Sonic the Hedgehog (1993) Reviews: Introduction

More or less my entire life, I have been a fan of “Sonic the Hedgehog.” A big factor in keeping my interest in the series alive was Archie's comic books. When the quality of Sega's video games became more and more sloppy, when the entire series began to be treated as a cruel joke by the internet, the inexplicable emotional attachment I had to this little blue hedgehog would go on due to Archie's seemingly undying comic book.

Of course, the comic book is not where our story starts.

As I've explored before, I don't actually remember how I first became interested in “Sonic the Hedgehog.” The easiest answer I have is that it was the early nineties, I was a little kid, and the Sega Genesis and its flagship character were the hottest, coolest thing at the time. Whatever the origin point for my obsession was, the Saturday morning cartoon show version of “Sonic” was absolutely what stoked the flames to such an intensity that they have burned, to various degrees of strength, my entire life.

What makes this even stranger is, if you disregard the two-and-a-half decades long comic book it spawned (which many fans indeed do), “SatAM's” impact on the “Sonic the Hedgehog” franchise seems fairly minor. In its original air time, the show ran only for two brief seasons, beginning in September of 1993 and ending by December of 1994. Aired on ABC's short-lived Saturday morning cartoon block, the show faced stiff competition from Fox's “Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers” juggernaut and was, in many areas, pre-empted all together by local newscast. The show often faced challenges from network executives and its schedule was often shifted around, many of the first season episodes being aired in back-to-back chunks.

Knowing all this, it's surprising “SatAM” managed to survive even as long as it did. The show, in fact, almost didn't come into existence at all. In the early nineties, Sega of America commissioned DiC Entertainment – the American/Luxembourgian purveyors of cheap but kind-of-beloved kids cartoons, including previous video game adaptations like “The Super Mario Bros. Super Show” and “Captain N: The Game Master” – to produce a “Sonic” cartoon. The company initially presented Sega and ABC with a farcical comedy series based on the property. This was rejected by ABC, who demanded something darker and more serious.

While that permutation of “Sonic the Hedgehog” would eventually evolve into a syndicated show, DiC went back to the drawing board. Story editor Len Janson is generally credited with pushing “Sonic” into a more character driven direction, about Sonic and a group of friends taking on a tyrannical version of Robotnik, ruling over their world. The characters would be loosely inspired by the animals Sonic freed in the first two games, with the original designs and names being totally different from what we finally got.

Janson's ideas, later expanded upon by talented writers like Ben Hurst and Pat Alee, were radically different from the admittedly loose “Sonic” canon that had been established up to this point. The games depicted Sonic running through colorful environments, fighting goofy robots, and ultimately besting a none-too-serious and overly round Dr. Robotnik. The cartoon, meanwhile, would add a dark backstory of global domination. Sonic and his newly introduced bands of friends hid from Robotnik's iron rule and fought a guerrilla war against his empire, in hopes of returning Mobius to its former glory. A constant threat was the idea of roboticization, that the villain had the ability to strip away the cartoon animal heroes' personality and turn them into mechanical slaves. A surprisingly deep mythology would soon develop. Tails, the only other character from the games carried over the show, was often sidelined in favor of the show's original cast members. It would seem Janson had given ABC the darker, edgier show they demanded. (Proving once and again that entertainment executives truly do not know what they want, ABC would later demand a more comedic approach in “SatAM's” second season.)

This approach has, over the years, polarized “Sonic” fans. Many people disliked the darker direction, feeling it ran counter to the tone of the games. Some were ambivalent to the expanded mythology, as it had little to do with the video games' various MacGuffins and story lines. Probably most controversial, the Freedom Fighters have continued to divide “Sonic” fans. Many were annoyed the show sometimes seemed to favored them over Sonic and Tails. And let's not even get into the topic of shipping, as Princess Sally and Sonic's will-they-won't-they? relationship would launch a thousand internet screeds.

However, those that fell in love with “SatAM” during its short existence were enchanted for life. I can't even really put into words the effect the show had on influencing my young mind. Watching as a young kid, it was the first time I had ever seen a show that dealt with serious themes like loss and the weight of warfare. Princess Sally was always searching for her missing father and many of the other characters were presumably orphans. The Freedom Fighters sometimes lost friends on their adventures. They grappled with betrayal and hardships. The heroes were always hiding from an enemy absolutely determined to wipe them out. The themes of environmentalism – of Sonic and friends co-existing with nature, of Robotnik polluting the world and turning Mobius into an industrial hellscape – were trendy as can be at the time but have only become more relevant with age.

I was absolutely smitten, in other words. “SatAM” struck six year old me as just about the most provocative and fascinating thing presented on television for kids at the time. While I already had an appreciation for Sonic's cool-dude-with-'tude persona, the supporting cast of “SatAM” was immediately endearing to me. While most of the female characters in show I watched up to that point had been token girly-girlies, usually existing to nag the heroes and get rescued, Sally was a tactician and a leader. She charged into combat just as often as Sonic did. (And also, yes, nagged him.) I became inordinately invested in Sonic and Sally's budding romance. Bunnie's pairing of sweetness and strength, Rotor's soft-spoken intelligence, even Antoine's comic relief cowardice all fascinated me. It was a group of well realized and lovable characters, the likes of which I hadn't really seen before then.

“SatAM” made such an impression on me, that it lingered in my heart and mind years after it disappeared from ABC. The show was occasionally rerun, though rarely in time slots when I could enjoy it. The series aired as part of USA Network's Cartoon Express but I recall it mostly being on really early in the morning, me usually only getting up early enough to catch the last few minutes of any given episode. (More recently, it's been popping up randomly on Starz Family Network, with no consistent schedule.) While “Adventures of Sonic the Hedgehog” reappeared on Toon Disney, “SatAM” remained elusive. In all that time, especially with the comic book continuing the lives of these characters I loved so much, “SatAM” became this monolithic show in my imagination. Something that existed more in my dreams than in actuality. I watched my VHS tapes until they wore out, so eager was I to return to this world.

When the show was finally released on DVD in 2007, I can't even describe it as being like revisiting a long lost friend. It was more like being reunited with a family member that had died a decade prior. Re-watching it for the first time in years, I was pleased that the show held up pretty well. Though it was way goofier than I remembered... And it was weird hearing specific voices coming out of everyone's mouths, when the sound of their voices had mutated and changed after reading them in the comics for so many years.

It's apparent that I wasn't alone in my obsession with “SatAM.” The show would develop a passionate cult following online. Petitions, begging for the show's resurrection, would be launched all over. Well maintained fan sites would be created and many would stay up for years and years. Fan art and fan fiction would sprout up all over the place. It's not a fandom that has ever really gone away either. Recently, it was announced that an industrious group of “Sonic” fans are bringing the unrealized third season to life. Even after the “Sonic” franchise has gone through countless other permutations, morphing practically into a beast unrecognizable from what I grew up with, some of us have never stopped holding a torch for the Saturday morning version.

Obviously, rewatching and reviewing the show is something I've been wanting to do here on Hedgehogs Can't Swim from the very beginning. After digging into every nook and cranny of the comic series it inspired, I think time has more than come for me to talk about the show in more depth. It won't take me long to watch and review the show but I'm sure I'll have absolutely way too much to say about it.

So sing along with me as we start this look back at one of the most cultishly beloved of Sonic's adventures. “Blue streak speeeeeds by!”