Greetings Ladies and Gents! It is I, The Shaman of Animation back again with a new installment of Comic Casual. I actually wanted to have one of these out sooner than I did, but we're here now with something more current. In July last year, Sega announced the end of its partnership with Archie, resulting in the cancellation of the Archie Sonic comic series: The longest comic based on a video game character. But you can't keep the blue blur down, his games more than prove that.
Sorry, couldn't help but reach for that low hanging fruit...
Not even a week later, the official Sonic Twitter page announced that IDW would be publishing for a new Sonic Comic; and as the months rolled out we got more information on the new series: Veteran Sonic comic writer Ian Flynn would be returning to the book along with various artists familiar with the hedgehog and that the 1st 4 issues would come out on a weekly basis to help usher in this new era. How do they fare? That's what we're here to find out!
This new IDW comic takes place shortly after the events of Sonic Forces and sees Sonic traveling town to town helping members of The Resistance fight remnants of Eggman's robot army from when he took over the world, teaming up with old friends along the way...and that is the entire story to all 4 of these comics.
And that is the biggest problem with these first four issues in general: they're very formulaic and telling a very simple story; and I'm sure some will argue that it's the first four issues, you have to give the comic time to grow before you go too crazy to & that's true in a way, but a new comic needs to have something to hook new people in.
To compare, IDW's TMNT run stared with Raphael separated from Splinter and the other Turtles, the latest (at least by the time of this post) Avengers story by Jason Aaron has started off with Space Gods falling from the sky. Superman Rebirth saw Superman balancing his usual duties alongside helping his son with his still developing powers. With this new Sonic series, I feel the only real hook that the book has is that it's a Sonic comic; and for a Sonic fan like me, that's cool, but I don't think that's enough to get the attention of other people.
A plus I'll give to Ian Flynn is that he adds just a little more depth to the details that the story in Sonic Forces look over. One of the most notable instances of this is in the first issue where Tails is worried about Sonic going off on his own again after he got captured by Eggman causing Tails to "Shut Down"; and my personal favorite is in issue three where there is a small explanation as to why the wisps are still in Sonic's world even though they left after Sonic Colors. They're things that probably didn't NEED to be done, but I appreciate him going the extra mile and filling in some of those small gaps.
This new IDW comic takes place shortly after the events of Sonic Forces and sees Sonic traveling town to town helping members of The Resistance fight remnants of Eggman's robot army from when he took over the world, teaming up with old friends along the way...and that is the entire story to all 4 of these comics.
And that is the biggest problem with these first four issues in general: they're very formulaic and telling a very simple story; and I'm sure some will argue that it's the first four issues, you have to give the comic time to grow before you go too crazy to & that's true in a way, but a new comic needs to have something to hook new people in.
To compare, IDW's TMNT run stared with Raphael separated from Splinter and the other Turtles, the latest (at least by the time of this post) Avengers story by Jason Aaron has started off with Space Gods falling from the sky. Superman Rebirth saw Superman balancing his usual duties alongside helping his son with his still developing powers. With this new Sonic series, I feel the only real hook that the book has is that it's a Sonic comic; and for a Sonic fan like me, that's cool, but I don't think that's enough to get the attention of other people.
While the comic so far is fairly simple story-wise, I do think these comics make up for it in Sonic's interactions with the characters that appear in each issue. My favorite being issue #2 where Sonic and Amy get to bounce off one another. I'm glad to see that their dynamic's evolved from just being a one-sided crush/obsession (depending on the series). It's something the Sonic Boom T.V. series had been doing and to see it here is a welcome change.
A plus I'll give to Ian Flynn is that he adds just a little more depth to the details that the story in Sonic Forces look over. One of the most notable instances of this is in the first issue where Tails is worried about Sonic going off on his own again after he got captured by Eggman causing Tails to "Shut Down"; and my personal favorite is in issue three where there is a small explanation as to why the wisps are still in Sonic's world even though they left after Sonic Colors. They're things that probably didn't NEED to be done, but I appreciate him going the extra mile and filling in some of those small gaps.
The last thing of note for this would be the new characters introduced. The first two are Rough and Tumble, two skunk brothers who have taken over a town and have the wisps locked up when we first see them. They give off the vibe of goofy fodder villains that we'll probably see plenty of as the book goes on. The final one you see in the picture above: Tangle the Lemur, introduced in Issue #4. Outside of the stuff she does with her tail, she's kind of bland. Of course, she had only been introduced in one issue so hopefully as the book goes on, she'll have more of a personality.
I feel as though this review was a little harsher than I wanted it to be. Despite how negative I may have appeared, I actually did enjoy these first four issues of IDW's Sonic comic. While the artist is different in all four of these books, it still looks great providing cool looking and flashy looking action sequences, and the story is well put together with the banter between characters being its biggest strength.
The thing is there's nothing in the book so far that makes it a must read series that you have to follow from issue to issue unless you're a Sonic fan. Hopefully with issue 5 around the corner, that may change, but for now wait for these to come out in trade.
Til next time folks, I'm The Shaman of Animation.
Take Care...
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