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Sonic The Hedgehog #57 "Back To Basics: or, The History Device" Cover: Fuselage by Spaz and Harvo, afterburner by J. D. Ray
and Heroic Age. At least, that's how it looked through my bifocals
AND a magnifier. Hey, I'm 46 years old; it comes with the
territory. Note the celestial Sally's reaction to Sonic's
departure on this cover, because you WON'T find it on the inside.
And I CAN'T look at this cover without thinking of what might have
been: Sally in Heaven, singing with the Choir Invisible. As it
turned out, Sally's in Mobitropolis and singing the chorus from
Chumbawamba's "Tubthumping" instead: "I get knocked down/But I get
up again/They're never gonna keep me down!" [Repeat ad nauseum].
I've set up a visual counterpart on the "Sally: Dead or Alive"
portion of my Sonic Website as a kind of coda to the whole affair.
What can you say about a five-year-old comic continuity that died?
OK, maybe that's a bit strong, but after this installment the
changes will be happening fast and furious. Just read the "Once a
virtual paradise" page past the boilerplate opening paragraph.
Having been brought up to speed plot-wise up to and including
developments from Sonic #56 and the Return Of The King special, it
states that Sonic is going to blow this pop stand. It's all
supposed to be noble, an attempt to put a positive spin on Ken
Penders' original vision of Sonic leaving Knothole to avenge
Sally's demise. Now, though, he's leaving in order to seek out
Naugus and any other villains who may be skulking about. I've got
no problem with that premise, but get down to the sentence:
"Excited about taking the high road to adventure with his buddy
Tails, Sonic packs with all the exuberance of a little boy...."
And you might feel like cancelling your subscription at that
point. The sea-change signalled in "Reality Bytes" (#51), which
showed Sonic sleeping in a kid's race car bed, has come to pass.
In a total surrender to the core audience of preadolescent boys,
Sonic is being turned INTO a preadolescent boy. Having Sonic the
Hedgehog act like a Mobian Luke Skywalker would have been far too
grim a prospect, but is it really such an improvement to turn him
into Tom Sawyer with quills instead? Those of us who came to Sonic
fandom via the Saturday morning television series have gotten used
to thinking of Sonic as a sixteen-year-old. Archie, apparently,
thinks they've got more than enough teenagers cluttering up
Riverdale already. Sonic, not to put too fine a point on it, has
been editorially emasculated by Archie Comics and his scrotum is
probably hanging on Richard Goldwater's office wall.
The splash page that opens this story shows Sonic packing, and
who's seated next to him? Amy Rose and THEN Princess Sally. What
does THAT tell you? Then Rotor walks in with the episode's gimmick
supreme: a device that's supposed to help Sonic see the future.
Alternatively referred to as a "doohickey" and a "thingamajig,"
Sonic straps it on his head. BTW, Art Mawhinney shows an overhead
view of Sonic's bed on page 2--it's still a race car bed but it's
now a widebody, i.e., a double bed. Knowing Archie, it probably
got low mileage IF you know what I mean AND I think some of you do.
It turns out that the thinkamahickey is the aforementioned
"history device," which it wouldn't surprise me to learn is a
technical term for those episodes of television shows (usually
sitcoms) which consist mostly of clips from previous episodes laced
together with varying degrees of editorial finesse. So this story
is mostly a recap of the issues that have gone before.
It's not a COMPLETE recap, by any means. But herewith is a
table of the way we were: Not that Sonic's memory is perfect. The Antisonic's gang
didn't really appear in "The Good, The Bad, and the Hedgehog" except
in one panel as part of an exposition; they only showed up later to
mix it up with the Knothole gang in "When Hedgehogs Collide." And
the events in "The Return" took place in an alternative future where
Sonic and Sally were not only older, but parents!
And of course like the song says, "what's too painful to
remember we simply choose to forget." As a result, there's no sign
of such embarrassments as "Let's Get Small" or "Sonic Shot" (both
#33) or "The Last Game Cartridge Hero" (Sonic Live special) or
"Battle Royal" (Battle Royal special). And since this is Sonic's
memory that's being probed, we are spared any reminders of what
happened in the lives of the supporting players: no mention is made
of "Deadliest of the Species" (Princess Sally miniseries) or
Rotor's "Tundra Road" arc (#31-32) or Tails' miniseries "Southern
Crossover" and its set-ups, "Sumbersible Rehearsal" (Game Gear
Adaptation) and "Growing Pains" (#28-29). However, there's also no
sign of one of the better recent stories, "Running To Stand Still"
(#54), either. Maybe it would be too embarrassing to suggest that
the Sonic continuity could have taken another turn than the one
it's about to take. Forget it; let's skip over to page 21 unless you want to
linger a while longer on Art Mawhinney's artistic revisionism. Not
that that's a complaint: his drawings for "Wedding Bell Blues"
(#18) and "That's The Spirit" (#20) are a definite improvement over
the Dave Manak originals. Unfortunately, when it comes time to
redraw Sonic and Sally embracing at the end of "The Big Goodbye" he
sticks with the Spaziante party line and keeps the couple at arm's
length from each other. That bummed me out at least as much as
Sonic was bummed out when the thingamahoozit shorted out and blew
up. So let's get on to page 21 and...the rest of the story (or at
least such story as Karl Bollers had to work with).
Karl has two bits of business left and because he obeys Sega's
dictates the handling of the two loose ends fails to live up to
their potential. In the first, Sonic tries to connect with his
roboticized parents (about whom we continue to know next to
nothing). I can't say it's all that emotionally satisfying, but
Sonic's been out of practice relating to grown-ups. It doesn t
help that Sonic's word balloon on page 22 panel 5 is misdirected so
that it looks like his mom is speaking. That kind of sloppiness
was disgusting enough...
But the second bit started out with more promise. It's Sonic
and Sally's parting, and at first Karl strikes just the right note
of adolescent awkwardness in the face of some pretty big emotions.
But the suits' iron rule prevails as Sally bestows on Sonic the
same kind of a "short kiss type thing" (to quote Ruby Echidna's
famed "Endlame") he gave her in "The Big Goodbye." For his part,
Sonic gives her a bunch of flowers, looking more like a schoolboy
than ever (get used to it, people--that's the future you're looking
at). They don't even BOTHER to attempt an embrace, even at arm'slength!
Rating: This SHOULD have been a defining moment for the characters,
and not just the Blue Blur! Sonic leaving his parents, Sally, and
Uncle Chuck, Tails leaving Sally and Bunnie...I don't care how
water-logged it could have gotten, those stories (if handled well)
could have blown every single useless flashback frame off the page!
Even Sonic taking one last verbal shot at Antoine would have been
good for a couple frames if not an entire page! Instead, we get NO
sense that, as I like to put it, anything is going on behind the
eyes of any of the characters. We hear the dialogue and see them
going through the motions but there isn't ONE OUNCE OF EMOTIONAL
HONESTY in the entire 24-page STORY!! Sonic and Sally may as well
have known each other for only a couple of hours rather than for
eleven YEARS as spelled out in the old continuity and implied in
all that history that Sonic has just reviewed. But the hearts of
the characters are a closed book to us because preadolescent boys
aren't into "mush." So the ONLY old comrade of Sonic and Tails
who's permitted to shed a tear at their departure is a greatly-
reduced Dulcy as she watches Sonic, Tails, and the old continuity
fly off into the sunset. We get no plot whatsoever; just Karl
Bollers thrashing around because it's difficult to write when
you're wearing a straitjacket. To paraphrase another Sonic fan,
Kulok, and his commentary on this issue:
I didn't laugh,
It's going to be hard to knock this one out of contention for Worst
Story of 1998.
Reader Reviews Zifei: OK, from now on, I'm not going to write anymore reviews. I'm going to let the people at Mobius Forum rate the comic, that means you could review future issues, too. Of course I'm going to rate it too, here it goes: Issue 57 is a BORING issue. They need to stop letting Karl Bollers write, he can't handle emotions. The only good thing about this issue is the Spaziante cover and Art Mawhenney's penciling. I give it Questa: I really think this deserved Christy: I give it Auburn: I rate it WB: While the retrospective part was good for people like me who don't have all of the back issues, it was repetetive for those who have them already, and the breakup was singlehandely the most throwaway plot device next to the entire "Let's Get Small" storyline, which was conveniently averted. Overall Maric: I give |
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