The Old World Menace

Your probably right, I don't know much about Ken or the general operation and out look of SEGA, I am just dropping in the middle of this and stating things that make since to me, you know, things that happen on the outside on more regular basis. Usually when there is comic or some kind of merchandise about something, it is regulated by the company completely, and there is contracts and rights transfers form the beginning. Even if SEGA wont use or portray the characters the way the comics do, usually the company would own them anyways as a way to have possibilities. Maybe a comic related game comes up as something more profitable then an old school sonic game, you never know, this is something I have seen companies take advantage of. (of course, for different types of merchandise and media.)

Know what would have stopped this whole thing, if SEGA just made Penders sign a contract that makes any character he included in the Sonic series automatically owned by SEGA from the beginning... you know like what most corporations do these days.

I see... This is making more since as to why Ken left, I am assuming he tried to bring the characters with him as a way to make demands, which obviously, didn't pan out. If there is one thing a corporation like SEGA will NOT tolerate, its being dragged around by one man, corporations will always be the leader and decision maker of their products. Even if it means they have to drop something and work around it, especially if it doesn't effect their product too much (I mean we are talking about Sonic here, who needs Meg, Julie-Su or King Elias ...etc)

Ok, so Penders was one of the main writers of StH, did he co-write with Ian Flynn, or did they make it strictly Ian or his wife after 160? (Not that my above statement would come true, but curiosity has me now.)

If all of that is true, then lets hope Penhead doesn't mess everything up, since he was the artist right? I don't think he wrote any of the story before the Genesis wave? I am not too certain. I hope he goes non-profit so he can use Sonic, and restarts it before the Genesis wave, and properly continues the journey while including all the secondary plots.  Call me desperate, but I want the original timeline to continue!

Yes, and I thought they were really strange, I didn't even know where to start, it was kind of all over the place to me. It didn't seem all that appealing other then it's craziness "Sonic the Human?" Ugh. 

I am not really a "fan" of the series per-say, but I did play the old games when I was young and always wandered what the background of these characters were. Well here I am years later having just found out about SatAM and thought "This would have been an even better universe to play the game in, there could have been more depth to it really." I thought the characters were pretty neat to have even existed, Bunny, Sally, Rotor, and even Snively were neat characters. It makes me wonder why some other, seemingly random, characters made the cut of the games and future shows, when they weren't nearly as developed as these current characters. So I thought it surely didn't stop at SatAM and I found myself here. I peeked around the old comics and came up to 160, which was appealing simply because it's art style felt more consistent and clean, so I skipped a little bit more all the way to 168. I thought that was a good place to start, I read back when they would allude to something that happened previously and I could actually keep up with it fairly well. My favorite thing though is learning about each character to a personal level, from their relationships to the way they act toward their peers at home. Such as Bunny getting married, Sonic's kind of awkward relationship with Sally, and Tails... Well, his relationship's are always in shambles, which is pretty funny.  The battles in 168 and beyond seemed to have 'more' reason and rhyme to it, and my favorite battle is when Dr. Eggman LOSES his s**t from having lost so many battles. I love that one, simply because he always just returns, and to see him finally fall back into the umbral parts of his actual insanity was hilarious, I just kept thinking to myself "Damn" and Einstein's definition of insanity. I didn't really like the chain where "Naugus?" was voted as king, it seemed so awkward, its like if Adolf Eatler (something tells me this site wouldn't like the mention of his actual name) just walked into Israel's governing facility and offered them better protection then the USA (Terrible example, but you get the point, I hope.) The ending though, broke something that had potential, it took this cool and interesting world, and literally, as in physically, threw away the comic IN the middle of a battle that was about to be resolved... Just for that, I just can't like the comics anymore, I will reread the old ones and skim through the new one's, but the new comics feel like Sonic Boom, too simplified. Now I have NO idea what the back stories of these characters are anymore. I only liked the fact that some part of their brain still has those gone memories, makes me wish they would seek to reverse what Egghead did, so I can return to the conclusion of the previous battle. This just makes it more awkward, because now I feel like the characters are consistently still in that battle in someway, especially since it just broke the entire planet. Now that it's sealed though, I hope they seek the return of their unknown past, but something tells me that the characters are just gonna forget because, if I remember correctly, that memory of them fades, so it's a real shame, they even seemed vary upset to have learned about their past. I don't know, this has been my experience so far, what do you think?

Well here is the main problem, we are talking about a company who only seeks profit, like most. Sonic the Hedgehog has had a lot of "inexcusably" terrible games for the new age, this goes to show that they don't care about Sonic really, they just bank on his popularity. The cheapest way is to rush out as much media as they can "which in the long run cuts costs,"  then sell them at full price. With that in mind, SEGA will seize any opportunity to advertise their games to make sure the media gets a hype train and the sales come in. SEGA looks at these comics being published by Archie "which comics in general have pretty much been killed off by modern media, this makes Archie struggle." SEGA will force the writers to advertise their games now because it comes at no expense to SEGA really. The comics becoming one big add removes all significance of the comics, which will end it... that means Ian Flynn would have to resort to making them himself... I don't know if he would though because he writes other stuff too. In the end I think SEGA will cash out on Sonic and close the franchise all together "or shelve it for a comeback someday when nothing else is making profit," especially since they have other major hits they dump way more money into, like Total War for one. 

"Hehe..."

Neat, I kind of figured that was the case, because the art style before his wasn't awful (it was definitely better than some older ones, I'd say second best), it just didn't look 'all that' appealing. I say the worst, in my opinion, was the art style of 138. That thing was hideous to look at! It was worse off then some really old comics, and boy, some of them were pretty awful. This is coming from the perspective of not only a non-fan, but someone who doesn't read comics on a regular basis. So those are my thoughts on the old art style, what do you think?

Damn, it makes since to be mad at Ken, but why Flynn? He had NOTHING to do with Ken' s robbery of 'other' interesting characters. I think Flynn did all he could really, it's not like he had a choice as to what the 'new' comics were going to be about.  I don't think Flynn is a great writer, but he has done the best job of it in my opinion. I mean I can tell he has inspiration from the real world, and does make the character's suffer some pretty realistic situations. This adds a darker element to it, which regardless of how 'cheezy' the comics can be, at least with Flynn' s writing there is moments I can respect it.

Wow, this is hilariously absurd, at least Snively stays, so all of the most interesting characters are still here, that is good. I guess I can kind of accept the fate of the comics, after better seeing how this all turned out. What is funny though, is I have seen the 25 years later arch, and I didn't really approve of it, I liked the idea of what life was like in the future, but it just didn't make any since.... at all... It had this weird version of the genesis wave in the middle of it's own story, I just didn't like it.

Ok, I knew there was some legal dispute over it, but I didn't know the depth of it, wow, so I guess Archie didn't want to publish something they had no control over, and Ken didn't want Archie messing with he story. I guess ken kind of knew that SEGA was going to try and intervene with the comics? I guess that is why I feel disconnected with the current comics, it portrayed like the games now, and not like the life sonic actually lives... though shame on Ken for not allowing full rights to Archie, it's not like there was anything he could do with the characters, its like a peanut better and jelly sandwich, and taking the peanut butter and jelly out of it, then finding out that there is really nothing you can do with just PB & J alone (Really stupid analogy.) I hope Ken gives his characters to Archie for Ian Flynn, because no one else wants those characters, SEGA certainly can care less about them, so it's kind of silly. I am rather glad though they managed to get Bunnie, Rotor, and Antoine. I think Snively got stuck with 'papa' Ken? (because it's like a terrible and pointless divorce) I don't recall ever seeing Snively after the crossover...