Sonic #99 [August 2001, I think; for some reason, they left out the publisher's boilerplate] Spaz/Harvo/Ray cover: This wasn't supposed to be the cover; the original cover featured Sonic, Kodos and Arachnis battling for possession of the Sword of Acorns. It's on display on Ken Penders's site at http://kenpenders.com/ebay/unpubl.jpg Spaz had to pull this one together in a hurry. This cover is both right and wrong. It's right in that it communicates the pivotal moment of this story, the Huge Misunderstanding Scene. It's wrong in that Sonic is his usual flat-faced, inexpressive, unemotional self. Considering his reaction to Mina's advances it's understandable, but it's yet another reminder of how lifeless the Powers That Be want this comic to remain. "Blow By Blow" Story: Karl Bollers; Art: Ron Lim; Ink: Pam Eklund and Andrew Pepoy; Lettering: Jeff Powel; Color: Frank Gagliardo; Editor/Art Director: Justin Gabrie; Managing Editor: Victor Gorelick; Editor-In-Chief: Richard Goldwater. [Note: Ron Lim is heralded as the "new penciler." Excuse me, but he's been with us since S90's "Sword of Omens" which he worked on with Fry, and he started doing the back stories with "Premonition" (S92). He also did the cover story art for S91's "Crash!" And let's not forget Ron's illustrating the Sonic Adventure special (SSS13). "New penciler;," as IF!] Sonic and Tails, or whoever/whatever passes for Tails these days, try to sneak back into Sonic's room in the middle of the night. Unfortunately, neither of them have seen either "A.I." or the "Reunification" two-parter from "Star Trek: The Next Generation." If they had, they'd have known that bots such as David or Data or Sonic's parental units really don't consider sleep to be a high priority item because bots are pretty much on 24/7. Jules demands an explanation, and before Sonic can say anything meaningful we cut away. Sega was so hot to get a Sonic Adventure 2 adaptation issue out to coincide with the game's release that no matter what stories were being worked on, the narrative flow would have been so jazzed that some cuts would have been necessary to include SOME kind of meaningful action in S100 instead of bumping it all over to S101. So I'm almost grateful that we were spared a rehash of the plot at this point. On another level, though, I rather doubt that there's any way on God's green footstool that Karl, Ken, Justin and the rest of the Mamaroneck brain trust can explain with anything like coherency just how they're going to resolve the "Tails isn't Tails" plot point from S97's "To The Brink," which Ken Penders dropped on the fans like a bomb, to use an appropriate analogy. The first time I read this story I actually got the impression that the editors and creatives were trying to walk away from that plot point, doing their best to look inconspicuous. It's an impression reinforced by blurbs for coming issues: S100: The Ultimate Villain, and someone/something bites the dust; Knuckles faces the Dark Legion S101: Something post-catastrophic for Sonic; Knuckles seeks to alter time and space S102: The Freedom Fighters liberate the roboticized Mobians but the King and Queen are held prisoner; Continuation of Knuckles screwing with space-time S103: Freedom Fighters of the Galaxy -- i.e., another crummy zone story; the Downunda Freedom Fighters face the Bunyip first alluded to back in S61's "Outback Gut Check" Loose continuity with a vengeance! But I believe that that sick headache of a plot development WILL come back to haunt us like a bad belch from a chili dog, you can bet cash money on that. We see the Royal Family finally being sprung from house arrest and being trotted out for some occasion or other. I don't know what kind of fanfare the horns are playing; judging from the color of the uniforms on the guards, maybe it's a cover version of Prince's "Raspberry Beret." But leave it to Karl Bollers to strike the wrong note. Consider the following contents of Sally's thought balloon: "I can hardly believe it ... I've finally gotten everything I've ever wanted: my family ... a peaceful kingdom...." I can almost hear Robotnik in the background, saying: "What am I, chopped liver?" But obviously Editorial is not backing down from the New Order revisionism. As far as they're concerned Robotnik is on another planet entirely. Karl, whether on his own or on orders from Editorial, continues to struggle to obliterate the idea that Robotnik has been a large feature on Sally's horizon, in more ways than one, for most of her life. She'd had her father snatched from her by Robotnik when she was 5, and has spent the last 6 years or so waging guerrilla war against the not-so-good Doctor. And here Sally doesn't give him a thought! Nice try. Maybe you can fool the pre-ads, but we hardcores won't forget. Anyway, as Sally scans the allegedly happy crowd, Geoffrey Sinjin and his bunch arrive with good news and bad news: the good news is, we're spared having to listen to the bad news as we ... Cut to Jules and Bernie processing the data Sonic and "Tails" have just input into their CPUs. We're left with the impression that Sonic basically recounted the action from SA2 for their benefit; no comment is made about Sonic's dressing up as Sneak, his being jailed along with Geoff, or the message from Uncle Chuck about the Sword of Acorns. With any luck, Karl really HAS got the Sonic-as-superhero notion out of his system. As for the tale of "Tails," nothing is said about the kid's impending identity crisis. "It's not their fault they were born with special abilities," Bernie says, making it sound like they're autistic or something. Mina then shows up, and we can see that Ron's manga lessons from Spaz are beginning to show. I don't know whether Karl or Jeff Powell gets the credit/blame for the parental word balloon at the bottom of page [5] but a parenthetical expression, in this case "Not Bunnie, either!", is set off not by parentheses but by commas (Strunk and White: I:3; Warriner's: 34k.3). You use parentheses for ... well, for technical material like the citations at the end of the last sentence. In addition, parentheses are NEVER used when writing dialogue. If you don't believe me, try speaking in parentheses some time. As a serious parenthetical phrase junkie who's trying to kick the parentheses habit, I ought to know. Nate Morgan, meanwhile, walks in on Geoff's debriefing of Prince Elias and Sally. And the trusty, rusty Golden Duh! Award goes to ... Geoffery Sinjin for reporting the startling development that "we found Robotropolis to be inhabited by Overlanders." Swell, Geoff; they've only been living there since they crash-landed on the freakin' planet back in "Crash!". That was at least "a month and a half ago" Mobian time, according to "New Order" (S94). Maybe next month he'll report that the sky is blue. Nate then delivers the final forensic report on the bot that good ol' Geoff shot up back in "The Messenger"(S96): turns out the message by the bot stated that the Sword is in the hands, or whatever, of Arachnis and not Robotnik. This doesn't elicit so much as an "Oops" from Geoffrey, but being in the Secret Service means never having to say you're sorry. Quick comment on the ad for S100; the definition of "ultimate" includes the concept of "being the last or concluding element in a series." Seems the boys in Marketing had the same trouble with S50; a number of fans wrote in thinking that "The Big Goodbye" was going to be the last issue of the comic. Memo to Marketing: a "thesaurus" is NOT something out of "Jurassic Park." Geoff puts on his game face and heads off to visit Kodos to subject him to "some extensive interrogation." Gee, maybe Sinjin'll ask TWO questions this time. I don't know what kind of answers he expects to get, though; last we saw of Kodos, he was more than a few beans short of a helping of chili. Elias, in the midst of a bout of self-doubt, notices that Sally has left the room. She's seen conversing with what appears to be a group of escapees from a Disney ice show with an Aladdin theme. Karl's not about to bother explaining who these dancing girls are and what they're doing at the palace. We're kept from thinking too much about that by Nate's bid for the Golden Duh! Runner-up: "Overlanders in Robotropolis? A serious matter, indeed." Back in the Great Forest, or in an unforested part thereof, we find Sonic trying to coach Mina on running. So far, about all she seems to be able to do is refine her impression of George of the Jungle. Knowing that the Huge Misunderstanding Scene is imminent, Sonic tells "Tails" to get his tails out of here. Good thing too, because the set-up for the Huge Misunderstanding Scene just flat out didn't work for me. And it's not because of the whole Sonic-alienated-from-Sally thing, either. It's because Sonic's dialogue at the bottom of page [9] is wrong, wrong, WRONG!! The set-up: Mina is upset at her latest crash landing and says: "I thought we had so much in common ... roboticized parents, the whole speed thing ... but you're obviously faster and way more in control. What was I thinking?" Which isn't bad, but here's what Sonic says in reply: "Geez, don't get so dramatic. I was only teasing. It's all part o' being a freedom fighter." Let's subject this word balloon to a little higher criticism: "GEEZ": No matter how you slice it or otherwise try and excuse it, this is still an abbreviation for the name of the Second Person of the Trinity. Granted, this isn't covered in the list of DOs and DON'Ts which appears at the Archie Comics Web site, but that's no excuse. More important, it just doesn't sound like something Sonic would say. "I WAS ONLY TEASING": Refers to Sonic's line on the preceding page "Is that all ya got? Is that the fastest you could go?" BTW, since Sonic and Mina are still in mid-run when that line is delivered it's supposed to be "Is that the fastest you can go?" "IT'S ALL PART O' BEING A FREEDOM FIGHTER." An awkward sentence; taken literally, Sonic is saying that teasing is part of being a Freedom Fighter. And overall, the entire dialogue fails to capture Sonic's personality. Let's try this rewrite on for size: "Hey, I know you can do it! You just gotta be patient. Not that patience is my best event!" This would necessitate a slight rewrite of Mina's following line. Still, it goes a long way toward injecting Sonic's personality into a line of dialogue that really needs it. Anyway, we finally get to the HMS, accompanied by the dancing girls wandering in and out of the scene for no apparent reason besides giving Sally a chance to get her heart broken. Back in Knothole, "Tails," Rotor and Nate discover that Kodos is recovering nicely from his bout of radiation poisoning, except that he's still deranged. You can tell because he pronounces "sword" with two syllables. In a moment of true narrative stupidity Geoff, who's on the verge of passing out, passes on word of the Sword not to Nate, who's hovering over him, but to one of the dancing girls! Maybe he's so delirious he thinks she's a scrub nurse wearing a surgical mask. Fortunately, the girl in question is Sally, who now has something else to think about other than Sonic. Leave it to Dr. Quack to demonstrate the difference, as if it needed further demonstration, between LOOSE continuity and BAD continuity. Jim Fry actually sent an e-mail apologizing for not having labeled some barrels of goo in Kodos's lair as being radioactive in "Crime 'N' Punishment"(S93). Yet we only learned that Kodos was suffering from radiation poisoning in S96's "The Messenger". But now three issues later it's "Oops, we meant to say 'exposure to harmful toxins'." Memo to Jim Fry: you're all right; EVERYBODY ELSE is crazy! Sally announces she's going after Kodos. Rotor, who looks like his nickname should be "Pea Head," wants to get Sonic, but Sal nixes that idea. As the three split up, and Sally continues brooding on the HMS, she comes across Arachnis. Seems the lady ninja spider has had the worse of an encounter with Kodos. As for Rotor and "Tails," they're a little busy having their windpipes crushed by Kodos, whose presence Sally doesn't sense even though he's standing right behind her. This is in keeping with the Jason Rule which states that, like the character Jason in the "Friday the 13th" movie franchise, big hulking homicidal maniacs always move with cat-like silence even when they're wearing boots. Nate, meanwhile, encounters Sonic and Mina, passes on the news that Sally has gone after Kodos, and watches as Sonic takes off. Sonic's next stop is the jail, where Antoine is still keeping company with his pere and Bunnie, who's mercifully changed clothes, is keeping company with Antoine. Sonic enlists their help, using the effects of the Sword as an inducement, and it looks like the band is gonna get back together. Or what's left of it after Kodos is through. HEAD: Though the overall story moves well and is compelling enough, there are still some major problems with it. For instance, what's with the dancing girls? They're in the castle for no real reason, they wander in on Sonic and Mina for no real reason, they come upon what's left of Geoff's commandoes for no real reason. Surely Karl could have come up with a more intelligent way to get Sally from point A to point B to point C for the sake of the plot. And why use dancing girls at all? The whole thing just doesn't seem ... well, Mobian! One of the most jarring elements of the otherwise wonderful "Blast To The Past" two-parter from the SatAM second season was the fact that the young Sally was dressed like a Princess Jasmine wanna-be. I didn't understand it then and I sure don't understand the sheik chic look here. To a greater extent than usual, characters wander in and out of the story with nothing better to do than deliver expository dialogue: Geoff, Nate, Sally, Elias, Antoine all do it. The HMS is about the only scene in the story where Karl is telling a story; most other times he's RETELLING one. This gives me another reason not to like loose continuity: you have to put the brakes on the story every so often to bring the newbies up to speed. Overall, though, there's enough action for those who want it. And he sets up the HMS well even though it probably won't have much of a long-term impact. I hope. Head Score: 5. EYE: I knew it, I KNEW it! When I saw Ron's artwork in last month's "When Shadow Awakes" I knew he belonged more to Old School hyoomon-oriented comic artwork than to the ranks of furry artists. In one of the SatAM eps, it's revealed that Sally's father used to call her "Bean." Here, it looks like her nickname should have been "Beanpole." And Bunnie on page 15 fares no better. To me, it's a dead giveaway: you can always tell hyoomon-oriented artists because they eventually try to give furries human proportions. That's what happened with Jim Valentino's artwork, especially to Sally in "Ascension" (SSS11). In this case, it may be an ironic side-effect of Spaz's drawing lessons. Spaz is heavily influenced by manga, where hyoomon females are especially leggy. Furries, however, aren't. It's just not a good look for a lot of them. The only time in the Sonic comics that the look worked for me was Fry's debut artwork featuring the Sailor Moon parody in "Zone Ware: Prelude" (SSS8). And that was forgivable because it WAS a parody! In the more successful strips I've seen where hyoomons and furries interact, the hyoomons are visually altered to some extent. Their bodies are a bit more compact, not rigidly adhering to the seven-and-a-half-heads-in-height rule. Yet they're still somewhat proportional and the look works. The best example I can site at the moment is Albert Temple's e-strip "Gene Catlow" (genecatlow.keenspace.com). That strip should be required reading for anyone wanting to do furry art. Not only is Temple's artwork terrific, but he's taking the skins-vs.-furs plot line where Archie's creatives and editors will never go. But even if Ron were to iron out his proportionality problems, he's got other things to worry about. Visually, a lot of the expressions on the faces of his characters are dead. And it's not just, for instance, the palace guards or the allegedly cheering crowd outside the palace. As a default he gives his characters this open parabola of a mouth which really isn't that expressive if you cover up the character's eyes. Of course if you can't do eyes then you should be in another line of work, and Ron does a fair job with eyes. But a handful of manga set pieces, such as Mina on page [5] panel 4, are no substitute for emotionally engaging artwork. OK, Ron can do Kodos on a rampage and Mina on page [8] has a nice panicked expression. But look at Sally at the bottom of page [10] right after the HMS. What is THAT? She looks like she's either tired or has a headache. Hurt, betrayal, sadness -- that's what was called for here, and Ron simply didn't deliver. Even Spaz knew that this was an occasion to turn on the waterworks, and his cover showed it. But here? Fuggedaboudit! I blame the editors. Their emotional emasculation of the comic continues unabated, and now it's Sally's turn to go under the knife. Eye Score: 4. HEART: The HMS which was supposed to be the major set-piece for this story was a disappointment. The characters went through the motions and all, but there was ultimately something ... unconvincing about the entire exercise. The set-up was obvious, and had been for months. But on the bright side, the way things are going the threatened Sally-Geoffrey counter-HMS won't be materializing. It hasn't been hinted at in the preview blurbs cited above, and will probably be undone by around Sonic 101. So what should have been a pivotal plot development has been abandoned to die of its own pointlessness. Given what's been going on in this comic for the eight years of its existence, I'm not surprised. Saddened, but not surprised. Heart Score: 3. "What Comes Around Goes Around" Story: Ken Penders; Art: Ken Penders; Ink: Not listed but I'll presume also Ken Penders; Lettering: Vickie Williams; Color: Frank Gagliardo; Editor: Justin F. Gabrie. We join up with Dimirti on the bridge of a Star Trek-like ship, an impression heightened by the title of this story appearing in Star Trek: The Original Series font. "The shockwave came out of nowhere, Sir!" one of the bridge officers reports, though it could have been downloaded from shockwave.com. The Treknobabble flows freely as one of the officers reports: "According to my monitor, the energy wave originated 180 degrees from our forward trajectory, Sir." From the above bit of dialogue, we get the sense of an all- business no-personality bridge officer, an unimportant bit player. The exact same information could have been conveyed by the words: "Holy $#!+! There's something right behind us!!" Maybe not as dignified, but a little more fun to read. That something proves to be the supposedly-deserted Floating Island. They also pick up on a scene from "To The Brink" but Ken cuts that short before he has to do any explaining. As Dimitri heads in for a closer look, a more lucid Knuckles finds himself on the Island in front of Dark Legion Central. "I feel like this place looks," he says. Yeah, well, a bad case of PhotoShop Blur will do that. Going inside, it's deja vu all over again as he sees Julie-Su being kidnaped by Legionnaires as well as ... himself? Wasn't that the problem with the first "Back To The Future" movie? Marty couldn't be in two places in the same neighborhood of the space-time continuum, watching himself drive the DeLorean and being chased by the terrorists in the parking lot... OK, let's stop this now before I get a headache. Enter Hawking, or at least the ghost of Hawking, even though Ken never uses the G-word. "I'm evolving," Hawking explains as he shows Knuckles what he looked like when he died. After a bit of dime store philosophy, Hawking vanishes and the Legionnaires have picked up on Knuckles's presence on the Island. But just then Knuckles appears on the bridge... ...and blows his dramatic entrance by ruining the joke. The line is supposed to be "I'll give you three guesses, and the first two don't count." Instead Knuckles says "Take a guess, and the first two don't count." The failure to specify three guesses makes the mention of the two that don't count meaningless. But Knuckles and Dimitri are face-to-face once more. HEAD: Maybe Ken had other things on his mind when he wrote this: short deadlines, his recent health problems. But it's not the first time that he got so close to perfection only to stumble and fall just short of the finish line. I still remember the terrific splash page from "The Gauntlet" (K8). It had all the makings of a great poster, were it not for the presence of the word "theyre" in the text box. And let's not forget Knuckles complaining about being "put through the ringer," instead of the wringer, in "When Destiny Calls"(S95). There was a minor flame war on Ken's message board about his over-dependence on visual quotations from the "Star Trek" and "Star Wars" franchises. I won't replay the arguments here, but this sort of thing really ought to be used way more sparingly, like ... oh, I don't know ... not at all if you can help it. I was seriously uncomfortable with the presence of Hawking's ghost. It reminded me too much of a creepy line I heard recently: death was described as "our doorway to God." I'll say no more about that line for fear of launching a theological flame war, and I understand Ken's need to be purposefully vague about what could eventually turn into a major plot point if the editors will allow it. But I'm also reminded of something from a documentary on the filming of the original "Planet of the Apes." In an earlier version of the script, the hyoomon babe that the Charleston Heston character takes up with is revealed to be pregnant toward the end of the picture. But the screenwriters realized that you just don't throw down a plot point like that without taking it somewhere. So the reference to the pregnancy was cut from the final version of the script. I feel that the same thing should have happened to Hawking in this case. Not that I have anything against the character one way or another. It's just that, in another example of loose continuity in practice, Ken has brought up a potentially major plot point only to let it drop again for who knows how many more months while he works on something else. OK, I know Knuckles had to start coming to a realization of what his powers are, but wouldn't a couple flashback panels have done the job? It's not like he hasn't done stuff like this before: creating a wormhole in "Picking Up The Pieces"(K15), disarming the hunter dude in "To The Death" (K32). Knuckles could have remembered these incidents, received a mental "Attaboy" from a disembodied voice in his head, and THEN we'd cut to the Legionnaire ship. Hawking's one-page cameo not only adds one more layer of confusion to a story line that already has that in abundance, it also diverts the reader's attention from the immediate plot. I'm reminded of the three word that recur in Strunk and White's "Elements of Style": Clarity, clarity, clarity. Head Score: 6. EYE: It's not Manny Galan but it's pretty darn close. After seeing Knuckles with pipecleaner arms and legs and a weird set of gnashing teeth courtesy of Ron Lim, it's nice to see the cast looking like itself again. Lien-Da's buggy Powerpuff eyes on the last page look kinda creepy, though. They remind me that villains and other cold, heartless people in manga have beady little eyes. I mean, as long as the comic is going for a style makeover.... Eye Score: 8. HEART: Not much of a factor in this case. Knuckles's head clears, he's confused by moving through space-time, and he ends up on the Borg ... excuse me ... Legionnaire's ship. Mainly action, and a set-up for the next installment. Hear Score: 4. Sonic-Grams: Ken does a tally of how some comics based on licensed characters fared. Which is nice, but he gives us the CNN Headline Sports scores-only version: Star Trek 81, Star Wars 107, X-Files 41. This tells us nothing. It says nothing about the talent, or lack of same, of the creatives involved. It says nothing about what editorial/managerial decisions may have contributed to the decline and fall of these titles. It says nothing about decision-making by Paramount, LucasFilms, and Fox that would have affected the runs of these books. Ken mentions that FIVE different publishers had the rights to Star Trek while it was in print; I want to know WHY the book couldn't settle down, but Ken never gives an explanation. Ken gives us the What without the Why. He also doesn't tell us that comic books don't die like plants that don't get enough water; they get killed off for not making enough money. Right, Knuckles? I can still hear all the old arguments that Ken would come up with to explain the market and Sonic's chances: "Licensed character comics don't have a good track record." "A comic without a motion picture or TV show to back it up won't sell well." "The market is extremely soft right now." "The problem is poor distribution." "The problem is disappearing shelf space." "The comic will never find an audience beyond pre- adolescent boys, and certainly not among females." Thus endeth the reading from The Gospel According To The Conventional Wisdom. Oh, ye of little faith. What intrigues me most is not what Ken says but what he doesn't say. While making the vaguest of bows to the "many people" involved in bringing the comic to pass, he fails to mention what DiC and the SatAM series brought to the table: fleshed-out and believable characters, a compelling back story, and a premise that can keep the comic going for decades. And yet the comic endures often in spite of, rather than because of, Archie's handling. The story line at this point is spinning like Sonic himself, spewing out subplots which may take yet another 100 issues to resolve. The characters are being spared the task of interacting meaningfully with each other by a management team that thrives on sabotaging their creatives by making last-minute changes and turning panic into standard operating procedure. On his message board, Ken expressed the hope that things will have calmed down by the end of the year. Sorry, Ken, I'm not taking THAT bet. So why did the book make it to #99 with the odds against it? Ken got THAT answer right: the fans. Against all odds and despite bouts of bad writing and worse art, such as the notorious "Naugus Games," we haven't given up on Sonic. We haven't given up on the hope of the Freedom Fighters getting back together. We haven't given up on the hope of Sonic going out and kicking Robotnik's butt again on a regular basis. We haven't given up on the hope, whatever Archie may think of it, that Sonic and Sally's relationship will solidify and that they won't continue to act like two characters who have no history or feelings for each other. We haven't given up on the hope that some day Archie will realize that it's not about the style, whether the drawings have been influenced by manga/anime or not. It's about the substance: the premise, the relationships. THESE are what holds this alternate reality together for us. All we ask, as we slide our two bills across the counter every month, is that you don't screw with that any more than you already have. And that you bring back Tails. Sonic #100: "chock full of surprises, thrills, tears, and anything else we could throw up ... er ... throw in." Sonic-Grams: April Washburn sent in an incantation for Merlin to use, before we learned that Ken had broken faith with the readers by revealing that he'd been passing off a phony Tails all along. Ken apologizes to Jack Collins's mom for not being able to guarantee that his fan art will be printed if he sends it in. "We could publish issue after issue of nothing but fan art and still we wouldn't be able to make everyone happy." Maybe not, but an entire issue/portfolio of fan art might have made an interesting special; it certainly would have been a GIANT improvement over SSS15!