<b>Chapter Six: Sega Takes Over and the Angst Overloads (Issues 76-100)</b>
<i>Last time, on As Mobius Turns…</i>
Just as Sonic and the Freedom Fighters were settling in to their new peaceful lives, a new threat has emerged. A robotic Robotnik, having destroyed his own Mobius, has travelled to their universe to repeat the process. Although our heroes have managed to derail his schemes briefly, they have some serious problems ahead. Robo-Robotnik has control of the Robians. The residents of Mobotropolis are under attack. And worse of all, Robotnik’s old computers still hold the location of Knothole. And in the months to come, these will be the least of their problems…
<i>And now, our feature presentation…</i>
After the disaster of the Sega Saturn, Sega desperately needed a new console, something that could chisel into that upstart Sony’s monumental market share and keep the company afloat for a little while longer. This gave birth to the Dreamcast, now regarded as one of the most underrated consoles ever released. Of course, this also meant it was finally time to get a new Sonic game released. What resulted was Sonic Adventure, easily one of the few good 3D Sonics.
Yes, I just said something positive about a 3D Sonic game. Go suck on that.
And since that little Archie comic was still running along, the execs at Sega of America decided it would be a wonderful idea to have their comic run an adaptation of said game. The problem was, it wasn’t their comic. Because of Yuji Naka’s retarded ego, Sega had missed the gravy train with X-Treme. And since they were too busy trying to save their own assies after Bernie Stolar wrecked the Saturn’s chances in the US, Archie had pretty much free reign of what went on. And you’ve seen the results.
But you know that already. Now on to the good stuff…if that term really applies.
THE GREAT ESCAPE
Upon returning to Mobotropolis, the gang find that the whole city has been reduced to near rubble. Shadow-Bots are quickly herding up whoever wasn’t lucky enough to escape already and marching them into Robotnik’s HQ to await Roboticization. Meanwhile, Robotnik is still finishing the final touches on his new body, which is the only thing giving the Freedom Fighters enough time to find survivors, implant a virus into Robotnik’s computer system, and hightail it to Knothole. Oh, and Snively’s still with them.
In the end, it basically comes down to everyone but Sonic, Sally, and Snively joining up with the advance parties, while the remaining three march boldly into Robotnik’s control room. Sonic ends up on guard duty, easily destroying some Shadow-Bots and saving a few other civilians in the process. Further proving that, for all his supposed genius, no Robotnik can design a robot that doesn’t break apart if a three-foot-tall hedgehog taps into it. Meanwhile, Sally and Snively manage to cast more doubt upon the engineering capabilities of our evil overlord by…shocking them to death with a few wires. Uh huh. Anyway, they easily implant the virus, and everything’s fine.
Except, the writers decided there wasn’t enough angst. And what was their solution? A LOVE TRIANGLE!
As it turns out, one of those rescued happens to be a sixteen-year-old mongoose, named…well, Mina Mongoose. Seriously, nobody was ever creative when they came up with these names. It’s like someone saying their name is “Joe Human." Anyway, her mother’s been captured, Sonic stops her from running inside after her, and rather than actually try to go and, you know, save Mina’s mom with his super speed, he just decides to sit down and tell her about how much their lives suck and all that. He tries to say it’s too dangerous, but NOTHING we have seen up to this point has implied that Robotnik’s so-called superior technology is that much more stable than the old Robotnik. He could have at least <i>checked</i> on her or something.
Anyway, Snively decides to run off, and the newly-minted band of refugees decide to head off for Knothole. Meanwhile, Robotnik emerges to launch his new offensive at the furry people’s little hideaway…only to suddenly catch a cold. Yes, the virus gave him a cold. Nevermind that they could have, you know, deleted the information on top of that, or crashed his whole network. No, it just gave him a cold.
Smooth move, princess.
SONIC ADVENTURE
After a quick filler of Sonic bashing some robots and the group returning to the refugee-overrun Knothole, the plot finally kicks back into gear. King Acorn decides to forgive Sonic for, you know, breaking a direct military order and leading an unsupervised attack on an unknown enemy in deep space. And putting his daughter in mortal danger. But in any case, Sonic gets a full pardon, and even gets knighted! Yay, happy endings for all! Oh, except for Robotnik retaking their capital and reverting it to Robotropolis. And just to make sure the angst factor is still in account, Alicia’s life support starts to fail, giving her only a week to live. Of course, they stil have that Ring of Acorns lying around, so Elias decides to use the last of its power to revive his mother.
Yes, another easy happy ending. Unfortunately, said ring could probably have also been used to, you know, defeat Robotnik and drive his fat ass off of Mobius forever. That would probably be a far better use for a mystical one-of-a-kind artifact in the long run. However, Elias isn’t that smart. And even more unfortunately, there is one more continuity snarl to deal with.
Sega realized how creepy having a ten-year-old girl lust after a sixteen-year-old speedster really was, and bumped her age up to thirteen. Archie’s Amy was still ten. So…what do they do? They first have her get cruelly rejected by the other Freedom Fighters because of her age (despite having Tails, who’s actually younger than her). Her solution? Break into the storage room, steal the Ring of Acorns, and selfishly use the last of its wishes to make herself thirteen! Oh, and she does it JUST AS ELIAS IS WALKING INTO THE ROOM. So, in short, she has quite visibly shattered the prince’s one remaining hope of reviving his mother, while also being caught stealing a priceless royal treasure, all because the Freedom Fighters weren’t willing to drag yet another child (an unskilled one, at that) into a danger zone.
Fortunately (depending on your perspective), Amy’s head is saved from the chopping block when Nate decides her magical age-up would be interesting to “study.” Yes, our “good Overlander” Nate is suddenly a Ephebohile. That, or my brain has been so polluted by the Internet that I’ve turned into a Freud sleuth, seeking out sexual undertones whereever I go. But anyway, this plot point goes nowhere, there are never any side effects to the age progression (other than the loss of the Ring of Acorns), and we have a game adaptation to make!
Turns out Nate also knows of one more place to check for a cure: the City of the Ancients, a hidden settlement occupied by gasp FIVE-FINGERED OVERLANDERS! AAAAAGH, THE HORROR! Meanwhile, Mina finally realizes that Sonic was probably right about leaving her mother to be turned into a mindless robot, and starts becoming attracted to him. And so we dump her for nearly a dozen issues. And, for that matter, anyone not connected to the games.
The gang fly over to an unidentified island, where they find the remains of a jet liner crash. (Checkhov’s gun loaded.) The actual city is underground, forcing them to go through an ancient mine shaft. (Checkhov’s gun cocked.) And finally, after their non-eventful trip, they stand before a metropolitan city, Station Square.
Yes, folks, the “Ancients” are, in fact, regular humans. Not Overlanders, but actual humans. They also happen to be a lot nicer than the Overlanders, gracefully accepting the furries and signing a mutual defense pact with the Mobians. I guess this was supposed to be an apology for the demonization of anything resembling a human, an attitude that would only grow deeper as the series continues. But it’s more likely they realized that the Sonic series is, in fact, an idealistic series, and were editorially forced to recant their previous position and fix their mistakes.
Or, perhaps, someone brought up those early issues where they MOCKED DARK, ANGSTY SUPERHEROES AND COMICS.
Anydangway, the Ancient’s city, Station Square, is very strangely futuristic for the survivors of a jet liner crash thousands of years in the past. Hell, they have mini malls! MINI MALLS! And a full military, despite there not being any contact with the outside world for all this time! And that’s not mentioning the subway (which makes a little sense), the beach (despite being underground), and plenty of chili dogs (despite the implication that the Mobians thought of the food first). But that’s enough of my shit musings, let’s continue.
Elsewhere, in the Cat Country (groan), Robotnik smashed the Black Emerald, unleashing the amorphous creature Chaos. In the actual game, said monstrosity was sealed inside the Master Emerald, but since Mammoth Mogul is sealed inside in this continuity, I guess they had to invent something as stupid as the CAT COUNTRY to explain his arrival. Of course, Chaos is far from full power; he can only “evolve” by swallowing Chaos Emeralds. And since they are in abundance on Mobius, that should be no problem. Strangely, though, Robotnik throws a hissy fit when one emerald is swallowed by a frog, and builds a small squad of bird-powered robots to get that amphibian. Enter Big the Cat. And exit Big the Cat, because even then, Archie realized nobody would ever fucking like that goddamn fishing fatass and moved on.
The CAT COUNTRY retaliates by stealing the Master Emerald, causing the Floating Island to lose orbit and collapse. Rather than shatter on impact with the ocean, the land mass defies physics even more than it already has and simply reverts to being a regular island. Meanwhile, Julie-Su and the Chaotix are captured by the CAT COUNTRY (!), forcing Knuckles to go hunt them down. After some shenanigans, it turns out the Cat Country was nearly wiped out by a more bloodthirsty Echidna tribe, and they simply thought they were in cahoots with Robotnik. And to hammer the point in more, the tribe was called the KNUCKLES tribe. Locke named his son after a group of warmongers who nearly fucked the planet over completely by pissing off Chaos. Oh, and NONE OF THIS HAS ANYTHING TO DO WITH SONIC ADVENTURE. Hurray for pointlessness!
The rest is pretty much like the game, with far fewer serious alterations. In the end, Chaos reaches its perfect form, only to get destroyed by Super Sonic. Then, next issue, Metal Sonic returns to attack Station Square. And…um…something happens, and he ends up dead. And Robotnik is driven out of Station Square once and for all. And thus, our time with the Ancients comes to an end.
MINA MONGOOSE…AGAIN
Meanwhile, back at Archie HQ, Karl Boellers was having a bad day. His much-planned love triangle between Sonic, Sally and Mina had been stopped by Sega’s editorial mandate. This left the new character woefully underdeveloped in all four of her very brief appearances to this point. His backup plan was to introduce her one defining characteristic in backup stories; unfortunately, Ken Penders was kicked back into his clutches, and with him came the Knuckles series. And thus, Mina’s one glowing chance of establishing herself was scuttled faster than the stock market. (/sarcasm.)
Oh, and what was that one magic link between her and Sonic? Well…she can run fast. Really, that’s it. Granted, she’s still a speedster, and is nearly as fast as Sonic in several regards, but just having the same superpower does not a match make. It didn’t help that her personality was custom built to simply be Sally’s opposite: a dainty, non-action girl to contrast with the Princess’ kickass demeanor. (Of course, by this point Sally had been reduced to the group chick, but let’s focus, people.) To top it off, Mina was absolutely WORTHLESS in combat. She couldn’t control her speed, she fainted at the sight of any danger, and her sole purpose in life was to nearly get kidnapped repeatedly. To say they have a relationship based only on the same power is like saying Batman and Batgirl should date because they both have the word “bat” in their name! (Um…bad example.)
So, we have a tacked-on character, in a tacked-on love triangle, with a tacked-on superpower, in the middle of a kids comic-turned-soap opera. She DOES get better MUCH later on (somewhat starting around Issue 119, and is the only DECENT reworking in the scourge that is Issue 135), but in the meantime, let’s soak in the hatedom of the comic’s most despised OC. (Until the much worse one comes back.)
SETTING ANGST LEVELS TO 11
So, the Sonic team (not the real-life inbred retards) comes back, only to remember they kinda forgot that whole Alicia thing. So, their plan is to lead an assault into Robotropolis and steal the medical supplies needed to save the queen. Except, if they were already IN Mobotropolis for 25 issues, why didn’t they think to scrounge this stuff up THEN? Maybe I’m just remembering this plot point wrong. I just remember this whole story arc sucking balls to put it lightly, but it ends with some confrontations with Uncle Chuck, a few battles, and finally concludes with Alicia being revived. Only…King Acorn is paralyzed from the waist down in the process. So, what is Sally’s response?
A) Simply be glad her mother is alive, and look into curing her father’s condition.
B) Get to work figuring out their next plan of attack, while remembering that they were lucky to get out alive.
C) Start blaming Sonic for everything that happened, even though he is CLEARLY not at fault.
If you guessed A or B, congratulations, you’re officially smarter than EVERYONE IN THIS FUCKING COMIC! We’re barely halfway through, and my brain is hurting already!
And while we’re in trivia time, what is Sonic’s reaction to all this?
A) Wait until Sally has calmed down and explain the situation.
B) Let the girl have some space while he keeps watch for a possible counterattack.
C) Steal the Sword of Acorns and run around playing knight with the priceless artifact.
If you found yourself reaching for a gun at this point, remember that they are evil, bastardly tools used only by primitive Overlanders. And while we’re on that plot point, Arachnis attacks and steal s the Sword of Acorns. While Sonic and Mina (who he bumped into along the way) give chase, they come across a recently-landed spaceship. And guess who’s on it? OVERLANDERS, led by none other than Colin Kintobor, Robotnik’s long-lost brother. Perhaps rightfully fearing retribution at the hands of the Mobians, a few Overlanders put themselves in cold sleep and blasted themselves into space in hopes of settling on a new planet. That backfires, however, when the ship suddenly comes back to Mobius ten years later.
Of course, Sonic decides to try and be cordial, offering to fill them in on what has happened and help them get settled. Unfortunately, one of the first people to exit the ship happens to be Hope Kintobor, Colin’s daughter who has never seen a Mobian in her life, and the sight of a three-foot-tall blue hedgehog is obviously enough to send her running and Colin into fight mode. But THEN, Robotnik shows up and offers to take them to Robotropolis. Needless to say, the Overlanders decide to settle in the robot-operated, toxic death hole rather than deal with the peace-loving Mobian. There’s a moral here, but…fuck it, it’s been said enough already.
And one more question, folks. Now that King Acorn is incapacitated, who will be the ruler of the Kingdom of Knothole?
A) Sally, because she has experience as the leader of a rebellion.
B) Alicia, because she is still technically co-ruler.
C) King Acorn, because his brain hasn’t been damaged any more in his near-death experience.
The answer is, NONE OF THE ABOVE. Instead, he instates Elias yet again, erasing any tiny shreds of sympathy we may have had for the character. And it gets BETTER! Because the prince is knowingly unfit to rule, he starts getting advice…from Geoffrey St. John. Sonic’s rival. You can guess where this is going, can’t you?
Well, needless to say, Sonic gets berated (which he should be for acting like an idiot), is stripped of knighthood (which is fair), and reduced to a common teenager. Which is where I start banging my head against the desk. Why would you ever, EVER consider stripping your best soldier, the one responsible for BRINGING ROBOTNIK DOWN IN THE FIRST PLACE, and make him nothing more than a regular kid? Why would you throw away the one advantage you have over a superiorly-numbered and vastly more advanced dictator? And the whole reason Elias is doing this? Because Geoffrey, who he KNOWS has designs on his sister, is telling him to.
Up to this issue, I actually liked Elias a lot. He actually seemed to know he wasn’t in a position to lead, and willingly turned it over to people more able. And yet he was also somewhat intelligent, being trained by the GREAT ECHIDNAS and all. But in this story, he goes from a somewhat believable (for a furry comic) royal to an absolutely clueless dipshit, all because a jealous skunk started whispering naughty thoughts in his ear.
Oh, and in the process of all this, Amy reveals she’s the sister of Rob O’ the Hedge, and goes to live with him. See you later, pink wish-stealing bitch.
SCHOOL DAYS
Nice boat. There, obligatory joke’s out of the way.
So, because Sonic is a regular person now, he has to go to school. And since this is a kid’s comic, it’s presented as the worst punishment one can ever face. It wasn’t that bad. I mean, once you get used to the swirlies, the beat downs, the disgusting apathy of all faculty, the institutionalized incompetence of teachers, and the stale smell of crushed dreams mixed with piss and excrement outside of a racketball court, it’s an all right experience. Isn’t going to school in California grand?
In the meantime, Elias has managed to build Knothole, which is SUPPOSED TO BE A FEW HUTS IN THE MIDDLE OF A FOREST, into a thriving city, complete with all manners of social services. Furthermore, he’s reinstated the Secret Service, the soldiers are more trained than ever, and Robotnik is still at bay. Too bad the blue hedgehog has to save their asses constantly. Only this time, every time he beats someone down, Geoffrey gets to make empty threats. Oh, and Nate is reduced to a physics teacher, which is pretty advanced stuff to teach to a bunch of woodland critters with no formalized education system for ten years.
And while this is going on, Tails is kidnapped by the Walkers. More on that later.
The comic follows this tangent for a while, while also trying desperately trying to scrape some development out of Mina. They fail, up until the part where Sally sneaks out of the palace, only to see Mina kiss Sonic. But wait, it’s a simple misunderstanding, she was just thanking him for saving her from a robot a few issues earlier! Unfortunately, the writers decide to stick with this sitcom plot for nearly ten more issues.
In the meantime, the Secret Service get themselves captured, but manage to escape with Sonic’s (disguised) help. Colin is reunited with his son, Snively, who is now working for Robotnik again. Sonic recaptures Kodos, now reduced to a total lunatic for some reason. And to top it off, Sonic is recruited to fight Shadow the Hedgehog in a horribly misplaced, generally poorly-written adaptation of Sonic Adventure 2. Fun times.
ISSUE 100
Issue 100 starts with Kodos escaping captivity. Meanwhile, Sally, having seen her hubby in a compromising situation, runs across Arachnos, who is now dying a horrible, toxic-fueled death. It turns out Robotnik’s openly poisonous industrial plants and poor handling of nuclear runoff can KILL people! Oh, and she still has the Sword of Acorns. Which is now what Kodos is focused on. Go fig.
Sonic rushes in to save the day…only for Kodos to shove Sally off a cliff. But as it turns out, the Sword of Acorns is connected to the Source, and she can FLY. And shoot death beams. Which kill Kodos. Joy. And then Mina comes running in to tell them that Nate has gone into Robotropolis to warn the Overlanders of their impending doom. So, the team comes rushing in to save his dumb midget ass. In the end, Uncle Chuck and Muttski manage to recover their free will AGAIN, they fail to save the Overlanders, but they DO manage to lead the Robians out. Unfortunately, Robotnik has also managed to program his body to Roboticize by touch, making him effectively invulernable. And in order to get everyone outside of Robotropolis’ newly-installed force field, Nate stays behind, just so Robotnik can reduce him to a machine.
And thus ends Nate Morgan. Considering he hasn’t done anything of import since his introduction, his passing was long overdue.
MEANWHILE, ON THE FLOATING ISLAND…
Lara-Le and Wyn get hitched. This is the worst thing you can do in a comic. I’m convinced that 99% of all writers are miserable curmudgeons, who project their inability to find and retain any meaningful relationships within their own sad lives. As a result, any character that gets married or has a serious romantic relationship is doomed to lose even more than they started with. Spider-Man? Sold his soul to the devil to suit the demands of a time-trapped editor. Daredevil? His girlfriend was stuffed in a fridge so the resulting story arc could have more impact. Batman? The guy’s gone from having basic superhero issues to being a paranoid wackjob incapable of even sustaining a working relationship with his sidekicks. And guess what happens here?
The dingoes start a rebellion. Yes, they grab a bunch of guns and start firing on everything in sight. But this gets derailed when the Dark Legion…destroy the Floating Island. Or “send everyone on it to another dimension.” Why? The whole thing just seems…counterproductive to their stated goal. They WANT to rule over the Echidnas! Wiping them out isn’t exactly a good way to get that point across!
But wait! Knuckles survives the attack, although he landed in the ocean and has no idea where he is. Furthermore, his father’s genetic tampering has started to turn him into the Hulk. Or…he suddenly turns green with unbridled Chaos energy and goes on a destructive spree. This is made MUCH worse when Gala-La, having abandoned any shreds of being a good guy, tries to drain him with a recreated Chaos Syphon. She rolls straight ones, causing the machine to fail spectacularly and make Knuckles even STRONGER. And next up, the Watchers decide that Tails would be the perfect person to send up against the Echidna equivalent of Doctor Manhattan.
Oh, and we also meet Tails’ grandfather, Merlin Prower. And you can probably guess what his schtick is. Tails is supercharged into Turbo Tails and sent to beat the shit out of his friend. And…he gets his ass handed to him. HARD. By the end of it all, the Watchers barely manage to save his two-tailed ass, but not before seeding the plot threads of a future issue. Yes, it seems Tails was SUPPOSED to win, but something went wrong during the teleportation. The consequences will be revealed a little over ten issues later.
Finally, Knuckles manages to reach the Floating Island…and in a series of unfortunate events, he stumbles across the Dark Legion’s headquarters. Inside, he finds Julie-Su, as well as Lien-Da and Dmitri, the latter two gloating over their newest victory. Oh, and Tobor and Kragok punch out of the Warp again, only to slam into the Dark Legion’s ship and die, destroying their zone projector in the process. Hurray for pointless deaths!
So, Knuckles is here, powerful enough to take out the entire Legion, and in a very pissed off mood. What does he do? He listens to one little pep talk from Dmitri and decides to abandon everything he’s ever known so he can join the Dark Legion. What?
What?
<b>WHAT THE HELL IS THIS, PENDERS?</b> Dmitri has tried to actively KILL KNUCKLES in the past. For all he knows, the former Enerjak may have damned his entire race in limbo over a small slight THOUSANDS OF YEARS IN THE PAST. And all it takes is one speech to change the Guardian’s mind?
This was the start of an unfortunate storyline that would run through the Knuckles stories, up to the time jump after Issue 125. In order to bring some more grey into the “good Brotherhood vs. evil Legion” backstory, the Legion’s standing was softened considerably, going from attempted conquerors to simply wanting to rejoin society at large. Which may have worked…except it was handled very poorly. The actual good points of the Legion (their advancement in actually beneficial technology over the virtual stagnation of Echidnaopolis) were avoided in favor of painting Dmitri as an unfortunate victim. He isn’t. He is a psychopath that tried to destroy his entire island because somebody wouldn’t allow him to test his pet project.
Sorry to bring up other comics again, but think about Doctor Doom in the 1980s and 1990s. Prior to that time, he was simply another mad scientist trying to kill the Fantastic Four. Eventually, Marvel realized he wasn’t that interesting anymore, so they changed him around, adding in that dash of greyness that can make or break a villain. And it worked. He was a despotic ruler of a third-world European nation, but he was occasionally allowed to show genuine care for his people. He actually managed to accomplish one or two good things under his rule, especially in reducing crime to near zero. The methods were horrid, but he was given enough character motivation to surpass his “kill Reed Richards” beginnings. (I’m sure Wil will argue with me on this point, but still.) However, that tonal change happened over time. Here, we’re given ONE ISSUE to change our perception on who was up to that point second only to Robotnik on the monster scale.
Oh, if only we had some fire ants, then we’d show him!
CONCLUSION
Robotnik’s return was welcome, but the series was still in heaps of trouble. Basically, nobody thought to keep it as an action series (what it was good as), and instead started to emphasize the characters and romantic conflicts more and more. This trend would continue until Karl Boellers and Ken Penders (the two head writers) were unceremoniously thrown out a plate glass window, and even then, it was a slow return to form.
Besides that, there’s nothing to report. The big stuff starts coming down in the next batch. Get your bile bags ready.
I have to see what else he’s reviewed, in Countdown to Final Crisis he’s got plenty of crap to attack. 
