Sonic Underground, Episode 1.31: Country Crisis

Sonic Underground, Episode 1.31: Country Crisis

Original Air Date: October 11, 1999

Last time, I referenced the "Sonic Underground" writers being completely out of ideas by this point. That continues to hold true with "Country Crisis," even if this was writer Laren Bright's first "Sonic" related credit. After performing an act of domestic terrorism in Robotropolis, Sonic and his siblings come across a note written by their mother. It informs them that Robotnik is building a dam in "Southern Mobius." The local Freedom Fighters could destroy it but are too busy feuding amongst themselves, a tradition that goes back to a visit from the Queen decades earlier. The royal triplets go about trying to patch over this schism and save the day. 

 

Divorced completely from its actual premise, "Country Crisis" has a good idea. More than one group of revolutionaries have been broken up by ideological differences within their own camps. In fact, it almost always happens. The idea of Freedom Fighters getting distracted from their fight against Robotnik, to fight each other, is an intriguing premise. (And one the Archie comic would touch on from time to time.) Sonic teaching an isolated resistance groups that there's more that binds them than separates them could produce a totally solid twenty-minute cartoon, even one with a nice moral. 

But that's not what "Country Crisis" is actually about. Instead, it explores the underwhelming premise of "Sonic, Sonia, and Manic meet the hillbillies." The episode is, obviously, inspired by the legendary backwoods feud between the Hatfields and McCoys. This includes the details of the youngest members of both families secretly falling in love. As many Appalachian stereotypes are touched upon as possible. Overalls, straw hats, mangy beards, shotguns, and bare feet are accounted for. There are numerous references to hoedowns and jugs. "Y'all" and other bits of Southern dialect are abused. The episode stops just shy of including moonshine and incest. As a resident of Appalachia myself, I'd be offended by these portrayals if I wasn't completely numb to seeing them in pop culture by this point. 

It's uninspired backwoods grotesquery and that extends to the character designs. The Valley Folk and Mountain Folk – as they are called even though they all seem to live in the valley – represent yet more unappealing design work from the "Sonic Underground" team. Granny, the leader of the Mountain Folk, has preposterously bad posture. Zeb, leader of the Valley Folk, is a hideous revival of every hillbilly cliché, including protruding teeth and a foot long beard. Jerod, the speedy raccoon type thing, wears bright green pants, a yellow shirt with a giant collar, and red suspenders. Which makes him look more like a New Romantics reject than a redneck. It's all ugly as fuck and is paired with some extremely shaky animation. A scene of Sonic running while holding his guitar makes it seem like his head is detached from his body, while I'm pretty sure the triplets' eyes never move in the first scene. 

Honestly, what insults me the most about this episode is not the reliance on long-since-outdated stereotypes about "mountain folk." Rather, it's the half-assed laziness of the entire script. The primary antagonist of the episode is an enormous robot guarding the dam. That's cool but the machine is never utilized in an interesting way. The episode seems to be building towards the neat visual of the robot smashing through the dam. Instead, the machine accidentally blows up Sleet and Dingo's aircraft and it's up to Manic's drumming to destroy the structure. Lame. Very little imagination was expended on this script. 

This is far from the only questionable writing. The feud between the two clans is based on a gift from the Queen, a medallion split in two, going missing. Each side blames the other for the theft. The actual answer – Granny lost it in her jug and never thought to look there in all this time – is one of the biggest ass-pulls this show has attempted. Moreover, it really says a lot about Queen Alena that she never once stepped in to resolve this conflict herself, even though she's well aware of it and is wandering around Mobius all the time. Instead, she gives orders to her kids to clean up her messes, her children never once asking why this is their responsibility. This is because, I guess, the completed medallion contains a map to some location. What are the odds this show will ever revisit that plot point? What do you think? 

Other than just laziness, why would the writers of a "Sonic" show stick the hedgehog in the very Earthly realm of squabbling hillbillies? Because this is a musical show and bluegrass is one of the genres "Underground" hasn't abused yet. "How You Play the Game" is an embarrassing riff on "Dueling Banjos," between Sonic's guitar and Sonia's keyboard on the banjo setting. It's about as lame as you'd expect, with both singers attempting weak southern accents. It's more forgettable than bad, which really tells you more about this show's standards for badness than anything else. Granny pulls out a washboard throughout the song, which is an instrument not actually associated with bluegrass music but I wouldn't expect the creators of this show to know that. 

Oh yeah, remember when I said kissin' cousins is one of the few Appalachian stereotypes this episode doesn't indulge in? I lied. But it doesn't come in where you'd expect. At the concluding hoedown, Sonia asks Sonic for a dance. Which is only mildly weird, I guess, but becomes way weirder when the hedgehog makes a point to dance with his brother instead. After all, royalty makes more of a habit of fucking their siblings than hillbillies ever did. Anyway, this episode is bad. [4/10]