Sonic the Hedgehog #147 [May 2005] Pat Spaziante/J. D. Ray cover: The good news is, this is a balanced and well-designed cover. The bad news is, it reminds me somewhat of an old-style boxing poster ... which given the contents of the story and the "Round 2 of 4" line may well have been the idea. "The Good, the Bad, and the Unknown: Part 2: Ignition" Story: Ken Penders; Art: Stephen Butler; Ink: Jim Amash; Color: Jason Jensen; Lettering: John E. Workman; Editor: Mike Pellerito; managing Editor: Victor Gorelick; Editor-in-Chief: Richard Goldwater. We start with a page of Metal Sonic version whatever rolling across the desert floor, alone except for eight text boxes which could have been dropped off the face of Mobius with no harm done to the narrative. Meanwhile, Tails and Tommy deal with their leftover abandonment issues from the previous installment by watching television. Turns out that what appears to be an episode of "E.R." is actually Bunnie and Rotor patching up Sonic. This leads Tails to exclaim his new catchphrase: "Sizzling SWATbots!!!" (With three exclamation points). Tails will use this phrase once more in the story; you'll excuse me for a moment while I gag. Tails wants to know what happened to Sonic so he starts channel-surfing. Maybe he thinks that the complex is equipped with TiVo(tm) and he and Tommy can rewind the tape when they find what they're looking for. What they sees instead are Shadow and Issac. It suddenly occurs to Tommy to wonder what happened to Fiona. Tails wants to keep channel surfing when he should have simply turned the page instead. See? There she is, demonstrating that when it comes to do- it-yourself projects you should always call in pros to take care of plumbing and electrical work. And I'm having my doubts about Rotor in that department. Based on Fiona's mishap with an electrical circuit, Rotor deduces that "this complex seems to be the product of a paranoid culture designed in such a way as to take offensive action at the slightest perceived threat." Actually, I'd guess that the real reason Rotor came to that conclusion was that Ken needed a quick-and-dirty way of goosing up the back story without busting the continuity. Sonic, meanwhile, decides to do some kart racing ... I mean, "cart" racing. While making a turn, Tails gets on the P.A. and let's Sonic know that he and Tommy are all right, that Fiona is close by, and so are Shadow and Isaac, aka "the Gamma look- alike." Resentful of being left out of the cast of characters, Metal Sonic checks in with Shadow. "He's in direct line of - sight of - Shadow and his pal!" Tails says, becoming so flustered he forgets his English grammar. Get ready to hold up your hand-lettered sign on poster board for the camera, the fight is under way. After a preliminary dose of chin music from Metal Sonic which momentarily gives Shadow a bit of an identity crisis, Metal blurts out a short version of his own biog which leads Shadow to state (somewhat uncharacteristically, I thought) "For a mechanoid, you register a distinctly hostile tone!" That earns Shadow a left to the jaw, but he comes back with the same. "They're going at it like crazed pumas!" Tommy gratuitously observes; good thing he didn't say they were "going at it like crazed voles" because that line carried another meaning entirely when Quark used it on a DS9 ep. Sonic then decides to join in the fun despite warnings from Bunnie and Fiona, neither of whom get the chance to remind him that he's playing hurt. Once again, we see why Sonic is NOT a member of the Brain Trust. Back in the ring, Shadow swing his partner into the nearest wall, but Metal gives him a turbine-powered kick in the gut. Metal moves in for a splash but gets splashed in the face with a rock instead. At which point Sonic shows up and asks "What do you do for the encore?" despite the fact that the story has four more pages to run. Isaac interrogates Sonic who tells him a really lame joke; it's so bad that I believe this is why Isaac tries blasting him. Shadow then tries to dog-pile his counterpart but Sonic gets a perfect 10 on the vault. He then spin-dashes into the three of them but his dialogue ("I was right about you mugs") only gets a 6.5 from the Russian judge. So Shadow, Metal and Isaac chase after Sonic. "And where's Robotnik/Eggman during all this?" I hear you not asking. Watching it all on his Metal Sonic Cam. "Too bad the reception on his cameras is a bit on the fuzzy side" he says as he gets a look at Sonic's fuzzy butt. Ken suddenly remembers that Rotor, Fiona and Bunnie are cooling their heels in another room so without any explanation whatsoever they get zapped with electricity. Tommy then demonstrates his own qualification to be a member of the Brain Trust by telling Tails to press the first button that presents itself; now we know why he's assigned to the clerical pool. Tails flashes on a bit of Zen wisdom: "Rotor always said to never press the red button except as a last resort," so he presses the nearest red button. This causes Sonic, Shadow, Metal Sonic and Isaac to drop through a trap door, while Rotor, Bunnie and Fiona continue to fry and Eggman busts a gut. "Sizzling SWATbots" indeed! HEAD: "Sizzling SWATbots." Ken Penders, you should be ashamed of yourself! This story is simple in its construction: forget character development, focus on the hitting and the kicking and the running and the falling. This is called "action." Unfortunately, Ken has to cut corners to keep the momentum going. The worst example was the gratuitous electrification of Rotor, Bunnie and Fiona. There was no real set-up to their being imperiled; it just fell out of the sky on top of them like an Acme(tm) anvil. You could probably argue that Rotor's line about this complex being put together by a "paranoid culture" would have something to do with it. But that doesn't redeem the writing here. Ken seems to have dropped these bits into the story and expects the reader to justify one gratuitous event with another. But if the creators were THAT paranoid, they would have used motion sensors to trigger the electrical charge thingies so EVERYBODY would have gotten juiced. But apparently that's too logical of a story development. And once again Ken's dialogue machine breaks down. Sonic in particular is cursed with bad balloons: "I was right about you mugs ... I'm really in the soup now!" Tails isn't any better served with his new catch-phrase. I don't know whether Ken suddenly decided to go retro and invent something that should have died with the Sixties, or else he came up with it while Mike Pellerito held a gun to his head. Sonic's jape featuring a play on "dissection" and "intersection" wouldn't be funny even if the awkward delivery had been smoothed out. And then there's Tommy's justification for Tails not knowing what he's doing: "HOW MUCH WORSE COULD IT GET?!?" Well ... could be raining. Even the text boxes could have benefitted from a once-over: "Metal Sonic now becomes the latest wild card to make the scene." "Wild card making the scene;" I mean, come ON! I know that, being part 2 of 4, this is the development phase of the story and that in theory the next installment should throw a curve at the readers, but like I said that's only the theory. If Ken's track record in these matters is any indication, next issue could very well feature another dose of the same. Head Score: 3. EYE: I was recently reminded that Bunnie used to be a lot browner than she is now; at some point she's become as tawny as Tails. I don't know whether Jason Jensen is just following orders on this one, but there it is. Generally, though, the artwork is basic Butler: good but without the inspiration of S130's "The Blue Blur Returns". Eye Score: 10. HEART: I felt that there should have been a sign posted somewhere: THIS COMIC HAS GONE _x_ YEARS WITHOUT AN ATTEMPT AT ESTABLISHING FIONA'S CHARACTER. For some of you newbies who came to the comic after 1995, a little back story is in order: Once upon a time all those years ago, Sonic #28 introduced a two-part story arc, "Growing Pains." Though technically a lead- in to the Tails miniseries that was waiting in the wings, it introduced the character of Fiona, who turned out to be a droid that Robotnik had built. Sounds simple, right? Well, it didn't work out that way. As it turned out the fan base embraced Fiona for the simple reason that Tails fell head over tails in love with her in the first installment. In the next installment, which featured some of the WORST writing in the comic's lifespan, the Fiona-droid tried to attack Tails but either rusted out or short-circuited, it was never clear which. She probably would have been forgotten had not the fans ... the ACTUAL FANS and not the writers and editors at the time ... kept her memory alive. To their credit, Archie bowed to the inevitable and brought in the "real" Fiona who had served as a model for the Fiona-droid of "Growing Pains." She was not, however, handled very well. Not only was Fiona given way too much edge in the Mighty Armadillo story arc (Knuckles #26-28) but the story suffered from the worst case of malfunctioning continuity I'd ever seen. So she was effectively put back in storage until S134's "Say You Will;" her one-panel appearance in S125 extravaganza hardly qualifies as an appearance. Unfortunately, having dropped her back into the continuity, and having re-established that Tails is still smitten with her in "Say You Will," Archie STILL doesn't seem to know what to do with her. In the Return To Angel Island arc she busied herself with nursing the wounds of her comrades. Here, though, she seems to have changed majors and is now taking electronics. This is a pretty clear sign that Archie and the creatives don't have a clue as to who she is but they're keeping her around because the fans like her. Or something. Not that the other characters have much interaction. The extent of our caring about them is limited to whether anybody is going to get shot, blown up, beat up, or electrocuted. This is plain old comic book writing and Ken Penders does it well enough. And it looks like blowing off the Heart factor is a hallowed part of that style. Heart Score: 1. "A movie that changes everything," is what the ad says for the made-for-TV Kim Possible movie. I don't know what the Disney bosses consider "change" but Rinacat has weighed in with her own idea at http://www.deviantart.com/view/14888910/ "This Side of Parodies" Story: Mike Gallagher; Art: Dave Manak; Ink: Rich Koslowski; Color: Jason Jensen; Lettering: John E. Workman It's been a while since a Sonic story has moved me to ask this question, but ask it I must: "What the hell is THIS crap?" It's not the stupidity of the plot and dialogue that I mind, nor the default into the tired superhero cliches (and it's not easy being a superhero these days as "The Incredibles" demonstrates). No, what sticks in my craw is the over-the-top self-indulgence of Gallagher, Manak and Pellerito. I thought Justin Gabrie had taken it to the limit in "Better Read Than Dead" but I guess I was wrong. This is exactly the kind of mindless, preening self-insertion that gives fanfic a bad name. Frankly I'd rather read a mediocre fanfic that spares me the self-indulgence than something like this! No ratings, no interest, no point. "The Fox and the Hound" Story: Romy Chacon; Art: Al Bigley; Ink: Ken Penders; Color: Jason Jensen; Lettering: Ken Penders Sonic is off on some mission or other which means that he doesn't get to interact with Muttski. So Tails gets to hang with the pooch, but just when things look like they're getting a little hairy ... OK, poor choice of words ... Sonic returns. That's it, really. HEAD: The most interesting thing about this "story" is that over at http://www.albigley.com/sonic.htm there's some early pencil art for this story which shows Muttski in his metallic state before Karl Bollers's "The Last Robian." It also stated that the story would run some time in 2004. I guess something happened on the way to running the story, such as a major reset in the continuity. Looks like Archie kept the story but told Al Bigley to do a major re-draw of his work. I'm guessing that the story didn't change at all. Having read this story a couple times I kept waiting for ... I don't know, for it to be ABOUT something. OK, Sonic leaves Muttski alone, Tails comes along and plays with Muttski, and Sonic comes back just when it looks like Muttski's getting ready to take a bite out of Tails. This doesn't even work on the level of a character study of Tails. For all their many faults, "Growing Pains" and the subsequent Tails miniseries did a better job of that than this story. Head Score: 3. EYE: One good thing about Archie kicking the story back: it gave Al a chance to polish up his character work. In the earlier pencil work posted online, Tails is practically pot-bellied. This seems to be one of two common problems for new artists, the other being their drawing furries with human proportions. Eye Score: 8. HEART: For a situation like this (a fox and his dog, which is sort of weird because they both belong to the Canidae family), there's not much going on amidst all that fun and frolic. We never get inside any of the characters' heads, neither Tails nor Muttski. And thanks to Karl Bollers's "Say You Will" eavesdropping on Muttski's thoughts is no longer a stretch, even if Sonic is no longer there to translate. I thought that this could get heartwarming after a certain point; maybe it's me but it never happened. Heart Score: 3. At this point, the comic is at the end of its first quarter with Mike Pellerito at the helm. And I can't help shake the feeling that Mike has decided that, at least for the time being, he's turning his back on the emotional entanglements that caused so much furor last year. Given the nature of the stories in here, the simple/simplistic plots, the juvenile humor, the action orientation, it's pretty clear that Mike is taking the comic back to basics. This is a comic tailored for pre-adolescent boys. I really didn't want to believe it but "Sizzling SWATbots!!!" tipped it in for me. At least Justin Gabrie tried to throw a bone to us older hardcores in a Jim Crow sort of way by sending the hardcore material to the back of the book. Maybe things will change after the hype of S150 settles. We'll see. Sonic-Grams (aka Letters): Mike again states that a resolution of M25YL will appear but doesn't say when except that it'll be after S150. Fan Art: Crayon art from Cameron Dodd; Tails oekaki by Jed Bartley, and Tyler McGarth teams up Super Sonic with Super Shadow. And for anyone wanting a better look at Thebe Jean- Francis's awesome drawing, go to http://www.deviantart.com/deviation/12914696/ ; maybe Archie can't return fanart submissions but the Internet is another story. Editorial: Hype, hype and more hype. S148 Blurb: there's a threat to revive the Chosen One plot point. The last time that happened, Tails was unconscious for half the story arc and we learn that Tails wasn't Tails anyway. Be very afraid. SonicX sneak peek (enough with the cute spelling, guys!): either someone is using a TON of model sheets or else Archie cheaped it out and used a screenshot from the cartoon here. Off-Panel: Sonic #71, It must have appeared something like 6 years ago. It featured the backward story structure gimmick. It featured the redesign of Sonic. And it features an Off-Panel where MIKE GALLAGHER AND DAVE MANAK FIRST DID THAT LAME GAG ABOUT HAVING ONE OF THE CHARACTERS RUN ERRANDS FOR THE EDITOR! In that issue, it was Sonic going out for Chinese (including "wanton" instead of "wonton" soup); here it's Tails doing the scutwork. Maybe Gallagher/Manak are entitled to recycle a joke when it gets that old; either that or "Off-Panel" is finally running out of gas. Or maybe they were so busy standing in the limelight themselves they didn't have time to come up with anything new. Me, I prefer to think that the series is running out of gas, which it seems to do every now and then. Any chance they'll finally turn the feature into a 4-frame non-canonical gag strip about the characters and not the editor and/or creatives? You're right, what was I thinking? This is Archie Comics.