Sonic Comics Concluded Massive Conflicts From the Cult Classic Cartoon

As a series completely based on a video game character, it might be surprising to hear that Archie Comics’ notorious Sonic the Hedgehog series originally took little to no inspiration from the games and instead relied heavily on a cartoon commonly referred to as Sonic SatAM for running on Saturday mornings.

Like every rendition of the hedgehog, Sonic SatAM still incorporated many of the same elements from the video games and even its much brighter and overly cartoony counterpart, the Adventures of Sonic the Hedgehog, such as the evil Dr. Robotnik. But some of the defining divergences in Sonic SatAM and Archie Comics included the Blue Blur’s affiliation with the Freedom Fighters.

To finally rid himself of these pesky vermin who had an alarming track record of incessantly foiling his most dastardly schemes, Dr. Robotnik needed to find the location of the Freedom Fighters’ secret base, Knothole Village. But in the meantime, he had to rely on his Roboticizer, a machine that could transform any living thing into a mindless, robot slave. Sonic shared a special animosity for the Roboticizer as his dear Uncle Chuck and childhood puppy Muttski were roboticized early on. But before the Blue Blur could destroy the Roboticizer and before Robotnik ever found Knothole, the show was canceled. Luckily, the comics continued and concluded these plotlines. However, the end result was complicated and confusing.

With the Roboticizer, Sonic actually wasn’t the hero who saved the day. It was Princess Sally Acorn and her ability to successfully wield and summon the powers of the mighty Sword of Acorn, which restored the minds of all robots in issue #100. As revealed two issues later, Sonic couldn’t have helped even if he wanted to because the sword could only return free will to afflicted critters so long as Sally was the wielder. But, of course, things got complicated. The original Roboticizer was lost upon the destruction of Robotropolis, but after Dr. Robotnik died, his life spark entered into Dr. Eggman who could roboticize anyone he touched. However, he soon lost this ability after being subjected to an alien experiment in issue #118.

In terms of Knothole, the comics’ original Dr. Robotnik had actually learned of its location as early as issue #50, but due to extenuating circumstances, his replacement, Dr. Eggman, wouldn’t launch a successful attack until issue #175. Things started going horribly wrong when the first Robotnik’s Ultimate Annihilator backfired incredibly, killing him and putting the village in a temporal rift that existed three hours in the future. Of course, Dr. Robotnik had the location of Knothole Village on file, so one of the first things the new Dr. Eggman did was an attempt to download the files. But upon learning that the new Dr. Eggman was roboticized, the Freedom Fighters implanted a virus into the late Dr. Robotnik’s main computer server in issue #76. So when Dr. Eggman tried to download the files, he became infected and couldn’t access the data. It wouldn’t be until issue #118 when Dr. Eggman became human again that he would finally remember the location of Knothole Village. But all his efforts to invade Knothole failed until issue #175 when he finally destroyed Knothole Village, forcing the Freedom Fighters to create their new home in the image of their original kingdom before Dr. Robotnik initially took over. 

While the comics were originally just another avenue to explore a world that the Sonic SatAM cartoon originally pioneered, it eventually became a vessel to carry on that world after the TV show’s cancellation. Archie’s series not only adopted the same dark tone as the Sonic the Hedgehog cartoon but eventually brought its cast of characters into the more complex and mystifying world of comics.

About The Author