Sonic Prime (Netflix Animated Series, New episodes coming July 13th)

Is it bad I want to see a game or TV show centered around Zeena?

 

I wish she was the leader of the deadly six instead of Zavok, who’s mostly just a brute

 

I don't remember when exactly I got my GameCube copy of Heroes, but it couldn't have been too long after release. Just checked it, and sure enough:

Spoiler

Odd that your manual doesn't mention it.

 

I don't have my Heroes manual to hand, but I'm sure mine had it too from memory - platform was GameCube too. Could it be a region-specific thing? I have an English-language UK copy of the game - it could be something as simple as the US manual has slightly different text or something.

 

Hmmmm it's definitely in my ps2 version. I'd send a photo of it but it's somewhere in there... *points to massive box of random games that have been sat there unsorted for the past 3 years*

EDIT: to clarify mine is UK english copy, second hand so I don't know if it was release or not.

 

Mine is a US English-language copy, so I'm skeptical that it's a region-based difference.

All of the English-language manual pdfs on the wiki have the line in Eggman's bio, including 3 US manuals and 1 UK manual (the PC manuals don't appear to have any character bios for some reason).

Does anyone have an English-language manual they can post a scan or picture of that doesn't have the line?

Edit: This might be worth splitting off into its own thread lol

 

She'd be a different character entirely, then. And for as little characterization they've found for her, I don't think it'd be worth letting go of what we have.
Zavok is a protege to Zik and actually does manage to keep the team together, for whatever that means. The fact that he's possibly the strongest seems to mean more for his placement in the game than anything else.

 

I don't like the humor in this show, or even care for most of the writing. The basic plot/premise is fine and has potential for something, and the action is solid, but the character writing for everyone not Sonic is a step down from past efforts. A lot of the humor is outright recycled/cliches used from elsewhere, almost as bad as what you'd see in a dry Adventure era game script, but without the charm of the rest of the gameplay and novelty of newness that those games had to carry it.

The Sonic vs Shadow battle was cool. Sonic's new voice actor clearly loves the role and his take on Sonic as a whole is solid (I actually don't find him annoying unlike a lot of early complaints), but man... it's just not doing it for me yet. Maybe in a few more episodes or by the second "season", but I found Boom's self awareness and willingness to twist the character tropes to be much more entertaining, even if the show basically had no plot at all and recycled the same 10 NPCs.

 

Just to clarify, I've not seen anyone dislike Sonic's voice in Prime yet. Devin Mack's take on Sonic is solid and as far as I can tell it seems like next to everyone is a fan. It's Sonic's character that some of us take issue with.

Also yeah, I enjoyed Boom's dry and sometimes dour sarcasm, and how self-aware it was (but it wasn't perfect). Prime's humour doesn't hit the mark for me at all.

 

The best way I can describe Mack's take on Sonic is that he's doing RCS's style (seriously, he is so insanely good at mimicking the kind of voice/accent RCS does that you would not guess Sonic was voiced by a black man at all in this, wow. Super glad that he is though!) but somehow...more genuine? Earnest? I just don't get much of the "snarky asshole" vibe from him, but maybe that's the writing, or the fact that I approach this as a kids show that's going to have a slightly corny protagonist. But to put it simply he delivers the cornball lines in a way that is far less grating than meta era RCS!Sonic.

Nearly every other voice is good too, except Knuckles, who is fine but also has two voice actors for some bizarre reason and I thought I was losing my goddamn mind when he suddenly started sounding different with zero warning. I'm so glad that Rogue's voice direction is back to her more normal SA2 direction than the godawful "horny character but its a kids show so she just sounds weirdly horny" direction of the 4kids cast or the current game cast (which is admittedly much less bad than the 4kids one but WOOF that was bad). Tails finally sounds like "a boy" and not "a grown woman imitating a boy" too. Amy's isn't cloyingly saccharine like her 4kids version or "children's brand marketing executive's idea of a GRRL POWER character" like her modern actress, it's the perfect mix between the two. Eggman sounds great as always and I liked the chaos council. Shadow is a huge improvement in voice direction, now if only he weren't still Shitty Vegeta.

Also is Shadow still an artificial lifeform or is he just a normal animal like everyone else in this canon. My current headcanon is that he is still artificial which is why he doesn't show up in any of the shatterspaces, because he's not "real". He only exists in universes where he's made. But then again, Sonic isn't in any of them either and that's a direction that's getting a bit too galaxy-brained so

 

Robotnik has also only appeared in one, the New Yolk City, so it could be they're somewhere in the universes, just unseen.

 

He still looks and sounds exactly like Boom Shadow to me.

+ - Why the fuck was Shadow even in Boom, anyway?  

 

It was on his terms

 

How far through the show are you? Spoilers for episode 8 follow:

Spoiler: Shadow's role in Prime

At the exact moment that the Paradox Prism was broken, Shadow used Chaos Control. It somehow protected him from becoming "shattered" like the world and other characters around him. He ended up in the void between universes, fully aware of what had happened. Sonic was unaffected because he was physically touching the Prism, I guess? The only difference is that Sonic got dumped into New Yoke City, whilst Shadow is in the void. Sonic can reach the himself by running fast for an extended period of time, which Shadow wants him to do.

As for why Eggman has only shown up in one universe so far, that's anyone's guess. I don't think there's supposed to be any kind of explanation for that. It's a kids show, and the rules are always a bit different for the bad guys.

 

I found the series ok so far, but as expected I'm more interested in the overarching premise than the individual arcs. Like others have said, New Yoke City works the best probably because it's the most relevant "shatterspace" in the "Shatter-verse" thus far. I kinda view it like how the Kingdom Hearts games treat worlds, if the world has more plot significance to the overarching plot I'm more interested than a world that contributes hardly anything.

The Voice of Sonic sounds really good. I kinda felt like he was oscillating between RCS and Drummond in tone, like he was blending both their voices for Sonic together and the result works very well. I have to give the guy credit for being able to do that since it's very difficult to pull that off and still feel like you're acting an actual character. In terms of personality, I guess they're leaning into Movie Sonic, but it doesn't quite work for me. Sonic is intelligent, and while he does love adventure he's by no means dumb or short-sided. Sonic tends to know a lot more than he lets on and while I get he needs some sort of character arc to keep him interesting, it feels like it does the character a disservice and ties into the 90s American interpretation of the character that never really fit what Sonic Team has had in mind for him.

Also, I love Nine and I would die for him.

 

Elaborate. 90s American Sonic was a bad boy with an attitude. This interpretation is nothing like what he was promoted as back then.

 

I'm 3 episodes in and so far this is my favorite Sonic Show. Leagues above the rest. Did anyone else notice that the Eggman theme (at least in New Yolk City) is very similar to the boos room theme in Sonic Spinball? Also I can catch a riff or two of the Sonic Heroes Boss theme from time to time. Not sure if that was on purpose.

 

Sorry, I should have made it more clear. I personally don't find Sonic's character annoying. I never meant to imply that people here were saying Devin himself was. I have nothing but praise for him and find Sonic's character to be the aspect that bugs me the least.

This is also a common issue I see with Netflix animated productions aimed at kids. The character writing is often very safe and takes very few risks. I find that in an anime setting like Japanese Sonic X or the Adventure games where dialogue is less of the focus, you can get away with it (and even then, Sonic's Engrish had charms and quirks that make it weirdly endearing), but in an all English production with a heavy emphasis on building the cast, it really suffers when the writers don't take as many risks.

That's not to say they have no good ideas. Robo-Rose, Hangry Big, and to a lesser extent Rogue's larger roles in this show are welcomed and are a bit more creative. And as I've said, Sonic himself I find to be fine as a whole. Perhaps not his 'best' writing, but it meshes well with Devin's performance to create a believable version of Sonic, if not flawed.

In retrospect, I'm also pretty spoiled when it comes to English speaking Sonic. The 90s SATAM/AOSTH cast had some of the best TV cartoon voice actors of the era working on both those shows, and it really helped sell who the cast were and they weren't afraid to experiment with their satire and tropes, even if some of 90s Sonic's elements could be annoying, they were 100% consistent with that version of him (even across 2 unrelated shows). I just love watching talented actors go all out, and it feels like a lot of the more cliche safe writing is holding the cast back a notch in this show and it bugs me. Sonic Boom was also the opposite of this, where the game cast pretty much got to go all out too, and it's often genuinely hilarious even if the show itself has a very boring plot and is based off of an outright 'awful' game.

Again, this is not a criticism of the actors themselves. Brian Drummond himself is in this cast and he's one of those very solid 90s/early 2000s talents that a lot of people remember fondly. If you want a great example of him going all out with a role, Beast Machines Jetstorm is a really good showing of what he can do under an amazing director that lets him improvise a bit (Susan Blu). He's certainly giving the best he can with the material given, but it's different from the energy I've seen him and other veteran actors give when they're allowed to go all out.

 

To clarify, I'm referring to the cocky, slightly arrogant, and impulsive attitude that Sonic was given in the US and UK. While the intent was to make Sonic "cool", Sonic Team didn't necessarily set out to make him impulsive, he was cool because he was confident and stood for empowerment (might be the wrong term) which is exemplified in the text on the japanese box art "to live a life of power" ect. That's a far cry from the bad boy persona that the US gave him, or the bizarre characterization he has in the fleetway comics.

What Prime seems to be doing (and to a lesser extent in the films) is take that American baseline for Sonic and deconstruct it. He's cocky and impulsive and it's portrayed as problem for him to overcome, his character arc. In the films this works a little better because he's learning confidence himself and making mistakes, Prime's Sonic is supposedly the Sonic from the games who never had these flaws to begin with (Lost World being an exception but I consider the characterization in that terrible for similar reasons). The result is that Sonic looks pretty dumb when he's supposed to feel more competent.

It's not to say it's a terrible take and I get why they did it because a static character isn't as interesting, but I don't care for it.