Sonic the Hedgehog #230 (December 2011)

Ben Bates cover: Sonic is preoccupied with giving Super-Sized Silver Sonic and Metal Sonic an overdue beat-down, while Sally prepares to enter the Avatar state. It’s a congested composition, but still impressive. I don’t know what the “Variant Cover Art provided by Sega” is but I assume it was used in the preview media. Unless they’re talking about the Ben Bates alt thumbnails, in which case we’ll get to them in the Sonic Spin department.

“Two Steps Back”

Story: Ian Flyn; Art: Ben Bates; Ink: Terry Austin; Color: Matt Herms; Lettering: John E. Workman; Editor: Paul Kaminski; Editor-in-Chief: Victor Gorelick; Roboticizer Maintenance: Mike Pellerito; Sega Licensing reps: Cindy Chau and Judy Gilbertson

We get a one-page flashback/reverie as Sonic comes up for air after being immersed in the Genesis arc for four issues. He doesn’t stop to analyze what happened, especially to ask why he never ran into Bunnie and Antoine; maybe they were getting in some serious honeymoon time after what happened to them in the Trouble In Paradise arc. He then remembers that Sally’s walking into a death cheat; not if HE has anything to say about it! He makes a dash for the Corridor of Doom, sweeps her off her feet and gets her past the BLAMer after signifying to her.

Eggman, meanwhile, is NOT having a good day; so what else is new? He yells at Snively that the Cosmic Reset Button (I like to think I had something to do with that name) isn’t cosmically resetting. Snively can’t find anything wrong; wrong answer. Eggy then takes a moment to remember whom he’s dealing with, and asks about Stage Two. THAT, the Sniveler says, is good to go.

Sonic and Sally arrive at the deck where the World Roboticizer is located, a little before Eggman joins them. When informed of what it can do by Eggman, Sonic plays the Last Robian card: the last time there was a global derobotization it was for keeps. Eggy then invokes a plot point from the ancient Princess Sally miniseries: when you roboticize something that’s already a bot, it explodes. This assumes, of course, that there’s some kind of explosive material present. That would be the case with GUN bots like Omega and United Federation hardware; as for the nanites that make up New Mobotropolis, the story doesn’t dwell on them and simply assumes the worst-case scenario. Sally counters that he’d be blowing up his Dark Egg Legions as well, not to mention giving the rebuilt Lien-Da the Mother of All Bad Hair Days. Eggman responds with a resounding “So what!”

Sonic then tries to flatten Eggy’s nose but is checked by Metal Sonic. That bucket of bolts he can handle. But then, like some kind of WWE roadshow, Super-Sized Silver Sonic jumps into the ring. And just like one heel getting the attention of the referee so the other heel can kick the crud out of the face, Eggman gets distracted by the absence of Sally. The momentary lapse is all Sonic needs to trash Eggman’s hover-whatever, since he figures Sally’s off somewhere doing something really important.

In fact, she and Nicole are below the floor plates hacking into the Death Egg and scoping out the situation. Credit to the Big Guy, the defenses of his roboticizer are formidable. The only option Nicole has is to “invert the beam to this exact point.” Sally tells her to cover her transistorized tuchus and go for it. Her explanation is classic: since Sonic saved her tail, it must’ve been for this reason. Sonic is fighting on, Eggman is giving the order to fire, and Nicole gives Sally the Great Cosmic Option:

GOOD-BYE MY FRIEND

EXECUTE: Y N

And with visions of Sonic dancing in her head, she selects Y. In a situation like this, there’s no time for Nicole to ask ARE YOU SURE?

And with a couple of VVVMMMs and big ol’ KA-THOOM, Tails observes, getting in touch with his inner Captain Obvious, that “Sonic and Sally must’ve done something.” That’s not the worst line of dialogue for the year, but it’s close.

It’s left to Snively to describe the “something”: power is leaking out all over the Death Egg, the roboticizer is just plain gone, and Eggman got his goggles blown off and his mustache trimmed. As for Sonic, he suffered shredding of the gloves but Metal Sonic got the worst of the encounter. The only consolation for Eggman, and the shock to Sonic’s system, is the appearance of… Metal Sally.

HEAD: Well, there you have it: the death cheat in S225 proved to be just that. Kudos to Ian for the cheat, which is basically a version of Traveling Back In Time, which usually doesn’t work that good. And it only took, what, 4 issues of the comic to set it up. Which, let’s face it, is not that out of place in a comic book.

For that matter, neither is the proposition that a roboticized Mobian is some kind of bomb. It reminds me of the ep from “The Office” where Michael off-handedly suggests that clerical work is as risky as working in the warehouse because you could blow up a computer. Fact: computers (or any other piece of consumer electronics) can only blow up if there’s something explosive inside them. That’s why the Legionnaires with the exploding dreds could do some damage; same thing with any GUN ordnance bots like Omega … no big loss there. The nanites are another matter; why would they even be made of explosive material? Bottom line: the threat of destruction sounds cool at first, but the more it’s analyzed the more just plain improbable it sounds. But since that would bring the story to a screeching halt, the story falls back on one of the oldest conventions in comic book storytelling: ignore the facts and keep moving.

At this point, the story needs a diversion, so we get the old school slugfest between Sonic and his two metallic alter egos, Metal and Silver. This frees up Sally to talk to Nicole and set up the story’s Heart moment and it’s a doozie, but more on that later.

Next question is, what about the loose threads left behind since S225 and the Death Egg set-up? There’s political intrigue within Mobius, Naugus making a play for the throne if not the hearts and minds of Mobians, and I’m still waiting for a straight answer concerning Hershey. I understand that, according to the doctrine of Loose Continuity, not all these issues will be addressed in the impending story arc. If they all somehow find their way into the new story arc, it’d be as dense as a fruitcake and just as nutty.

The main thing, though, is that Sally’s back in circulation, with a very broad hint in the Spin Zone as to when Sally will rejoin the world of the organics. And the Sonic/Sally shippers breathe a sigh of relief. Head Score: 5.

EYE: Great artwork from Ben Bates, taking a page from Ian’s playbook by using page layouts that aren’t simple grids; the curves on page [3] are a very dynamic example, and the lighting when Sally enters “Goodbye” (though it’s probably more like TTFN) is equally impressive. Props to Matt Herms for the coloring job on that. Eye Score: 10.

HEART: Some months ago, in a piece of fan art, Sally asked in a fan drawing why she was the “fall guy.” That designation was in keeping with what happened to her in S47, and also a reference to the fact that Fall From A Great Height as a cause of death has been used more than once in Disney films (c.f. Gaston in “Beauty and the Beast,” and Charles Muntz in “Up”). It also highlights the passive nature of the threats against Sally. In “Endgame,” Sally was rappelling down Robotnik’s HQ when the rope was cut. Just 5 issues ago, she scurried into a hallway and into the path of a BLAMer. Neither death cheat was what you’d call “heroic.” Well, that gets undone in a major way here.

This time, Sally takes one for the team … heck, for the planet. No matter how preposterous the Exploding Robian scenario might be (feel free to blame Ken Penders for it if you like), Sally figures out a way to prevent it from happening even at the cost of her own … well, not “life” exactly. It’s not even a permanent solution since editor Paul Kaminski drops a reference to “the road to 250.”

One of the problems I have with this comic is the timing of special events: every 25 issues, they feel that something major has to happen. This is a regularity that borders on numerology. I don’t mind stuff happening in the comic; I do mind making the plot and story pacing a slave to the release schedule. It feels like the same thing is happening with Sonic Universe: four issues per arc, no exceptions. Sure, it makes it easier to repackage them as collections and market them, but if you only have three issues’ worth of story it’s a disservice to pad it out for no good reason (c.f. the “Inside Job” arc).

So not only will Sally survive in her robo form, there’s every reason to believe she’ll be back to her furry self in 20 issues. I don’t know how, but I can only hope it’ll make sense. Get that right, and the artwork can take care of itself.

And for the time being, there’s no telling whether anything Sally does as a bot is being done of her own free will or not. Hey, if they can play games with the action in this comic, I can play games with the interpretation.

I can only hope that the writers pause to do SOMETHING with the set-up. Ian tried to give Sonic and Sally a romantic interlude in S222 before the storm clouds gathered; he succeeded about as well as could be expected. But I’m not ruling out making the story line a slave to the Action And More Action dictum.

Still, Sally’s strategy to save Mobius from a less-than-credible fate demonstrates why she’s got as big and loyal of a fan base as she does. Honestly, can you picture Amy Rose taking a bullet like that? I’m having a hard time picturing it, myself. Heart Score: 10.

The Sonic Spin: Rhymes with “the fix is in.” Paul Kaminski promises “familiar faces, epic battles, shocking events, and unexpected twists.” Great, as long as they make sense. Speaking of which, check out the thumbnail cover ideas by Ben Bates. The ones that DON’T feature Sally, from what I can tell, don’t have a lot going for them. And not only is the Sally design stronger, she IS the emotional core of the story so her presence makes sense.

“Sonic Generations”

Story: Ian Flynn; Art: Jamal Peppers; Ink: Terry Austin; Color: Matt Herms; Lettering: John E. Workman

Sonic shows up for a surprise birthday party attended only by Sega-approved characters. But no sooner does he start chowing down on the grub than a number of roaring vortices open up in the sky and swallows everybody but Sonic. OK, say it with me: “Well, THIS party sucks!” Sonic awakens in White Space to find a portal leading back to our old friend, the Green Hill Zone; like we didn’t see enough of THAT in the Sonic Genesis arc. Sonic takes the plunge into the dimension as he’s observed by … himself, or at least a shorter, chubbier version. This is Classic Sonic, as opposed to Modern Sonic.

HEAD: This is your standard 5-page flog for the newest Sonic game from Sega, in this case “Sonic Generations.” As with most Archie flogs, it brings next to nothing to the party. In fact this story, which is pretty much a transcription of the initial cutscene for the game (you can look for it on YouTube) manages to tell the same story while leaving out the little bits of personality that would make it interesting. For one thing, you have Ian and Jamal minimizing the presence of Time Eater, the malevolent personality in the maelstrom that crashes the party. And there’s a great little moment in the cutscene where Sonic does NOT get embraced by Amy Rose, as Jamal would have it. Instead, he keeps Amy at arm’s length with a variation on the facepalm: Amy’s face meets Sonic’s palm. You can’t tell me that it wouldn’t have been sweet to include that! Why Archie chose not to incorporate it, even with Sega’s blessing, I can’t say. It’s bad enough that Sega has virtually done the writing for Ian here, but a 5-pager like this still needs all the help it can get. Head Score: 6.

EYE: Again, Sega has already done the heavy lifting, and if anything Jamal has simply transcribed the cutscene and smoothed it out in the process. We’re no longer back in the day when Sega either couldn’t or wouldn’t work with Archie on these game adaptations, a situation I attributed to anal-retentiveness on the part of the game developers. I like to think Sega has learned something about marketing since then. Eye Score: 8.

HEART: Not much of a factor here, as is the case with most 5-page flogs. I think the major exception was Sonic and the Black Knight where you got the sense that Merlina was the Damsel In Distress until you realize she’s actually the villain, sort of. But SatBK caught flak from the fanbase for incorporating adventure game elements that slowed the pace of the gameplay while SonGen is keeping the focus on the need for speed. Heart: n/a

Fan Art: Lucas provides an appropriately high-tech rendering of Eggman; Sam does a 20^th anniversary commemorative; and Eddie provides an appropriately cartoony look back at Sonic vs. Grounder.

Fan funnies: Samantha makes the point that Eggman has a habit of not thinking things through. Also, unlike what happened to Sally in this issue, being Legionized simply provides one with a way to kick Eggy’s butt.

Off-Panel: OK, I’m sure there are SOME Sal/Metal shippers out there who are down with this. Sonic himself isn’t one of them.

Sonic-Grams: Matthew asks why Eggman is fat, is told that a Sonic/Mario crossover is not going to happen (I’m sure there are complicated legal reasons for it that Editorial has no intention of discussing), and that a Super Nicole would be a redundancy. Milton plugs the Knuckles compilations, reveals that the Metal Sally plot point was discussed on a Web blog, and wants to know (belatedly) about Metal Sonic. Rashawn is trying to come up to speed with the comic and wants to know if the X Years Later stories are canon (Editorial gives the non-answer that they’re mere possibilities which happen to be more entertaining than the stories that are allegedly canon IMO), and asks about Amy Rose’s parents (Editorial says they’re working on a back story). THAT I’d like to see!