1. It's a Sonic comic, it MUST do publicity. 2. Ian never recieves enough info to make a hastily shit adaption like the Sonic Adventure one. 3. By just doing a non-canon small story, he is then free to adapt the games as he wants and on his rythm. I mean, it's not fair to compare adapting Sonic Colours, for an example (a game that had just come out and would have to be adapted to the Archie canon, plus completely change the plans they had) with adapting Tails Adventure (a game released around 15 years ago.) Greg, I advise you to look past your stomach. 90% of the fanbase is reacting very positively to Ben Bates. As for Ian's quality of writing, he has had many blunders, true. While the Iron Dominion arc does read better if you just read the whole thing (SU included) together, at the time, wuith it coming out once a month, it really promised too much and gave too little. However, he has moved past the DARK ANGSTY comics of Penders into something more adventureous and light-hearted, that can still be serious when necessary. Which being a comic with a blue hedgehog, is actually a good idea. Obviously, to each his own. But to be honest, thse comics recently have had a much better eception than you guys are making it look. As for Scourge, basically, he's Evil Sonic, from an EVIL Mobius. At the time, it was just for some simple stories. But then, either Penders or Bollers (can't remember) had the idiotic idea of actually making Anti Mobius something serious and interwoven with the story, which is... stupid. Ian solved that by doing a clever change of heart for the character- they're recolors fighthing to be recognized as original characters in their own right. Plus Finitevus.
I do own them all, but it's a long time since I picked them up. The very early ones are DIRE; more with plot than artwork, though if you really want to feel like pulling out your own eyes, look at issue #4. Luckily, that's the worst it ever got. I'd advise starting with #24, which is the beginning of the series' Sonic CD adaptation. I recall really enjoying that. The Sonic 3 adaptation started in #37, as well. In general, Fleetway stuck much more closely to the games than Archie when doing their stories, so that's a plus. They did start to phase out the non-Sonic scripts over time as well, though I can't remember when they finally stopped altogether. Although in fairness, the Ecco the Dolphin stories they did were fantastic, so don't write non-Hedgehog-ness off entirely. The Metal Sonic Kai plot culminating in #72 establishes Robotnik as a magnificent bastard, and the story arc leading up to #100 is awesome as well. The Fleetway comics kinda go downhill after #100, I think, 'cos that's when Sonic basicly defeated Robotnik and the fat guy just ended up on Flickies Island going mad. The next hundred-and-something issues see the comics go down the Archie route, introducing a bunch of shitty comics-only villains and heroes and following them around while Sonic pisses around not doing anything fun or exciting. I think he keeps it, though we do get little tidbits - it was Flynn that let slip Orbot's model number SA-55, which was the only name he had anywhere pre-Colours.
There will be less "non Sonic" stories through time to the point of having 4 Sonic stories in the book. Get #8 and 9 to see how Robotnik took over Mobius. #21, I think, starts the Metal Sonic saga. I think it's a good start.
Though to be honest the non-Sonic strips were occasionally worth it, like Decap Attack or (IMO) Shinobi. Kid Chameleon was also nice.
Again, after the ShtH, which more or less all got resolved in one issue, there hasn't been a real adaptation since SA2 besides Tails' Adventure, unless you want to count Sonic Rush for Blaze and Sonic '06 for Silver. The rest are just advertisements for upcoming games. Besides, he does them because Sega says, "Hey, this game is coming out. Write something."
He does it in an overly blatant manner, as well, without even TRYING to tie it into the Archie continuity in any way. They are, in a very real sense, just 8-page advertisments in comic form.
Sally's nose bridge is bad (her face looks a little flattened as well). Still at least the rest of the face (such as the eye and brow proportioning) look accurate in comparison to the standard modern design used by Yardley and such. I notice every artist seems to be making Sally more 'Tails-ish' in some aspect or other, I think the facial design is the one aspect they should leave alone. Axer as well. Spaz actually predates them both, using the humanoid Sal since the Sonic CD adaption around the 20s or 30s. His attention to nearly every figment and joint really shown in some of his cover art and looked kinda grotesque.
The best Sonic cover ever up in here: I don't normally snatch up any of the comics, but I was compelled to grab this off of ebay for that alone. Just badass. As for the comic ITSELF, I can't really offer an opinion on that since I haven't well, you know, read it.
Since it was early on in Flynn's run, it almost looked like the comicwriters were trying to literally wipe out everything Penders made. The story even comes to show what seems like the entirety of Knothole being nuked to all sundry; with nobody surviving except Sonic, Tails, Knuckles and Amy Rose. The four then headed that way to proceed to taking down Robotnik once and for all, in honor of the entirety of Knothole's population (and the Freedom Fighters) being demolished in the attack. Some time before that though, Sonic tries to take on Robotnik alone running on pure anger, and Robotnik is in a mecha, putting Sonic in his place; mentally warping him Joker-style and leaving him near death without a leg to stand on. Easily the best Archie Sonic comic ever made. Too bad the idea of the removal of the Freedom Fighters and etc. would've created huuuuge backlash, which is why they seemingly in the next issue pulled out of their bum the excuse that "oh yeah, they weren't destroyed, they were all put in Egg Grapes :specialed:".
I know Archie would die rather than to get rid of their top seller, but has anyone ever thought about what a Sonic comic would be like under a different publisher?
I'd recommend going beyond just #50. Personally, my favorite period in the series was the #51-#75 era, where Sonic & Tails were hunting down Naugus, and Eggman was being set up as Robotnik's successor. It fleshed out the world of Mobius a bit more, and introduced a few of my favorite Archie-exclusive characters, such as Monkey Khan, Elias and Nate Morgan (though I'm aware Nate Morgan actually came from prototype-SatAM). Though that was also the era where I started reading the comics, so my preference could be a little skewed by nostalgia admittedly. And then the Sonic Adventure adaptation happened; but that's another story for another time... Two things have prevented me from liking hat issue as much as the rest of the fandom seems to. First, the quick resolution #176 gave to #175 has always annoyed me. I'm the last person who'd want to see the Freedom Fighters killed off (they are, after all, the last thing that remains of SatAM), but it always bothered me how quickly Sonic got them all back, and how quickly they set up their new nanite-Nicole-OS home, without even really mourning the loss of their longtime old home. Second, it also bothered me how "upbeat" Sonic was at the end of #175, after just having been beaten so thoroughly by Eggman. You'd think he'd be a bit more dour after being beaten the way he was. But no. I've since read somewhere else that it was Sega who wanted #175 to end on that note, though they've loosened up on some of their restrictions on Archie over the years, it seems they still prefer to keep Sonic emotionally castrated. For those reasons, my three favorite "landmark" issues are still #50, #75, and #25. Silly as #25 was; it was still a cool Sonic CD adaptation, and it was one of the few issues drawn entirely by Spaz.
Like I said, I hated the way they resolved EVERYTHING an issue later, but alas the series could've been much more interesting if they made it drag out longer and gave better reasoning and storywriting regarding the survival of Robotnik's attack (they could've killed off a couple of characters at least, instead of them ALL surviving in those Egg Grape things). I honestly love the Freedom Fighters and would've wanted them to survive, but I wish it didn't come so.. suddenly. Also Sonic, like Batman, is a tough dude. It only took him a minute to get himself back together from the mental trauma Robotnik slammed down on him, much like Batman does after the Joker's assaults.
I'm fairly certain that a great quantity of Pender's dross characters DID die inside the Egg Grapes. No-one major, sure, but Flynn certainly cleaned house a bit.
EDIT: Really, if Archie made a "Very Best of Sonic" collection that had #25, Sonic Quest, the Mecha Madness Saga, (#39, SS6, #40) and Endgame, (#47-#50) I wouldn't need to buy another Sonic comic again.
Those comic artists had a strange habit of giving the Metal Sonics mouths back in the day for some strange reason. Although as much as I like that cover I like this one more: Spaz can be a great Sonic artist, but he just never really learned how to draw the modern styles very well IMO. They should let him draw classic style if he wants (because his modern Sonic art seems to take hints from Sonic 06 for some reason)
What was stopping Flynn from not using them to begin with? Only redshirts died and the epicness of 175 was destroyed because of that.
I personally have always wanted to see a Sonic comic by Marvel. And I want it to resemble the writing of old school X-Men so bad. And if he's up to it, I want to see Neal Adams illustrating the book. + - I mean he did do Atomic Mouse... One can only hope for a Sonic book that good.
That was the idea. Cleaning out the redshirts was Ian's first goal since there was an entire sea of them (Mainly echidnas, Ken Penders' pet race).
