Sonic Universe #11 (Feb 2010) Yardley!/Hunzeker cover: Dr. Fin and Knuckles flashing their pearlies as they grin and glower, respectively. Why do I think they're going to start Indian wrestling in a second? "Echoes of the Past: Part 3" Story: Ian Flynn; Art: Tracy Yardley!; Ink: Jim Amash; Color Jason Jensen; Lettering: Teresa Davidson; Assistant Editor: Paul Kaminski; Editor: Mike Pellerito; Editor-in-Chief: Victor Gorelick; Sega Licensing reps: Cindy Chau and David Chu OK, Angel Island has been anchored over the hole in the ground where it once stood. In the previous issue, Dr. Fin gave Knuckles the choice of "cave in my skull now or we can save your precious island." To Knuckles's credit, he chooses the former and we get a page of Knux smacking Fin into several available walls, but the Doc is as pompous and uncooperative as he is unrepentant. He also admits that what's in it for him is access to the Master Emerald, which is being guarded by Ray and Vector. Unfortunately, they make an untimely entrance at this point as Knuckles has a palmface moment. The trip by warp ring must've really affected Ray because his stutter flattens right out; either that, or Archie Comics got letters. Anyway, it starts getting crowded because the Wing-Dingoes show up as well. But before the Chaotix can go into action... Yes, you didn't ask for them but here they are anyway: the Downunda Freedom Fighters: Walt the transsexual Wallabee (I'll ask again: how come a MALE kangaroo has a pouch?), Barby (yes, I know the coloring and the nose and the build are all wrong) Koala, Wombat Stu, Thrash the Tasmanian Devil and body double for Sonic the Werehog, and nobody's favorite Sixties throwback Guru Emu. It only takes one page to get the introductions and the decommissioning of the Wing Dingoes out of the way, but for the benefit of the noobs they all "take cover" and gear up for three pages of exposition. The major development is that former DUFF member Duck Bill Platypus had gone over to the fat side (i.e., signed on with Eggman), and all the local platypuses got the Dark Legion treatment. That's when Thrash was added to the cadre, though the details of his "quest" are unstated, which puts him on the Watch List as far as I'm concerned. Walt then goes into a private confab with Knuckles, telling him that Fin's in league with the local Dark Legion. At this point, the groups have trouble getting their act together. Walt wants to take care of Fin but Guru doesn't like that option. So Guru is swapped to Knuckles's team, but Knuckles then sends Julie-Su and Ray back to babysit the Master Emerald. Julie-Su isn't too keen for the plan, but Knuckles turns on the charm (such as he has) and she agrees. Ray's stutter still hasn't caught up with him by the time he leaves. The Chaotix team gets to the launchers for the chains holding the island in place and notes that they're using "warp ring tech" (which sounds like the name of the college where Dr. Fin earned his degree). Before they can figure out what to do about it, the Wing Dingoes and the Platypus Legion close in. Things aren't going any better for the DUFF Team, either. Fin taunts Thrash with what passes in this comic for racist remarks, and we then get a page of Fin doing some more of his Portal tricks with warp rings. Before Barby can punch him out she's hit in the back by an Ambiguous Fantasy Violence weapon. Back at the crater, Knuckles's team is getting their tails kicked, except for Guru who fast-forwarded to surrender. Knuckles then gets kissed with some AFV 9000s. So we end with Knuckles coming to with at least some of the teams captured (we don't see Guru), and his being confronted with Duck Bill and Fin. HEAD: Back in 1991, Disney re-released the animated "101 Dalmatians" on its 30th anniversary. At least one critic noted that Cruella DeVil was even more villainous in 1991 than in 1961 because when the film first came out it wasn't that big of a deal if you chain-smoked and wore fur. Since she did both, someone suggested that she might as well be a Nazi. We actually get something of that here because despite Dr. Fin's track record in this comic in the villainy department, Ian felt the need to kick it up a notch by making Fin a racist. His taunting of Thrash is unmistakable: "His breed' is useless next to the rest of the mongrels my kind perfected ... the remainder of a failed experiment." Of course, Thrash isn't exactly innocent, either. He signifies his own prejudice with the line "There sure are a lot of echidnas all of a sudden," while practically holding his nose. I don't want to go into a lot of detail on this point, but that's a long-standing bit of shorthand for "racism." It even reared its head in an episode of the animated "Sabrina." Sabrina is sent to a witch's boot camp where she's verbally abused by the top kick for having mixed parentage (human father, witch mother). The recruits are taught a "Sound Off"-type rhyme: "I don't know but I've heard tell Mortals have a funny smell." Frankly, I think Ian is beginning to pile it on a little too thick here. Granted the story needed an element of ambiguity where Fin was concerned to make the very temporary alliance between Knuckles and the Doc seem like a good idea. But this is beginning to feel like the scene from "The Stand" where Stephen King has Randall Flagg, his supernaturally evil antagonist, kick a puppy to death. Should comic books even deal with racism? I don't see why not. But this feels like an exploitation of it to establish Fin's evil cred, which frankly didn't need enhancement. By the end of the issue he's betrayed Knux, his crew and the DUFF. The only other possibility, of course, is that Fin has no allegiance to anyone but himself and is just a free-lance mad scientist. I also wonder whether Ray's long-standing stutter didn't flatten itself out so much as get censored by Editorial because some parents complained. Chau and Chu didn't seem to mind his stutter in the two previous issues or they would have short- stopped it. But given this comic's history it's hard to tell. This could be a significant plot point like the infamous Sonic "double" who did the dirty to Sally in "Endgame," or it could be an example of Editorial censorship, or simply an example of careless writing, the equivalent of Ken Penders forgetting about Antoine's accent after the first two speech balloons of a story. Fin proves, in the best comic book tradition, to be frustratingly indestructible, or at the very least bruise-proof. Despite Knuckles's best efforts at smacking him around, and an aborted attempt by Julie-Su to do the same, he goes through this ep generally unruffled. Small wonder Guru Emu states that "Violence is rarely the answer" : in a comic like this it literally doesn't seem to accomplish anything. There's nothing wrong with the pacing here, and Ian handled the exposition about Duck Bill and the Downunda situation well. Fin's warp ring act, though, is really getting stale. That leaves open the question of how much Ian will/won't reveal in the next and final installment of this arc. I've given up expecting loose continuity to be overruled as a guiding principle in these stories, so I don't expect all of our questions to be answered, let along Knuckles's. Hope he can live with that. Head Score: 7. EYE: Again, Yardley! shows his layout skills on page [2] where Kunckles is smacking Fin around. The same is true for ther next-to-last page where Knuckles comes to and we get a skewed view of the Chaotix and DUFF members as if Knuckles were lying down. Despite that, the dialogue between Knuckles and Julie-Su where he tells her and Ray to beat it is oddly passive. Eye Score: 9. HEART: Sorry, there's nothing really Heart-worthy going on here. The moment between Knuckles and Julie-Su is as flat and static as the two panels that contain it. Fin is the star of this installment, like it or not, and he's about as heartless as they come. Heart Score: n/a Off-Panel: "Ray Saves The Day" is all right, but "Gotcha" immediately made me think: "Toons; get's em every time." Points if you know where that line came from. Letters: M.I. is told that Fiona is coming back soon, which is interesting. At this point she either has to stay hooked up with Scourge or else risk destruction attempting one more face turn. Antwuan wants to know what Rutan's deal is, but whoever in Editorial answers the mail isn't even dropping any hints. It'll be hard enough work to get word to Rutan that mama's gone bye- bye. Daniel (no relation) also asks about the Mobius: 30 Years Later arc and gets told "Wait and see." Ditto with the Dark Legion. Hey, if I wanted to wait I'd go to a bus stop. Fan Art: And now for something completely different: Maria as a hedgehog. Honestly, she looks kind of cute. Props to Bryn and Brendan for the artwork. I'd be surprised if someone didn't attempt a fanfic along those line among the thousands of Sonic fanfics floating around the Net.