Sonic the Hedgehog #182 (January 2008)
     Yardley!/Hunzeker cover: in no particular order: Sonic,
Knuckles dba Enerjak, Shadow, Dr. Fin, the Egg Fleet.  It's a
bad sign when they throw this much onto the cover so early in
the arc.


     "Fallen Angel"
     Story: Ian Flynn; Art: Tracy Yardley!; Ink: Jim Amash;
Color: Jason Jensen; Lettering: John E. Workman; Editor: Mike
Pellerito; Managing Editor: Victor Gorelick; Editor-in-Chief:
the late Richard Goldwater; Sega Licensing reps: the late
Robert Leffler, Dyna Lopez, and Cindy Chau

     We start off with Enerjak 2.0, aka Knuckles, giving what
sounds like an acceptance speech at the Republican National
Convention, calling himself a "living god" and promising a
"better tomorrow ... free of pain and suffering ... free of
technology ... built by my unmatched power!"  And in case
anybody missed the point despite the speech and the title,
he's identified as "Enerjak : Knuckles turned villain" at the
bottom of the page.  Simply describing him as "stupid
powerful" apparently wasn't good enough.
     Right away, all the women folk(!) get in his face: Sally
complains about the "devastation" on Angel Island, Nicole sort
of hedges her bets, and Julie-Su invokes past story arcs and
urges him to pull the plug on his power trip.  Knux is
"disappointed" by the reception and is about to strip Julie-Su
(!) of her techno appendages (Whew!) when Sonic makes his
entrance, on Knuckles's head, telling him to forget about
"whatever you were villainously monologing about."  I'm not
sure about the spelling of "monologing" but I'll give it a bye
for the self-referential humor.
     Sonic then takes a run at Knuckles, who deflects the
blow.  This diversion allows Shadow to show up and sucker-
punch Knuckles in the name of G.U.N.  Sonic gets the puns and
insults out of his system, while Shadow unleashes a Chaos
Blast.  Nicole tries to keep the city from flying apart while
explaining "even if I fully shut down my body I don't have
enough power to raise the energy shield.  If Dr. Eggman were
to attack, we'd be defenseless."
     OK, thanks to THAT heavy-handed little bit of exposition,
take a wild guess as to what happens next.  If you said "Dr.
Eggman attacks," you have what it takes to write for comic
books, or for THIS comic book, anyway.  There's a bit or
repartee going on between Eggman and Snively but nothing
seriously connected to the plot.  Not yet, anyway.
     Shadow and Knuckles continue to trade licks.  Sonic gets
in a head shot and because he dropped in in the middle of
things he only NOW realizes that Enerjak 2.0 is really
Knuckles.  But as the entire population of New Knothole tries
rushing him, Knuckles freezes them all with Chaos energy.  He
then launches into a monologue, naming Dr. Finitevus as his
puppet master; the main purpose of the monologue and
subsequent dialogue between Sonic and Knuckles, of course, is
to give the Egg Fleet time to show up and "teleport" Knuckles
as Enerjak 2.0 to the Egg Vineyard 2.0.  Eggman's bad virtual
self is beamed down saying "Don't everybody thank me at once;
by the way, I still plan to kick your butts eventually."
     At this point, Sally has mixed feelings about rescuing
Knuckles but by the bottom of the page Sonic and Julie-Su are
whisked away via warp ring to Angel Island.  There they
encounter Locke, Knuckles's old man, who explains that Dr. Fin
has put a lock on the Master Emerald.  So Locke tells them
that the Guardians had crafted a weapon to use on Enerjak if
he should ever return, as Julie-Su's day just keeps getting
better and better!

     HEAD: Well, I can't say that Ian has failed to deliver on
the "action and more action" clause.  There are threats galore
in this story; I only wish I could take them seriously.  I'm
guessing we're in for a double helping of the Weapon That
Doesn't Do the Job plot point.
     I first noticed it in an ancient "Superman" episode ...
the old live action, black-and-white, George Reeves as
Superman on television variety.  I remember that some mad
scientist or other, in league with some crime boss I think,
lures Superman into a concrete bunker, slams the door on him,
and they subjects him to cheap special effects lightning of
some kind.  Superman crumples, drops to his knees, lays still,
and it's only when the bad guys file into the room to witness
their accomplishment that Supes jumps to his feet and says
something along the lines of "Did you really thing that your
little fireworks display would have any effect on me?  Or that
I couldn't have broken out of this room at any time?"  He then
proves his point by punching a hole in the wall which is the
cue for the very one-sided fight to begin.
     I take this stroll down memory lane because the fun of
the Weapon That Doesn't Do The Job plot point is when you
think that it DID work; then comes the surprise.  I don't know
if Ian will go the same way, but let's just say I'm not at all
confident that either the Egg Vineyard 2.0 or Locke's anti-
Enerjak system will be sufficient to do the job.
     The Egg Grapes, of course, have the added burden of only
working in retrospect.  We never actually SAW them in action
killing off ... well, however many characters were supposed to
be killed off by them.  I suppose the blame for that falls on
Archie Comics for not permitting any actual death on the pages
of their comics, unless it's something tidy like that of Sir
Connery or the late unlamented Tommy Turtle.  We have to take
Ian's word for it that the Grapes work against mere mortals. 
Knuckles-as-Enerjak is another story.  And we'll find out more
about the Brotherhood's "weapon" in the next issue.  Head
Score: 7.
     EYE: Nothing really to complain about here, though
Sally's pose during her rallying speech on page [10] was
overdone.  Eye Score: 10.
     HEART: Sonic's confrontation of Knuckles is the focus of
this issue, and to an extent that's understandable.  Sonic's
the Main Man in the franchise and his name is on the cover of
the comic, after all.  Still, having Julie-Su along for the
ride should have brought a shift of perspective.  She's
identified as "Knuckles' love" in the first page, but Ian
doesn't really work hard to make us remember that after
Knuckles is prevented from de-Borging her.  After Sonic
rescues her, in fact, she's so traumatized or something that
she's almost forgotten.  She's a silent presence until whisked
away to Angel Island and then is given only half a line of
dialogue on the next-to-last page.  She's supposed to have
considerable emotional stake in Knuckles's life and/or death
but we never get to see it.  It's as if Ian blew the emotional
budget in last month's issue and couldn't afford to put Julie-
Su through the wringer again.  He may be doing her a favor but
it leaves a sizable hole in the story.  Maybe Ian will patch
over it in the next installment.  Heart Score: 4.


     "Albion's Shameful Secret"
     Story: Ian Flynn; Art: Tracy Yardley!; Ink: Jim Amash;
Color: Jason Jensen; Lettering : Patrick Owsley (debut)

     Remember how I said that at certain times in the history
of this comic some characters, such as Nate Morgan, sank so
low that all they were good for was being an "exposition
machine" that provided back story for the sake of the
characters and the reader?  Well, Ian's taken me to heart
because this story is brought to us BY an Exposition Machine,
with Gala-Na of Albion doing the holographic honors.
     Her electronic alter ego explains that back during
Knuckles's Green period (in the ill-fated year 2001) a young
Dr. Finitevus worked on the project of trying to leach the
Chaos energy out of Knuckles and to do so developed a "Chaos
Siphon Suit."  If you think this sounds stupid, it's nowhere
near as bad as the communications break-down that took place
during the creation of S94's "The Best Laid Plans," where
Knuckles is subjected to the effects of a mere Chaos Syphon. 
But because artist Ron Lim had to draw the story with nothing
to go on by way of a model for the device in question, we
witnessed the spectacle of Knuckles being subjected to the
effects of the Chaos Syphon without Ron Lim actually SHOWING
the Chaos Syphon.  The text box at the bottom of Page [2]
fails to mention that this was one among many low points in
the history of the comic that happened in 2001.  
     Because Fin was wearing the Chaos Syphon Suit when
Knuckles got zapped (Why do I think this is a huge conceptual
flaw?), Fin was altered by the experience.  He grew more
powerful, and it went to his head; that's so you know he's a
villain.  Naturally, Fin took exception with the Executive
Council's decision to execute him, and he became point man for
the Egg Fleet.  That's about it, really.  Gala-Na's sign-off
lacks the poignancy of "Help me, Obi-wan Kenobi; you're our
only hope!" but it gets the point across.
     Turns out it was Locke who was operating the Exposition
Machine which he acquired from the recently-rehabilitated
Remington.  Leaving the refugees from the Legions and
Echidnaopolis in the former Constable's capable mittens, he
has to get back to the cover story where he has to tease his
own son's destruction.

     HEAD: Honestly, if you're going to have almost nothing
but exposition, why NOT just save it in an MP3 file and play
it back?  It beats having a story come to a screeching halt so
some character few readers even care about gets to run his or
her or its mouth (in the case of Isaac the robot from the
infamous The Good, The Bad, and The Unknown story arc) for 4
or 5 pages.  If anything, I'm surprised nobody at the comic
has come up with this device before now.
     Like I said, I think the Chaos Syphon Suit has a serious
conceptual problem.  It reminds me of the "Saturday Night
Live" sketch where Dan Ackroyd as sleazy businessman Irwin
Mainway is marketing a line of Halloween costumes that could
only kindly be described as "hazardous."  The one I remember
most vividly: "Johnny the Human Torch: a bunch of oily rags
and a lighter."  I'm sorry, but if Dr. Fin had come to me with
a proposal to absorb rampant Chaos energy into the clothes one
is wearing I'd have him transferred out of R&D and into
Accounting for a while.  But I suppose Ian had to come up with
SOME explanation as to how he got powerful and twisted. 
Personally, I think he brought "twisted" to the party even
before he met Green Knuckles.  Head Score: 7.
     EYE: Tracy Yardley! has the thankless job of having to
work with Jon Gray's character design for Dr. Fin, who made
his debut in S139's "Avatar."  His most memorable performance
in that story, for me anyway, was the way he screamed and
ranted and generally overacted like crazy when a couple
echidnas thought that Knuckles could heal their blind
daughter.
     But if anybody remembers Dr. Fin for anything other than
his cockeyed name it was probably for his wardrobe.  Jon Gray
appeared to have thought it up under the influence of 1930s
Flash Gordon comic strips.  This was the sort of thing that
gave sci-fi a bad name for years.  But Tracy was stuck with
it, and he acquits himself well enough.  Eye Score: 9.
     HEART: This is all back story, except for the last page
where no attempt is made to react emotionally to what was just
seen.  Heart Score: n/a