INFO BURST

Format: Comic strip
Initial Release Date: December 1992
Feature character: Sonic the Hedgehog
Villain: Jaws
Other Characters: Rotor Walrus, Miles “Tails” Prower
Locations: None specifically named but the story seemingly takes place near to the Great Forest at a dock and in an underwater space with elements resembling the Labyrinth Zone.
Items: Waterproof Robot Maker, Bathysphere
Continuity: Archie Comics
Synopsis: Sonic attempts to enjoy peaceful day fishing but finds himself attacked by Jaws, the piranha Badnik. Sonic spots too late that Robotnik has been polluting the water from his factory and is dumped beneath the surface by Jaws. Sonic gives chase deep underwater and eyes Jaws heading for a cavern but is captured in a net and dragged towards the Waterproof Robot Maker, an undersea version of the Robo-Machine which Jaws is guarding on behalf of Robotnik. The villain intends to convert Sonic into a robot. Rotor and Tails, having planned to meet Sonic to fish together, find the destroyed dock. Rotor brings one of his latest inventions, the bathysphere, which will allow him and Tails to head underwater to investigate. Beneath the waves, Sonic cuts himself free of the net with a spin, but finds himself running low on oxygen. Jaws moves in for the kill but is blasted by a torpedo from the bathysphere. The air bubbles made by the torpedo are just what Sonic needs to get his strength back and allow him to destroy the Waterproof Robot Maker. Jaws flees, intending to report the situation to Robotnik- but with his propeller damaged by the torpedo, he struggles to move in a straight line without colliding with things. Sonic, Tails and Rotor return to land and Sonic, having lost his appetite for seafood, settles on a chilli dog meal instead.
Notes: The first western Sonic story to note feature Robotnik as the villain.

CREDITS

Writer: Michael Gallagher
Artists: Scott Shaw, Bill White, Barry Grossman
Letterer: Dan Nakrosis

Review

Throughout the Sonic series there are surprisingly few villains when compared to the hero side. It almost makes one wonder how the heroes don’t simply overthrow all the bad guys and live in peace, though one could just as easily argue that it shows just how effective an enemy the likes of Doctor Robotnik can be. This is particularly notable in the series’ earliest years where Robotnik is the sole recurring enemy in the video games, meaning there’s not much in the way of variety on the side of evil. These days the Sonic cast is certainly large enough that there’s plenty of room to simply mix and match different pairings of hero and villain and get dozens of different stories, even if the good guys are generally going to come out the clear victor and the bad guys are fewer in number.

In an effort to stop things from being quite so stale, then, Archie Comics’ earliest issues make greater use of Robotnik’s Badniks from the Sonic the Hedgehog video games, particularly those from the original title in the series. Aside from having the benefit of giving Robotnik someone to talk to in these early issues (series regular Snively having not debuted yet), this set-up also affords the writers the opportunity to have different Badniks in expanded roles as the main villain of the story. While in the Sonic the Hedgehog video games, Jaws is just another Badnik to be defeated, here he’s able to direct the story by forcing Sonic into an underwater clash.

Something particularly fun this story does in the early part is play up to Jaws’ design. Jaws is one of many piranha-based Badniks the series has seen over the years (he’s not even the only one in his debut game- in fact, throughout this story he’s erroneously coloured with Chopper’s colour scheme) but little is often made of that throughout the franchise. If a regular piranha can eat flesh with ease, what could a robot piranha do? The answer, according to this story, is eat through a wooden dock with absolute ease! It’s almost a shame, then, that after Sonic is dumped into the water, this aspect isn’t really used for most of the rest of the story, with Jaws effectively becoming a generic henchman character to herd Sonic and some captured fish into the Waterproof Robot Maker (and is that a robot maker which is waterproof, something which makes waterproof robots or both? Answers to the usual address please…).

What is fun is having Tails and Rotor share page space together. Rotor is generally one of the least developed members of the Archie Comics cast and when the writers actually do play around with his skill for invention, the end result is usually over-the-top fun as Rotor’s inventions are usually oversized and over-loud (hence his original name during pre-production of the Sonic the Hedgehog TV series and the one used for these earliest issues, Boomer, alluding to the explosions caused by most of the things he creates). The bathysphere is the first water-borne invention Rotor will create over the course of the comic, but not the last, and it’s fun to return to these earliest instalments and be able to pinpoint the beginning of something that would become much more important later on.

The ending is perhaps a touch by-the-numbers with Sonic once again saving the day with a Spin Attack, but it’s all pretty well earned after the peril of him almost drowning and Jaws becoming beaten and battered, unable to steer properly, is an amusing punishment for the villain. While this isn’t going to be remembered as an all-time classic, it’s a fun change of pace for the stories and showed that the comic could- and would- be more than just Sonic and Robotnik.