Sonic Boom, Episode 2.46: Lair on Lockdown

Sonic Boom, Episode 2.46: Lair on Lockdown

Original Air Date: October 7th, 2017

Having been produced in 2016, when the term "lockdown" had slightly different connotations than it does post-COVID, "Lair on Lockdown" begins with Team Sonic rushing into Eggman's base, incensed at his latest scheme: A ticketing website full of bogus processing fees. (Another reference that has changed somewhat more recently.) During the following fight, Eggman's control panel is pierced with some shrapnel. This activates lockdown protocol, the characters sorted into different rooms that are then sealed shut. Now, these very different personalities have to work together if they hope to escape... Which is slightly more urgent, since there's a pile of toxic waste in the basement about to explode too. 

"Lair on Lockdown" is "Sonic Boom's" take on a well-trotted piece of television lore. That would be the "bottle episode." This is an episode of a series in which a limited number of characters are trapped in a single location for most of the runtime. It is designed to be an episode that can be produced quickly and cheaply, usually to make up for another episode going over-budget or other gaps in funds. Wikipedia tells me the term was coined by "The Outer Limits" creator Leslie Stevens, because the format could be pulled from a bottle like a genie. I always assumed the name referred to the single location being like trapping the cast in a bottle. (Which, funnily enough, is a good description of an episode of "Outer Limits" rival, "The Twilight Zone.") While less despised than that other cash-saving measure common on TV – the clip show – the bottle episode has become an easily recognized trope. Due to this, many examples of this type of story put a deliberately meta riff on the idea. Such as "Community's" hilarious evisceration or one-season wonder "That's My Bush!," which is where I first heard the term explicitly identified. The idea is less common in animation – seeing as how cartoons don't have sets – but it makes sense for a CGI series like "Boom," as a bottle episode would mean few new designs or elements to render. 

Bottle episodes have been criticized for being hacky and cheap but, at the same time, the premise has also become something of a fan favorite. Shows like "Star Trek: The Next Generation" or "Friends" have often been praised for their bottle episodes. The set-up allows the writers to narrow their focus, sometimes resulting in a smaller scale drama that can give the actors a chance to shine or dig deeper into the personalities of the characters. The specific perimeters of "Lair on Lockdown" has another benefit of the bottle episode in mind: Throwing together two characters that otherwise don't interact much. Here, we have Sonic and Cubot paired up in the control room, Tails and Amy in the basement, Knuckles and Eggman in a storage area, and Sticks and Orbot shoved into a lobby with a visible A/C vent. Constraining these duos in a tight location sharply contrasts their attributes and forces them to put aside their differences and work together to escape. 

As self-aware as "Sonic Boom" is, you'd expect the show to acknowledge the bottle episode idea and subvert it accordingly. Surprisingly, "Lair on Lockdown" is a relatively straight execution of the concept. It's not a bad one either. Of the various combos, Sticks and Orbot are by far the funniest. Sticks' paranoid nature has her distrustful of all robots so forcing her to work with Orbot – a prissy droid especially focused on helping others – makes for a lot of sharp comedy. A sequence where Sticks reacts to every suggestion Orbot has with enraged accusations made me chuckle healthily. Teaming up Eggman, rather conceited about his own intelligence, and Knuckles, the show's resident lunkhead, has its benefits as well. Eggman continuously mispronouncing Knuckles' name is a running gag that gets an especially good workout here. Eggman's melancholy side also bounces nicely off Knuckles' constant state of blissful ignorance. 

Some of the other pairings aren't quite as well realized. Sonic getting stuck with Cubot leads to some good gags, based on the robot's tendency to misunderstand simple ideas and Sonic's difficulty navigating Eggman's control panel. However, these two have the most plot heavy segment of the episode, meaning there aren't as many opportunities for them to banter together. Tails and Amy break the pattern of one of our heroes getting stuck with one of their adversaries. These two are already friends, so there's less tension in locking them into a room together. (I guess the basic math of the two teams made a pairing like that inevitable.) That's probably why those two are the duo that discover the barrels of toxic waste, which will explode if they aren't kept constantly cool. That's a problem when Sticks shuts off the A/C so her and Orbot can John McClane around in the ventilation shafts. 

As contrived as that particular plot point is, I rather like it. Bottle episodes usually play off two people locked in a location overnight or something similar. Time is the primary factor keeping them stuck here. I expected "Lair on Lockdown" to do something similar, since it's noted early on that the quarantine period ends after 48 hours. Introducing the idea of the nuclear waste about to burst adds a twist, making the need to escape far more urgent. If this show wasn't a comedy, that ideally would've been played for suspense. Instead, any sense of tension is undermined by the jokes. The best joke of which is Tails and Amy attempting to keep the barrels of Mootonium cool manually. However, since "Lair on Lockdown" basically fuses four separate "bottles" together, creating a plot that links all these isolated duos is a smart solution. The segregated pairings have to communicate through Morse code to help each other out, providing a dramatic throughline across the four different rooms. 

All of this makes "Lair on Lockdown" a fairly well-done example of a commonly utilized premise. My favorite aspect to emerge out of this one is another look at Eggman's various vulnerabilities. The storage room contains artifacts from past failures of his, such as a tin can robot from "Dr. Eggman's Tomato Sauce" or Swifty the Shrew's head from "Blue with Envy." (The rule of three dictates that there be a third object, which turns out to be a dinosaur egg, referencing an episode that doesn't actually exist. A good joke that is the closet this script comes to winking at the fourth wall.) Being surrounded by reminders of previous defeats puts Eggman into a funk. His mood shifts slightly when Knuckles uncovers Zippie, the very first robot Eggman built. The small, beeping, wheeled device shows a simple, child-like spirit. That reminds Eggman of why he started building machines in the first place, renewing his spirit a little bit. Zippie is also there to comfort him at the end, after his base gets blown up. Though that's not exactly an uncommon occurrence on this show, so I don't know why it gets Eggman so down. We also find out that the doctor's primary password is "chili dogs," pointing towards what Cubot refers to as Eggman seeking Sonic's approval. Once again, the image of Eggman as a neurotic, lonely kid desperate to be accepted and praised emerges. 

"Lair on Lockdown" goes to show that, no matter how often "Sonic Boom" would poke at its own status as a formulaic TV show, it could still put some of those formulas to good use. Françoise Gralewski's script probably could've been a little funnier or deeper. However, considering this show is always stuck in a bottle known as the eleven minute runtime, I think he did a good job. Now I want to know how this format would've gone with other "Sonic" shows. What would have happened if Sally and Snively got stuck in an elevator or a sinking submarine or something? What sexy shenanigans would result from Knuckles and Rouge being trapped in a cave-in together? Can Sonic and Metal Sonic put aside their differences and figure out to escape a locked PortaPotty? Oh no, I'm writing fanfiction again. Better wrap this review up before I'm tempted to sign up for an AO3 account... [7/10]