The issue with Chris is that even as a kid you knew he's just there because someone made a business decision that kids need a self-insert character instead of actually adding something beneficial to the story. At the time there was an interview that mentioned Chris was created to go after the audience Pokémon had and be a character like Ash that kids can identify with. And it really shows. And it's not like he's not interesting, I think that while the majority of us are not rich we can still identify with parents working all the time and not seeing them enough. But the show can only commit to it so much because it has to focus on Sonic's adventures. So there's pull between the two of them that clashes. This is not even going getting to the part where I don't know about everyone, but I always identified more with the actual heroes than the self-insert characters like Chris. And Chris did not have the benefit of being in Ash's position and role he had in Pokémon. Chris could've worked as a kid that Sonic helped in a few episodes at the beginning while he got used to the human world. Same goes with the rest of the human cast. Just random people Sonic helps between adventures (like Helen's episode or Knuckles with Hawk) instead of being part of the main cast.
Here's an unpopular opinion these days: Sonic Superstars has great music. I'm not suggesting it's better than Sonic 2 or S3K, but overall I definitely enjoyed the music better than Sonic 1. The good music never matched the highs of Sonic Mania (e.g. Studiopolis, Stardust Speedway, and Mirage Saloon), but the forgettable music was better than the lower end of Mania's soundtrack, especially the lazy remixes on most of the past levels *cough cough* Lava Reef *cough*.
Are you sure about that? I was a national champion rifle marksman in 2011 and I used to compete in quickdraw competitions for fun back when I lived in rural Texas. If that's your definition of a party, I'm your huckleberry :P All joking aside, I'm not trying to spoil the fun for people who enjoyed the Mania remix of Lava Reef, but I just thought the choice of instruments ruined it: the first 4 notes had no punch, the MIDI electric guitar didn't have any distortion or reverb, and all the other parts were toned way down. I think the Lava Reef Act 2 theme had to have been one of the last tracks written, because it sounds like a rough draft that someone made in 3 hours. With that said, I'm a huge fan of Tee Lopes and I thought Metallic Madness Act 2 was underrated brilliance. As good as Studiopolis and Stardust Speedway were, I thought MM act 2 was just as good.
I'd love to hear Tee's Lava Reef Act 2 without the lead guitar. It's fantastic with it, but I just love the atmosphere from the rest of the track. A bit like US SCD.
Agreed, even if he was decently executed all he would be doing for most fans would be taking time away from possible good writing of the actual Sonic characters (I'm looking at you, Tom Wachowski.) Unfortunately, they nosedived this already hard-to-pull-off concept even further by making him what a lot of people see as a squeaky-voiced annoying unnecessary character that could improve the series by being removed. They basically did the writer's ritual of making sure he would be completely hated and made it even worse by making him have so much plot relevance.
Tom is probably the best used example of the concept as he's the deuteragonist of the first movie and it's built on his relationship to Sonic, and even if he's demoted to a mostly supporting role in the second movie, that relationship established in the first one is still used as a foundation. I know people would always prefer no humans barring Eggman, but I actually think Tom is a decent character for the role he plays. They've slowly been phasing him and his family out as of the second movie and I expect the third to be mostly about the Sonic stuff even more than 2 was, but I hope they don't completely leave him behind.
The only reason I can think of why a writer would want to include some new human character to pal around with Sonic and the gang is so the audience has someone who looks more like them to self-insert as, to relate to, and identify with. But if the writers are doing their job, we should be able to self-insert as, relate to, and identify with the actual Sonic characters in the stories they're telling. I think that's why I've never liked the random humans like Chris and Tom very much; they feel forced and unnecessary.
Tom is a really good example of this done decently, and I think it was smart to use him to rope in a lot of casual moviegoers. In Sonic 2 they did a really good job of not having him be too in the way of the plot but still relevant now that they had already gained an audience. (barring the awful dad scene of course) Where they really start to stumble is trying to fit in more human characters and give them relevance and scenes like the awful wedding scene that should have gone to tails using his own gadgets. This is one of the worst aspects of them as they usually feel really shoehorned no matter what for me too. It's very difficult not to make them feel shoehorned because if the actual Sonic characters are written very well and then have to share space with a random human who is poorly written it feels like time is being wasted. If they write the humans very well and spend time fleshing them out, then the Sonic characters will have less time to develop leading to the character still feeling shoehorned. I just wish these shows and movies would stop doing it entirely and focus on fleshing each Sonic character out so that the audience can just relate to them instead like you said.
I hate relatable human sidekicks in Sonic, but I also don't like when people articulate this as "no humans besides Eggman", because I want there to be humans, just not humans that steal screentime from the characters I care about.
"No humans besides Eggman" is so funny to me because then why the fuck does eggman exist? Did he just spawn into existence one day? Did he hatch from an egg??? Plus you can't erase humans from Sonic at this point without completely rebooting the continuity considering Shadow's entire existence :p
qft Topaz was great, and I legitimately loved the role Rouge played in X. Best thing about the show for sure.
Most of the humans in Sonic X are meant to compliment the development of the regular Sonic cast, And they do that pretty successfully I think. Tails and Chuck, Amy, Cream and Ella, topaz and Rouge. If not they're usually decent hangouts like Knuckles and Hawk and Sonic and Sam. Chris is the one character who doesn't, because he can't, because Sonic is a static character, so his development is entirely one sided... Like pretty much every other character that looks up to Sonic. Even then, I think his prominence is overstated especially because they brought him back for Series 2, even though there's even less screentime for him and they still cut the whole cast in half. I just don't know where this criticism that they're somehow the biggest focus of the show and take away from the existing characters is supposed to come in because 90% of the time it doesn't matter that they're there and the existing characters are the existing characters in their existing dynamics. And I'll be honest I think a lot of the hate, especially for Chris, is just genuinely people being hateful for no good reason.
Dr. Eggman's heritage is clearly stated in his name, he is simply an egg with legs and a mustache. But on a serious note, I've always been baffled by people who think that the humans we see in the adventure series and onwards came out of nowhere or shouldn't exist. Where does this clearly human villain come from if there are no human settlements? Do some people expect the rest of humanity to be stuck in the Stone Age or the Medieval Era while Eggman has spacefaring technology? Of course not, there was always going to have to be some form of human cities far away from South Island. It's always been very clear that there were most likely other humans in Sonic's world and SA1 in particular did them really well by making the humans interesting and kind of funny yet not too far off from reality. I wish more people said "Not too many humans besides Eggman taking up too much plot relevance" instead of "No humans besides Eggman." Also on a side note, I really dislike the pixarish look the humans were given in Unleashed personally even though I've heard a lot of people praise it for "fitting" more with Sonic's world.
There was a fake Sonic 3 movie "leak" going around that depicted Maria as a furry creature (presumably not related to Eggman, at least biologically) and I do wonder if that's what Sega would go with if they ever rebooted Shadow's continuity Then again, considering Sage, they might be willing to allow humans back in again. Sure, Sage is an AI, but her design is clearly meant to be that of a human child
Because Chris is the primary POV character of the series, so we see events from his perspective more than anyone else's, even Sonic's. This mostly affects Tails the most though as because of this change, his and Sonic's dynamic is heavily diluted and filtered and Chris is inserted into scenes where other characters played a role; i.e. being the one to convince Shadow's face turn as opposed to Amy. None of that is inherently bad and makes sense for the adaptation, but it doesn't really change that the already established characters had to get snubbed to make way for someone else and that's always going to rub fans the wrong way. That's why people only started to like him in Season 3; not only has his character matured, but since he is no longer the primary POV character, Tails has much more room to breathe and develop as a character. The screentime feels a lot more evenly distributed in Season 3 basically.
