evil wrong. It's so great.

 

12 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

The writing in this issue in particular has been stellar.

This is all so much fun. I don’t even know why this one in particular is getting to me so well. I just love it when the absurd is treated with such intense vigor and seriousness by the characters participating in the madness. It's the kind of stuff that would make me bounce around my room in excitement as a kid. Everything is just crazy and everyone's acting insane but they're taking it so seriously as well. It's my kind of fun.

I know one person who didn't like El Gran Gordo. It was some dingus who uploaded all the comics to YouTube back in the day (Yeah you can probably guess his channel is gone) he tried to do reviews and came to the asinine conclusion that Ian made this story really silly to mock the X comics. I often wonder what it's like to literally never once experience joy. It must be awful.

 

12 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

 

"You knocked his block off!" "Come with me pal."

 

12 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

I love that the President calls this a heel turn. The shocked look on all the faces of the children was nice as well.

"MAH GOD KING! Gordo was Eggman the whole time!" "This is a dark day for the sport of kings Jim."

 

12 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

Sonic and Eggman have a handshake, delighted that the truce is off, and then Eggman and his cronies escape in the giant green head of one of the Rock-em Sock-em Robots

I love that implies they're Eggman's creations. Eggman doesn't give a shit about copyright infringement.

 

10 hours ago, Sonictrainer said:

One of the people in the audience bumped into him while dancing.

 

4 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

Goddammit. That shit is so hard to see. I wish the impact was stronger. Well, at least its an explanation.

I...never noticed that so hey we both learned something here. I just thought Nack was a shitty shot.

 

[Dr. Detective]

7 hours ago, SBR2 said:

I mean for me the fact he hates Sonic so much for Mia having been attracted to him that he'd rather she be left unprotected than have Sonic as her bodyguard is something that makes me not like Ash all that much. It makes him come off as petty and kinda toxic.

Wait, what? When did he say that? He said "What can he do that our regular bodyguards can't?" implying that he was very much for keeping her protected. Then when Sonic said he could keep her breathing and the regular bodyguards couldn't (which is a bit of a diss but probably accurate) he just said "Meh" and walked off. Where'd you get that he'd rather her be unprotected?

I'm not saying it isn't petty. It is but... I don't really get what the comic is going for here seeing as how this doesn't feel like that important of a conflict. He doesn't like Sonic but he's not currently doing anything to stop him from protecting Mina or anything so who gives a shit?

[SBR2]

2 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

Wait, what? When did he say that? He said "What can he do that our regular bodyguards can't?" implying that he was very much for keeping her protected. Then when Sonic said he could keep her breathing and the regular bodyguards couldn't (which is a bit of a diss but probably accurate) he just said "Meh" and walked off. Where'd you get that he'd rather her be unprotected?

I'm not saying it isn't petty. It is but... I don't really get what the comic is going for here seeing as how this doesn't feel like that important of a conflict. He doesn't like Sonic but he's not currently doing anything to stop him from protecting Mina or anything so who gives a shit?

Fair enough maybe I'm reading too much into it but it just comes off like he just sort of begrudgingly stormed off without really agreeing to it. 

I'll also admit that I have only read this part the most I never got the second one and only read it like once so I can't remember if he has any moments where he's really bad or not. Maybe I'm just reading too much into it. 

[Sonictrainer]

15 hours ago, Dr. Detective Mike said:

Goddammit. That shit is so hard to see. I wish the impact was stronger. Well, at least its an explanation.

Yeah, it's not drawn very well in that panel.

Also, when's the last time someone's elbow bumped into someone else and made a WHUN sound?