Sonic the Hedgehog #176 (Aug 2007)


     Yardley/Amash/Jensen cover: Sonic is all anger and
gnashing of teeth as he holds the Acorn banner, but
considering he's doing so with a burning building to his back
he might want to think about relocating his hedgehog hinder.


     "Cracking the Empire"
     Story: Ian Flynn, Art: Tracy Yardley!; Ink: Jim Amash;
Color: Jason Jensen; Lettering: John E. Workman; Editor: Mike
Pellerito; Managing Editor: Victor Goreligk; Editor-in-Chief:
Richard Goldwater

     Welcome to what's left of Knothole.  Population: 4,
namely Sonic, Tails, Knuckles and Amy Rose.  Sonic gives the
bad news about the last issue to Knux and Amy Rose, then
starts putting together a Dramatic Single-Handed Rescue Plan,
much to Tails's consternation.  After the kid reminds Sonic of
the score after the last encounter, another party is heard
from: Nicole, who apparently managed to download herself into
her/its old handheld home sweet home to escape destruction. 
Being the coolest head in the room, she/it has come up with a
plan.
     The story then splits off so that while the gang
implements the rescue plan for 5 pages, Ian lets Robotnik do
the (trash) talking.  As Robotnik is about to demonstrate the
whole Egg Grape thing on Charmy, the Furry Four make their
entrance and Amy uses her Pico Hammer to start kicking glass. 
Tails meanwhile is introducing Nicole to Robotnik's computer
system, while Sonic shoos everyone outside, with Sally stating
that this is all pretty counterintuitive.  But Sonic maintains
his trademark smirk even as Robotnik and his battle suit show
up and with a feeling of Here We Go Again starts zapping
everyone in sight, including Sonic who refuses to put up a
fight this time.  Only when everyone has gone bye-bye does
Robotnik bother listening to Snively who's been trying to tell
him that none of those he'd zapped ever reached the Egg Grape
Chamber.  It takes but a moment for Snively to trace their
trail, make a left at Albuquerque, and find they've gone to...
     No, it's not Lothlorien the Elfin hideaway from "Lord of
the Rings."  It's ... let's see, we've had Knothole, which was
then rebuilt as part of the fun and games of S94's "World
Order," so that would make this Knothole-3 (if you're a fan of
"Neon Genesis Evangelion") or maybe we should just call it
Neo-Knothole.  Or would that be "Kneo-Knothole"?  And speaking
of Neo-things, let's greet the architect not only of the city
but of the escape plan, Neo-Nicole.  Seems that she used the
leftovers from the nanite structure, a relic from the
forgotten and forgettable "Sonic's Angels" (S152) to cobble it
together, with enough "holographic matrixes" left over to
allow herself to get out and stretch her virtual legs.  The
Mobians are full of questions, one of which should have been
"How are we keeping hidden?"  Short answer: "We're not."  And
with a feeling of Here We Go Again Again, the Egg Fleet
appears on the outskirts of town.

HEAD: Ian can't seem to break away from the convention of the
Villain Blabbing His Head Off.  It was a major feature in the
previous story as Robotnik gloated while Sonic was getting his
butt kicked.  This time around, it's an in-your-face
exposition to the Mobians under glass followed by a monologue
as he goes back to zapping the Mobians.
     Exposition is one of those necessary evils in writing. 
Sometimes, a writer just has to shift gears and slow down the
story while delivering enough story details as told by one of
the characters to help the reader make sense of what's
happening.  It's not necessarily a sin, and I've done my share
of it in writing my fanfics [Note: approaching spoilers if you
haven't read my stuff yet].  In my very first Sonic outing,
"Bloodlines," I used dialogue between Sally and her sister to
bring her (and us) up to speed on where Queen Alicia had been
all these years.   Same with Sparticus in "Matter of Trust,"
and Jay in "Space Case."  I did commit exposition-by-villain
in "My Quills Are Quick," I'll confess.  And in "Runaway," I
had exposition from several sources: Nicole, Bunnie's family,
and Gearbox.  Looking back on it, I find I've mainly been
relying on two rules for writing exposition:

1. Never use a monologue when a dialogue will do.

2. Always give information to trustworthy (i.e., sympathetic)
characters.

     I thought about the second rule as I read Robotnik once
again holding forth while zapping the characters; mercifully,
Snively's attempts to horn in made it go down easier.  Perhaps
I'm getting impatient in my old age: I've only seen the
Villain Blabbing His Head Off used like a million times in
writing, and I've gone down that path myself.  But then I run
up against the biggest obstacle to using it: How do I know I
can trust what the villain says?  He can usually be trusted to
give a warped (or at least a self-serving) version of events,
which is why I tend to adhere to Rule #2.
     All that said, I enjoyed "Cracking The Empire" more than
the previous installment which was a mere slugfest where
everyone gets zapped, Knothole is wiped out, and Sonic gets
beat up.  No way Ian could have left it at that, and to his
credit he didn't.  He also came up with an imaginative dea ex
machina (using the feminine form here) in the form of Nicole's
plan.
     And it's always good to see Neo-Nicole, who is probably
the first original character in this comic since its
inception.  Most other characters have been animal morphs who
needed a while to find their voice (Mina), or were so
misbegotten as to deserve death (Nate Morgan, Tommy Turtle). 
Neo-Nicole is unique.  As envisioned by Tania del Rio, she's
Nicole's operating system gone sentient, but instead of trying
to take over the world or some other cliche, she just wanted
to be able to get out of the box.  Ian obliged her in "I Am"
where she reintroduced Shadow to Maria.  Now she appears to
have crafted a reality she can share with the suddenly-
homeless Mobians.
     Unfortunately, the emphasis is on "appear."  The story
has taken a nice turn from the slugfest that was the previous
installment.  So why do I feel like I'm being set up yet
again?
     Maybe it's because, of Neo-Nicole's two appearances in
the book, she faded out at the end of the first story and
stayed safely down the electronic rabbit hole in the second. 
Now she's out and about in her Neopet form.  I WANT to believe
in it, don't get me wrong, and Tracy Yardley! makes her look
cute enough, but this is getting dangerously close to
rewriting the rules for convenience sake.  What's to stop Neo-
Knothole from being as much of a simulated reality as Neo-
Nicole herself, a dreamscape cobbled together of electrons, a
variation on a holodeck theme?  The Mobians seem to think it's
real, but HOW real?
     Remember, once Nicole told Sonic et al. she had a plan,
we never heard all of it.  What if Neo-Knothole is all part of
an elaborate sting, just bait for a trap to catch Robotnik? 
Looking at Neo-Knothole, I can't help wondering whether, in a
metaphorical sense, it won't somehow turn into one of those
Tex Avery-Chuck Jones bear traps ready to bite down on the Egg
Fleet.
     I don't know if I'm spoiling anything here; I've
certainly guessed wrong often enough when dealing with this
comic.  But I can't escape the feeling that there's more going
on here than Ian is telling.
     That's why, like last time, I can't bring myself to rate
this story yet.  Once again I have to wait until next issue. 
All I can say is, the payoff had better be worth it.