The Sonic the Hedgehog Continuity Thread of Love and Timelines

https://comicbook.com/gaming/news/netflix-sonic-prime-deven-mack-logan-mcpherson-interview/#2

I sincerely apologise for linking you to comicbook.com, but there it is.

Edit: Apologies, just reread Plorpus’ reply, initially thought he was just asking for confirmation aside from Ian Flynn. Alas, sources are still good!

 

Ian Flynn's name is also in the credits of Sonic Prime incase you all didn't know. He helped worked on it and said including Birdie from Sonic Adventure in it was his idea.

 

Yet Boxer Hockey has noted not to take things lore-wise from Sonic Prime, suggesting its not canonical since we can't use it for canon. So where does that fall into things?

 

I've said at Prime's release, a simple look at it's script it was obvious (Badniks without flickies, *gasp*) that "this is canon" was no more than a marketing ploy to be droped later when convenient.

And look at that, we're starting to walk down that road.

 

Oh, I've always had that stance, and apply the same to the comics. Just noting what Boxer Hockey begged us.

 

Each person making contradictory statements (regardless of how small or ambiguous they may seem) makes things harder for us to discern properly...

As if the canon itself ain't already a glorious mess...

 

Things can be "bad for lore" without necessarily being "non canon". Sonic 06 is still canon, after all, even though there are things that simply cannot be true contained within its narrative.

 

Precisely why I was deliberate with my phrasing. We've got two people who worked on Prime saying its canon and one person saying it isn't, backed by a few inconsistencies with the main continuity. It's quite the grey area, especially because SEGA haven't officially weighed in on it. My point, however, is that ultimately there is such discussion surrounding Prime's canonicity in relation to its continuity errors *because* there are assertions by people who worked on it that the show is canon, and that in order for us to have a discussion about there needs to be acknowledgement of that fact. And in large part, discussion regarding Prime has worked well on this point because people are disputing it based on significant empirical inconsistencies with prior information.

Contrast with the assertion that Secret Rings isn't canon based on the poster's personal feelings on the writers of Generations, or any other attempt to reject a piece of the franchise based on taste.

 

There was more nuance to Ian Flynn's comments about Sonic Prime. For example, he more or less said that rings being depicted as in-universe objects in Prime's first episode should be ignored. He also commented that there's more he could say but shouldn't/won't.



^ 18m 22s



^ 2m 57s



^ 48s



^ 35m 18s (about rings)



^ 22m 30s (about Amy's bird friend)

 

Still hate the Rings embargo.

 

About Secret Ring's canonicty...

Personally, I'd say that almost every writer that ever touched the series from Adventure 2 onwards didn't quite get Sonic as the series was originally. Sure, I LIKE a lot of the material that came from people like Shiro Maekawa, but that doesn't change the fact that I feel the original Sonic ended in Adventure 1, and that Adventure 2 was the beginning of a new series that shared similarities with the original, but was ultimately trying to be a new thing. It really does feel like Maekawa turned Sonic into his Sonic. Yes, his new Sonic isn't totally incompatible with the old one, which is why I still like it, but the series lost something in this transition, and I'd much rather see these stories and ideas being told as part of the old Sonic, rather than seeing the new Sonic hijacking the franchise for itself.

My point here is that you can't really argue about what we should consider canon or not on the merits of "Does it feel like Sonic?" or "Did the writers get Sonic?" because the answer to those questions are never going to be the same for everyone. I'm 100% some of you reading this might feel I'm being a little bit to extreme, while others will totally agree with me. It's simply unproductive to argue what's canon based on feelings because it just stops discussion and it will never get anybody anywere.

I also don't see how the Pontaff not knowing about Sonic or making.... sigh... meta jokes... has any bearing on wether or not you should take the details on their stories as canon (Also, I'm taking a big risk at assuming this here since I only consume these stories in japanese anyway, but I seriously doubt they even make that many 4th wall breaks in the first place because people only use the exact same 3 examples all the time). At that point, you might as well say that Frontiers is non-canon because Ian Flynn wrote in the encyclo-speed-ia that Sharyar confused Sonic with a genie, or that Sir Lancelot compared the Earth Dragon with Biolizard, when none of these things actually happened. I don't see the relation between some weird jokes and a dialogue that makes reference to a previous adventure.

I mean, I have no idea what canon even is at this point, but I'd say there's pretty much no reason to question statements that have no contradictions whatsoever

 

@Ura can you remind me who wrote the story of the Sonic games up to SA1?

 

As far as I know, we don't have the names for anybody in the case of the classic games, most likely the manuals were written by random members of the staff. I think Sonic's origin story was written by Naka himself? I might be completely wrong here, though. The writer for Adventure is Nishiyama Akinori

 

The 2D classics, I understand. But why didn't they keep Nishiyama for SA2 onwards?
Now I wonder how the franchise might've been if that writer stayed there more years...

 

That's sad...so sad...

 

Bringing this here from the Superstars thread, for obvious reasons.

Was this recently commented on? I know they've flip-flopped semi-recently on a lot of things relating to the in-universe implications of the branding division, but I don't remember Flynn or anyone specifying one way or another about the designs specifically. Maybe I've just got a goldfish memory, or am just assuming without justification that designs are also implied when they say "Classic is the past".

 

No one from nowadays said anything of that matter, as far as I know.
I think it derives from that interview on SA1's time, regarding the aesthetic changes for the 3D era.

 

I don't really see the point of canonizing the storybook games considering they took place in their own separate universes with intentionally retconned versions of all the characters but Sonic. I guess just so Sonic can refer back to them?

Yeah this makes no sense at all. Why would a knight of the round table know what a Biolizard is? Might have to board the Ian hate train if he's just gonna go and make random connections like this.

Classic Sonic is referred to as a younger Sonic in Generations. But yeah Sega completely retconned that in Forces and AFAIK haven't gone back on it since. Though current Sonic suddenly being obsessed with canon could indicate that Superstars is a pre-Adventure story but I have doubts.

 

It's actually Sonic that makes the connection, so likely a typo.