Tag Archives: Tails

Sonic The Hedgehog Volume 3: Battle For Angel Island Review

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It’s time to dive back into the world of Sonic, one of the ultimate video game characters of all time. The comic run has really been a lot of fun thus far and this continues the trend. We finally get to see Metal Sonic’s grand master plan and it’s a doozy. He makes for a good villain and it’ll be tough to top this arc for a while with how large scale it was. Might be time to bring Scourge in.

The comic starts off right away with the heroes meeting up and deciding what they need to do about Metal Sonic. Ultimately they decide to split into multiple teams so they can take Metal Sonic down, defeat his minions, and restore balance to the cosmos. Sonic and Knuckles will be going to fight off Metal Sonic directly while the others spread out across the globe. Do they really have what it takes to defeat the world’s ultimate robot?

The graphic novel brings 4 issues and they basically all go towards this arc with 3 to wrap this up and then one that’s an epilogue which also sets up the next arc. As you can imagine that means this is a very action packed story. Metal Sonic was always very powerful so throw in his copy abilities and the abilities of the Master Emerald and now you’ve really got a tough opponent to deal with. Metal Sonic keeps his logic the whole time too so don’t expect him to turn into a mindless monster. No, Metal Sonic is here to stay and has the abilities to dominate a fight in close or long range. He really seems to be overpowering Sonic and Knuckles with ease even before his power up.

The only one really able to give him a good fight there was Shadow and that’s in large part due to him landing a cheap shot when he first showed up. Ultimately if he and Sonic worked together I expect they would have really been able to throw him for a loop though. If I had any minor issue with the comic it’s that I would have enjoyed a longer fight. I feel like it ends just as it’s getting good and I just would have liked to have really gotten to settle in and enjoy this for a while longer. Still, we do have a lot of general action all around so it’s not the kind of thing that will really hurt the score.

In terms of power levels I am a bit skeptical on burning Blaze basically using up all of her energy while taking down the other villains. I know she had to use up a bunch of her powers in the fight but all of them? Felt like a quick way to keep her from fighting Metal Sonic but that would have been a really cool fight. In general Blaze looks great here though and I’m glad that her flame abilities are getting a lot of props. Back in the Sonic Rush days she was able to fight on par with Sonic after all. I would ultimately give him the edge in a fight of course but it would be a good battle.

Shadow is still a really big solo player here and the guy definitely has no inclination to work with the heroes at all. In fact he actively works against them most of the time which can be a bit funny but I can also see how it would annoy some. Ultimately Shadow just wants to do his own thing at all costs and he typically has the power to back it up so it all works out. If we eventually get a Sonic vs Shadow battle that would definitely be a whole lot of fun.

This arc also ends the era of the Sonic Forces group I’d say as it feels like everyone will be going their separate ways more. I am personally expecting a few more down to Earth arcs before we get to the next grand one like the Metal Sonic saga. I could be wrong of course but it makes sense as a way to scale back before we ramp things up again. With the new scientist who revived Eggman the plot could be her trying to impress him by building a bunch of robots that Sonic keeps on destroying. Finally she and Eggman create an ultimate robot even stronger than Metal Sonic and we go from there.

Meanwhile it also might not be a bad idea to do some arcs where you focus on other characters like Tails and Knuckles. I don’t think you want to leave Sonic out of the picture for very long but some quick meanwhiles could definitely work. The Sonic cast is absolutely big enough where you could really pull that off if you wanted to. If you’re feeling extra bold you could even do a mini Shadow arc since that guy is always a lot of fun to follow around.

As always the art is definitely really solid here. The character designs are on point and the action scenes are good. The pages capture Sonic’s speed well and it’s just very easy o read the stories. They are all real page turners and so this way there is no delay in you trying to figure out what is happening on screen. There’s a lot of attention to detail and the writing is on point too. It really goes back to the top of there not really being any big issues here. As another future plot point, Silver also seems to think that the real threat is still approaching so I’ll be interested to see what that is.

Metal Sonic is still around even if he’s weakened so I look forward to seeing what he does from here. I don’t think he will be able to go back to just being another minion so going forward I see him as a wild card threat. That sounds good to me because he is such an interesting character. He has his own goals, aspirations, and tactics and I think having him return with an army that forces Eggman and Sonic to team up would be brilliant.

Overall, Sonic The Hedgehog continues to deliver with a ton of great comics. The IDW series has really done a splendid job of keeping up the momentum here to really mitigate the sadness of losing the Archie verse. The characters are true to their game counterparts and the stories make sense as sequels to what happened in the games. The comics have even introduced a few new characters already who are cool. At the end of the day these are comics that I can recommend to anyone and that’s great because Sonic is a series that really should appeal to everyone. It’s just such a fun franchise. I’m confident that the series will continue to go strong from here so I’m really looking forward to the next one. After all this will be the first time we get to see Eggman really get involved in the comics and as he’s Sonic’s most well known villain it’s about time we catch up with him.

Overall 8/10

Sonic the Hedgehog, Vol. 1: Fallout! Review

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It’s time to finally jump into the world of Sonic in the more recent comic series. Sonic has had a ton of epic comics over the years and you’d expect no less from the greatest video game series of all time. After playing Sonic Frontiers it was pretty good timing to be reading this comic. It really is a great way of starting off the saga. I had a blast and look forward to seeing how things go from here.

The story kicks off fairly quick as Sonic takes down a bunch of Eggman’s robots. After the events of Sonic Forces Eggman vanished but his army remained. They now randomly attack across the planet and so the heroes must all join forces and do their best to stop these bots. The problem is the sheer numbers of them and more are built by the day. So while they may not be a threat to Sonic and friends, the world is quite large and people will continue to be at danger until they’re all taken down. This volume brings 4 issues and right now they’re all fairly stand alone as we start to learn more about the overall threat.

The first story involves Tails as Sonic teams up with him to stop the robots. Then we have one for Amy, Knuckles, and finally Tangle. In each comic Sonic shows up to save the day but it becomes clear that the robots do have some kind of a master now. The attacks have grown coordinated and more powerful robots are also showing up. Sonic is as confident as ever but the rest of the heroes are getting a bit nervous at this point. Can they really hold out against such an onslaught forever?

My first big praise for the series will be the action series. Perhaps it’ll feel like a given that the series has great fights but there is a lot of detail to the action in each issue. There will be whole pages of no text, just action as the heroes use combo attacks and take the enemies down. I like that there is a lot of choreography here and actual back and forth. These aren’t one hit KOs or anything like that. Instead you’re getting actual battles through and through which is a great thing. Sure the robots aren’t a real threat to Sonic but that’s not really the point anyway. You’re here to see what he can do with his speed and I like the combos are are used all the time.

The writing here is also great as you would expect. Sonic is as confident as ever and takes all the villains down easily but he has the skills to back it up. He’s never overconfident and he’s also still very mature. When the other heroes want to get deep or talk about something important he doesn’t brush them off and still has a reasonable answer. His conversation with Amy about joining the resistance was a very good conversation. Nobody jumped to conclusions or anything, just a solid talk where they each explained their points of view and that was the end of it.

As a result I’m happy to report that all of the characters were solid here. Tails also looks good and while he may still be a little on the nervous side, he can still fight and defend himself. This is Tails closer to his best like in Adventure 2 Battle and I like that because he absolutely has proven himself many times at this point. It’s fine to be a little nervous especially with Sonic being taken down by Infinite and pals in the past but he’s not whining about it or anything like that.

Meanwhile Amy looks really good here as well. She’s keeping her feelings in check and doing a great job as the leader of the resistance. (She’s basically the leader at this point) She can still fight a lot and of course she would love to go with Sonic but she chooses her responsibilities first. Amy has come a long way and this really makes her a much more endearing character. You can also sympathize with her one sided romance towards Sonic more now that it’s not portrayed as this crazy gag that’s always around. Holding herself back and just trying to go about things normally is a great move. Even if Sonic were to vanish again, I think she’d be able to keep the resistance in good shape.

Then we have Knuckles who is on point here. He always has a great dynamic with Sonic and you know that the two of them can take on any threat that gets in their way. They have a good fight against two new fighters who showed up and I would take these two against just about any villain combination. I can also see why Knuckles is eager to go back to Angel Island since actively running around and getting results is really his thing. He’s not the kind of guy who usually just sits behind the desk and it fits in with his character.

Finally we have Tangle who is new for the comics and she’s been a fun character so far. I know apparently there is a reference for her within Sonic Frontiers as well so she may even get to the games soon. Her tail makes for a very handy weapon in combat and she can take care of herself. I’m not sure I totally have a read on her personality yet but she’s strong and is a quick thinker as she helped Sonic and Blaze take out the enemies. I look forward to seeing more of her later on.

Meanwhile Blaze did get to appear as well which was fun. She shows up rather suddenly but that’s the fun part of time travel. The comics are already hinting that something major is about to happen and I’m absolutely ready for it. Imagine if Infinite returns soon? We already have a mysterious villain talking tough in the background and planning things out so I’m looking forward to seeing who that is. Shadow hasn’t appeared yet either but there will be time for that. The comics are slowly re-introducing all of the characters which is a good way to start things off. I also like how they show that the Egg robots can be a decent threat when there are enough of them.

I was always skeptical about the world being taken over without Sonic and I still am to be honest since the game never gave a good reason for why Shadow wasn’t around taking everyone out. I consider that to be a bit of a plot hole but the comics are doing good damage control here. I also just like the continuity being present here because it just adds a little extra immersion to the whole experience.

It almost goes without saying but the art is really solid. All of the characters stand out and the colors are bright and vibrant in general. This all looks fantastic all the way around and it makes reading the comics a breeze. I hope they keep this artist for the full run if possible because it would be difficult to top this.

Overall, Sonic is off to the races once more. I always thought the Archie comics were fantastic as well so I was sad to see them go but hopefully this new ongoing will continue for a very long time as well. I think Archie had something like 700 issues so for me I first want to see 100 total issues and then after that I’d like the series to reach 1000. Of course that will take years to do but it would be a really fun goal. If you haven’t read the comics yet then you definitely should. It’s got everything that a Sonic fan could possibly want!

Overall 8/10

Team Sonic Racing Stats and Records

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Stats time!

PS4 Trophies 20/52
1341 R Points
64/142 Story Stars Collected
Total Distance Driven 551KM
Wisps Transferred 289
Favorite Character Sonic
Team Ultimates Activated 75
Stunts Performed 326
Skimboosts Given 43
Slingshot Boosts Performed 116
Total Rings Collected 4688
Total Races Finished 60

Sonic Colors: Rise of the Wisps Review

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It’s always hype when Sega decides to give us a cool Sonic animated short. This one is in the Sonic Colors part of the verse. It’s a phrase I never thought I would see again. I was never a big fan of the Wisp mechanics since I much prefer to just be doing my own thing at all times with Sonic speed but if you’ve got it you might as well use it right? This special is around 10-12 minutes long and features Metal Sonic so you can’t go wrong.

The basic plot is that Eggman has his two robots: Cubot and Orbot kidnapping Wisps across the planet. Sonic and Tails decide that the mad man must be stopped. He’s already captured a lot of the Wisps across the planet so saving them all will be difficult. Additionally, Eggman has brought in his most powerful robot of all time…Metal Sonic. Can Sonic take down this robot or are the Wisps doomed?

Sonic has his signature humor which is always fun. The guy’s just a great character and even with only a few minutes to spare in the special you can tell that these guys really get the core of his character. Sonic may not like to sit around and listen to long stories but he is quick to act. Metal Sonic may be a tad faster in base but Sonic has a lot more experience in combat and uses that to his advantage.

He also has the Wisps at the ready and uses them to get a pretty good advantage in their battle. Sonic reminds us that the powers of friendship are always a mighty ally to have on your side at all times. Even at the end of the special he is looking at the big picture while Tails is beginning to panic. It’s why Sonic is always seen as such a natural leader.

Tails doesn’t look at good with the panicking but usually that is the sidekick’s role. You panic a lot which by extension makes the main hero look even better. It’s all part of the plan after all. Tails peaked in Sonic Adventure 2 Battle and since then the new continuity hasn’t used him quite as well. His gadgets always do come in handy though.

As for Metal Sonic, this is one of those versions that is more on the mindless side. I wouldn’t say he is completely mindless or anything like that but the guy is more instinct than anything else. He just wants to win and prove he is the fastest but don’t expect a lot of strategy or anything like that. Still, it is great to see him as always. He definitely gives Sonic a run for his money.

Cubot and Orbot are decent. I prefer them as Eggman’s mindless minions to some of the other iterations. Changing one of their voice boxes to the announcer’s sound effects felt very odd though. Maybe they couldn’t get the voice actor back in time for this special? That would be my guess at least but the whole announcer thing works well enough. Just watch your volume if you’re on headphones because it can be a bit on the loud side.

As for the Wisps, I’m still not much of a fan but they do end up helping when it counts which is good. It was nice to see them actually contribute and even try to free everyone before Sonic showed up. It at least meant that the Wisps were resourceful and weren’t just going to wait and be saved. Now that’s what I like to see.

The animation’s not bad. It’s definitely good for a Youtube exclusive. The colors are smooth and we get some nice speed effects. It’s going for a bit of an old school cutscene look. I like the direction it’s going in but for a full show I would definitely like to clean up the animation a bit. This special has full voice acting which is really cool so that definitely gets a thumbs up from me.


Overall, This special is under 15 minutes so there isn’t a whole lot more to talk about. It’s pretty fun and really feels like it is over in the blink of an eye. The writing is solid and most importantly, they really got Sonic’s personality across. He’s really a hero you can count on and who is always ready to have the team at his back. He isn’t trying to do things solo if it’ll put anyone in danger. It’ll be cool if we get more specials like this.

Overall 7/10

Audrey II vs Tails

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Suggested by Sonic Audrey II is a powerful plant that eats anyone in sight. Naturally that’s not someone that you want to mess with. Still, Tails has a lot of gadgets at his disposal that will make dealing with her a lot easier. Put it this way, he can just fire a few of his fire bombs from the Cyclone and that’ll end the match. There’s no way for Audrey to close the gap. Tails wins.

Team Sonic Racing Overdrive Review

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It’s time to take a look at the 2 part segment Sega released. It’s roughly 10 minutes or a little shorter than that, but it’s a nice way to cross promote the game. I was lightly tempted to get the game day 1, but there are just so many good games coming out right now that it’s tough to know which ones to take the plunge on. Regardless, I do look forward to playing it some day. I imagine it will be quite solid just as this special is.

The plot is pretty straightforward. The various heroes and villains have entered a race where the winner will receive a large gold trophy. Team Sonic, Chaotix, Rose, and Dark are all entering the race. Only one team can win though and it quickly becomes clear that Shadow and Sonic are the front runners here. That being said, there are a lot of racers on the track and so anything can happen. Be sure to stay glued to the seat so you don’t miss a second of the action.

The animation is very smooth and this style is definitely good at energetic scenes like this one. In general it’s a nostalgic style and one that’s very “clean” You will always know what’s happening and the designs are simplistic and so they are able to go through a lot of movements very quickly. It’s always been one of the big strengths of this animation style and Overdrive puts it to good use. A whole show like this would be quite fun for sure. Although the characters don’t talk here you can still get a lot of their personalities instantly because of how well animated they are.

As always Shadow is definitely a stand out character here. He actually does really well while at the same time knowing when it’s best to finally put his abilities into motion. The other characters also have to deal with a lot of interference on the track. It puts all of their skills on the line. There’s certainly nothing negative about this special and so it’s pretty much ideal. Between this and the Sonic Mania shorts, it’ll be fun to see if Sega decides to keep them up. I remember at the big Sonic event they did say that it takes forever to animate these scenes but maybe if they bring more animators on board they would be able to make a whole show like this. I’ll certainly be ready if they do.

Overall, I’d definitely recommend checking this special out. Even if you aren’t planning on getting the game it’s fun to see the cast just hanging out and getting all competitive. It’s also a lot of fun for fans who grew up in the Adventure era as there are a bunch of references and remixed tunes from the old game. You’ll likely remember all of them even if you don’t know the exact names. It’s the little things like that which really help take Overdrive to the next level. Also, it’s super short so it’s not like it’ll take all that much time out of your day to check it out right?

Overall 7/10

Sonic Mania Adventures Review

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It’s time to look at the little promo series Sega came out with to promote the complete Sonic Mania collection. It’s always nice to see a company put out a little extra effort to bring something like this to the table. It’s just a cool thing to do and I’m always up for some new animations. When you combine the 5 parts the series is around 11 minutes. In that time we get to see the main cast of Sonic Mania mix it up a bit. It’s a solid promo that I would recommend to anyone.

The basic premise is that Sonic and Tails are having fun on the island when they notice that Eggman is up to his old tricks once again. They decide to put a stop to him while grabbing the Chaos Emeralds along the way. Meanwhile Knuckles, Mighty, and Ray are also having some trouble with Eggman. The group all head towards Eggman’s location from various directions. Eggman was prepared for this though and sends out Metal Sonic. Can the heroes defeat a being who is as fast as Sonic and is powered by the Chaos Emeralds?

Right away you’ll have to give the series a lot of credit for its nostalgic art direction. The characters all really look like their counterparts from the original games. The animation is like something out of the original Sonic cartoon but possibly even more retro. It’s all very smooth and once again you’ll wonder why we get this level of animation for a web series while the cartoons on TV don’t even look as good. It’s a very different style from many of the other Sonic cartoons, but it holds its own against all of them. Sonic X certainly still looks the best, but this one would give Sonic Boom a run for its money in the graphics department.

Then you’ve also got the classic music which is a lot of fun as well. It makes all of this feel like a 2D Sonic adventure. Considering that this was before any of the characters could talk either, the series has to be very expressive with them. You can always tell what the characters are thinking and doing so that’s another bit of credit we have to give the animation team. Sometimes a character can just be annoying when they can’t talk as poor writers can’t use them well, but this show had no problems there.

Sonic is a solid character as always and I was glad to see him head right for Metal Sonic and enter battle. He’s as fearless as always and Sonic also puts up a great fight considering that he was holding his own against Metal Sonic while in base form. Tails is nice as well although he doesn’t really get to do much. It’s still always good to have a sidekick. Mighty gets a considerable amount of hype here as he completely destroys Metal Sonic in a fight. Who knew that this guy was so high tier? Ray doesn’t do nearly as well, but then again he never was too much of a fighter so I suppose it was to be expected to an extent. Then we have Knuckles who got less of a role than the others, but did come through in the end when it counted.

I can’t say that Metal Sonic’s appearance was too positive though since he was treated as a big punching bag the whole time. It’s unfortunate because he should be way stronger than these guys. This isn’t meant to be a very serious action show so it’s not like we were ever going to get really long fights, but Metal Sonic still could have looked more powerful with the amount of screen time that he was given. His fight also had some stills when I would have preferred to see him speed blitzing, but we got scenes of both varieties for him so it’s not really a problem. Eggman was also consistent as always which is good.

Overall, This special was a lot of fun to watch. I’d recommend it to anyone and at 11 minutes you have no good excuse not to watch it. It’s a fun adventure with a little action, you can’t go wrong there. Hopefully one day we will get another full length Sonic show since the possibilities are always endless for it. If TMNT can get so many different shows within such a small time frame, Sonic should also get the same treatment. He has proven that action as well as comedy works within his universe so no matter which direction they take the franchise in, we should be set for a golden experience. Yes, I don’t have Sonic Mania at the moment, but I’m sure its time will come. As a Sonic fan I’d expect nothing less.

Overall 7/10

Mario & Sonic at the London 2012 Olympic Games Review

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If there was ever such a thing as a low budget Mario and Sonic game then this is it. We no longer have the intense campaign mode from the first game and we don’t even get to keep the tournaments. With all of the characters and games already unlocked as well you just have to wonder what the developers were thinking. It’s not a bad game but it doesn’t do anything to help the Olympics legacy. It would have gone over better if this had been the first title in the series.

We do have a new mode though and that is essentially Mario Party mode. Here you run around a board trying to get items and bump into one of the characters who is running around. This will trigger a mini game. You want to win the mini games to get cards that you can put in your sticker album. Once you’ve obtained 16 stickers (or more depending on the length you choose) you will have won the game. Inside your sticker board you have two random items as well which may steal stickers from other players or just give you extras. They’re pretty handy so use them wisely. If you want to blast through the party then simply seek out the NPCs as soon as possible. I’m not sure if there is even a point to delaying it to be honest since grabbing the items didn’t actually seem to be doing anything. There’s probably something that I’m missing though.

I also have to point out that the mini games are starting to randomly get convoluted here. You should always be able to get a basic understanding of the game from the rules section before it starts. That wasn’t the case for the Dream Bike mini game. This one is a team game of 4 vs 4. You have to try and stay in a perfect line and shake your way to the goal. The problem is that you have to switch places during the race and the controls for being in the back were not clear. I struggled as best as I could but I just couldn’t form a line and I ended up losing the mini game and nearly the whole party map. I actually did lose the first time I played the mode, but I got them the second time.

Even the really solid games suffer from dicey instructions. Take the Nintendo/Sega trivia. The questions were solid and with prep time I could probably even get them right. However the game tells you to hold the Wii Remote horizontally when in fact you are supposed to hold it vertically. This cost me the very first question which I knew I would have gotten right. So the main point here is to read the rules carefully and be warned that you may not be able to win some of these games on the first try because you will have to figure out how it works.

One of the new games that is pretty solid is the throwing darts one. You essentially have to hit the bullseye as quickly as possible and try to get others. Essentially I don’t know if you go for all of the bullseyes but that would make sense. I hit 2 and won the mini game so just aim for the center and you will be all set.

We’ve also got some games that I believe are old like Table Tennis and Soccer. Table Tennis is the same old same old so I wouldn’t expect too much more out of that one. It’s a fun game as always but it didn’t take much effort to port it over. I forgot if soccer already existed or not but it doesn’t look good for this game either way since the soccer gameplay is probably the weakest I’ve ever seen in the genre. I know low budget Wii games with better soccer gameplay. Your passes always go too high so it is usually safest to take the bell through the whole field yourself before shooting. That’s just not good gameplay and teamwork is supposed to be the name of the game here. I just don’t know how you can possibly mess up a game like soccer this way.

100mm Swinming is another mini game that doesn’t even try to hide how recycled it is. It’s the exact same controls as always in what appears to be the same background. It’s a good mini game so I’m fine with it coming back of course, but we just should have had more games. Reusing minigames is like bringing back old fighters in a classic fighting game. It’s a great move and one that I stand by 100%. However, if the cast is unchanged then there is no point in upgrading as in the case of Godzilla Save The Earth to Godzilla Unleashed on the PS2.

What this Olympics should have done was have close to 40-50 events. They could easily have brought back events from the previous games in addition to a bunch of new ones. The only reason why I could see this being a bad thing is if they are trying to perfectly emulate the games that will be at each Olympics. If that is the case then I suppose they will need to find another solution (have the old mini games be unlockable) but either way we definitely needed more games than the rather limited amount that we got.

The graphics look nice as always at least. It’s about the same as the last game only without the cinematic cutscenes so maybe it is actually a downgrade. Those cutscenes strike me as being the hard part after all but maybe the gameplay is just as difficult. Either way the last game did manage to do both so I’d give it the edge. When it comes to the soundtrack there is no contest that the last one was better. It blended together a bunch of brilliant themes from both Mario and Sonic which made the games even more fun. While this game has a lot of those songs in the music player, don’t expect to hear them very often.

As far as the replay value goes I suppose that there is a lot to buy here. You can use your money to buy clothes which boost your stats and you can try to earn medals for all of the various mini games. That could take a little while and then you also have a lot of challenges to complete for the bragging rights. Complete all of the challenges and you will really be an Olympics champ. Considering that the game is pretty cheap I’d say that this is already enough value to justify the cost.

Overall, This is one of those games that may have been more acceptable if it had been the first in the series. However it is the third and after seeing what this series could really do with the second game it feels like a total downgrade. The game just lost all of its heart and it felt like the developers just cashed it in this time. There wasn’t much effort put behind this game as far as I could see and even though this is a decent game I would recommend going back to buy the Winter Olympics instead.

Overall 6/10

Sonic Boom Review

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The first time I started watching Sonic Boom I knew that I had a winner on my hands. The series is the perfect blend of action and comedy. Due in part to the solid animation and naturally the strong writing as well, Sonic Boom is one of those all star titles that is not to be trifled with. It’s rare to see a comedy centered show actually be really funny throughout as opposed to once in a while but Boom pulls it off.

The basic plot of the show is that a group of friends live on an island. Their names are Sonic, Amy, Sticks, Tails, and Knuckles. This town is fairly isolated so the friends have to try and not get tired of each other or the fact that there is only one eatery in the entire town. They just have to learn to live the sub par food. Meanwhile, we also can’t forget about the evil Dr. Eggman who uses his evil inventions to try and conquer the town or sometimes to fight off tax corruption. One thing is for sure, there is always something happening in this show.

Sonic Boom may be a CGI show but the animation is so smooth and colorful that it is basically on the level of hand drawn animation. The character designs are really on point. At first people did make fun of some of the designs like Knuckles and Sonic but you quickly get used to them. The bright animation works well for the action scenes as well as the back and forth banter. It’s very versatile. Then there is also the solid soundtrack. It’s quite large as some episodes will have guest star montage themes. The normal everyday themes work well too and one of the big ones is the theme that plays when Sonic fights Shadow for the last time. It will keep you guessing throughout the show and that’s the sign of a good soundtrack.

The writing is certainly 5 Star material as the jokes just work so well. Part of it is the delivery of course, but you also have to give credit to the script for coming up with the jokes. In particular Sonic and Knuckles tend to get all of the best ones although every character has their moment. Eggman naturally gets a lot of time to shine as well with all of the banter between him and Sonic.

One thing you’ll also notice about Sonic Boom is that the show can get serious when necessary. Not all of the serious arcs may have always worked out, but for the most part they were pretty hype. The final two part event for the series certainly brought in the hype as Shadow’s battle with Sonic was as good as it gets. We haven’t had many battles with the two characters so it was cool to see them go at it. Shadow certainly had the edge in the fight which certainly makes sense since his speed is comparable to Sonic’s plus he has his chaos abilities like teleportation. It was fortunate for Sonic that Metal Sonic showed up and that fight was certainly epic as well. He was really doing pretty well against both of the hedgehogs even though he was outnumbered. The best part of the episode was still the early part though as Shadow’s takedown of the main cast was particularly brutal and showed him to be a legitimate threat. He did have a rather similar role in both seasons, but because his screen time was rather rare and limited it never actually felt redundant.

All right, let’s look at the cast. Sonic is essentially the perfect lead as he acts just like his hand counterpart, but dialed up to 11. This let him bring in a lot of snappy dialogue while still wrecking everyone when it came time for combat. This is definitely the Sonic that I remember from the games and his character is really done Justice. Whenever he faces off with someone you basically know that he is going to come out on top. Occasionally he will even subvert whatever the message of the episode was on account of being so talented. That just goes to show his skilled he is. He also does a good job of insulting everyone without being all that mean about it. He just tells it like it is and manages to look cool while doing so.

Knuckles certainly isn’t a very smart character and the show makes this as extreme as possible. Such an exaggerated character would certainly be either a big hit or a disaster and fortunately this portrayal was spot on. I think what really sells the character is how absolutely confident he is of being right. If someone tries to correct him Knuckles will typically put on a smug expression and explain why they are wrong. He has delusions of grandeur and at times he has gotten so big into his own ego that he ends up forgetting his bonds with the others. Knuckles is a nice guy, but one who just can’t cope too well with being the head honcho. He is still the power hitter of the team as well so you want to have Knuckles on your team.

For Tails, it’s an interesting case because rather than simply play up the genius angle, they play up the “genius wannabe” card. He is consistently shown to not be as smart as Eggman in this version and his inventions have to be fixed many times. Still, he does send up saving the day a lot through his inventions as well so it basically cancels out. Tails is a good character and he also has a bit of a rivalry with Sonic at times which is pretty fun. Sonic tends to come out on top, but the same can basically be said for all of his rivalries in the show (except Shadow) so that’s not bad. Tails’ best invention was certainly the one that could make clones of the individual. That’s a useful piece of tech for any situation.

Amy has her girl power sticker on for the show and loves to remind Sonic that not all problems have to be responded to with violence. Although, she is typically the one to jump into a fight. Her split personality is played up a lot in the show and makes her a character that can be feared by others aides. You just don’t want to make her angry. Her part time job as a psychiatrist also makes for a lot of entertaining scenes. She may be a little on the gullible side, but she is also the hero who gives the villains the benefit of the doubt more than the others which is surely a nice thing to do. Sonic never tends to buy into the villains actually having a change of heart in this show for better or worse.

Sticks was made up for Sonic Boom so it was always going to be interesting to see what route they took her. She is the big conspiracy nut of the series and spends a lot of her time yelling and trying to tell the cast what is actually happening. Her refusal to use technology does come in handy at times like when the villain tries to mind control everyone through the TV. Such tactics won’t work on Sticks. In a fight she does appear to be the weakest member but it’s not all about strength when you’re looking at a character. She’s definitely not one of the best members of the main cast, but she’s a reasonably solid member of the team:

Then we’ve got Eggman who is definitely a very important character in the series. He keeps everyone in check and seems to have a fairly formalized deal with Sonic that he will attack the town every week or so. They reference these plans quite a bit. Of course, a Eggman does sometimes switch things up if the town gets on his nerves. It’s not a great defense but if we’re being honest the town can be pretty annoying. They’ll try to cheat you out of money or cut out in line. Other townsfolk will try to guilt trip you into helping them and the mayor is absolutely corrupt. Some characters may just sit there and take it, but not Eggman. In all of these instances I am actually rooting for Eggman since he just seems to be in the right. It’s the town that really needs to change, not really Eggman.

Shadow only appears in 2 different stories but they are both quite good. He sounds intimidating for sure and just isn’t someone that you want to mess with. Especially when you consider how strong he is. Shadow may be a little gullible which is an unusual trait for the character and the only one that doesn’t work well, but he looks really good beyond that. His style of chaos control based combat is always fun to watch. As Sonic Boom surprisingly didn’t use guest stars all that often, it made their appearances even more special than usual.

Then we have Dave the Intern. Well, he has many jobs to be honest but he is most well known for his time over at Metburger where he sells fast food that isn’t healthy for you and the ingredients are also very suspect. He tends to get everyone’s order wrong and you run a risk whenever you go inside. So why do people eat there? Well, it’s the only food place in the small village. This is actually mentioned quite a few times and you wonder why the heroes would even live in such a village. There are probably quite a lot of fun theories about this, but I like to think that they are just trying to lay low for a little while. They don’t want to have to constantly be fighting so this was a way to get some r n r, but Eggman showing up definitely broke that plan. Dave is a really fun character thanks in large part to how his voice sounds. He clearly doesn’t want to be at the burger shop and has a lot of goals. Dave just isn’t particularly skilled enough to pull any of them off.

Another fairly big character in the show is Eggman’s twin brother robot from another dimension. His name is Morpho and his accent is certainly on point. I imagine that it must have taken a while to perfect it. He uses his shape changing abilities to great effect as he makes it hard for the heroes to trust each other. Eggman’s mother was also a quality character as she kept everyone in line. The supporting cast is just so great in this show and all of them get their due screen time. Even the old lady who is always losing her baby manages to be a solid character. There’s also a whole group of villains who work at the club house who are sort of like the Cutie Mark Crusaders, but the evil version.

For other guest stars, we’ve got Metal Sonic and Vector. It was a surprise to see Vector show up, but definitely a nice one. He’s not one of the coolest Sonic characters, but it was certainly about time that he got to be in something animated again. Metal Sonic was awesome as expected with his abilities still being top notch. Eggman’s lackeys Cubot and Orbot show up constantly and while their comedic moments don’t work quite as well as some of the others, they have their moments. It’s hard to totally be a bad character when you’re in this show. Even relatively weaker characters like the girl fox who showed up a bit and the old man who guilt trips everyone are more passable than they usually would be.

What really brings the humor home for Sonic Boom is how self aware it is with the characters and what is happening. When it pulls off homages to old sport films or classic moments in the Sonic franchise it works because the writers clearly know what they are referencing. Research was certainly being done on this show throughout. Superman is naturally referenced as well which is hype. Sadly the show did not last long enough for us to get to Super Sonic, but I like to think that the next season would have managed to squeeze that in at some point. There are so many more possibilities for episodes here.

In the end I’d definitely have to say that this is the best Sonic TV show. Sonic X isn’t far behind and then from there they all get rather close. I’d give the original Sonic The Hedgehog cartoon third, Adventures of Sonic 4th and then Underground would take a respectable last place finish. Sonic’s never really had a bad show before and that’s a credit to how good the franchise is. The original movie was excellent as well and hopefully the upcoming one will continue the trend.


Overall, Sonic Boom is an excellent show and one of the best non anime shows that I’ve seen in a long time. You could always expect high quality episodes from week to week. I’m still not a big fan of how many shows like to divide their episodes into 2 parts nowadays, but Boom pulls it off as well as it can. Hopefully it does get another season someday although its odds aren’t looking very great at the moment. I doubt the next Sonic show can surpass this one, but hopefully it is quite solid as well. So if you haven’t seen Sonic Boom yet, be sure to check it out asap.

Overall 8/10

Sonic The Hedgehog Archives Volume 4 Review

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SonicArchives4
It’s been about half a year so it’s time to look at the next volume of the Sonic archives! In this collection, good ole Knuckles joins the fray. I always liked his first appearance in the Sonic games and the comic is fairly faithful to the original events while adding that Archie humor that we all know and love. As always, this makes for a fun Sonic collection and you’ll certainly enjoy checking out the various stories.

The big story is naturally the one that involves Knuckles. Sonic and Tails land in a new island and Knuckles keeps trying to destroy them to keep his Chaos Emerald safe. Little does he know that Eggman is playing him for the sap! A short story has Bunny and Sally prove to Eggman that girls can fight just as well as boys and even better as they beat him up. Another short story has Sonic make the ultimate sacrifice of jumping into the mud to save an animal. As for the other big stories, one of them had Sonic get kidnapped by Eggman along with the other Freedom Fighters and locked into a Virtual Reality simulator. Sonic wouldn’t have any of that and admitted that the real world is tougher, but still the best. Another entertaining comic was when Tails became a super genius and it corrupted him. He wanted to be the leader of the Freedom Fighters and attacked Eggman, but it was a doomed plan. Eggman is simply too powerful when surrounded by his robots. Tails was really good in that issue and I liked his evil form. It would be cool to see it return. We also can’t forget about Sonic’s three gems of power. They gave him incredible abilities to use against Eggman, which was cool. Naturally, this is just the tip of the iceberg as far as the comics go.

It’s a pretty short collection. The Knuckles comic is really the big one, but there are 1-2 other big two part adventures and then a lot of one shot stories. It may sound like there are a bunch of stories, but many of them are only a few pages long, which is why it still makes for a very quick read. It’s safe to say that Eggman underestimated Sonic and his friends. The Freedom Fighters are a threat to any villain as long as Sonic is around and even without him, Bunny and Sally proved to be more than a match for the evil genius. This was back during the days where Eggman had no tough allies to help him. It’s hard to believe that there were days when Metal Sonic wasn’t around to help very often right?

Naturally, the art is good and flows quite well with the stories. The designs have aged well although it’s safe to say that all of the modern looks are better than their old counterparts. Tails being brown just seems odd at this point and a chubby Sonic? We’re not exactly in the Mushroom Kingdom are we!? A part of me misses this Eggman look as well, but I’m still glad that we ended up getting the sleek re design from the modern games. That Eggman looks like a more formidable fighter while this guy was typically a pushover.

Sonic is still the main highlight of the comics as he always steals the show. As the comedy angle was played up more than in the modern issues, Sonic got a lot of crazy feats back in the day. This comic is no exception as Sonic moves so fast that he can dodge all of the raindrops on a rainy day to stay dry. That ends up being one of the mini comics and it’s an even more impressive feat than you may think. See, someone like the Flash can do this by simply going fast enough so that the air just nullifies the raindrops that get close to him or phasing through him, but that’s not what Sonic is doing. He’s simply dodging them all at super speed and if you’re ever been outside during a downpour, you’ll know that this is clearly impossible. Sonic is so fast that he’s essentially throwing away your reality and replacing it with his own. his speed defies logic and understanding, which is why he’s still one of the fastest characters of all time.

Knuckles got tricked into thinking that Sonic is a villain like usual, but at least he saw the light and helped Sonic take down Eggman. Knuckles isn’t the sharpest tool in the shed, but he means well and he was a likable supporting character here. It was fun to see the iconic character make his debut. This was back during the days where Tails wanted to prove himself fairly often so he doesn’t look quite as good. The comic where he turned into a genius was certainly enjoyable though and Tails definitely isn’t a bad character. I don’t think that I’d say that any of the characters were bad. It’s one of the reasons why the Sonic series has been so much fun. Even if some characters barely register for me, they typically won’t be downright unlikable although that will certainly happen at some point.

The other Freedom Fighters are around, but don’t get to do a whole lot. Bunny and Sally had their fight against Eggman, which was neat. Antoine is still the punchline for all of the jokes and you feel bad for him, but at least he never seems to notice or forgets the insults very quickly. He’s definitely one of the more entertaining characters in the series even if nobody ever takes him seriously. It’s similar to Eggman. I love this version of Eggman, but he didn’t get much to do this time. In previous comics, he literally broke his robots while having a tantrum and put one in the shredder. That was an awesome and iconic moment so it’s tough to top. He didn’t get too many burns or big moments here, but I suppose that he will have his time to shine soon.

This was before the modern days with Shadow and more of a plot based storyline, but the issues still hold up well. Sonic has always been able to succeed in whatever medium or style he has wanted too. The Sonic franchise has had successful video games in the 2-D Platformer, Racing, Fighting, 3-D Platformer, and Party game genres. He had successful TV shows in the comedy and action genres and the comics have ranged from light and happy to cheerfully dark. It’s no exaggeration to say that Sonic is one of the greatest franchises of all time and he’s not going anywhere. I’ll be checking out the next Sonic archives soon so be on the lookout for it.

Overall, I definitely recommend this collection. Whether you are already a fan of Sonic or not, the humor is very well written and the comics will go by in a flash. All of the characters are good and the smooth art really completes the package. There’s really nothing to dislike about the comic and you’ll just wish that it was a little longer. Sonic has been a consistently good comic series for decades at this point and I am confident that it will continue to be one of the best comic books out there. I’m still looking forward to checking out the two crossovers with Mega Man at some point although there should be a lot of plot hax around there.

Overall 7/10