Sonic the Hedgehog #239 (September 2012)

Greg Horn cover: single pose of Sonic. It’s well done, I’ll say that, but that’s it. As much as I dislike covers that tease the reader by ultimately having nothing to do with the story, this is one of those nondescript covers that tell us absolutely nothing about the comic, except that stars Sonic. This kind of cover isn’t even in the running for Best/Worst cover art.

“Heroes Part 1: Team Building”

Story: Ian Flynn; Art: Jamal Peppers; Ink: Terry Austin; Color: Matt Herms; Lettering: John E. Workman; Assistant Editor: Vincent Lovallo; Editor: Paul Kaminski; Editor-in-Chief: Victor Gorelick; Robot Maintenance: Mike Pellerito; Sega Licensing reps: Anthony Gaccione and Cindy Chau

Sonic, Tails, Amy and T-Pup are closing in on the Death Egg which, inconsiderately, starts moving away and toward New Mobitropolis. But a slow-speed chase in the air isn’t much of a plot, and since the Egg dropped “a small invasion force” on a village in the Feral Forest, that’s excuse enough for the comic and they bail out of the plane en masse and let it keep circling around in the air. For all his technical prowess, I guess Tails couldn’t be bothered to figure out a way to do vertical take-offs and landings. Hope he topped off the tank.

On the ground, Mecha-Sally is positioning the troops as Sonic wonders what the attraction is in this place. Then, miracle of miracles, Amy Rose actually says something useful: that this is where Elias and his family settled after “Unthinkable” (S234) when they managed to get clear while Antoine got blown up. Having hammered home the plot, she is rewarded with her Piko Hammer.

Sonic then tries to catch up with Mecha-Sally, but she sics Giant Silver Sonic on him to keep him busy as she heads toward a hut.

Inside, the Macho Males of Mobius are holding a meeting as Elias and Col. Summersby trade guff about being able to kick some bot butt on their own without either of them looking out the window. But it’s all talk; Elias has to get over to Harvey Who’s Spies R Us emporium while his wife and daughter are spirited away by Mrs. Sommersby. The appearance of Leeta and Larry suddenly causes him to change his mind because, well, because Ian wanted to throw that in. It really makes no sense otherwise. But he’s finally talked into acting upon his original decision by the bottom of the page.

We then get an entire page devoted to Tails catching sight of Elias and crew sneaking out the back window. Larry must be off his game; if he were a true jinx, Elias would have sprained his ankle or put his back out while jumping out the window. Anyway, Elias tells Tails “You saw nothing.” And Tails is all “OK.” Then they run away.

Finally, Sally busts into the hut where the Colonel tries that Gandalf “You shall not pass!” thing and then punches Sally in the face. She throws him against a wall for his trouble. Amy shows up and we get two pages of girl-on-girl action with Sally being all “You just want to chase Sonic” and Amy being all “As IF!” Tails then shows up to tell the Colonel, who’s still regaining consciousness, that his wife and the Acorns “made it out the back,” which would be a good thing, except that he said it while Sally is still in earshot. Oops. Well, that one was for the sake of the readers, anyway. With Amy and Tails in her face, Sally breaks out a flame thrower to even the odds. She blasts through a wall, setting a nearby hut on fire, and bails out of the fight.

Sonic, meanwhile, is getting served by Silver Sonic. But since life has handed him a very large and lethal lemon, he decides to make some lemonade by having it plow through some Egg SWATS. Sonic could use a deus ex machina right about now but has to settles for a deus ex mechanica in the form of T-Pup who deploys a stasis plot device to immobilize Silver Sonic.

Sally calls for reinforcements and Amy has to break off her attacking Sally when the Egg SWATS start swarming. She finally realizes that Elias and family have made themselves scarce.

Meanwhile, the Feral Foresters have gotten their act together. In addition to giving Silver Sonic the Gulliver On The Beach treatment, they’re going up against the remaining Egg SWATS with axes, swords and, in the case of Colonel Sommersby, bare knuckles. Yeah, good luck with THAT! That’s Sally’s cue to hit the sky and return to the mother ship. And since the village has some huts on fire and some Egg SWATS pestering the villagers, Sonic and crew can’t give chase. Besides, there’s still that VTOL issue when Tails gets back to the plane, which he finally lands when the fires are out and the excitement is over. Neither the Colonel nor Tails clue Sonic in to what’s going on.

As Elias and the others arrive at New Mobitropolis they find the Death Egg hovering over the city (ho-hum), and Team Freedom, aka the Bottom Of The Barrel Freedom Fighters consisting of Rotor, Big, Cream, Cheese, and Bomb, waiting for them.

HEAD: Let’s talk about tension. That’s where the reader/viewer/audience sees something threatening heading toward the hero, getting closer and closer. It’s a staple ingredient of slasher movies as we see the inhuman human killing machine moving closer to his next victim who doesn’t have the good sense to look over her shoulder. Showing Mecha Sally standing what appears to be ten yards or so from the hut where Elias and the rest are huddled is supposed to induce that kind of tension.

But it fails miserably. For one thing, Elias is never allowed to look out the window. If he had, he’d have seen that they were on the verge of being attacked by his own sister, a plot point that Amy Rose had already mentioned but which would have changed up the emotional dynamic of the story if Elias were aware of it.

While Ian passes up a major heart moment in favor of a minor one with Elias and Meg’s abbreviated one-panel farewell, he also needlessly delays Elias’s leave-taking by having him dither uselessly about leaving and then by arguing with Leeta. Dramatically it all makes no sense. I fear that the real reason was to be able to fill up three pages, if you include the escape out the window and into Tails’s presence.

The cumulative effect is that whatever tension Ian invested in the story is totally drained away by the time Sally punches through the wall or door or whatever. A delay of one page would have worked; a three-page delay is just plain fatal to the pacing. I almost expected to see a receptionist in the front of the hut look at Sally, who’s been sitting around leafing through old magazines, and tell her “Sorry to keep you waiting; the victims will see you now.”

Kudos to Ian for proving me wrong in one respect. I thought for sure that after “Trouble in Paradise” (SU17-20), we’d never see T-Pup do anything substantial again, but here he manages to thwart Silver Sonic with some kind of “stasis” charge. It’s too convenient to have him deploy that gimmick here and I hope that Ian doesn’t make a habit of it the way the Warp Ring has been cheapened. Still, it wrapped up the chase sequence.

Once again, Sally did less damage than she was capable of doing. With those laser-like forearm shields, I imagine she could have eviscerated Colonel Sommersby or taken Amy Rose’s head off if she’s been so inclined. She must have internalized Asimov’s Three Laws somewhere along the way, I don’t know. The longer this goes on, the more I think that she hasn’t completely gone over to the dark side. If she had, she’d be doing a lot more damage, Archie standards or no Archie standards.

For those wondering about the Sommersby’s record of “experience looking after young Acorns,” the missus isn’t talking horticulture. They were, in effect, Elias’s foster parents. Rescued as an infant from a crash on Angel Island, he was first raised by the Brotherhood of Guardians before being lateraled over to the Royal Compound and the care of the Sommersby’s. Ken Penders established as much in the Knuckles story arc, “Forbidden Zone” (K19-21). I elaborated on the relationship between Elias and the Sommersbys in my fanfic, “The Gray Letter.”

Despite a few details, this is another helping of the same old same old. Ian is running out of changes to make this story arc interesting. Small wonder that the comics will slam on the brakes as far as the continuity is concerned and work in stories about the Olympics and “Sonic and All-Stars Racing Transformed,” one of the most unwieldy names for a video game I’ve ever heard. The interruption will also realign the numbering of both Sonic and Sonic Universe so that S250 will work with the numbering scheme and not against it. This story still showcases some seriously weak writing, though. Head Score: 5.

EYE: Jamal Peppers’s artwork is excellent, though the Colonel is unbelievably buff for someone who’s supposed to be retired from active service. Eye Score: 10.

HEART: I keep coming back to the fact that Elias never looked out the window at Sally. Had he done so, it would have given the story a reason to slow to a crawl as Elias wrestles with himself, trying to reconcile his earlier macho posing with whatever feelings he should have been allowed to have toward his kid sister. The dithering and arguing that ended up slowing his escape made a poor substitute.

Once again, Archie wimps out on the possibility of a Heart moment, especially when family is involved. Elias can’t even do the math himself; we get Amy Rose crunching the relationship numbers.

As for Mecha-Sally, if she’s still herself in a metallic body, she’s not letting on. Her observation “Target lost” betrays no emotions at having failed to reunite with her brother, even with hostile intent.

I don’t know why Archie, which is the only constant in the comic’s two decade run, seems to think that a display of emotion is a liability. It’s been my experience that while action makes a story interesting, Heart makes it memorable. There certainly isn’t very much memorable about this installment, considering it’s been done. And redone. Heart Score: 4.

SONIC SPIN: Another sales pitch disguised as “Editorial commentary.” That, too, has been done. And redone.

FAN ART: All Sonic this time, with work by Caleb, Demetrius and Fidelia.

FAN FUNNIES: Emily appears to believe that when Amy Rose plays the fear card, Sonic plays it harder. Maybe if it were bigger than 1.5 x 2 inches some of us readers with older eyebones can better appreciate it.

OFF PANEL: Leeta and Lyco mess with Silver’s head. OK, speaking as an identical twin, these kind of head games don’t always work as advertised, because I learned early on that there are things you know that your twin doesn’t and vice versa. That can screw up whatever identity game you might want to try. Besides, when it comes to messing with Silver’s mind, at least Silver as Archie Comics has depicted him, I believe Hank Hill put it best when he spoke of “putting extra stress on a structure that wasn't up to code in the first place.”

SONIC-GRAM: Only one again. Ryan isn’t told whether Metal Shadow or Metal Amy will be back, he isn’t in fact told much of anything about Metal Sonic with the exception of Shard. Turbo Tails and Hyper Sonic, we learn, won’t be making any appearances, either. They do, however, think that Dark Super Sonic getting some face time is a good idea. All this talk of Metal Sonic and Hyper Sonic and Super Sonic makes me think of two words: “New Coke.” Look it up.