Sonic Mania Adventures: Papercraft Edition

Sonic Mania Adventures: Papercraft Edition

Original Release Date: January 19th, 2019 / February 14th, 2019

In today's hyper-online world, when we live so much of our lives through social media and our phone screens, the question must truly be asked: Where does an advertisement end and everything else begin? There is now an industry of "influencers" and "content creators" who are paid by companies to shill their products, usually while disguising it as their honest opinion or as a regular post. Shockingly, many of their young followers then go out and buy these products. It's gotten so bad that YouTube actually forces uploaders to specify if their videos contain paid advertisements. Unavoidably, we have reached a point where, when looking at anything we see on the internet, we have to wonder if something is trying to be sold to us. We are constantly inundated with advertisements, trying to influence our opinions and sway our wallets, to the point that it's hard to distinguish them from everything else.

This raises some complicated questions of its own: When do advertisements end and art – an expression of something from inside the person making it – begin? To say that "commercials can't be art" is demonstratively false at this point. Corporations have hired critically acclaimed filmmakers like David Lynch or Jonathan Glazer to run wild and make weirdo short films out of sixty second spots. A case can be made that some of the great documentarian Errol Morris' most iconic works are fucking Apple commercials. We live in a society, a capitalistic one, and that infects everything we do. Drawings, paintings, sculptures, songs, books, movies: We sell them for money. Does that mean that everything, no matter how sincerely made by the artist for its own sake, is an advertisement for itself? If that is the case, then surely it cuts both ways. Something made simply to sell a product can also be art. 

Don't you love it when I open a review for a stupid "Sonic" meme video with a philosophical discussion? The truth is that most beloved pop culture franchises exist to sell something. That is the nature of the beast. "Transformers," "He-Man," "Ninja Turtles," and "Power Rangers" were all shows created to sell toys and that has done little to stop them from developing die-hard fan bases who are touched, moved, and inspired by them. The creation of fan work – art made strictly for its own sake, with no intention of monetary compensation, inspired by commercial work! – suggests that this conversation is much stickier than it seems. "SatAM" was a cartoon made to sell "Sonic the Hedgehog" video games but its stories, characters, and themes resonated with me so deeply that it still influences my life thirty years later. If you are immersed in any fandom, this is probably the case. Maybe artistic expression is such a fundamental part of the human soul that we can't help but sneak something of ourselves, a feeling or thought that we hold deeply about life and the world, into the most mercenary of work. Are the burger flippers, house painters, plumbers and trashmen not artists in their own ways? Idunknow. 

I bring this up because, after the success of "Sonic Mania Adventures" in 2018, somebody at Sega's advertising department realized they still had some copies of "Sonic Mania Plus" to move. In order to push the title back into people's timelines, perhaps reaching some dedicated Sonic fan who didn't yet own it, they commissioned two short animations to post on their YouTube channel. Tyson Hesse was busy I guess, so someone else – uncredited, as far as I can tell – was hired to make some much cheaper, quicker, far less elaborate animations. While "Sonic Mania Adventures" immediately became a beloved classic among fans, nobody has said much about "Papercraft Mania Adventures" since its two episodes were posted in the early months of 2019. I've got nothing better to do today so let us try and examine why this is the case. 

The first episode of the "Papercraft Edition" of "Sonia Mania Adventures" is called "Snow Sculpting Contest." It involves three teams – made up of Mighty and Ray, Sonic and Tails, and Amy and Knuckles – having a snow sculpture contest. They each use their special skills to build sculptures. The viewer is then asked to decide who the winner is. The second installment, called "Valentine's Day," is a little more narratively driven. For unexplained reasons, Eggman has disguised himself as a jewelry store owner and seems to be selling the Chaos Emeralds as enormous rings. Sonic grabs them, because he wants to become Super Sonic. Knuckles and Amy both see the hedgehog carrying around all seven Dragonballs and draw their own conclusions from it. Knuckles thinks Sonic has stolen his EMEROWDS and Amy thinks they are gifts for her. A chase ensues, ending with the reveal that the jewels were never real to begin with. Knuckles and Amy take matters into their own hands. 

While "Sonic Mania Adventures" told a story, invoked emotions, and contained thematic ideas, it's much easier to dismiss these "Papercraft Editions" as nothing but commercials. The first one especially. The way it presents a series of events simply to ask the viewer to respond makes it, in the parlance of our times, engagement bait. We don't know why Sonic and friends are building these snow sculptures. We don't know who wins. There's no rising action, plot twist, or climax. I spent too much time on Letterboxd and there's a lot of debate over there about what a "film" actually is. Is a TV show, a music video, or a YouTube video essay a "film?" The debate rages on with no end in sight. However, it's difficult for me to classify "Snow Sculpting Contest" as a movie. I guess we get some reflection into everyone's personalities from what they build and how they do it. But it's not really telling a story or making a point, is it? 

At least "Valentine's Day" is telling a story. Not a good one, mind you. What did Eggman hope to accomplish by dressing up as the proprietor of a jewel store – which looks more like a hot dog cart – and selling Sonic bogus Chaos Emeralds? The hedgehog does not trade money or services for these artifacts, so it wasn't to make a profit. Does it make Sonic look like a fool? Yeah, I mean, I guess. To what end though? Why does the mere sight of Sonic holding the regular Emeralds, not the Master Emerald mind you, awaken Knuckles from his slumber and enrage him? And why does he smash Eggman's cart afterwards? Why does he need Amy's hammer to do it? Knuckles is perfectly capable of smashing things on his own! Are both of them simply expressing the anger they feel about being duped? As vague as "Valentine's Day" is... At least it is telling a story of some sort. There is a degree of dramatic tension here. It does more than merely exist and distract the eyes with some bright colors for a few minutes. 

Truthfully, I think "Valentine's Day" functions primarily to do something Sega loves: Give Sonic/Amy shippers some hope that the pretend romance between these two cartoon hedgehogs they are very invested in actually exists without confirming anything one way or another. Amy is obviously enamored of Sonic and, seeing him carrying a butt load of rings with big rocks on them, brings obvious connotations to mind. At the very least, she imagines them receiving them as gifts at a romantic gesture, if not thinking of them as engagement rings. Sonic isn't interested though. He's so not interested that, the minute he sees Amy behind him, he willingly gives Knuckles the rocks. Sonic is so disinterested in making Amy think he has any feelings for her that he immediately concedes to his brawny rival rather than have the girl get any ideas. Despite that, certain audiences will use this cartoon as evidence that the fast blue hedgehog truly, deeply loves the little pink one. So it goes. 

What value is there to these "Papercraft Editions?" They certainly don't feature the lovingly rendered hand drawn and painted animation of the proper "Mania Adventures" shorts. This so-called papercraft is much, much cruder. That's by design, obviously. The charm of animation like this – ostensibly assembled by arranging specifically cut paper into various shapes and photographing it in sequence – is that it has a handmade, simplistic quality that reminds us of playing with constructed paper in kindergarten. I kind of doubt that these shorts were made with real papercraft, the old fashion way. One assumes it was all done digitally. However, it does look cute. There is certainly a charm to these images, despite the unavoidable feeling that this format was chosen more so because it's a lot faster to produce than regular animation. 

These two videos also carry on the gimmick of the first five "Sonic Mania Adventures" episodes by using music and sound effects from the games. That continues to strike me as an extremely fun, entertaining choice. However, while the series these two cartoons spun off from was undoubtedly an achievement, it's much harder to consider these "Papercraft Editions" as anything but cute little commercials. Harmless, sure. Eggman wearing a fake mustache over his real mustache in the second one is a good joke. Stuff like this, however, truly straddles the line between a creation worthy of in-depth conversation and a thing that pops up on your phone, you chuckle at and give a heart or thumbs-up to, before immediately scrolling onto the next distraction. (Though that didn't stop me from writing an in-depth examination of them... Good God, what am I doing with my life?) Is it art or is it merely "content?" I guess you can argue about that but I know I'm never going to think about these again after I finish typing these words. [5/10]