#36 [July 1996]
     Spaziante cover art -- the castle and carved gates don't
figure into the story, but who cares?  Another masterpiece.
     Heart of Darkness (3 parts)
     Story: Ken Penders; Art: Art Mawhinney
     HOYOTOHO!
     No, Rotor hasn't tuned into Bayreuth to watch the Flight of
the Valkyrie.  What he DOES have is a "live" remote from the
"Zone of Silence."  Isn't that the same thing as "The Void"? 
After about 5 panels of explanation, some of the readers of this
list still seem uncertain on this point.  All I know is, it bears
no resemblance to the Void featured in the TV ep of the same
name.  In any event, the fact that it isn't the Void is offered
up by Rotor as a way of explaining why previous attempts to
travel there and back again were so easy.  But in a more
important complication, there are serious power reading coming
from Robotropolis.  Sonic goes to investigate, and arrives to
find Snively at the controls of some kind of beam generator which
reminds me too much of the climax of "All Good Things...", the
final ep of "Star Trek: The Next Generation" (now that Ken
Penders has revealed himself to have worked on Star Trek comics
I'm keeping my copy of the _Star Trek Encyclopedia_ close at hand
to check for references, though the STE as a reference work
suffers from flaws that range from annoying to unforgivable.  But
I digress...).  Sonic arrives and takes the device out of
commission, and Robotnik congratulates him on endangering all of
Mobius.  Cue the flashback for Sonic's (and our) benefit: Seems
that when Robotnik took over eleven years ago, he wanted to use
the Zone of Silence developed by his "mentor" Kodos as a sort of
interdimensional concentration camp.  Unfortunately, once he sent
King Acorn there he realized that it was unstable and would
absorb Mobius.  Subjecting the thing to a steady stream from a
photon cannon managed to keep it in check, but with the cannon
destroyed by Sonic alternative measures have to be taken. 
Robotnik gives Sonic an "energy inhibitor" which bears a striking
resemblance to a household bug bomb.  He convinces Sonic to
detonate it within the Zone; despite serious reservations, Sonic,
Sally, Tails, and Antoine enter the Zone, which basically looks
like Space, The Final Frontier(tm).  There, they confront the
dark rider flanked by some characters who look like they belong
in a game of Doom.  Sonic dispatches these bit players, but
before the rider/knight/whatever can draw a bead on Sonic, Sally
intervenes.  In the struggle, she knocks off his helmet and
reveals him to be...what the heck, someone of the list has
already spilled the beans...King Acorn!!!  Or a reasonable
facsimile thereof.  Actually, he's not that reasonable, for he
gives Sally a quick jolt with his lance for her troubles.  In
response, Sonic detonates the bug bomb -- don't ask me what the
practical results were because they're never spelled out.  Rotor
manages to drag the Mobians back through the portal before they
overshoot it, and a shaken and subdued Sally is probably thinking
that now she knows how Luke Skywalker must have felt at the
end of "The Empire Strikes Back."  To be continued, somewhere
along the way.
     And to think it was only three issues ago that we were
witnesses to some of the lamest excuses for storytelling ever,
even for the medium of comic books.  The improvement, both in
terms of complexity and emotional impact, has been quantum. 
Major kudos for both artwork and story.
     So, does anyone besides me think that that WASN'T Sally's
father wearing that armor?  Not only did the Zone bear no
resemblance to the Void, but in the two TV eps where Sally and
her father were reunited ["Blast To The Past, Part 1" and "The
Void"] Sally's father didn't fail to recognize her.  That didn't
happen this time, which makes it all just a little too
unconvincing.  I'm also haunted by Robotnik's aside on page 9
about Sonic doing his "dirty work" for him.  It leaves me with
the strong impression that Robotnik knew precisely what effect
the bug bomb would have in the Zone.  So the question remains:
whom did Sonic destroy?  Possible candidates:
     A. the real King Acorn
     B. Kodos as King Acorn
     C. a parallel King Acorn (cf. "Night of a Thousand Sonics")
     D. None of the above
And judging from the effects of the bug bomb in the Zone, I feel
pretty safe in saying that whoever it was was destroyed when it
detonated.  Which has major consequences from Sally's point of
view: can she really feel close to the hedgehog who (she may
believe) assassinated her father?  I don't envy Ken Penders his
job: this story's opened some major pitfalls and trap doors, and
it's his burden to resolve matters plausibly (unlike the
conclusion to "Growing Pains").  Stay tuned; you can bet I will!
     "A Sense of History: Part 3"
     Story: Mike Kanterovich and Ken Penders/Art: Ken Penders
     No wonder Ken P. has been waiting for this review!  Let's
recap the story to date: Dmitri has just used the "chaos siphon"
to trash eleven of the 12 Chaos Emeralds that hold up the
floating island.  He has taken his brother and some of the
leaders of echidna society prisoner.  He has already directed the
resident "mecha-nauts" to enslave the populace, and once the
island is equipped with sails he plans to similarly conquer the
rest of the planet.  In the midst of this raving, however, it
develops that his fortress Mt. Fate has been subverted from
within: the foundation has been eroded by fire ants and the place
starts collapsing.  The imprisoned echidnas escape and Dmitri is
buried beneath the rubble.  The Magistrate gratuitously quotes
from the Book of Proverbs and declares that Dmitri's end was as
much a result of the society's trust in science resulting in
hubris as it was Dmitri's own madness.  This led to a certain
overreaction as the echidnas destroyed their city and appointed a
guardian over the last remaining emerald.  Which, several
generations later, turns out to be Knuckles.
     So what's this all have to do with the plot?  (Remember the
plot?)  Knuckles suddenly starts putting it together: he
remembers the words "Grand Conserve" from issue #31(!) and
realizes that it refers to The Grand Conservatory, an underground
warehouse where artifacts of echidna society were stored.  He
believes that this is where Archimedes (remember him?) is hiding
out and where the missing Chaotix (remember them?) are being
held.  So, as Bill Cosby said in the course of one of his comedy
routines: "I told you that story to tell you this one."  And once
more quoting his father (who was apparently named George
Santayana) he reminds us of the plot and begins his segue to his
miniseries (conveniently advertised on the facing page).
     WHEW!  I know that this process took longer than
anticipated, what with the addition of three 2-pagers over the
course of three months, but Kanterovich & Penders came pretty
darn close to losing the audience there.  In any event, the ad
for the miniseries pretty well telegraphs the plot based on what
went before: Dmitri vs. Knuckles.  BTW, I wouldn't make too much
of the movie poster format.
     Sonic-Grams: Who was it that said "We buy the product so we
can read about Sonic and Tails, not Scott and Paul."  Oh, yeah,
it was me...in my review of #29.  Nice to know the Fredster is
willing to listen; by keeping the Blue Blur front and center in
the "office humor" section [drawn by Spaziante] he actually
managed to come up with something funny!  Senor Mendez limits
himself to less than 2 column inches of self-introduction before
going on to "what you really want to know: mainly Sonic the
Hedgehog!"  [By George, I think he's got it!]  Topics: the launch
of the Knuckles miniseries; a story titled "The Fall of
Robotropolis" by DeCesare and Thomas (after his debut in "To Bot
or Not To Bot" in #34); plus further developments on the King
Acorn plot set up by "Heart of Darkness."  Letters: Kim Wessels
of Des Moines agrees with Tails that it's rough being treated
like a kid.  In answer to a barrage of questions, the person
writing the replies pegs the birthdates of Sonic, Tails, and
Knuckles to the release dates of the Sonic 1, 2 and 3 games
respectively.  However, he punts the question as to whether the
TV series is still on the air -- this reply must have been locked
in months ago, before the USA Network picked up Sonic's option. 
And in a major concession to the comic's popularity, there's a
list of people who sent in letters and fan art that didn't get
published but who still might love seeing their names in print. 
Fred, I like your style!
     Spaziante cover art for #37 shows Sonic holding a
(lifeless?) Sally in his arms.  Is it possible for Spaziante NOT
to do a cool cover that involves Sally?  Looks like the train is
definitely back on the rails!  Double-bag this puppy!