The Death of Sonic Canon

Be prepared for a very long read here fellas.

Often times in human history many great concepts and theories are put into horrible practices by idealistic but otherwise completely incompetent creators and planners, which leads down a logical fallacy that said idea is not good to begin with and should not be pursued at all.

Sonic Canon and some of it's inceptions is a prime candidate and example of this phenomenon. To spare everyone who reads this the small details, after multiple failed attempts of trying to soft-reboot (and in one instance outright rebooting the series entirely) it appears that SEGA has officially announced that they have given up entirely on trying to give the Sonic series and overarching plot or narrative and as such have ended any potential or otherwise planned canon in all other forms of Sonic media.

How exactly did they do this and why? Well simply put SEGA has seemingly gone out of their way ever since "the Pendering" happened to buy out or otherwise update all forms of copyrighted Sonic media and materials to ensure that all characters, plots, narratives and pretty much any other thing relating to Sonic is purely and solely theirs to have and keep. This means that even Sonic Underground characters, however horrible they are, are now officially licensed and the sole property of SEGA and the ONLY way anyone could ever use those characters again would be with SEGA sole and explicit permission. Of course this stretches beyond shows and into the comics. As I type this SEGA effectively owns every single character that showed up beyond the Archie Sonic comic soft-reboot and most of the characters that showed up before then, OCs or otherwise. This definitely includes the Freedom Fighters and Eggman's Dozen.

Combine this with their now seemingly, looming, draconian treatment of the IDW comic and the fact that Sonic Forces, what is otherwise known as Sonic's newest mainline iteration, is a travesty and almost complete reversal of what would be Sonic Canon extending even up until Sonic Colors and it paints a very vivid and un-enticing image for those of us who liked Sonic for the characters and interactions between them...The fact of the matter is that SEGA is, probably for the first time ever, making and active and conscious decision to ensure that there is no real over-arching canon or plot to Sonic. Given this was a process that most likely started waaaay back when Sonic Unleashed was in it's design phase this is the first year where they have shown an outright aggressive approach on the matter.

Let's first back-up and talk about what started all of this, Sonic 06. I'm going to quickly gloss over this because honestly that game has been beaten to death. Beaten to hell and back. Resurrected only to be burned in effigy and then had it's ashes pissed on.

Here's the very sad and surreal fact of the matter of Sonic 06. There is no reason why Sonic, as a franchise, should have ever survived a blow like that...ever. There should never, ever, be a series or franchise that should ever survive past the absolute abortion and train-wreck that was Sonic 06, and SEGA and Sonic Team knows this and so they essentially did so. The essence of Sonic's design, story, world and characters all changed. It wasn't dramatic at first and to be honest it was easy to glance over at the time and not see it but it has become apparent in hindsight and in retrospects that almost every game after Sonic 06 is essentially a new form of Sonic altogether.

Sonic Unleashed was the first mainline Sonic game after Sonic 06 and for better or worse it was a soft-reboot of the series. The cast was cut-down back to the 4 earliest characters of the Sonic series, Sonic, Tails, Eggman and Amy. Everyone else wasn't even mentioned as part of the universe, let alone showed up despite the whole plot of the game literally had the world shattered into pieces. In fact the next time even Knuckles or Shadow, two very popular and known characters of the series, would even show up in a mainline Sonic game would be in Sonic Generations. Almost five whole years after their last appearance and even within that game Knuckles literally did nothing but talk and Shadow was nothing more than a boss fight. Other characters also appeared but it must be pointed out that Sonic Generations was a celebratory game of the Franchise's age and legacy. The immediate game after Generations, Sonic Lost World, yet again cut back down to the original cast with only Sonic and Tails and Eggman effectively doing anything at all. It was also at this point that it became apparent that Sonic canon and narrative no longer was linear and cohesive as Lost World didn't even mention past games unless it was to crack a quip or joke. This is also when it became extremely noticeable that characters, specifically Amy and Tails, no longer lined up with their previous established personality or even fell in line with more recent games like Unleashed and Colors. Tails specifically had this very bad as it seemed that his personality was only consistent depending on which game he was in. As far as Knuckles goes it also became clear that his backstory and ties to the M.E. has been essentially retconned as well because he's almost never around it anymore.

Now let's talk about the travesty and ultimately failed campaign of Sonic Boom for a moment. Let's not pamper or sugar coat this anymore people. SEGA completely and utterly intended to reboot the franchise with Sonic Boom however as months dragged on and it became more and more apparent that SEGA simply did not like the idea and that Sonic Boom was already being thrown under the bad spotlight of the general audience SEGA kept on taking steps backward on their plan and eventually pulled out of the reboot altogether. Sonic Boom, which had originally shown to have an overarching narrative between the games and show, was effectively left to die by SEGA after Rise of Lyric hit the shelves and was critically and rightfully panned by everyone. This was a death sentence to the reboot before it had even got it's footing and as such SEGA pulled out of funding the show entirely and talks of a sequel were a fever dream to literally everyone. Put simply, SEGA had decided that any narrative action towards Sonic canon was a death sentence alone regardless of how little characters or otherwise they put in.

Combine a previous incident that is now considered "the Pendering" with the comics (It's about time I finally got to this point.) which forcefully brought legal attention to the Archie comics, along with past issues on how SEGA didn't like how Sonic was being represented within the comics it's clear now why SEGA put in those very restrictive mandates and became really strict on how the game characters were being presented and used. SEGA had little to no faith that any form of Sonic narrative or canon could work by that point.

Now the whole exact reason why SEGA had decided to strip the license from Archie is up to literally anyone's guess at this point. No one really knows exactly why but most opinions and guesses agree upon the fact that a more recent upcoming lawsuit had basically struck SEGA's last nerve and consequentially had them remove the license from Archie altogether.

This now leaves us to the here and now, with IDW Sonic Comics and Sonic Forces. Now let's talk about Sonic Forces first because this is the best and most prime example of the narrative death of the franchise.
Let's just take a step back for a moment and look at how the characters are being portrayed in Sonic Forces compared to how they were back in Sonic Adventure 2, which is widely said to be the best game for Sonic Canon.

Tails in SA2 was naive, young and at times hesitant to put himself in harms way, but he had solidified to himself the belief that he needs to always push himself further if he wants to be a hero like Sonic and be independent.
Tails in Sonic Forces is simply a coward with little to no use outside of tech whiz. He cowers in fear over villains and enemies that he had previously been able to at least put up a decent fight against.

Knuckles in SA2 is an anger-prone isolationist who is extremely duty-bound but also enjoys thrill-seeking. He has very low tolerance for BS and he has very little forethought that leads him into a lot of trouble, despite this fact he can be very wise and forgiving at times to those he trusts.
Knuckles in Sonic Forces is somehow the leader of a resistance against Eggman's forces despite him being a complete and utter idiot and showing absolutely no sort of strategic planning whatosever. He often times charges straight into a plan without even thinking about it and just rolls with whatever the outcome is. During the whole game he almost never really gets angry despite it being a characteristic trait of his.

Amy in SA2 is a Sonic fangirl who quite literally doesn't know when to give up but that gives her a quality and charm similar to Sonic in an odd way.
Amy in Sonic Forces is often referred to be more like Amy in Sonic Boom where she has a small but noticeable crush on Sonic but it's not a driving point, Amy is also, for some reason, a better strategist then Knuckles but is somehow not the leader of the resistance. Her interest in Sonic is at times passing if not outright annoying and she almost never does any real action herself anymore, let alone chase Sonic around.

Shadow in SA2 a loner with a dark past who seeks revenge against those who have wronged him but eventually comes to realize that the one person he loved wants him to forgive them for their sins, he also views himself as Sonic's direct rival and seemingly enjoys the competition near the end.
Shadow in Sonic Forces most likely works for G.U.N. (though who he and Team Dark work for is never said in the game) and is a special reconnaissance agent. The depth of his character really can't be gauge due to how little we get out of him but from what we can suffice is that he cares for Rouge and Omega and that he dislikes anything that's too weak to give him a challenge.

There is a unique pattern here that only Shadow does not exhibit and that is that all of these characters, despite being a central part of Sonic as a franchise, are essentially the exact opposite of what they were originally shown to be when Sonic Adventure was released with it's narrative and canon heavy material and with that it becomes extremely apparent that SEGA has effectively made and active effort in removing any sort of narrative cohesion or linearity to the franchise.

To put simply, the reason why the games all seem disjointed and screwed up is because there is no more canon to link them. They all exist in their own little bubble next to eachother to only briefly and passingly mention one another.

So finally getting on the topic of the IDW comics, what does this narrative-ly dead franchise mean for the comics and likewise for the characters? Well before anything else let's take a look at what the IDW Comic is and what it is for and allowed to use.
SEGA has put down the same restrictions as they did with Archie only now it appears that they have taken and active role and eye to the comic themselves. First and foremost the comics are to go along with the story of the mainline games regardless of the authors and writers wishes. What SEGA releases and says the story should be is the word of god and is the ultimate decision. SEGA has also been the one state that any characters who were in previous games, shows or comics are almost all under their copyrights and as such IDW must ask for permission to use them.
Here's a very shortened and yet still long list of characters that IDW must ask and beg for SEGA to use that they don't already have an automatic "yes" for:
Literally any character from any of the Sonic cartoons or shows.
Almost every pre-reboot Archie comic character and all post-reboot comic characters including the Freedom Fighters.
Emeral/Gemerl
Eggman Nega
Possibly any previous villain that isn't Eggman.
Literally any characters that are considered "classic characters"
Blaze
Literally every single human that has ever appeared in the franchise that isn't Eggman.
Any Sonic Boom characters.
Chao as a race and whole are probably under this too.
And finally, any and all alternate forms of any characters including even Super Sonic.

This list is absolutely freaking massive if you were to write each character down. Combine this with the fact that all OC characters that are presented to the comic staff must also go through SEGA's watchful eye and ultimately be absorbed into the copyright, not even OCs that are introduced within the comic itself are really safe from just being denied to ever be spoken or talked of again. SEGA has also made it clear that they view each division and suppository of Sonic as it's own niche and IP and that they do not like to mix two separate universe together and...well...the likely hood of literally any of the characters being accepted into the comic seem rather depressingly low and combining that with the fact that SEGA at any moment can literally tell them to stop putting them in the comic and never do it again that puts a heavy detriment on whatever kind of narrative and development can be planned for them.

Then there's the fact that SEGA wants the IDW comics to closely follow whatever Sonic games that are released to serve as an advertisement to the games, rather than doing their own thing like they did with Archie.
I'm not going to sugar coat this for anyone. This is SEGA basically telling the author "We do not care at all what you have planned or what kind of arc you are writing at any given point, if we tell you we have a game coming up and it's plot is this, you are to write out the comic to follow that plot, regardless of where the comic was previously." This is basically a death sentence to any sort of long-stretching narrative or overarching plot because at any given moment the whole thing can be stripped away entirely and diverge into a game-centric plot altogether.

Then there's the fact that all the mainline game cast absolutely have to adhere to their game counterparts and cannot develop beyond those archetypes. Which is an outright rejection on SEGA's end to allow for natural character growth to happen. This essentially means that the only way the comics are to have any sort of character progression is to have an inordinate amount of OCs running around so that they can develop in-place of the SEGA cast. However as I said previously all these OCs would automatically fall under SEGA's copyright and as such, at any given point in the process SEGA can tell them to not use the character anymore.

What this all means and leads up to is this simple fact. IDW Sonic, as a narrative and canon Sonic material, is doomed. There is no way to have any of the mainline Sonic characters develop. There is no real or safe way to have any overarching plots or narrative interaction happen without risking a new Sonic game coming along and destroying it entirely. There is no real way to ensure that any of the OCs can get full character development and/or arcs either due to SEGA's extremely strict and almost draconian levels of supervision. The IDW Sonic comics, as I see it, were dead on arrival only to be used as a shallow marketing campaign for an ever-dwindling niche crowd of Sonic fandom.

Even if the IDW Sonic Comic's were to garner enough OCs and backstory for them to garner it's own plot and narrative separate from the games and the mainline cast members I must simply ask "Why?"
Why all this? Why go through all this trouble, go and make all these new OCs and plots that none of the mainline characters can really take part of in a comic based off a narrative-ly bankrupt series?

At that point, you should honestly just make a new IP altogether as tying your characters to the Sonic franchise by default renders them highly volatile and unstable to work with.
Which is pretty much where I am at with this franchise to be honest. None of the characters I used to like are either around anymore or are so fundamentally different that they no longer give me entertainment.

And so I think, at this point in time, we can say that this franchise's canon is thoroughly and irrevocably, dead with little hope of resurrection.