Sonic Super Special #10 [Jul 1999] Before plunging into the special, I decided that I'd better do some background research first. After all, as an oft-proclaimed Sonic fanboy, I had no information about Sabrina to work with. So I consulted the "All About Sabrina" portion of the Archie Comics Web site (www.archiecomics.com). Thinking that I should bone up on witchcraft as well, I downloaded the "Witchcraft and Wicca" essay at www.religioustolerance.org and consulted the article "Witchcraft" in the Schaff-Herzog Encyclopedia of Religious Knowledge. Finally, I watched an episode of the "Sabrina" TV show and read Sabrina #28. It was a mixed bag of experiences. According to Schaff-Herzog the ancient conception of a witch was "someone who by supernatural means injures the possession of her neighbors or of the inhabitants of a district, directing her destructive activity against...corn and wine and cattle... Witchcraft is in general the accomplishment of some purpose through the help of supernatural means...." Whether one actually believes in spirits or not, the article is still critical of witchcraft because of the "essential impiety and idolatry which witchcraft involves." This continues to reflect the establishment view of witchcraft which, in the minds of many Christian fundamentalists, is simply considered to be a form of Satanism. Wiccans, or practitioners of the modern Neopagan rites which have come together under the umbrella name "Wicca," claim that theirs is a benign system which does not seek to harm anyone. In fact, they believe in a variation on the Hindu principle of karma which holds that they will end up receiving threefold upon themselves any harm done to others. Their belief system generally acknowledges the existence of a creative force in the universe expressed in both male (god) and female (goddess) aspects. Theirs is an animist religion, believing that spirit exists in everything: stars, planets, man, animals, plants, rocks, etc. The Wiccan belief in both the god and the goddess finds expression in a belief in gender equality, though men are usually in the minority in most local groups of Wiccans, or covens. Wiccan rites are performed out of doors where possible (though social pressures and prejudices have driven many covens indoors -- that plus the practice of conducting Wiccan rites in the nude), and ceremonies may include divination, teaching, and consecration of objects for ceremonial use. What has all this to do with Sonic Special #10? About as much as "Sabrina" has to do with either of the definitions of witchcraft cited above. Sabrina Spellman, according to the Archie Web site, is the offspring of a globe-trotting warlock and an equally peripatetic archaeologist mom. Since her parents aren't part of the scene, she's living in a sort of coven with her witch aunts, Hilda and Zelda, and a black cat named Salem. The latter isn't a "familiar," i.e., a subservient demon who accomplishes the bidding of a witch and which usually (in the popular imagination) assumes the form of a black cat. Rather, he's a former warlock who made the mistake of breaking off his engagement to Enchantra, the villain of this piece. I never found out why she's so ticked off at the Spellman family, but suffice it to say she comes up with a plot to make Sabrina's life miserable about as often as Cosmo Spacely gets it into his balding head to fire George Jetson. But don't expect Sabrina to act like a witch. You won't see her performing rituals using an anatheme, a 9-inch dagger that's standard Wiccan equipment, while naked. If Sabrina bears a resemblance to any witch, it's to Wendy, one of the mainstays of the old Harvey comics. Sabrina, in fact, is little more than a post-pubescent Wendy. Comfortably post-pubescent, in fact. According to Archie, Sabrina didn't acquire her powers until her 16th birthday, thereby equating magic with getting your driver's licence (which I suppose is how some teens look at it). Sabrina is nothing more than your standard brand comic book heroine with a repertoire of powers useful to the plot of the latest story, with no relation to anything resembling witchcraft whatsoever. And yet there are benign, and even poetic, variations that can be woven on the witchcraft theme. Consider the following: a thirteen-year-old girl must spend a year away from home as part of her development as a witch. This was the central idea in a novel by Eiko Kadono which became "Kiki's Delivery Service," one of Hayao Miyazaki's most beloved animated films and the top-grossing Japanese film in the year of its release. The film was beautifully animated and was insightfully written (and, since this IS a review of a Sonic the Hedgehog comic, it should be noted that the American voice for Kiki's mom was provided by Kath Soucie). The episode of the TV series "Sabrina" that I saw, however, would have had to work very VERY hard to rise to the level of stupid. The plot involved pirates who appeared to have wandered in from a Monty Python sketch, and Sabrina trying to get a fake I.D. You'd think that if she was supposed to know something about shape- shifting she would have gotten around that obstacle. And Salem! I swear, the puppet used for Toonces the Driving Cat on "Saturday Night Live" looked more convincing! And you want to know what REALLY depressed me? The writing for that ep was about on a par with the level of writing for the comic. Keep your barf bags handy while we look at Sabrina #28, which more or less sets up the lead story in Sonic Special #10: "Thor Loser" Story: Mike Gallagher; Art: Dan DeCarlo; Ink: Jon D'Agostino; Lettering: Bill Yoshida; Color: Barry Grossman; Editor: Victor Gorlick; Editor-in-Chief: Richard Goldwater. Enchantra, whose hairdo looks like a cross between the Bride of Frankenstein's and Marge Simpson's, is throwing a fit because of Sabrina's account of their previous adventure (which I did NOT read -- I have my limits!). In keeping with the Marcie Rule, wherein an overbearingly strong female character has to be counterbalanced by her being partnered with a bespectacled "female nerd" type (c.f. Peppermint Patty and Marcie in "Peanuts," Helga and Phoebe in "Hey, Arnold!"), Enchantra's secretary Della (with hair in a bun and wearing a gray business suit) does what secretaries all over the world do: hold the office together while the boss has a fit. On full boil, Enchantra orders Della to... When I began reading this, I wondered at what point I'd want to give up on this thing. It's official: Mike Gallagher lost me on Page 3. Enchantra orders Della to summon "the mythical Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse," described by Della as "those awful creatures who destroy all they see," to trash Sabrina and her family. But just as Sabrina bears little or no relationship to witchcraft, so Mike Gallagher is way off the mark here. "The Apocalypse" is the name under which the Book of Revelation appears in Catholic Bibles. And that's where you'll find the account of the Four Horsemen: in Revelation 6:1-8. I won't go into all the details here, nor do I presume to understand every symbol in one of the most enigmatic of Biblical books, but the fact remains that they are Biblical and not mythical. They are, in fact, an enduring symbol in Christian eschatology (i.e., concerning the end of the world). Mike Gallagher makes it sound like Enchantra's ordering a pizza. Della has trouble filling the order because the Shift key on her manual typewriter is broken, and there's been too much wear on the typeface of the small "h." Reminds me of the joke about the Ronald Reagan typewriter, but I won't go there. So, before you can say "Ufda!" the Spellman coven is playing host to Thor the son of Odin from Norse mythology, and three mopes from present-day Norway. Four Norsemen, get it? It's official: Mike Gallagher lost me on Page 3, and I lost my lunch on Page 4. But we persevere. The witches place Thor and the Three Stooges in suspended animation for five minutes while they come up with a plan. That plan, supplied by Zelda, is to ship them all (except Sabrina and Thor) to Florida. I was hard-pressed to think of a rationale for this particular strategy, except that it gives Dan DeCarlo an excuse to draw Hilda and Zelda wearing swimsuits. Sabrina, meanwhile, thinks she can escort Thor around her home town solo without his attracting undue attention. It's a good thing he's fluent in English, but he really doesn't have much else going for him besides the hammer and his Kool-Aid(tm) orange hair. Personally, I prefer the SoCal hip-cool of Val Hallan, the Thor parody from the "Justice Friends" cartoon. But there's no point in investing ANY of these characters with a personality. Enchantra gets back to the office, discovers the clerical error that's at the heart of the alleged plot of this story, and hits the Cosmic Reset button. On the last page of the story, Salem drops the fact that he's traded off his Mighty Thor comics for issues of Sonic The Hedgehog. Remember, all you would- be writers: foreshadowing is our friend. I'll spare you the Fan Art and the one-pager and cut to the chase: "Some Enchantra Evening" Story: Mike Gallagher; Art: Dan DeCarlo and Dave Manak; Ink: Jon D'Agostino; Lettering: Bill Yoshida; Color: Barry Grossman: Editorial: The Usual Suspects. Enchantra pries open her purse with a crowbar and authorizes Della to upgrade the office equipment, based on the snafu in the previous story. After turning the service rep into a slug (in violation of the unwritten rule that says you should NEVER honk off the service guys), we see her watching Hilda and Zelda making themselves scarce for the duration of the plot. Before we can scream at the witch aunts "Take us with you!!" Enchantra gets impatient with the new computer system and interfaces with the thing herself. This move doesn't seem to make her any smarter, however. Instead it somehow allows her to peek into alternate realities. Unfortunately for us, one of those realities is Mobius. Transporting herself to a Mobian desert, she comes upon Sonic and Sally. Fans can recognize that this is an alternate universe because Sonic has initiated a discussion with Sally about their relationship! Amazing what you can accomplish when Sega's looking the other way. Both Sonic and Sally are generally on-model, but I can't say the same for Nicole. My guess is that Jon D'Agostino didn't know that Nicole is a handheld computer; he made her look as chunky and clunky as the 8-track player from a Gremlin! But that's probably fitting because Mike Gallagher appears to have forgotten how to write for Nicole in the process. Anyway, Enchantra hognaps Sonic and enslaves his mind. Ivo Robotnik, have I got a girl for you! Enchantra's upgrade must not have been that much of an improvement, since her first word on page 7 is "If" where it should have been "In." Or maybe Bill Yoshida had decided that the only way to stay sane when lettering this thing was to letter it without reading it. Anyway, Salem gets the runaround from Sonic, whom he zaps in retaliation. Sonic goes into spin, and the only way Salem can save himself is to make himself as insubstantial as this story. Sonic, however, recovers enough to continue his rampage. Once again Salem outsmarts him by spreading around the contents of a bag of kitty litter...and you don't know HOW tempted I am to make an appropriate comment about that! At this point Sally makes her entrance; don't ask me how she followed Enchantra and/or Sonic from one reality to another. She just did, all right? And NOW we come to Special #10...assuming there's anyone left who cares: Sonic Super Special #10 [July 1999] Spaz/Harvo/Ray cover: Sonic, caught between the characters from "Sonic Underground" (about whom more later) and Sabrina in an issue collectively known as "Crossover Chaos." Well, we can't accuse Archie of false advertising. Credits page art: The Antisonic and the gang (with the usual notable no-show) by Jim Valentino, in the style I grew to hate in "Dark Alliance " (K22-24). At first I thought that the Antirotor was popping a zit. Valentino's work gets better, actually. "Some Enchantra Evening" Writer, Artist, Ink, Etc.: The Usual Gang of Idiots, except that Jim Amash inked instead of Jon D'Agostino. As Salem and Nicole bring the reader up to speed using several stretched and squashed panels from Sabrina #28, Sonic is still in attack mode. It must've taken Sonic a while to rev up his motor because it gave Sabrina enough time to change out of her purple nightshirt (on display in two of the exposition panels) and into a black tank top, violet jeans, and sandals. As I've said before, there's a difference between LOOSE continuity and BAD continuity. Guess which one this is. Sabrina then recites a rhyming incantation on Sonic. The Genie in Disney's "Aladdin" figured ten thousand years in a Cave of Wonders would be sufficient to chill out Jafar, but Sabrina literally has Sonic chill out by transporting him to the top of Mount Everest. While Sabrina, Sally and Salem get their stories straight, Enchantra re-establishes a mind link with Sonic before he turns into a hogsicle. While Sally tracks Sonic using Nicole, Sabrina changes into blue jeans, and matching purple sweatshirt and shoes. No wonder the Sabrina Fan Art looks more like an exercise in paper dollsmanship. Sabrina confronts Sonic before he can trash Westbridge High, and once more the creatives can't seem to figure out what a "figure 8" maneuver by Sonic [first seen in Sonic #25, if I remember correctly] is supposed to look like or accomplish. Sonic then tries to subdue Sabrina using a maneuver called the PhotoShop Blur. Sabrina counters this with a spell that involves the kind of poetry you'd expect to find on the ear tag of a Beanie Baby(tm). Basically, Sonic runs face first into a tree, and he and the exhausted Sabrina both pass out. Sabrina probably had low blood sugar from all those changes of clothes before breakfast. Enchantra orders Della to re-establish her link with Sonic, but instead Sally and Salem show up. Sally threatens to send some ineffective (if not deceased) Mobian villains into Enchantra's realm, having discovered its location. Mike Gallagher must have felt a real need to pad out the story, because he has Enchantra name TEN of the series villains in her declamation. Sonic and Sabrina then show up, looking none the worse for their experiences. Thanks to some fast talking by Sally and what Salem admits is "a lot of bull" from Sabrina, Enchantra is pacified and puts everything back where she found it. And THAT's how you fill 22 pages in two issues. HEAD: Will Rogers is supposed to have said of the Congress: "Every time they make a joke, it's a law. And every time they make a law, it's a joke." I imagine something like that happened here as well. Archie Comics put together a Halloween giveaway, "A Festival of Fantasy," which featured characters from the Archie, Sabrina and Sonic continuities. I suppose after Ken Penders, Dan DeCarlo and Pat Spaziante were finished with it they expected never to see it again. Wrong! The only thing I can figure is that someone in management saw the finished product and took it seriously enough to believe that a plausible crossover story could be worked out. Excuse me, I mis-spoke: Since when has management ever worried about plausibility? Mike Gallagher, who had given us two strong stories in the last Sonic Kids Special ("My Secret Guardian" and "Eve of Destruction"), appears to have checked his gray matter at the door when he wrote this one. I don't know how this will play with Sabrina fans, but this Sonic fanboy felt like he'd wasted his time. Head Score: 1. EYE: I assume Dan DeCarlo (who's scheduled to be feted in San Diego this year for his lifetime body of work) and Dave Manak got along during this epic, splitting the penciling chores. Still, Nicole is the only one who needs to complain about being seriously off-model. Eye Score: 4. HEART: You're kidding, right? All along, it's been maintained that part of the reason Archie has kept Sonic on a short emotional leash has been because a heartfelt Sonic wouldn't play well with the core audience of pre- adolescent boys. Yet I seriously doubt that they are the core audience for "Sabrina." So I'm left with the question: of all the other crossover possibilities, why go with a pretend witch/teenage clothes horse? As far as I'm concerned, Archie no longer has any justification to make sure Sonic keeps a straight face. This story is proof positive that Archie doesn't care WHO reads their product so long as SOMEBODY does and is willing to fork over a couple dollars for the privilege. As was the case with "Retro Activity" (S71), this crossover didn't happen because there was a story that needed telling; rather, there was a product that needed selling. Finally, this story failed in the purpose of any crossover: to generate interest in one story continuity by associating it (however briefly) with another. Your milage may vary, but just as "Parallel Paradigm" did nothing to interest me in any of the Image super "heroes," so I wasn't left with a feeling that I wanted to become a fan of Sabrina, Hilda, Zelda, Salem and the rest. But "Some Enchantra Evening" did NOT make me want to stop reading Sonic comics. It made me want to stop reading comics altogether! I swear upon my issue of Sonic #18, I have NEVER worked so hard at a review only to be left feeling that I'd simply wasted the time I spent reading the story. I now fully understand Kurt Vonnegut's description of a critic as "a person who has put on full body armor to attack a hot fudge sundae." This story was so lightweight it just wasn't worth the effort. I don't know why I even bothered. Heart Score: 1. "Zone Wars: A Tale of Two Hedgehogs" Story: Karl Bollers; Art: Jim Valentino; Ink: Harvey Mercadoocasio; Lettering: Vickie Williams; Coloring: Joshua D. Ray and Aimee R. Ray; Editorial: G-Force After an establishing shot of the Antisonic and his horde failing in their attempt to trash the building that houses "Doctor Kintobor's Clinic," they head back to headquarters to regroup. They may also be wondering when the name change went down; in every previous outing involving the Antisonic, he's been "Robotnik" and not "Kintobor." He was also seriously endomorphic, unlike the sallow beanpole depicted by Valentino. And just when you think the continuity problems couldn't get any worse, Karl Bollers plunges to new depths by repeating the lie that the Antiantoine is a "coyote." Yeah, right, a coyote with a French accent. The last time Justin made this goof in the context of answering fan mail, devotees of Coyote (as depicted in Native American lore) took JG to task more eloquently than I ever could. So I'll only suggest that Justin reread his old "fan mail" on the subject. But I will go into beg mode: PLEASE, what do I have to do to get a crack at editing the character bible for the comic and what will it take for Archie to have their creatives start using it? We're three pages into the story and Robotnik is misnamed and off- model while the Antiantoine's species is misidentified! At least Jim Valentino is keeping the Antisonic on-model; the last time he showed up, in "Black and Blue and Red All Over" (S44), Manny Galan drew him wearing sneakers instead of engineer boots. Speaking of boots, the Antisally's boots were made for walking, and that's just what she does as she and the rest of the horde walk out (or in the case of the Antitails, fly out) on Sonic. So he's all by himself when Robotnik (or whatever is passing for Robotnik in the Sonic continuity these days) makes him an offer he'd better not refuse if he wants to keep the plot going. Back on Mobius (the one and only, IMHO), the Knothole gang is taking some R&R when they're busted. No, it's neither the Picnic Police nor the Continuity Cops, it's Zonic the zonehog, come to recruit Sonic. We then get a two-page spread of Zonic's office, filled with more variations on Sonic that I wanted to see. Most of the images look like throwaway ideas, grist for a hundred bad crossover plotlines, though if you people at Archie ever get it into your heads to do a Sonic/Archie Andrews crossover, let me know. I've got a few ideas. Zonic then tells Sonic that the Robo-Robotnik Battle Borg of "Night of a Thousand Sonics" (S19) is being put back together by the Antisonic. Sonic points out a plot discrepancy introduced by Zonic and Dan Slott in "Zone Wars: Prelude" (Special #8) and is told "anything's possible." Especially when it comes to getting a writer out of a tough jam. Cut to the new continuity and a bit of exposition. Even though DiC stopped production on "Sonic the Hedgehog" after two seasons with ABC, they cranked up production again on a new series, "Sonic Underground," but with an almost completely different plotline. Hence the two pages of exposition as we're introduced to Sonic and his two sibs, Sonia and Manic. But the prosaic truth of the matter is, Bollers is trying manfully to shoehorn the "Sonic Underground" continuity into a plotline that got started before the series was even in production. Chalk up another one for loose continuity. The two-page expo pretty well tracks with the new continuity, so I'll spare you. You can get further info on the series on Tyro's Sonic page at http://www.franken.de/users/deco. AFAIK, however, the series has only run in France, the UK and New Zealand. Where it'll be shown in the states, where it's subject to the crapshoot known as the syndication market, is anybody's guess. The Antisonic, however, is not having a good day. Having delivered the Borg parts to a red-eyed Robotnik, he's promptly double-crossed and taken into custody, all the while being watched on page 17 by...ANOTHER Robotnik! Probably as a tease for whatever's going to be sprung on us in Sonic #75. "Back in Robotropolis" (I hope YOU'RE keeping track of which one because I don't care at this point) Sonic and the SU characters work out a plot to get ol' Red Eye out of town so they can destroy the borg. Meanwhile, the Antisonic is busted out of his cell by Sonia and Manic only to be busted by Zonic. And all's right with the worlds. Except that the Antisonic's horde is now under the leadership of the Antigeoffrey. HEAD: As a way of introducing crossover characters that the vast majority of fans have never even heard of, it works as well as can be expected. Still, Bollers threw in one Robotnik too many, to the point where I simply stopped caring and let the rest of the story sort of happen. It's official: Karl Bollers lost me on page 17. Head Score: 6. EYE: Jim Valentino surprised me in this one. His story art wasn't nearly as disagreeable as the frontispiece, and he has a good grasp of the SU characters (based on the screen shots I've seen). I even liked the splash on page 10. So maybe things won't be so bad when he takes over drawing Sonic. Eye Score: 7. HEART: Ironically, it was easier for me to care about the SU characters (having learned their back story) than it was to care about the Antisonic's plot. Maybe it's BECAUSE I learned their back story. With 26 pages at his disposal, Karl Bollers could take a more leisurely pace than Ken Penders could in telling Ray's history in his Mighty back story (K26-28), where he has to make do with 18 pages spread over three issues. But as I said, throwing in one Robotnik too many was more than I could stomach. And once more conspicuous by her absence: the Antibunnie. C'mon, people, am I the only one who's bothered to come up with a plausible explanation of what she's like on the world of the Antisonic? Or is it BECAUSE I wrote a story featuring the character that Karl Bollers has become the third Sonic writer (after Mike Kanterovich and Ken Penders) to duck the issue? I know I'm just hollering into an empty cave here -- the boys in Legal will probably tell everyone at Archie to keep their mouths shut on the question. Still, it'd be nice to know. Heart Score: 4. Off-Panel: Gallagher and Manak get one shot without Dan DeCarlo. More importantly, there's the blurb for the next Special, featuring the distaff side. About time, too! Praise letters for Specials 7 and 8, blurbs for K28 and S75, and pencil art by Ron Lim.