DESCRIPTION

CAST

OVA AdventureSonic the Hedgehog
ANIME ActionSonic X Season 2
SPECIAL ActionSonic X Pilot
MANGA ActionShikkoku no Harinezumi Shadow the Hedgehog

REVIEWS

• 

  IfUrNotAWeebUrLyin

  69/100
  Middle-schoolers and fans of the series should definitely check it out.

  Sonic X is a 78-episode anime series based on the Sonic The Hedgehog video game series. For those who aren't familiar with it, the games follow Sonic, a blue, talking hedgehog that can run at the speed of sound, who fights the evil Dr. Eggman, a mad scientist who desires to conquer the world, and in doing so, turns Sonic's friends in robots and pollutes Sonic's home. These fights are usually waged over the powerful and coveted Chaos Emeralds, which are seven gems that, when all brought together, provide the user with unlimited power. The anime series doesn't stray from that concept. It starts with Eggman having collected all of the emeralds to power a doomsday machine, which Sonic damages so that when activated, it sends them all to an alternate dimension, that dimension being that of our own planet earth. From this point on, Sonic meets up with a 12-year-old boy named Chris, whose grandfather welcomes him and his friends into their home to help them find the emeralds once more in order to find a way back home. The series follows a number of original story arcs, alongside adaptations of the Sonic Adventure, Sonic Adventure 2, and Sonic Battle video games. The third and final season of the show a story unlike anything the series has ever received, where the crew venture into space to battle the evil Metarex: robotic monsters that are terrorizing planets, seeking to rule to galaxy. The story has a much darker tone to it than anything the series has ever received, even to this day.
  The Sonic series only delivers so much in terms of storytelling, so this anime is an essential watch for anyone who considers themselves a fan of the series. That doesn't mean that it's anything too, too special though, do bear in mind. Production quality changes from episode to episode: big, important episodes are very well animated, while everything in-between can range from decent, to acceptable, to straight up horrible, with poorly drawn character models being a constant source of contention. Character development only ever happens to a handful of characters, and only ever happens when an arc reaches its conclusion. This means that the show is mostly a generic children's action anime, which, if you're into the series and its characters, is still worth a watch, even if you aren't nine years old. Like I said earlier, if you're a fan of the series, the show has some great stories and awesome moments that you absolutely need to watch, even if there's a lot of generic kids'-show filler to round out the majority of the experience.
  Now, I can't end the review without mentioning the Western adaption, handled by 4Kids Entertainment. 4Kids is known for taking series and injecting a more "Western" flavour to it, changing the overall tone and dialogue to feel more like your typical American Saturday-morning cartoon. In the case of Sonic X, it makes the series feel a little more juvenile, but it definitely makes for a far more entertaining watch. The original Japanese series is honestly pretty boring, with the English dub opting to give the characters more comedic personalities, which fits right in with the Sonic franchise--a franchise that doesn't take itself very seriously in general, and that's a good thing. For this reason, I recommend sticking with the dub. Besides, if you're a fan of the games, you'll recognize all the voice actors, since they appeared in the games from 2005 through 2009 (granted, they aren't games I would recommend playing...those years were dark times for the Sonic series...).
  In my books, an anime is a must-watch if in the 90's, worth watching if in the 80's, casually enjoyable if in the 70's, and not a complete write-off if in the 60's. At a 69/100, I'd say that the show definitely isn't for everyone, but middle schoolers and fans of the series should definitely check it out.

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• 

  ChirekachiMizu

  69/100
  An anime that I have mixed feelings about..

  My Thoughts on Sonic X

  ---

  Well... this feels weird to come to. A 17 year old boy who does nothing but watch anime for his life, actually decided to return to an anime that he once gave a 1/10 out of spite. That boy is me. I originally gave this show a 1/10 out of spite, but the more I looked at it, I feel a lot different about it. The show's not great, for sure. But it's not that bad when coming to it again. I guess it's the nostalgia of it. So... why do I feel mixed about Sonic X? Well, let me just get it's points out first.

  ---

  Season 1: Overview

  So Sonic, alongside with his pals, have went in and infiltrate Dr. Eggman's base after hearing the fact that the doc has all 7 Chaos Emeralds and is holding Cream held hostage. With no time to waste, Sonic goes in and saves them in the neck of time, and stops Eggman from any shenanigans he's pulling off. Unfortunately for them, one of Eggman robots shot the machine in which the doc made which utilizes the Chaos Emeralds. This causes an explosion in which Knuckles saw the blast as Chaos Control, and everyone caught within the blast radius is dragged to wherever the hell it takes them....

  Well, it's already answered as it takes them to a strange world that is filled with humans, and humans are quite puzzled with them. Sonic, landing in the middle of the street, is surrounded by a number of them. Seeing as how the police quite literally think that he's just an ordinary Hedgehog, they decided to ahead and catch him. Unfortunately for them, Sonic runs away fast, and not only he out speeds the police, but he also out-sped the S-Team, a team of fast police drivers that go as fast as how the hedgehog goes. Still though, Sonic is faster than all of them, and he launches himself off of the air enjoying the view of the city (Btw, it's Station Square, if you were asking.) And unfortunately for the hedgehog, he lands in a pool of water, which is outside from a rich person's house and mansion. There, he is saved by Christopher Thorndyke (Just Chris will do) and thus kick starts off the adventure.

  And then from here on out of Season 1, it's all of the matter to collect all the Chaos Emeralds. Every one of Sonic's friends are gathered and they set off to find the Chaos Emeralds to return to their world. Not a bad start for Sonic X so far. However, we do have more of the show to fill, so what happened at the end of Season 1, did they managed to go back. Well... no actually, after Sonic recieved a beating from one of Eggman's strongest robots, Chris manages to take away the Chaos Emeralds from Eggman, which was powering his robot, and throws it in the water to save the beaten up Sonic. There he's transformed into Super Sonic and starts to break the robot in to pieces. It not only breaks the robot, but it also starts Chaos Control, in which surprisingly, it does not take them back to their world, no. It instead takes more of what was in Sonic's world. And we see that with Angel Island landing in the ocean. We have another 52 episodes to fill for the show.

  Season 2: Overview

  Thankfully for Season 2, there is much less to talk about. Season 2 follows up with the Adventure Games and throwing it's own original ideas. (Like how Eggman fixes the moon and Chaotix trying to get Cream to reunite with her mother) and it's also home to one of my favorite episodes (In which I'll get to in a bit). Season 2 is not that bad of a season. That's really all I can say. Let's go to the last season.

  Season 3: Overview

  Now originally, Sonic X was only gonna be 52 episodes long, but someone had the mind to actually continue with it and come up with one of the best arcs to exist in the show, the Metarex Saga. This starts off with Sonic ALREADY taking a beating from a formidable enemy named Dark Oak. In his Super State, he uses Chaos Control to separate the Chaos Emeralds across the galaxy, and because of that, Dark Oak is now set off to go find them, as that is his original goal. What does he do with them is a spoiler, so I'm not gonna mention. In a second half, Tails, alongside with Amy and Cream, encountered a spaceship that crash-landed to their planet during a meteor shower. From there, they meet Cosmo, an alien in which she tells them about the threat that is to come. Of course with Sonic and co. concerned about it, they set off in an adventure to space to grab all the Chaos Emeralds again. AND FOR SOME WHAT OF A REASON, THEY DECIDED TO PUT CHRIS IN IT. (I'll get to the details on him in just a sec, but come on.. the season would be much more interesting if Chris wasn't involved.)

  Season 3, from what sounded like a mediocre start, turned out to be a literal Sonic Unleashed filled adventure. But instead of the world, it's the entire galaxy. And from there, the metarex saga has it's own charm. I really like it for that sort of reason in of itself.

  The three seasons of Sonic X all has something unique to the table and I applaud it for that. But now, we go on talking about the whole thing.

  ---

  Story

  Sonic X was made to be a kids show, thus, yes, the humor isn't all that great, but it does what it does best. Like I said, all three seasons have something unique to the table. Each season are on the same level and they have the same amount of humor. But like I said, the humor isn't all that great. It's passable though seeing as this is a show made in 2003 (Same year in which the very original Fullmetal Alchemist aired). I also quite like the original stories it shares, but only some of them though. Season 1 suffers it the most as some are mediocre while others are just, bland and it just continues with the story.

  Characters

  Characters for the most part, it's the characters of Sonic that you mostly know and love. Knuckles being the guardian of the Master Emerald, Tails being a mechanical genius, Amy still being Sonic's self-proclaimed "girlfriend", Cream being the youngest and quite a brave youngster, really, the main cast of Sonic is still all the same and is represented like how their suppose to be. Even Sonic himself is who he is (Although, I will admit, sometimes he's an asshole).

  Now it's time for the major issue of the show, the human characters, specifically... Chris in general. I don't dislike Chris, but Chris really is quite unremarkable and for somewhat of a reason, has the most screen time. His personality, I really didn't like, seeing as how he's an elementary kid, it's understandable as to why he's like this, but I do wish he was made more useful (Hell, Chris' grandfather, Chuck, is more useful than Chris himself), cause all he does is listen to the conversation, and does the objective. He's just a kid that's there for the sake of having to be there. Nothing else, nothing more. That's all I can really say about him. The rest of the characters, are pretty solid.

  Visuals

  Believe it or not, this is made by the same studio that did Dr. STONE, Rent-a-Girlfriend, Detective Conan, ReLIFE, and their best work, Fruits Basket. Being such, I really do like the art-style that TMS went with for Sonic X. It definitely suits 2003 standards. They have definitely gotten better with their later works and while that is a given, I'd like to think that it started with Sonic X actually. They did a decent job. It's passable.

  ---

  Well now is the part where I share to you about the things I liked about this anime

  • Openings

  Sonic X has a total of 3 different openings. One made for US, one for Japan, and one for Europe (except for France, in which it shares the JP opening).

  The US version is known for the famous meme "Gotta Go Fast". In which it exists here in the US opening of Sonic X, and ya know what, the nostalgia pandrums and memes aside, this is a good song. Definitely one of the best things that 4kids has done (Alongside with the 1st Pokemon Opening). And I applaud it. It really is catchy too.

  Japan's version of the opening, I'm just saying it right now. It's the best opening out of all the three. It's sung by Hideaki Takatori and Hironobu Kageyama. Hironobu best known for his works singing the openings of Dragon Ball Z. While Gotta Go Fast is filled with energy and attitude, Sonic Drive has a lot, and I mean a LOT more of that. It's positive inducing and is a lot more serious compared to US' goofiness in Gotta Go Fast. All I can really say is... it's really good.

  Europe's version of the opening, gonna say... it's definitely the worst one. It's just the vocalist saying "Sonic X" over and over again. As if you don't know what the show is already. It's instruments used is also very weak, and not that great. France was lucky enough to share Japan's OP. Overall, not the best OP for the show. There's just no energy to it.

  So basically, this is the order. JP > US> EU

  • Endings

  While US and EU got it's OP's played as ED's, Japan has a total of 3 endings. Those 3 being Mi-Ra-I, Hikaru Michi, and T.O.P

  Yeah... not a big fan of Mi-Ra-I. I don't know, maybe it's the quirkiness, but this ED, doesn't really suit Sonic X whatsoever. It's definitely the worst one out of all of them, but it does get a pass as the melody does sound nice, just the lyrics I guess.

  Fun fact about this one. Aya Hiroshige was only 12 at the time the 2nd ED was made. Tell me how does a 12 year old make such a depressing ED this good. FOR FUCKS SAKE, THIS IS A KIDS SHOW!! WE'RE NOT SUPPOSE TO CRY, WE'RE SUPPOSE TO HAVE LAUGHS DAMN IT! Definitely a WHOLE lot better than the 1st ED by a LONG shot. And it's definitely one of the sadder ones that it can even fit such a sad scene. I'll get more into it later.

  T.O.P thankfully isn't quirky, nor depressing. It's another attitude ED that's positive inducing, and I say, best suits Sonic X more. Though, because of ED 2, it's only 2nd best in terms of ED's. I gotta like it's energy the song has. Definitely is something else.

  In the ED department. ED 2 > ED 3 > ED 1

  • Voice Acting

  This is where Jason Griffeth, Mike Polluck, and such other voice actors from the 4kids cast debuted as Sonic characters. And, bless 4kids for it. They were some of the best Voice Actors that we had in Sonic. And I'm glad to see that Polluck is still going strong as Eggman. He's really the perfect VA for him, and I can't really think of anyone else for the job. The 4kids cast definitely did a great job. But even then. I even get a kick out of hearing the Japanese VA's, in which, I'm saying it right now.

  Sonic X is better if you watch it in Japanese.

  More on that later, but the voice acting in Sonic X (JP) is really good. I especially love Sonic's engrish here. You're better off listening it to yourself, it's really great:

  uh... anyhow. Moving on.

  • Why Sonic X is best off when watching it in Japanese

  Well, aside from the obvious cut content, it's sounds better and like I said with the opening, it's more serious. I have respects to the 4kids cast, in fact, the first time I watched Sonic X was in English Dub, but when I watch the Japanese Dub, I noticed how much better it was. First off, the OST is great and does set the atmosphere, secondly there's all the original stuff that you couldn't see in the original English Dub, and thirdly, 25 minutes of an episode is better than having like, 4 minutes less of the episode. Thus, ending why Sonic X is better when watching it in Japanese. I mean, I ain't forcing you to watch the dub too, that's all up to you.

  • Character traits

  Specifically for Tails' case. Tails often relies on Sonic and doesn't wanna be a big bother to him. He wants to stand up for himself and Season 3 definitely highlights it. You know what's unfortunate, the brother moments that Sonic and Tails have, it's not present here. It's mostly Chris that gets all the highlights with him and Sonic, and nothing else. But Tails in S3 makes up for it. He's really trying to do things his own. He's becoming an independent man, you may say. I like that.

  • Dr. Eggman as a villain

  I really like Eggman here. There's the one side where he's trying to take over the world, and then there's the other in which he's a goofy villain, in which that's what Eggman is supposed to be. And he does sound like it too, whether it'd be Mike Polluck, or the late Chikao Ootsuka, both do a great job at portraying Eggman. I also like how Eggman does have a soft spot. While he does wanna take over the world, he wants Sonic to at least come in and stop him from taking over said world. It's a moment like that where Eggman, not only is a really great Villain, but does wanna put up a fight for it. Where does that soft spot show?

  • Just Episode 52 in general

  So... I actually never really got to finish off the anime, and while saying that "I didn't bother" would be a good excuse, in truth of reality, I'm just trying not to watch the heavy hitters. The biggest one being Episode 52, which is the last episode of Season 2 and was originally supposed to be the last episode in all of Sonic X, but then another 26 came. I'd make a long thesis about why I love this episode so much, but instead, I'll do it in bulletins. (Spoiler Warning, btw)

  • All the points I made about Eggman having a soft-spot.
  • Everyone being worried about Sonic (Yes, Eggman too)
  • My god, Eggman just simply roasting Amy so hard. LMAO
  • Knuckles and Rouge acting like a couple that just started to duke it out on who's right
  • Sonic's way of returning back to his world and just destroys Eggman's ship in one blow
  • Yeah, remember Knuckles and Rouge duking it out? They easily stopped by seeing that Sonic is indeed alive and well.
  • Chris being an adult (in which I honestly like about him
  • Remember what I said about Hikaru Michi fitting such a sad scene, yeah, hopefully this will answer the question as to why, and just to let you know, THIS IS JUST ONE OF THEM:

  ---

  Overall Statement

  Never in my life would I actually have mixed feelings about an anime that I've seen in 2018. And to be fair, all the points that I was talking about was based off my experience with watching it back in 2018. Good lord... I was a weird 14 year old back then.

  Sonic X isn't a bad show, but it's also not a masterpiece, it's good, and I really liked it a whole lot. Maybe if Chris was written better as a character, this show would've sat at an 8 or a 7. But I'm satisfied with a 69/100. Do I recommend it? No. Especially since it's made for kids, but if you're really curious enough, or if you're a Sonic fan, go ahead. But only if you can handle someone like Chris, or the humor.

  Jesus, I think this is as long as my K-On review. I did say there that it's hard for me to try and compose a 5 sentence paragraph for something that I love the most. This is not an anime that I love, this is an anime that I have fond memories about, AND THIS REVIEW TOOK 5 HOURS TO MAKE! God damn, my experience with this anime might've been the reason why it's this long. But like I said, it does require a lot of thought. And hey, at least you got a review that was lower than an 89. I kept a promise... I guess.

  If I were to decide to come back to it again for nostalgia, I'll indeed do it, though, not as a modern anime watcher, but as a Sonic fan. I grew up with Sonic the Hedgehog, and I've played a couple of games from the franchise. The community is very chill and I like reading the fan comics. Some fan arts are also nice too. And lots of other stuff. I sadly left it at 2018, but then today, I decided to come back to it. And I'm glad I did, because this anime solidified my signature as a Sonic fan.

  Alright, enough rambling, I'm a end it off by saying this: Go watch it if you're curious enough. That's all.

  See you in another review, which will take another decade. :)

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• 

  myvelouria

  55/100
  Live and learn, hanging on the edge of tomorrow.

  This review contains spoilers for “Sonic X”, “Sonic the Hedgehog” (2020), and “Sonic the Hedgehog 2” (2022). All gif sets linked were created by adhd-sonic-the-hedgehog.tumblr.com and provided with permission.

  

  In 2003 TMS Entertainment, producer of anime such as “Detective Conan” and “Lupin III” and future subsidiary of Sega Sammy Holdings, would team up with Sega and Sonic Team to create a new experience for “Sonic the Hedgehog” fans. The anime was “Sonic X”, a 52 episode TV series that ran from April 2003 through March 2004. It would receive an English dub put forth by the now defunct 4Kids Entertainment and would air throughout North America, Europe, and the Middle East. Then head of Sonic Team, Yuji Naka, would serve as executive producer and believed it to be an endeavor that would cause Sonic’s popularity to spike much in the same way the “Pokemon” anime did for that franchise. Takashi Iizuka, a producer and now current head of Sonic Team, believed the combined releases of “Sonic X” and the video game “Sonic Heroes” would broaden Sonic’s appeal to a new generation of gamers and dubbed 2003 to be a “Sonic Year”. Was it? “Sonic X” is an anime that occupies an interesting space within its franchise. I remember when it began airing in the US back in 2005 and while at the time I was a teenager and didn’t watch much of it, it did seem to leave an impression on its target audience of children. Unfortunately, it was just before that awkward period for Sonic’s games starting with “Shadow the Hedgehog” and the infamous “Sonic the Hedgehog” (2006). Regardless, I still fairly often see fans recommend it and credit it as one of their favorite adaptations of the games. And I am genuinely happy to see that “Sonic X” still has fans and is highly accessible to new audiences. But was it the key to creating a new generation of Sonic fans? The “Sonic Adventure” duology had already been out for years before “Sonic X” debuted on Japanese TV and many people, myself included, credit them for launching a new era in the franchise and its fandom. Still, to say “Sonic X” left no impact would be both unfair and simply incorrect. So let’s explore this moment in Sonic history, his first and currently only TV anime.

  “Sonic X” begins in the home world of Sonic the Hedgehog and his friends. Dr. Eggman has obtained the seven Chaos Emeralds and instigates Chaos Control, but due to the intervention of Sonic this causes a massive explosion sending them and the characters we know and love to Earth. Alone in a new world Sonic is rescued from drowning by a 12 year old boy named Chris Thorndyke and together they team up to find Sonic’s friends and stop Eggman from world domination. The first 26 episodes of this anime are episodic and comprised of anime original content taking some inspiration from the games, however when the second season rolls in we see adaptations of the two “Adventure” titles and elements of “Sonic Battle”. Though not without an original arc to conclude the show. There was another season of “Sonic X”, but given that has a separate listing on this site it won’t be taken into account. The anime was directed by Hajime Kamegaki, who’s history includes the “Lupin III vs Detective Conan” collaborations and the first “Naruto Shippuuden” movie. Series composition was by Hiro Masaki, who has credits on “Digimon Adventure” and “Zatch Bell”. And the character designs were provided by Satoshi Hirayama who worked on various “Lupin III” specials from around this time, though these designs were based off of Yuji Uekawa’s work from the games. This is an anime that offers me a surprising amount of content to discuss. And I won’t beat around the bush, there’s also a lot for me to criticize.

  

  I don’t normally find an anime where I can trace so many of my grievances back to one thing, yet here we are. That one thing would be young Chris Thorndyke. It’s almost mesmerizing how many problems one character can create, especially one as bland and uninteresting as Chris. The biggest sin I can name with regards to this character is how he’s too present in the narrative. I don’t just mean that we see too much of him, though that is true, it’s that he honestly feels more like the protagonist than Sonic does. He doesn’t simply join in on the adventure, he is the one we’re actually following for a considerable portion of the anime. So much time gets devoted to seeing him at school, with his friends, doing things with Tails and the others, dealing with his wealthy parents being too busy, getting kidnapped, making certain situations worse. Meanwhile Sonic is too often doing things off camera by himself that aren’t terribly consequential and tends to be used as a means of doing a cool thing in the climax only to go back to being out of the way. This is honestly an issue I have with the way TMS sometimes handles Goemon Ishikawa XIII from “Lupin III”. In Goemon’s case, while I don’t like it, I can at least understand the logic behind it. Goemon’s not an outwardly expressive individual and that can be difficult to write for, especially as a main character. So it makes sense to have him spend a lot of time training or meditating while Lupin and Jigen handle the plot. But this is Sonic the Hedgehog. The Blue Blur, “you’re too sloooow”,”I’ll make you eat those words”, you mean to tell me he isn’t expressive enough to carry an anime? Sonic has successfully carried various media before and after “Sonic X”, it can be done. Even when he was a silent 2D sprite he always was this force of personality, some would even argue he has too much. But instead of pinning the focus of the anime on him they chose to latch onto a character that epitomizes what it means to be milquetoast. And the real insult to injury is there’s nothing wrong with how Sonic is written here, he’s good and has all that classic attitude and charisma. The issue is we aren’t seeing enough of him and it’s a decision I find thoroughly confusing. Why are you holding back one of the best characters ever? It doesn’t make sense to me.

  Now when it comes to Chris the other big issue I have is I just don’t think the anime justifies his existence in the first place. In the beginning when Sonic is alone you’d think that he’s there to be his companion, but Sonic gets all his main friends back within the first several episodes. Then you would probably think this is one of those “hiding an alien” stories so Chris is there to keep them safe and protected from the public. Well that goes out the window once the citizens of Station Square learn about them and they become celebrities. Maybe he’s there to make the anime feel grounded. Except do we really need that in a Sonic anime? Perhaps Chris is there to be someone for the kids at home to project onto, but that feels like a weak reason to insert this character into as much of the show as they did. Kids want to see Sonic, Tails, Knuckles, and all the rest doing the fun stuff they’re known for. I know there are people who don’t care for the humans in the live action films, but at least with Tom and Maddie they serve the purpose of giving Sonic a home and family after spending most of his life alone on Earth. I’m not saying the first film executes it perfectly, there’s deleted scenes that would have made it work better, but you can at least recognize the role these characters have in this story. And not once in any of the times that I’ve seen the films did I feel their inclusion came at the expense of Sonic’s status as the protagonist. Don’t let the bizarre fact that Ben Schwartz’s name isn’t on several of the posters fool you, in the movies Sonic is definitely the hero of the story. But here we’re stuck with this little boy who is not interesting, swallows up more screen time than he should, does not have a worthwhile reason for being there, and all at the expense of the characters you were sold on.

  

  Another major issue with this anime is it did not know how to prioritize things. Let me explain. The first half of the anime is spent on new content that is mostly episodic. I like episodic anime, I’ve defended them before, but so many of these episodes didn’t work for me because they weren’t telling particularly good stories. You do have some gems like the one where they’re on the ship and Sonic’s fear of water eats away at him, the one where Sonic spends a day with a disabled girl instead of kowtowing to the president, the episode where Amy wants to give Sonic a seashell bracelet for luck, the one where Eggman manipulates Knuckles into fighting Sonic, Rouge’s debut episode, and the one where we get to see how Sonic and Tails met. Too many episodes during this very large period are forgettable though. And it becomes an egregious decision when you see how rushed the stories for the “Adventure” titles are in this adaptation. You want to know how many episodes each game received to tell their stories? Six a piece. That is not enough time to properly tell them. The thing about the “Adventure” games is their stories are good, but have room for improvement. Things could be expanded upon or changed, and this is what I hoped “Sonic X” planned to do. The English and Japanese openings really build you up with the anticipation for these episodes only for their time in the anime being too brief. In adapting the first of these two games they do manage to get quite a bit right. Amy gets her arc about helping the bird and connecting with Gamma, Knuckles is more present than he is during the first half of the anime, Chris is stuck with Big the Cat and neither get too much spotlight, we get to see Tikal and the lore behind the Master Emerald, Chaos has his entire arc, its good. It’s just too bad they didn’t allow it more episodes to properly develop everything. I know Sonic’s all about speed, but this is ridiculous. And yet this is nothing compared to what I’m about to share.

  

  I don’t know how controversial this is to say, but I think “Sonic X” makes a real mess out of “Sonic Adventure 2”, and more specifically, Shadow the Hedgehog’s arc. Six episodes is not enough time to tell this and it’s rather bizarre to see where TMS was willing to adhere to the game canon verses where they allowed change. That laughable sub plot where everyone sees a clear image of Shadow and mistakes him for Sonic? It’s still here and I know this mix up is important to the plot, but they could have framed it where nobody gets a good look at Shadow and just knows it’s a male hedgehog and jumps to conclusions from there. This would at least make the confusion a bit more understandable, except they’re watching footage of Shadow on the news where his face is plainly visible. Chris’s grandfather even says there’s no mistaking this is Sonic with no irony or self-awareness. And somehow this is still not the worst thing about how they adapted this game. You see Shadow ends up crossing paths with Chris and, when using Chaos Control to save himself and Rouge, he sees hints of Maria Robotnik in Chris and saves him. This leads to Chris going back to Space Colony ARK with them and doing something I don’t think I can forgive the anime for. He actively takes on the role Amy had in “Sonic Adventure 2”. She wasn’t playable in that game, but for what little time she has in it she accomplishes something important: she challenges Shadow on if revenge is really what Maria wanted and it gets through to him. This was a moment that reinforced Amy’s kindness and empathy despite Shadow doing nothing to earn it. Here it just feels like TMS trying once again to make Chris seem more important than he is. Whatever similarities he has with Maria are superficial at best and any moment where the anime tries to make that connection feels forced. Amy is literally right there while it happens and she is stunned he would even do this, it’s like they’re mocking Amy fans. But don’t worry, she still gets that scene where she hugs Shadow because she thinks he’s Sonic. Can’t forget that.

  

  The problems with how “Sonic X” uses Shadow don’t stop there unfortunately. In an aggravating display of poor adaptation decisions TMS thought it would be a good idea to have us meet the former GUN soldier that shot and killed Maria. This in itself isn’t the worst idea, but they frame it as though he’s a character we’re supposed to sympathize with. His flashback to her death was ridiculous. 4Kids was infamous for their razor sharp editing and refusal to expose children to concepts like death so I actually rewatched these episodes in Japanese to see what they originally were. Maria’s death isn’t graphic, there’s no blood, but they do make it clear she was shot. And the way it’s handled here makes it look like an accident, but this felt rather demeaning to me. A grown man was reckless and an innocent child died due to his own carelessness. I’m seriously supposed to feel bad for him? I would have much preferred an episode devoted to showing Maria and Shadow’s lives on the ARK so we could have formed a greater attachment to both characters, but especially Maria who is little more than a cipher in this series. But no, we have to see that the man who killed her feels really bad about it instead of seeing her as her own person. I know she only received so much attention in the game, but an anime is a great vehicle for developing her as more than Shadow’s dead sister and TMS let it slip. Maria’s death is the emotional lynchpin to “Sonic Adventure 2” and the driving force of one of the franchise’s most beloved characters and they really dropped the ball on it. Other core elements of “Adventure 2” like Knuckles’ and Rouge’s rivalry, Tails and Eggman’s roles, Sonic and Shadow’s entire dynamic, they feel like afterthoughts despite the significance they originally had.

  

  But what about the show’s production values? After all, I spent a lot of time in my “Lupin III” reviews discussing how beautiful and groundbreaking those anime are. Well, about that. TMS is a studio with a lot of great anime to their credit, but an animation powerhouse is not what comes to my mind when I think of them. “Lupin III” really lucked into the fact that some of the industry’s most talented people were involved with it. And now that it has such a legacy tied to it as a cornerstone of Japanese animation I feel that’s how you continue to see talented people working on it. But in the case of many other anime by TMS, and even some “Lupin III” specials, the animation tends to be very standard. With “Sonic X” I feel like the animation is just way too static for its own good. There are so many panning shots and we get that “slide show” style of animation too frequently. I can respect that they tried to inject CGI into the anime, for the early 2000s that seems pretty ambitious, but it also looks very dated. I don’t doubt that the animators working on this show tried their best given whatever their circumstances were, but the end results just leave a lot to be desired. I may not know much about the way “Sonic X” was handled behind the scenes, but with the toxic environment that is the anime industry I am confident the animators worked hard. I don’t know who or what is to blame for it turning out this way, but it’s a force that’s above these overworked and underpaid people. So that’s why you won’t be seeing any “How did they go from ‘The Castle of Cagliostro’ to this?” style commentary out of me. When I reviewed the “Sonic the Hedgehog” OVA I said that was animated better than “Sonic X” and I stand by that. It isn’t the best animation, the cut scenes from “Sonic CD” are still the best traditionally animated Sonic content we have, but it is superior to this. The character designs for our canon characters are solid, they were wise to work directly off of the game designs. That said this is an anime where characters are drawn better in one episode than they would be in another. I’m not sure if “Sonic X” had a particularly difficult production, and I’m already not a fan of the 2000s as a decade in anime, but something was amiss and it’s unfortunate how it turned out.

  Now that I’ve vented my emotions at you it feels like a good moment to talk about 4Kids and the English dub. There is a fair amount of context for why the voice actors from the “Adventure” games got replaced with the 4Kids cast. If I’m being honest it’s messy, has polarized fans to this day, and I’d rather not get that into it, but because this anime recast everyone they would continue to reprise their roles in the games for continuity’s sake. This is all to say it’s the first time we would hear Jason Griffith as Sonic and Shadow, Mike Pollock as Eggman, Dan Green as Knuckles, and so on. When it comes to discussing 4Kids dubs I just need to come right out and say they weren’t good at it. In between their desire to sanitize every anime they touched to laughable degrees they just didn’t seem to be good at directing their actors. I honestly think Jason does a good job as Sonic and blame any awkwardness in his delivery on bad dialogue or bad direction. The general consensus seems to be that he got better with the character as time progressed, but I don’t think he’s bad here. If you ever notice Sonic, or any anime character in an English dub from this period, having awkward or overly long pauses in their sentences that’s actually them trying to facilitate the mouth animations. Given anime are created in a different language it makes it a challenge to properly translate and synch dialogue to those mouth flaps. A lot of English dubs, even good ones, struggle with this. So I don’t want to act like this was Jason’s fault. His voice still sounds good, I find when people imitate a “Sonic voice” they sound like either him or Ryan Drummond. As Shadow he’s spectacular, easily the best voice actor the character has had to date. There’s a reason fans want him to reprise the role again even if it feels unlikely. Dan Green is a good Knuckles, he does sound similar to how he played the Pharaoh in “Yugioh” but that works. I like Lisa Ortiz as Amy, this voice is what my mind always defaults to when I see her. Personally though I think my favorite performance in the anime is Mike Pollock. I love the way he laughs like a prissy rich girl in a shoujo anime, I love that he calls Sonic a hog, you hear him and you can tell he was having fun. Eggman’s seiyuu, Chikao Otsuka, struggled with reconciling making Eggman someone villainous but not someone you hate. With Mike Pollock it all feels just right. He continues to voice this character well after everyone else was replaced and it feels good hearing the early days of him in the role. Given this was a 4Kids dub its very flawed, some choices like giving Mr. Tanaka and Ella stereotypical accents baffle me, but I am if anything happy it helped bring some talented people into these roles. Hearing some of it in Japanese felt nice as well. Sonic’s seiyuu Junichi Kanemaru is fantastic and needs to be heard, I especially like the random English his dialogue is peppered with. And I think Shadow’s seiyuu, Kouji Yusa, deserves some recognition as well. However, I don’t want to write off the 4Kids cast when I think several of the actors perform their roles well. I do wish they left the music alone though. In Japanese during the climax of Shadow and Sonic fighting the Biolizard we get to hear Crush 40’s “Live and Learn”. In English it’s replaced with the score 4Kids was using throughout the dub. There is no justification for that change and it makes the scene worse. That’s 4Kids though, for every good thing they do there’s plenty of bad decisions to follow.

  

  This ended up being an experience to write about. In spite of everything I’ve just said I don’t consider my time with “Sonic X” a waste. I’d be lying if I said I regret watching it. And I don’t want things to be misconstrued where people think I dislike “Sonic X” for not being more like the films or that I’m trying to trample on someone’s childhood memories. I make no secret I love the live action movies, they’re the reason I started fixating on the franchise again. But I don’t hold them against other Sonic media. Almost 20 years exist between “Sonic X” and these films and they operate under different circumstances. However, that hasn’t stopped Jeff Fowler from taking inspiration from “Sonic X” for the first and second film and I’m sure we’ll see more when the next installment releases. It feels good knowing it has a legacy in the west because “Sonic X” was unfortunately a flop in Japan. It had poor ratings to the point that the next season was only available in Japan through streaming services until 2020 to coincide with the first movie. It did air on TV internationally, but in Japan they didn’t bother and I suspect this is why we haven’t seen other Sonic anime since then. If an anime underperforms in Japan then that’s usually the end of that. But that hasn’t held back fans in other areas of the world from loving it anyway. After all, this anime is where we got that phrase that has become so ubiquitous with the franchise in the west that it may as well be the series’ tagline. I don’t even need to say it, you know exactly what those three sweet words are. And this anime gave us some fan favorite voice actors. For all of my issues with “Sonic X” I am happy it did something for other people. I was already into the characters, but there’s no doubt for some people seeing “Sonic X” on TV inspired them to get into this wild and glorious franchise. I appreciate seeing fans recommend it to the new people brought on from the films. I know someone who gifted the first season to a friend’s son who’s become obsessed with Sonic. If someone told me this was their favorite of Sonic’s TV shows I could honestly see where they’re coming from. It didn’t do all the things I wanted, but I wouldn’t wish it away when it has connected with so many others. For all my criticisms I’m truly happy that “Sonic X” exists.

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