Sonic Boom 2.13: Mech Suits Me

Sonic Boom 2.13: Mech Suits Me

Original Air Date: February 4th, 2017

During a regular training game/reference to a classic 1980s sci-fi/action film, Sonic and the gang stumble upon a cave full of glowing hieroglyphs. Amy quickly deduces that this was a lair for the Ancients. The quartet discover an advance mech suit in the rumble. Sonic places it on and quickly finds it helps fight off Eggman with ease. However, Tails and others soon notice that the suit is negatively effecting Sonic's personality. In short, it's making him into a huge asshole. The influence on Sonic goes so far that he even teams up with Eggman, who is quickly frightened by his former enemy's malicious intent. Tails figures out a way to reverse the effects but the heroes have to get it on Sonic's suit first, a task easier said than done.

“Mech Suits Me” starts with an extended homage to “Predator.” And, listen, man, I love me some “Predator.” It combines two of the greatest pleasures of eighties cinema: Arnold Schwarzenegger senselessly murdering dozens of people and the slimy, exquisite practical creature effects of Stan Winston. Beyond that, “Predator” is just a great movie with multiple classic sequences. Honestly, “Sonic Boom” does a good job of copying it. The inferred P.O.V. shots, the trees swaying with some invisible presence, Tails being dragged suddenly off-screen... It's all genuinely effective. The episode even throws in some Alan Silvestri-soundalike music on the soundtrack.  It's well done enough that I honestly wish the whole episode ran with it, being an eleven minute tribute to John McTiernan's masterpiece. Even when Sonic shows up and the gang starts fighting with some giant Q-tip/”American Gladiators” pummel sticks. 

However, “Mech Suits Me” isn't actually a tribute to “Predator.” Instead, it's built around ripping off another well known piece of eighties sci-fi literature: Namely, the Symbiote Suit Spider-Man story line. Anybody who knows anything about comics is familiar with this plot, probably one of the most famous plot lines in the storied history of “Spider-Man” lore. Just as in that frequently adapted arc, Sonic finds a mysterious suit in a random place. He puts it on and, at first, it gives him amazing powers that make fighting evil a lot easier. However, the suit also emphasizes the more negative aspects of the hero's personality. What starts out as petty dickery – cutting in line at Meh-Burger – soon escalates to full-blown villainy. “Sonic Boom” stops short of someone who has long resented Sonic getting a hold of the suit after he discards it and becoming an insanely popular villain who eventually becomes an anti-hero and gets his own movie franchise... But the similarities are readily apparent to me. The word “Symbiote” is even used a few times, suggesting this all too intentional. 

Of course, I understand why “Boom” would want to imitate the Black Suit plot line. That story is a classic for a reason. First off, there's a certain novelty in watching the good guy act like a villain. It's why mirror universe storylines and evil clone set-ups are also so insanely popular. Seeing hero Sonic act like a prick, bullying people and being totally self-interested, is is such a change from the norm, such an subversion of our built-in expectations, that it's fun and neat. Moreover, it also plays off on Sonic or Spider-Man or any hero's personality in an interesting way. Even a child – the target audience of media like this – can recognize that the impulses that make someone a hero aren't all that different from the ones that make someone a bad guy. The desire to go against the typical survival instincts, to make big changes in the world, to decide you know better than the common knowledge, are something both heroes and villains do. That's depth, ya know? That all it takes is a disregard for common courtesy, an excision of ethical judgment, to make a freedom fighter into a power-hungry mad man. 

Applying this story outline to another archetypal hero like Sonic is such an obvious idea that I'm surprised “Boom” is the first branch of the franchise to do it. I guess if Ken Penders was a Gen-Xer who grew up reading 80s Marvel comics, instead of being a boomer who watched “Star Trek” reruns, we would've gotten that instead of the Anti-Sonic issues. Anyway, “Sonic Boom” is not really setting out to explore the similarities between good and evil and the limits there-in. Instead, this is a sitcom, designed to make us ha-ha with its little goofy giggly jokes. Alan Denton and Greg Hahn's script probably focuses a little too hard on that goal. “Mech Suits Me” is one of those episodes that features non-stop one-liners. Eggman is just slinging nonstop quips in the first third, about Gordon Ramses and doing his laundry and a metaphor being obvious, that it quickly gets obnoxious. In fact, Eggman continues in this mode throughout the whole episode and it comes off as fairly desperate. 

However, “Mech Suits Me” isn't not a funny episode. There's some good gags here. Maybe it's because Sticks is perpetually amusing to me but she gets some of the best jokes here. Such as a tossed-off line about the League of Ventriloquists. Or a random appearance of a dinosaur skull. Sonic's temporary turn towards villainy does produce some amusing moment. Such as his badgering of Mayor Fink or an appearance from Perci and her sister, which comes back around at the end. Probably the comedic highlight of the episode is a montage devoted to Sonic and Eggman becoming friends through expectedly petty acts of crime. That kind of shit always makes me chuckle. 

I noted the other day that a previous season two episode of “Boom” randomly gave Sonic a radicool hovercraft, for no other reason than the show needed something flashy and cool a toy could be made of. This was clearly an on-going concern in season two. After stepping into that Ancients cave early on, Sonic, Tails, Knuckles, and Amy's clothes start to glow. This is apparently their “Luminous Suits,” the Sonic New Network Wiki tells me, and it's exactly the kind of shit that would make a bitchin' action figure. A cheap to make one too, as all you'd have to do is just take the standard “Boom” toys and add a coat of glow-in-the-dark paint. (They were apparently inspired by power-ups from the “Boom” video game, which is why Sticks didn't get one, but my point stands.) The personality altering mech suit is not quite as flashy as those, lacking bright and highly marketable colors, but one can easily imagine Tomy making a toy of that as well. Weirdly, as far as I can tell, neither of these toyifications came to pass. But I wouldn't be shocked if the “Boom” writers included them with that intention in mind.

Let me conclude this review with an amusing, partially related anecdote: When I was a kid, after watching the 90's “Spider-Man” cartoon adapt the Black Suit story, I wrote a fanfic where Sonic gets possessed by an evil spirit, grows bat-wings and starts wearing goth eye-liner, and went bad for a while. I think I had him calling himself something like Black-Wing or an equally generic villain name. Kid-me followed this rip-off to its Venomized conclusion and had the spirit run off and bond with Nack the Weasel afterwards. Anywho, “Mech Suit Me” has a cool set-up for an episode and mostly does some amusing things with it, even if it probably could've stood to be a little funnier. But random “Predator” and “Spider-Man” references go a long way, at least for an old nerd like me. [7/10]