Sonic Boom, Episode 1.42: Late Night Wars

Sonic Boom, Episode 1.42: Late Night Wars

Original Air Date: September 5th, 2015

In its forty-second episode, "Sonic Boom" would do the closest thing we'll ever get to a hedgehog version of "The Late Shift." In  "Late Night Wars," Comedy Chimp is mocked for his incredibly old head shots. He gets some new photos done but, during the shoot, Knuckles wanders in while wearing a trash can on his head. As soon as the images are published, the echidna becomes a celebrity overnight. While Comedy Chimp goes on vacation to get plastic surgery, he selects Knuckles to be his guest host, assuming the echidna's incompetence will lead him to bombing. Instead, the audience loves his slapstick antics. This forces Comedy Chimp to go to Eggman and utilize a little domestic terrorism so he can get his job back. 

"Late Night Wars" is probably the most cynical episode of "Sonic Boom" I've seen so far. In the first scene, the kids buying autographs from Comedy Chimp make a crack about his old headshots having "a sparkle of hope" in his eyes. When the photographer gets a look at Knuckles, she says he's "oblivious to the never-ending sea of despair." Comedy Chimp's subplot about aging revolves around a fear of failing and being forgotten. He never thinks twice about teaming up with Eggman, a notorious villain, to regain his fame. Meanwhile, people loving Knuckles' imbecilic antics paints the public as utterly moronic simpletons who will fall in love with the most dubious level of celebrity, a point that is even acknowledged in dialogue. Knuckles similarly has no problem selling out the minute a good deal comes along. The thesis to this episode really seems to be "life is misery, greed motivates people, and everyone is stupid." 

I don't mind such a dark outlook, though it's surprising to see in children's television. I do wish there was more of a concrete point to this story though. I really thought this episode was going to be about how fickle fame is. By plopping a trash can on his head, Knuckles becomes a celebrity overnight. Like any number of human beings who have become living memes, he goes from being an anonymous stranger to an internationally recognized star by accident. Yet walking around with a trash can hat is a gimmick with few avenues to exploit. By the time he's hosting Comedy Chimp's show, it's already evident that Knux's limited intelligence will cost him this new level of fame he's grabbed. 

I really expected the public to then turn on Knuckles, his fifteen minutes being up, and the echidna forced to increasingly desperate ends to hold into that fame. His ego, which has increasingly pushed his friends away, would make him reluctant to realize this. Maybe that's when Eggman should've entered the story, capitalizing on Knuckles hitting rock bottom. Eventually, Knux would realize his friends love him for who he is and that's more important than being admired by hundreds of strangers simply for your keen taste in headwear. It's a story arc we've see before but a lesson that always needs to be taught, especially in our modern, social media driven landscape. 

That's not what this episode does. Instead, it seems like Knuckles really could have ridden his wave of fame even further, simply because his slapstick buffoonery is so irresistible. At the end, after Eggman attacks, he goes back to his friends with only a moment's pause. He delivers a line about "getting carried away by his ego," which feels like it's referencing a version of this episode we didn't see. The episode then abruptly ends, Comedy Chimp getting some last minute comeuppance for his greed. Whatever conflict might have existed between Knuckles and his friends essentially wraps itself up on its own, leading a really unsatisfying ending. 

Reid Harrison probably didn't have time to fit in a fully developed story like what I outlined above, once again because this cartoon is so short. Yet I think the real issue with "Late Night Wars" is that it's about Comedy Chimp. C.C. is, by design, a one-note character. He's the hackiest of stand-up comics, a total corporate sell-out, and the thinnest parody of celebrity possible. As a background player, who shows up for a single gag or one-liner every couple of episodes, he serves his purpose. Building an entire episode around the guy strains credibility though. Comedy Chimp isn't likable. He's a self-absorbed dickwad. I do not especially enjoy spending time with him. (The comics got more mileage out of him when they dropped this cowardly guy into the middle of a massive crossover.) He has an annoying sidekick, who is even more desperate for fame than he is, that adds very little to the proceedings. I understand that he was a favorite character of the show writers, who probably find shallow show-biz satire like this a lot more entertaining than the kids watching at home would. But focusing a whole episode on him feels like an in-joke taken too far. 

I've been pretty critical of this episode but I did find it marginally funny. Travis Willingham more-or-less makes this episode. His delivery of Knuckles’ idiotic antics got me to laugh more than anything else. The confusion he displays when trying to get through a simple monologue, or negotiating about tie-ins, is funnier than pretty much every other joke in this episode. The montage devoted to showing Knuckles’ rising celebrity does feature a mildly amusing bit about paparazzi. The last act hammers the gag about Eggman sponsoring this act of supervillainy too hard though. It creates a small grin the first time and then nothing more every time it’s repeated. I did like the simplistic way the bad guy is defeated though. 

Oh, and one more thing before I go: In this episode, we see that photographs, for whatever reason, are depicted as 2D illustrations, as opposed to the CGI animation used to bring the rest of the show to life. I guess previous episodes established this but it’s repeatedly done here. And it’s distracting, especially since the drawings look a lot more appealing than the 3D models. Not to mention it raises the question of why in-universe photos look so markedly different than everything else. I’m definitely thinking too hard about this but it’s still distracting. Anyway, mid episode! Try harder next time, “Sonic Boom!” [6/10]