Sonic X, Episode 1.17: The Adventures of Knuckles and Hawk

Sonic X, Episode 1.17: The Adventures of Knuckles and Hawk

Japanese Title: Knuckles! Fist of Fury

Japanese Air Date: July 27th, 2003

U.S. Date: January 24th, 2003

When I was reading through Archie's "Sonic X" comic, I would occasionally encounter explicit references to the events of the cartoon show. These would always baffle and confuse me, as I did this all ass-backwards and read the comic before watching the cartoon. What this really means is you guys have to suffer through me sometimes stopping these reviews and saying "Oh, that's what that meant!" One of the most confusing tie-ins with the show the comic made was a random reference to Knuckles hanging out with Hawk, a portly gentleman with a bowl cut in a sports jacket. Thanks to episode seventeen, helpfully entitled "The Adventures of Knuckles and Hawk " I now know what this Hawk dude is all about. 

As the English title also indicates, this is episode that doesn't feature Sonic at all and has Knuckles take the lead role. He's been scrounging the globe for Chaos Emeralds. While digging through an Aztec temple in Mexico, Knuckles comes across this helpless fellow named Hawk. Sometime afterwards, he gets a message that Hawk is hanging out in the Far East. The echidna saves the human again, this time from local gangsters, and gets led to the location of a Chaos Emerald. That's when Eggman's latest robot, E-91 Kunoichi, appears to snatch the magic rock. Now Knuckles has to steal his emerald back and rescue Hawk for a third time. 

Despite his appearance in the opening sequence of every episode, the "Sonic X" version of Knuckles has been more like a reoccurring guest star than a regular supporting player. So it's extra-nice to see him get a starring role like this. That also allows for a little more exploration of this version of Knuckles' backstory. He really wants to return home to Angel Island because he has a very special relationship with the Master Emerald. In flashback, we seem him relaxing with the Emerald, standing by it in a thunderstorm, and lovingly caressing it afterwards. That's a little weird, Knux! But if my entire life had been devoted to protecting a giant glowing rock, I would probably have an unhealthy attachment to it too. 

So what about this Hawk guy? If my above comments didn't make it clear, he's kind of a nincompoop and not of the lovable variety. We don't actually learn much about Hawk or why he has such bad fashion sense. Knuckles has to rescue him three separate times over the course of this episode. He seems to get in trouble a lot and that is his sole personality trait. The only useful stuff he does is hand Knuckles the Red Chaos Emerald and give him a place to crash for a night. Despite that, the echidna seems to have some fondness for him, as he lovingly refers to him as "partner" at the end. I guess when you're a solitary teenager whose closest relationship is with a giant gemstone, you take whatever friends you can get. By the way, that parting gesture almost brings Hawk to tears, so I guess he's really lonely too. Just what this series needed: Another human with a needy relationship with one of the video game characters!

This episode is also, as far as I can tell, a sort-of half-assed homage to martial arts movies. The city the majority of the episode is set in is referred to as, no kidding, "Oriental City." It seems patterned after Hong Kong. Knuckles almost gets into a scuffle with some goons in a bar and the crook who has Hawk locked up seems like the kind of dude a young Jackie Chan would kick in the face. Also, the Japanese title is obviously taken from a Bruce Lee movie. And I guess Hawk kind of looks like Sammo Hung if you're standing really far away. I call it a half-assed homage because there's not much actual fighting in this episode. Bokkun threatening to do some kicks and punches is the closest we come to some wire-fu. Maybe kung-fu movies were just the animators' primary visual reference for this part of Asia.

Aside from all that, the biggest nod towards the Asian fisticuffs genre is the new antagonist. The Eggman robot of the week is E-93 Kunoichi. The 4Kids dub renamed her "E-93 Lady Ninja," which is basically what "Kunoichi" means. There's a long list of genre tropes associated with this character type in Japan and this episode hits some of them. Such as the fishnets in her costume, her primary weapon being a Kusari-Fundo, and the scene where she glides on a kite. (The Kunoichi's legendary sex appeal is also hinted at by this robot having a bustline bigger than Rouge's.) Despite all that, E-93 Kunoichi speaks with a man's voice for large stretches of the episode. She puts up a good fight and is a memorable adversary but Knuckles still uppercuts her into the stratosphere at the end. 

What "Sonic X" is most known for, at least to me, is directly adapting the plot of the "Adventure" games. That habit begins here. While rescuing Hawk the first time, Knuckles discovers his shovel claws power-up. This is given much pomp-and-circumstance, despite playing a fairly small role in the episode. At the very end, the Red Chaos Emerald glows, Knuckles hears a woman saying a cryptic thing, and has a vision of something exploding out of the Master Emerald. This is the first hint that Tikal and Chaos will be appearing on this show eventually. Kids watching this show for the first time presumably got a real kick out of this. 

It's an okay episode. It's neat that Knuckles got a starring role and the Kunoichi stuff is pretty entertaining. Hawk is kind of a dork though and it bugs me that Rouge appears in this episode but doesn't do much. The game tie-in feels more like corporate synergy than natural storytelling. And that's all I have to say about that, until the next time this comes up anyway. [6/10]