Sonic the Hedgehog (IDW): Issue 61

Sonic the Hedgehog (IDW): Issue 61

Publication Date: June 7th, 2023

After six long months, IDW's "Sonic" comic finally concludes the "Urban Warfare" story arc. Eggman is confident in his victory as he has the heroes trapped in his tripod walking machine. Things take a turn for the worst when Sonic is trapped in the same pocket dimension device that snared the Diamond Cutters. Yet the power grid to Eggperial City has been successfully disrupted, freeing the team from this trap. At the same time, Silver gives Shadow the pep talk necessary for him to escape the artificial Chaos Emeralds. He does another Chaos Control, causing the city to overpower and explode. Will our heroes make it out in time? 

I criticized the previous issue for the way Evan Stanley wrapped up the proceeding cliffhanger in an almost nonsensical fashion. Tangle got tossed out of a skyscraper but survived the fall because she suddenly became intangible, for reasons that were not really satisfyingly explained. Unfortunately, Stanley relies on a similar, sloppy deus ex machina here, attempting to justify it with the story's extremely shaky science. When Sonic gets scooped up by the pocket dimension trap, that's a very dramatic moment. The book's title hero has been vanquished and the rest of the team is exposed to Eggman. Things are looking bleak!

How does Stanley get our guys out of this jam? It just... Kind of happens. Suddenly, without immediate explanation, Tangle is corporeal again. Eggman can touch and hold her. That's when Lanolin and Whisper casually walk into the panel. A page later, Tails drops a word balloon of chunky exposition, explaining that the city's computer systems being off-line has shifted everyone from the pocket dimension back into normal space. This means Sonic is also freed and he rushes into a panel a little further down the page in an equally unceremonious fashion.

You see what's wrong with this, right? Stanley created a very dramatic, very dire situation for the good guys... One so dire that she obviously could not think of a way for them to organically get out of it. Instead, she cooks up some totally off-panel bullshit that resolves the problem for the team. Through no actions of their own, the heroes escape the predicament and can then turn the tide on the baddie. It is, at best, awkward writing and, much more bluntly put, lazy writing. This is the kind of narrative cheating I expect from old-timey movie serials and Ken Penders, not from modern comic books. 

I've complained that this entire story arc was overly reliant on sketchily defined science-fiction concepts. That continues here. I still don't fully understand how the whole fake Chaos Emeralds that power the city thing works. I thought Eggperial City got its energy source by strip-mining the land under it? Yet the book continues to focus on the fake emeralds, making them a primary part of the climax here. I would say Eggman powering his latest super weapon with such a violative energy source was bad planning but that's pretty typical behavior for him. That doesn't make it good writing. Once again, a very serious threat is dismissed quickly and sloppily seemingly because the writers painted themselves into a corner. They needed a big-ass explosion at the end to destroy all of Eggperial City at once. Stanley cooked up some nonsensical plot device to provide just that.

And so, the day is saved by Shadow's fabulous, secret powers. I've bitched about this before but, truly, action sequences that rely solely on the character's various superpowers really bore me. It's not narratively dynamic! Instead of the heroes defeating the villains in natural ways that feel earned, they pull some fucking miracle out of their ass. This issue really leans heavily on that feeling. Shadow Chaos Controls the threat away twice. Lanolin's bell wispon thingy reveals an ability to crack open a window. Sonic does a big wind-up special move that finishes off Eggman's tripod. It's just not interesting to me. Have people resolve problems with strategy, with down-to-earth skills, not with some magic trick they pull out of a hat. 

Sonic doing the Fastball Special at the end is presumably meant to be a big, applause worthy action sequence to wrap things up with. Yet it feels a bit too little, too late to me. Earlier in the comic, after Sonic makes his re-entrance, he dramatically tells Eggman he's "taken this too far" and "you know what I'm gonna do next." The hedgehog then... Jumps out of a window, away from his archenemy. A few pages later, Metal Sonic grabs Sonic off a flying robot turtle. The two scuffle and Sonic kicks his robotic double away from him. He then half-ass quibs "Until next time, Metal" at his dismissed foe. 

It reminds me of the similarly disappointing "Recovery" arc from a while back, where Sonic just let Eggman fly away at the end after foiling his scheme. I know, this is a kids' comic that heavily relies on the trope of the big bad always escaping, so he can tango with the heroes another day. Yet Eggman getting away is different than Sonic letting Eggman get away. It totally undermines him saying some hard-ass shit to Eggman when he just runs off immediately afterwards. Come on, Sonic, gut-punch him first! Do something! 

I know he spin-dash the tripod shortly afterwards but it's still such a deflating sequence. Once again, I am left with this feeling that Sonic doesn't actually want to apprehend Eggman, to permanently put a stop to his devastating schemes. That he prefers minor short-term victories over actually winning the war. It makes the climax, where Eggman is seemingly left to die – or at least Chaos Controlled to parts unknown – as Eggperial City explodes, feel all the more out-of-balance. Sonic isn't willing to provide a long-term solution to the Eggman problem. He lets other people clean up the mess. And every time this comic starts to actually interrogate the fact that Sonic continually lets Eggman escape, to plot again and potentially endanger more lives further down the road, it backs off. 

Yet all of this just points towards this story arc's weird reluctance to actually commit to raised stakes. Tangle is dropped to her death but miraculously survives. The Diamond Cutters and Sonic are trapped but then escape off-screen. Brutal moments are immediately undermined. There's a badass panel where Eggman grabs Tangle and puts a fucking gun to her head. Before any consequences of this grim image play out, Whisper and Lanolin swoop in out of literally nowhere. Metal Sonic slams his palm right across Tails' nose and tosses him backwards, only to be swatted by Sonic a page later. Every time this issue finds a genuinely captivating moment, it pulls back just as quickly. 

Here's another example of how this issue continuously deflated itself: Shadow is imprisoned in the fake Chaos Emeralds and Silver simply tells him he's the Ultimate Lifeform, he can't give up. So... He doesn't. Shadow just stands up and decides to keep fighting. You're telling me Shadow could've ended this any time he wanted but he was too busy brooding like a moody teenager? What a fucking dork! Does Evan realize how ineffectual this makes Shadow look? At least have him restrained by the magic rocks or something! Don't just have him stand up and shrug it off! 

I guess it's clear that this issue really frustrated me. Have I got something good to say about it? Well, the art work is really good. Adam Bryce Thomas once again provides plenty of bold images. There's lots of eye-catching panels of heroes and villains lunging at each other.  Yet even then, some of these pages feel a bit overstuffed. There are a few pages where the panels are packed in, each one overloaded with info-filled word bubbles. It just furthers this feeling that this entire story arc has been all weighed down by too much exposition and needlessly crowded plotting. 

The entire "Urban Warfare" story arc has been very disappointing. Especially after the book came off such a strong story involving Surge and Kit. It makes this entire bloated, uneven storyline feel like a desperately assembled filler arc in between the shit we actually care about. Evan Stanley can do good work and has before in the past. Yet she's not at her best when relying on brute-force plotting, as she tends to fall back on messy structure and bullshitty technobabble. At least it's over now though. Hopefully the next arc – gratuitously set up by the last few pages here – is better. [5/10]