Artail Productions - Knuckles #13 Review

Knuckles #13 [June 1998] Review by Dan Drazen

The Chaotix Caper: Part 1 "The Unsuspecting" Story: Ken Penders Art: Manny Galan Ink: Andrew Pepoy Color: Barry Grossman Lettering: Vickie Williams Editorial: G-Force

     There's been talk in the past about the stories being "light" versus "grim." Ken Penders serves notice with this issue that the grim slide has begun in earnest.
     Spaz/Penders/Ray/Heroic Age cover: What happens when you're supposed to appear on the cover of every issue of the comic that bears your name but you can only manage a two-page appearance in an issue? Your face becomes a transparent, ghostly presence. And "ghostly" is an appropriate term as Charmy's compadre, Mello, appears on the verge of giving up his own. Behind Charmy stands an appropriately grim rendering of Harry, about whom more later. As for Charmy himself, that he's allowed to show more emotion on the cover than Sonic did in the entire Endgame arc (and you ain't seen nothin' yet!) tells me conclusively that Sega has given Archie a much freer hand with this book than with the Sonic product. But Spaz and Penders thow a little something in to keep the suits happy, too.
     Credits page: nice group portrait, though somewhat pedestrian after some of the recent experiments (head-on shots, cameos, etc.). Remington is particularly ill-served: at that angle and with his dark hair falling in front of his snout, he looks like Hitler.
     "Born to the most noble..." and so on and so on.
     On the heels of "Stop...Sonic Time!" (Sonic Kids special) we start off with another first person narrative. This time around, the storyteller is Harry. He's also hairy -- a dingo who left General Buzzcut and the military life and who now drives a taxi in Echidnaopolis. His speaking style combines elements of the Mickey Spillane school of hard-boiled detective writing with the style of the Ernest Borgnine character from John Carpenter's "Escape From New York." He doesn't share the echidna ambivalence about technology that fueled the Dark Legion story arc: "Either you use it or you don't...period!" No ambiguities here. Anyway, Harry
interrupts his first-person musings to answer a call for help: Charmy's companion, Mello, has fallen and he can't get up. Instead of calling an ambulance as Charmy requested, Harry bundles the bumble into his cab and races for the nearest hospital after radioing ahead. I know that cabs usually have a radio link with their dispatchers, but this is the first time I ever heard of a cab that could break into a channel usually reserved for police traffic. Maybe they do things differently in Echidnaopolis.
     At the hospital Mello gets wheeled into the ER while Harry tries to make himself scarce, and Constable Remington's arrival only motivates him further. Vector's arrival, however, insures that he hangs around through Charmy's explanation about why his being so large constitutes his "normal" size. To tell you the truth, it didn't register with me. Anyway, at that moment the echidna doc comes in and lays the bad news on Charmy. We then get a look at how Sonic SHOULD have been allowed to act upon learning that Sally had cashed in her chips. I can only hope that the fault will be corrected in the Director's Cut of #50. It's kind of odd that Charmy should choose the shoulder of a total stranger to cry on, but then again it IS the only shoulder with fur on it in the room. And for those of you keeping score at home, the Sonic body count is back to three:

     Cut to another part of the island where Jollie, a rather buff dingo, is driving a truck for "Rainbow Delivery." Yes, the color spectrum is screwed up again as it was in "Immortality is Immoral..." (#56) but keep that name in mind. "Rainbow," like "Sunshine" and "Windowpane," is the name of a kind of LSD. While Jollie talks to the shipping clerk, they're unaware that they're being watched by...
     Ladies and gentlemen, after a well-deserved absence he's back: Renfield T. Rodent! Yeah, we haven't seen him since the Chaotix special but our luck seems to have run out. After the usual Rambling Discourse By The Bad Guy we discover that he's unaware he's being watched by...
     "Downtown Ebony Hare"? He looks like Buster Bunny trying (rather badly) to impersonate a pimp. At least it's a mercy that he doesn't speak in fluid Ebonic -- we have that walking handbag Vector for that, anyway. So we have Buster...I mean DEH watching Renfield watching Jollie and the shipping clerk. That's about par for the course in a Ken Penders story; why should Locke and Sabre have a corner on the deceit and secrecy market?
     Back at the hospital, Remington is trying to put all the pieces together but waits until Julie-Su shows up and until after the ritual trading of insults between her and Vector. According to Charmy, he and Mello visited the HappyLand Amusement Park (the establishment which Robotnik used to trap the Freedom Fighters and compromise Knuckles's abilities). It was shortly after their visit that Mello succumbed to whatever sent him off to the big beehive in the sky.
     Remington finally gets around to informing the Chaotix why they've been assembled. It seems several residents of the Island have contracted "Lemon Sundrop Dandelion poisoning." Go back and look at the capital letters in that last quote; when you're lettering a comic book using all caps it loses something in the transition. Remington begins to theorize what could have triggered the reaction, and...
     Note to the advertising honchos at Archie: we're in the middle of having Remington ponder whether something that the hapless echidnas (and the dead bee) ingested could have had something to do with their conditions. You really think this is the best spot for a junk food ad? Or were you guys out to Planet Lunch when you laid out this issue? I'm sure Frito-Lay wanted the center spread no matter what the content of the story, and I'm sure they paid well for it.
     Remington goes on to talk about "suspected contamination of the food supply" though I'm SURE he's prepared to give the fine products of Frito-Lay a clean bill of health. And since it was the last place Mello visited before he croaked, he sends the Chaotix off to visit HappyLand.
     Cut to Haven where Locke and Sabre are once again doing that voyeur thing. They discover their son/grandson/successor trekking back from Albion through the Badlands when their radar, and Knuckles earholes (we've never seen his ears, have we?), pick up on an approaching something or other. They then do that "Oh, wow! Did you see THAT!?" number as a tease to get us interested in Knuckles #14.
     Our curiosity sufficiently piqued, the Chaotix head outside. Charmy spots Harry's cab parked nearby and...
     OK, I think he's supposed to be turning on the aforementioned charm in an attempt to get Harry to give them a lift to HappyLand. Gee, isn't that what the dingo does for a living? And if Charmy is doing this because the Chaotix are broke, couldn't they just tell Harry to send the bill to EST Headquarters? As it is, the last panel on page 16 left me with the impression that Charmy is gay and is developing a crush on Harry. Manny Galan could have clarified matters by drawing Charmy with really big, sad-looking eyes instead of those bedroom numbers Charmy is flashing. Think "bee on black velvet."
     We finally get past that awkward interlude as Harry drops the Chaotix off at the amusement park. Once they get there, Charmy has this unusual flashback where he clearly remembers being distracted by a clown while Mello grabs a chili dog, and then tells the group that he CAN'T remember whether Mello ate anything there or not. As the awkward moments start piling up...
     Harry is still in first-person narrator mode and there's no way he could have known that the car he passes on the road contained Downtown plus his...I'm going to be really cautious here and call the vixen sitting next to him his "moll." There ARE kids who read these reviews.
     Back at HappyLand there are no signs of mass misbehavior so everyone except Julie-Su jumps to the conclusion that the food is kosher. But while Julie-Su advises caution and Renfield basks in the glow of his anticipated profits, Downtown busts into his office, places himself on the HappyLand board of directors, and introduces Renfield to his business associate, a bulldog named Blackjack who despite his name shows a preference for brass knuckles. What can I say? The name "Knuckles" was already taken.
     Back out on the grounds, though, whatever's been affecting the populace is starting to kick in with the Chaotix. While Espio simply hurls, Charmy and Mighty start to freak out and Vector is mercifully silent. Charmy, in true stereotypical druggie fashion, quotes lyrics from rock records. Hmmm, I think I'd better check with my consultant as to where those lyrics come from. I'd like to take this opportunity to introduce my designated expert on the rock music scene, Skippy Squirrel.
     "Hello."
     Skippy, what's the name of the group that performed the song Charmy is quoting at the bottom of page 21?
     "Who."
     The name of the group.
     "Who."
     The group that performed the song.
     "Who!"
     Are you gonna tell me who performed the song?
     "I don't have to, you just answered your own question. Who performed the song!"
     THAT'S WHAT *I* WANNA KNOW!!
     Ta-daaaaa!
     I couldn't resist; that bit from "Woodstock Slappy" is one of my favorites.
     "A-HEM!"
     Sorry: Skippy Squirrel appeared courtesy of Warner Brothers. Thanks.
     "Any time. Uh..."
     What?
     "Am I supposed to be related to Princess Sally?"
     Don't go there, kid.
     "OK. Bye."
     This was NOT an easy story to review, and not because I didn't know what was coming (unlike the Forgotten Tribe arc). Ken Penders is really breaking out of the story formula as its been established to date with "The Unsuspecting." I haven't seen a Sonic writer trying to stretch himself like this since Mike Gallagher wrote "Ring of Truth" (Sonic #35). Ken has set up a VERY complex plot here, and he has a better handle on the use of first-person narrative here that Karl Bollers and Tom Rolston did in "Stop...Sonic Time!" It's not perfect: the bits where Harry couldn't know what's going on still stick out like opposable thumbs (the scene with Downtown in the car, Jollie pulling up to the loading dock) but the story still flows well. Harry's personality comes through very forcefully and one senses he's a true individual, but Downtown Ebony Hare is rather incomplete and falls somewhere between the cliched and the stereotyped. I suppose Ken had to walk the old tightrope when portraying Downtown: too much "street" and he could have come off as a racist caricature, but as a member of the Mobian "demi monde" (as Antoine might say) he couldn't be as sympathetic as Harry. Both Harry and Downtown are strong contenders for Best and Worst New Character, respectively.
     I sense that Manny Galan either had a lot of fun drawing this story or else he got bored easily and let his mind wander. He's done a good job on the whole, and he's made very liberal use of a convention of Japanese manga: drawing full-length characters who have broken out of the frames: Remington on pages 9 and 12, and Espio and Charmy on page 13. The layouts are clean and coherent and don't feel out of place. What DOES feel out of place are a lot of the in-jokes Galan has thrown in. Some are easy to figure out (the Gabrie's Pizza handbill on page 3) and some are just plain unnecessary (the Rugrats-inspired character modeling on page 13). And Manny can't be faulted for the hair on the echidna E.R. doctor; he had no way of knowing that between the time he drew the story and the time it came out, George Clooney (the obvious inspiration for the character) would switch hairstyles; he now wears a Young Elvis/Brian Setzer retro hairdo.
     But the biggest artistic flaw is his design for the "lady" accompanying Downtown. I know that some characters look as if their bodies aren't big enough to support their heads, but even Princess Sally never looked THIS bad. There was simply no way that I could believe that the head and the body of the vixen on page 20 belonged together. It looked off-center somehow. Still, this was really the only visual weak spot in the story. It'll be interesting to see how much further Ken tries to push the envelope.
     Fistful of Letters: Knuckles #14's story is titled "A Tenuous Grip On Reality" [insert joke about Sega management here]. With the Chaotix "hors de combat" as Antoine would say, Remington and Julie-Su team up. Sonic #60 promises the return of Monkey Khan and the appearance of "The Iron King." In preparation, I have read the story of The Monkey King's confrontation with Princess Iron Fan and the Bull Demon King. If Frank Strom is going to work elements of Chinese folklore into his stories, it's the least I can do. Only two letters: a nameless "Echidna Afficionado" from Australia expresses his enjoyment of the book and finds Julie-Su "especially interesting": "A leading man needs a leading lady, right?" Where was this guy when Ken Penders was plotting "Endgame"? And some very good Fan Art: Faniee Greegoire does a nice study of Julie-Su and the Floating Island, but top honors go to that fan art veteran and contributor to the Squeaky Clean Furry Archives, the pride and joy of Johnson City, Tennessee: Julie Miyamoto, creator of that long-eared biped Hysteria who (it can never be stated too often) is NOT a bunny! Here Julie does the same kind of turnabout she gave us in her "Sonic the Human" group study, with Princess Sara from the Sonic anime going from human to ground squirrel. So we have Sara (who is NOT a hyooman), Nicole (who is NOT a tricorder), and Knuckles (who is NOT entirely sure what's going on here).