Ultimate soldiers, if I recall correctly. The UF President wanted eternal life to be President eternally, which G.U.N. saw as a threat, but thought the concept could be applied to soldiers on the field for an eternal peacekeeper service. They didn't detail why they went with the execution, but I would assume, and this is pure speculation on my part, that it's down to the fact Gerald was literally writing on the walls, so someone was brought in to check the maths where they figured out "oh, this is a colony drop..." Execute Gerald, check the ARK but find nothing in the computers about the colony drop (because it's in Shadow instead), and you've got your plotholes covered. Still digging around, I need to secure the next source I find... EDIT: Y'know what, I'll just look to buy the paperback copy and scan it in at some point. Finding these things online is a pain.
Interesting thoughts, headcanon and otherwise. My next question would be regarding Gerald’s diary. Not only was it created during his imprisonment, but it detailed Shadow’s part in Gerald’s revenge scheme. Was GUN aware of it? If not, how? And in any case, how did it wind up in Eggman’s possession?
The following is all speculation on my part based on the story we know: Probably, why do you think he was sealed so far down with such heavy guard and required a Chaos Emerald, of which only seven such 'keys' exist that teleport randomly around the planet if they aren't in a different dimension altogether, to get to him? And to answer why they didn't just 'Baby Thanos' him while he slept, he's immortal. We don't know what type of immortality is in regards to Shadow, but we do know he fought E-123 Omega, a walking arsenal with rockets and machine guns, and had to be sealed to sleep where he hasn't aged a day in Sonic the Hedgehog (2006), so there's a good chance that, outside of gameplay, bullets wouldn't actually work on him... Robotnik, meanwhile, must have gone after G.U.N. at some point to get the diary. I wouldn't imagine they would allow the release of something confirming Shadow's existence willingly, but Robotnik, despite his goofiness, built a Death Star and two giant carriers with wave motion guns. If I had to take an educated guess, I'd say it was subterfuge, since I'm sure they would have doubled up on the guards, robots and had B-3x Hot Shot on constant alert to intercept Robotnik before he even got close to Shadow if they realised he had Gerald's diary, rather than B-3x Hot Shot coming in after Shadow was awakened as if it was sent in after him. But that's just speculation, probably better for the Headcanon thread.
In Sonic X, Eggman hacks into the GUN database and finds the Journal. Perhaps something similar happened in game canon as well. On the other hand, I have a vague recollection that Eggman had in his possession long before? Not sure where I read that...
They didn't follow up because his threat was "If you want me to fuck up the world, then wake up Shadow". So they never woke him up and buried everything relating to him, which should have prevented it from ever coming to pass, but then Eggman happened. As for the "SA2 Shadow is a recreation" storyline: I think it's safe to say that because the Black Arms were retconed to be involved in his creation, there is only one Shadow, who was shot to earth, recovered by GUN and reprogrammed by Gerald to carry out his revenge.
I always thought the two Shadows thing was to add a mystery to his lore, but also give themselves an option to bring him back from the dead. As in, the Shadow we saw in the game died, but there's another Shadow sealed somewhere ready to go. Seems like they had already plans to bring him back even before the game was release so maybe that's why they did that. Obviously they didn't go that route so it was settled that he was the original.
I'd think they decided to execute Gerald and seal Shadow when they found out that the former had "rigged" the latter to bring about the end of the world. The game threw in the possibility that Sonic himself is the original Ultimate Lifeform, which would go with the fact the two are very similar, and further tie them together as rivals. The hero being the original UFL created for benign purposes, while his "evil twin" rival is the replica created as a weapon. Of course, Shadow the Hedgehog did away with that possibility.
Yeah, I'm in agreement with Starduster, it was just Shadow acknowledging Sonic's superior heroism and capability, especially with the Super Forms where Shadow was noted as struggling while Sonic was just doing as he does.
Different people have interpreted that line differently. Myself, I see it as Shadow using in the sense you guys mentioned. At the same time, regardless of the in-universe context, it draws a parallel between Sonic and the ULF on a meta level. There is also this moment, which can be interpreted either as Sonic referring to Shadow, or as Sonic considering the possibility that he was created as the ULF after hearing Shadow's suggestion, especially since he seems to look at himself toward the end.
on the long run it's an acknowledgement from Shadow, but considering the conspiracy-laden plot, I do think the intention was to at least induce in the audience that doubt, together with the line during the end. Goes alongside with the general lines doubting whether Shadow even was the Shadow of 50 years ago, etc. It's muddying things intentionally.
I suppose for the audience muddying it makes sense, but Sonic Team did have that bible story that Yuji Naka referenced decades later about Sonic being born on Christmas Island, so I would imagine internally that there was zero confusion: Sonic's just a natural born hedgehog. But then, what do we know of his parents? Could they have been the Ultimate Lifeform?
If we believe the headcannon that Shadow was based off something like a hidden palace mural, Sonic being the ULF and Shadow being an attempt to recreate it makes sense in my head. IDK it seems to me like they were planning to potentially do stuff with that but never did. As they seemingly dropped it I'm not sure it will have a bearing on official cannon. Unless Shadow is in the next game. Sonic- "Wow yo THIS grind rail reminds me of the Ark Shadow" Shadow- "Hmm the Ark, that's where I was born and it's where we fought the biolizard" *jpg of the bossfight* Sonic- "Oh yeah you also told me that I was the true ultimate lifeform" Shadow- "I wonder where Rouge is, she stole my Taylor Swift mixtape" (Ian Flynn enjoyers this is a joke don't kill me)
The hidden palace mural theory has always been dumb, I don’t know why it became some widespread belief among the fanbase. The mural doesn’t even show a hedgehog.
Because Gerald has clearly been to Angel Island (Artificial Chaos et al), and Shadow somewhat resembles Super Sonic.
It shows a blue spikey guy covered in a yellow aura/fireball, and Eggman holding/reaching for the Master Emerald. The blue spikey guy is definitely Sonic. But yeah, there's absolutely nothing connecting Sonic Adventure 2 and Shadow to Hidden Palace Zone, Doomsday Zone, or anything else specific to Sonic 3 & Knuckles. All of SA2's references were to SA1: the emerald altar was based on the SA1/Mystic Ruins version, Chaos was an SA1 character and his legend was kept in the Mystic Ruins temple. Gerald had access to the Chaos Emeralds and at least some knowledge of what happened in the Mystic Ruins 3000 years ago, but there's not even the slightest hint that he's been to Angel Island or knew about the Hidden Palace Zone. I also strongly dislike the theory and think it would be a bad idea story-wise. Gerald is already connected to enough stuff, connecting him to Angel Island and Sonic 3 would only make the world feel smaller. Sonic 3's story should be about Sonic and Eggman stepping foot on an island that has been considered nothing but a legend for millennia, that has been cut off from the outside world in all that time. Saying that Eggman's grandfather coincidentally beat him to it by 50+ years undermines that.
He knew what the Master Emerald Alter looked like and recreated it to harness the power of the Chaos Emeralds. That suggests he was on Angel Island.
He never saw Chaos, with Mystic Ruins portraying Perfect Chaos over Chaos 0 and nothing otherwise seen on Angel Island, yet built the Artificial Chaos based on the appearance of the latter. There's a few ways the ARK Altar of Emerald can be answered, such as an unseen tablet or mural Gerald discovered in his studies, but if I were the one doing it (speculation hence forth) I'd have it come from when he interfaced the Gizoid Emerl with the ARK's most powerful computer and "reams and reams of data" caused it to crash: as Emerl was designed by the Fourth Great Civilization to use the Chaos Emeralds, I would imagine Emerl would have data on the Altar of Emerald that could've been accessed in that instance.
