Sonic the Hedgehog #218 [December 2010] Yardley!/Austin/Herms cover: generic Sonic, busting his move in a desert setting rather than the Green Hill Zone as befits this story arc. "Thicker Than Water: Part 2" Story: Ian Flynn; Art: Ben Bates; Ink: Terry Austin; Color: Matt Herms; Lettering : John E. Workman; Editor: Paul Kaminski; Editor-in-Chief: Victor Gorelisk; President: Mike Pellerito; Sega Licensing reps: Cindy Chau and Jerry Chu. Back to the fight from last time: Sonic and Bunnie are mixing it up at an oil refinery contested by the Sand Blast Citizens and their rather disreputable Freedom Fighter franchise led by Jack Rabbit, and the local Legion whose leader, Baron Beauregard Rabbot, is taking a certain amount of pride in Bunnie's skills since she IS his niece. But battling gives way to banter as Sonic and Bunnie compare notes for their own sakes as well as for those just joining us. Sonic is all for trashing the refinery and running away but Bunnie fears for her Uncle Beau's well-being if that happens. Only once Bunnie informs Sonic that she and the D.E.L. Grand Master are related do they get the picture. They both admit that they're in a losing situation if their interests coincide with either the D.E.L. or the Sand Blasters and that it would be so much easier if they could just trash the refinery on their own like in the old days... And the light bulb comes on over both their furry heads, saving this story from going down the road to becoming an Idiot Plot. We then get a page of the two trashing the place in style, followed by one page each of the Sand Blasters and the Legionnaires realizing what's going on. Apparently the broad grins on the faces of Bunnie and Sonic are a clear violation of one of the major rules of professional wrestling: Make It Look Good. Their destructive spree then runs up against the other parties and they have to kick some Legion and Blaster butt. Before Avery can take out Bunnie and Sonic with a bazooka, the Baron intervenes and introduces his cane to Avery's noggin. He then goes paw-to-paw with Jack Rabbit, interrupting himself to give Bunnie a good talking-to about her trashing the refinery. Bunnie snatches up Jack's sidearm and, in a move I saw dozens of times growing up watching George Reeves in the old Superman TV series, scrunches up his pistol as if it were Play-Doh (tm). I love it when that happens. Not only does she then inform Uncle Beau that she and Sonic are playing their own game and not anybody else's, she supplies Beau with a Blame That Cursed Hedgehog card so Eggman won't come down on him too hard. Not that she thinks siding with Eggman was the smartest thing the former Robians could have done. Beau apparently still feels the familial tug because rather than letting his Legion minions capture Bunnie he orders them to break it off. With a farewell somewhat less heartfelt than their recent reunion, the two part company. It's then left to Sonic to demonstrate that one of the things that make someone a friend isn't just knowing what to say, it's knowing what not to say. And as the two walk off into the sunset... We cut back to Castle Acorn where the sun is shining and the Flickies are flicking and King Max still isn't in very good shape. And his sending out for an order of Geoffrey doesn't bode well, either. HEAD: Major kudos to Ian for taking this story down the right path. Once Sonic and Bunnie are able to take in the big picture, the resolution of their dilemma becomes clear to them, even though it may not serve the interests of either the Sand Blasters or Uncle Beau's Legionnaires. This gives the Action and More Action an actual point and prevents either hero from selling out. As for the two anti-heroes, they end up frustrated given that the refinery has been reduced to a smoking ruin. Beau apparently has been taking rave-out lessons because he puts on quite a show while chewing Bunnie out; I haven't seen that kind of rabbit ferocity since the duel between Bigwig and General Woundwort in "Watership Down." Props to Bunnie for not backing down in the face of a long-lost relative. More about that aspect of things in the Heart section. I can't remember the last time a Sonic story introduced this level of moral ambiguity. Ian sets up a situation where helping either the Legion or the Sand Blasters simply won't end well. The former, of course, are allied with Eggman while the latter is probably the biggest bunch of loose canons ever to call themselves "Freedom Fighters." There are aspects of the Downundas and Forty Fathoms that make them more comic relief than anything else, but the Sand Blasters actually radiate an aura of menace, and Ian isn't afraid to play with that to good effect. The answer, of course, is for Sonic and Bunnie to ignore the appeals of either group and go rogue in spectacular fashion. Speaking of which, before the two of them start play- fighting for the benefit of the audience, there's something exhilarating about Sonic and Bunnie's moves, whether the choreographer of their fights is Ian or Ben, I don't know. But Sonic fooling around with Bunnie's hat on page [4] was a nice bit of whimsy we don't get to see too often in this comic. The two previous arcs became by-the-numbers exercises in variations on the same plot; this story spectacularly broke the mold. Head Score: 10. EYE: Ben Bates delivers another bravura performance. While the bulk of the artwork is in the action vein, Ben gets to do some more subdued pieces, and he completely won me over with the symmetry of page [15] where Beau and Bunnie both leave and they take their hats with them. Eye Score: 10. HEART: There are three occasions in manga where an artist can really have a character turn on the water works: reunions, reconciliations, and partings. There was a far-from-tearful reunion in "Thicker Than Water: Part 1" where Bunnie and Beau were reunited with Bunnie's face kept upstage where her tear- filled eyes went completely unnoticed. As Bunnie and Beau part here, the atmosphere has been poisoned by the mutual realization that they may be family but they can never be close under the present circumstances. So Bunnie's reaction is held until page [16] and is way more subdued than would be expected. That it works at all is due to the symmetry of the solution to the plot as much as anything else. Unlike the antagonists from the two previous story arcs (Drago, Razorklaw, and Akhlut), Beauregard gets to show a depth of character unusual not just for a Legion Grand Master but for a character in this comic in general. Of course, he has his orders and his troops, but he's also been reunited with his niece for good or ill: he's happy that Bunnie's gotten hitched but doesn't care for her taste in mates. Still, despite the fact that she's married to Antoine, despite the fact that she's a Freedom Fighter, despite the fact that she and Sonic have frustrated his objective, he's also not going to let any of the Sand Blasters open up a space between her ears with some heavy ordnance. Granted that a pretty sizable gulf has opened up between them, I like to think that just as Beau ordered his Legion minions not to make a fight of it at the end, he's going to be just as much in the middle should his path cross Bunnie's again (and given that one of his troops is Mighty's sister Matilda that's definitely going to happen at some point). His warning to Bunnie that she can't play both sides forever applies just as much to himself Speaking of Matilda, we know next to nothing about her and yet she's an intriguing presence here because Ben's only given her one expression. Jack could be maliciously gleeful, Beau could rant with the best of them, but Matilda's flat affect throughout this story has me curious. It's just out of place enough in a story where practically everybody else gets a chance to pump up the emotional volume at some point. Makes me wonder what her back story is. But that's the point, isn't it? Heart Score: 10. "Hindsight" Story: Ian Flynn; Art: Jamal Peppers; Ink: Tery Austin; Color: Matt Herms; Lettering: John E. Workman It's not a good day for Snively, who's ushered into his Uncle's presence at gunpoint to explain his repeated calls to the Dragon Kingdom. Snively starts tap-dancing like crazy, claiming that he's back-stopping Robotnik's loss of influence now that the Irons have lost control. In evidence, Uncle Eggman plays back a recent conversation between Snively and Conquering Storm of the Raiju Lynx clan. After the routine business of shipping Legionizing hardware to the Raiju is dealt with, the Sniveler makes the mistake of asking about Regina. Connie, with a marvelous "Here we go again" expression, tells Snively (and us) that she's still locked away in a low-tech fortress where she can't use her technomagic on anything. Once the tape ends, Eggman browbeats Snively into saying that it's over between him and Regina. Yeah, like THAT'S going to work! HEAD: This is basically an update on the Iron Dominion arc that ended earlier this year. The main point, of course, is that Robotnik gets to put the smackdown on Snively, who ONCE AGAIN is plotting to take it out on the Fat Man by story's end. This was foreshadowed in S212's "The Roads We Take," but here Eggman zeroes in specifically on Snively's got-no-shot relationship with Regina. More about that below. At some point, this story will be elaborated upon and we will see her escape from prison, possibly with Snively's covert assistance. Since she's basically being held in what must look like a Flintstones-type pile of rocks, it's hard to see how Ian will come up with the kind of spectacular jailbreak perpetrated by Tai Lung in "Kung Fu Panda." Unless Snively smuggles an iPhone in to her. In which case she faces the danger of being so preoccupied playing "Angry Birds" that she forgets about escaping. Head Score: 7. EYE: Jamal Peppers is back for this one, and he appears to be turning into a Snively specialist, wringing a number of facial expressions out of a character who usually is given a limited range. For a story that takes place entirely in one room (with a lot of video screens), he keeps it visually interesting and that's no small accomplishment. Eye Score: 9. HEART: Snively never did get it. In the course of the Iron Dominion arc, he seemed to actually believe that there could have been something between himself and the Iron Queen. This despite some rather obvious clues from Regina herself that she wasn't about to return Snively's attentions. This was especially on display in S206's "On the Run: Part Two: Troubles by the Dozen" where Snively literally eats the Queen's dust. R. F., of course, has cynically used Snively to establish herself and the Bull King in Robotnik's old domain, so it's not like she'd think there was anything between the two of them. From the look of it in this latest installment, Snively is STILL carrying the torch for Regina, and nothing says "I love you" quite like engineering a jailbreak. So, yeah, we can expect that to happen at some point. It's odd that Eggman took the easy way out by simply ordering Snively to break off his interest in R. F. It's not like he couldn't have figured it out if he'd watched the tapes a little more critically and asked a couple of questions. So we miss the spectacle of Robotnik rubbing his nephew's needle-nose in the fact that she used him and doesn't feel about him the way he does about her. Maybe that kind of reality check is a bit much for this comic, though after Mina took one for Sonic's sake in "Hearts Held Hostage: Part 2" (S123) I don't see why it should have been out of bounds. It's some pretty strong emotional medicine here, but Ian chooses to micro-dose it for whatever reason. It's about what one can expect for a 5-pager, though. Heart Score: 7. Sonic Spin: Paul Kaminski gives a useful overview of the comic writing and production process. "Comics are a TEAM effort," he stresses, though it might have been more enlightening to mention just WHERE he, Ian Flynn, Ben Bates, John Workman, Matt Herms and Terry Austin are based. Hint: they're not all in the same building. Heck, they all may not be in the same Time Zone! Fan Art: Portrait of Nicole by Kayla, Sonic and Scourge by Shane, and Sonic and Sally by Kaitlyn. Fan comic: Celena gives us Miles Prower meeting Vulpes vulpes. Off Panel: Rabbit role call and a really obvious joke. Sonic-Grams: Rachel brags about her Sonic obsession, and Amanda is informed that Mighty and Ray will be back, though whether they'll link up with Matilda is still an open question; she's NOT told about the Babylon Rogues's appearance in the Treasure Team Tango arc but is told that Antoine is a "French coyote" (you gotta admire editors who stick with the party line even when it makes no sense); we learn that she digs the Wolf Pack, she's reminded of who Jun Kun is, and we get a late dispatch from the 2010 New York Comic Con. And a shout out to "The Illustrious Q."