Much of what I said when I posted the previous review in this series is true of this entry as well.
These two posts were part of three I wrote for the Sonic Tenth Anniversary thing I mentioned last time. I don't think I'm going to be able to post the third one of these I've got because everything I've got that I thought might have been able to open it with says it's either not compatible with the file type or that the file is corrupted. The worst part of that is that it's actually the first of the three in the miniseries and would have explained a few things that happened in the "Sonic Conversion" review and this one.
But even if I can't post all three of these, there's still plenty of other old stuff I'll try to get posted here as soon as I can, almost certainly interspersed with Text Play issues and other items.
In the meantime, grab up some goodies and get ready for more unintentional laughs for all the wrong reasons that I know I've only brought upon myself. We've got Retro Review Sign!
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J. Michael Shearer’s Theater Reviews the Saturday morning Cartoon Show “Sonic the Hedgehog”
Episode Title: Cry of the Wolf
Original Airdate: Spring 1994
Review Number: 23
Character List
Sonic the Hedgehog: Title character
Sally: Princess of the planet, Sonic’s main squeeze
Antione (AKA the Grand Duke of Knob): Another of Sonic’s teammates, although not nececarily a friend, per se
Dulcy: A female dragon used as much for comic relief as plot advancement
Nichole: Sally’s handheld Artificial Intelegence device.
Robotnik (AKA Captain Schnook, Beldar Conehead): The main villain of the show
Snively (AKA Mister Smeg, Needlenose, Mr. Pointy Nose): Robotnik’s lackey and supposedly his nephue
Wolf Pack: A second resistance cell fighting against Robotnik.
Lupe: Leader of the Wolf Pack
Scottybot: Robotnik’s repair model robot.
The Review
This episode greets us with a rather harsh and inhospitable landscape. As the shot pans right, we come to rest at a clear spot where up from the ground comes bubbling... Well, not exactly bubbling, really, as it’s a flying saucer that begins scanning for something. But bubbling will be involved later, that much I’m willing to foreshadow for. The flying saucer detects a band of wolves that seems to be waiting for it. For a moment, we are left to wonder about who’s good and who’s evil as the saucer deploys an orb from its underside and begins signaling to the planet’s population of humpback whales. Or not, considering how it’s rather difficult to do that with a phazer array. So the saucer takes a couple shots at the wolves who run and scream in terror for a minute before a few of them remember that they’re carrying impact bombs and hurl them at the saucer; which comes down in a shambles.
Shortly thereafter, we find a report of the incident coming in at Robotnik’s central command. Mr. Smeg peels it off the printer, reads it, and has a heart attack. No, he doesn’t die. In fact, he’s perfectly healthy. So much so that he personally goes to Captain Schnook to deliver the report. Apparently, Captain Schnook feels that Snively’s poking him in the rear end is the signal to gloat about his oh-so-wonderful Doomsday Project and how it will finally allow him to take over the planet and such. After Snively’s repeated responses that seem more bent upon speeding through the exposition than anything, Robotnik has a cow about the seeming lack of interest. Which I would call natural, since Mr. Smeg is, after all, a lackey.
But to continue, Beldar Conehead reads the report and says he thought they had already done in the Wolf Pack. I guess we now know who that band of wolves was. After reading the report, Beldar asks for the vid of what happend. The vid shows the saucer, wich is revealed as a test pod, getting pretty beat up by a handfull of homemade grenades. Robotnik asks “What’s the Damage, Kenneth?”. OK, no, but he does get a damage report. Wheather or not either Beldar or Mr. Pointy Nose realize that what the test pod needs is at least stronger hull plating, if not some sort of shield generator, is not exactly clear. But later events will indicate that at least one of the two thought of it.
Meanwhile, in Cosmo Canyon, Sally, Sonic, Antione, and Dulcy discuss setting up a freedom fighters network. Nichole finds the Wolf Pack and Sonic goes zipping off along the supposedly shortest route. Good ol’ Son finds a swamp blocking his route and suggests that he’s sniffing hinder. He then heads off into a nearby area that seems to be home to a perpetual electrical storm. Of course, the humor in that comes from the fact that nobody really knew that untill a bolt of lightning came down and gave Sonic reason to scream “OUCH! My ARSE!” Sonic makes it out without further injury only to find out that Dulcy’s coming in and is about to pancake him along with Sally and the Grand Duke of Knob, although in the case of the latter, that would be no real loss, before Dulcy slides into the storm herself and gets the shock of her young life. Fortunately, Sonic dodges and helps his dragon friend stop before any of that can happen. The down side is that we still have to deal with the Grand Duke’s somewhat reasonable but none the less overly dramatic panic attack.
Sonic then procedes to demonstrate three things at once. In the order that the authors intended, at least for the first two, they are that one, this particular lightning storm hones in on biosignatures; two, that Sonic is supposed to have a really cute hinder; and three, if the authors intended this one, that Sonic’s also a fan of -The Red Green Show- and has apparently mistaken the “Adventures with Bill” segment for something educational. How, you ask, does our Blue Spiked Wonder do it? He does it by sticking his foot into the storm, where it is almost struck by lightning, and then showing Dulcy the burn marks on his butt. Now, what’s the -Red Green- connection? Well, he’s willingly done something any other reasonably sane mind would have tried to avoid. And sticking his foot back into the lightning storm wasn’t especially bright, either. Sally asks Nichole to give them a new course to the Wolf Pack base. Nichole produces a commertial break instead.
When we return, we find the gang approaching what proves to be the entrance to the Wolf Pack’s den. Nichole translates some glyphs on the door that says something about a curse. Antione starts squaking again. He knocks three times on the section of wall with the door and it opens. Knock three times on the ceiling if you love me...
Dulcy won’t enter because she’s claustrophobic, or as Sally explians it, affraid of small underground places. Unfortunately, that gets one of my favorite characters in the whole show a free pass out of the show. The Grand Duke feels worse about it than I do, because he won’t go with her, apparantly prefering to throw himself down the steps behind the door instead.
Once Ant comes to rest, Sally asks if he’s alright. Well, he’s uninjured, if that’s the correct answer. Then the door closes and Sonic lights a torch before making a crack about the Grand Duke’s socks. The problem with them, of course, is that they are on his feet.
Sonic then begins searching for a way out. A portion of the tunnel collapses and Sonic quips that they should stick together. Sally then proves that she’s at least part Vulcan when she suggests that perhaps someone wants them to stay in the other part of the tunnel, where they find a wolf who throws them down a tunnel and into... The Wolf Pack’s den.
Lupe is the only one who introduces herself and says that she’s the boss of that there town. After we get the backstory on the WP, Lupe shows off some major technoprize booty hidden behind a wall.
Meanwhile, back at the wrecked test pod, Mr. Smeg has a Scottybot working on repairing a few systems that may or may not be repaired soon. Captain Schnook calls and frustrates the situation, prompting Mr. Smeg to lie. Then we go to commertial.
When we come back from commertial, we find that Mr. Smeg has almost found this episode’s mixed bag of freedom fighters as they are scurrying into a cave. Mr. Smeg asks his onboard Scottybot to turn on the heat sensors. Why they weren’t the whole time, we can only guess. Anywhoo, our heros get away long enough to set up a phazer unit of their own to use against the test pod.
When we next see a functioning test pod, there have apparently been some upgrades to the hull plates because the phazer has no effect beyond forcing it into a blast area that also has no effect on the pod. Then Sonic tries to create a vortex to bring the pod down. It works better on Mr. Smeg than it does on the pod.
Once Mr. Smeg bangs his head a few times, Beldar Conehead calls and orders some survalence vids from which he actually draws a logical conclusion. Beldar orders Mr. Smeg to uncover the lower entrances that weren’t in the vids and go after the Mixed Bag.
Back at Wolf Pack HQ, the Grand Duke of Knob is going on about the curse again. Lupe tells us that there is no curse. And then a gurard comes in and says that yes there is because Mr. Smeg has found a low entrance large enough to fly a pod into. Sonic and Sally come up with a plan to use it to their advantage.
What they come up with is a way to beat the test pod, which has been rebuilt for a third time. How, you ask? Remember that biosignature-seeking electrical storm? That’s the way the Mixed Bag beats the test pod. Sonic lures the test pod through the storm, where the storm gets mixed up and thinks the test pod is alive. Lightning strikes the test pod. What happens next is difficult to tell, but from the effects, I was lead to believe that the Starship Enterprize was in orbit and Scotty had beamed it aboard.
The episode ends with Lupe reading a message that says all the other resistance cells are willing to join together as Knothole and Wolf Pack have.
Looking Back.
There was alot of evidence of story compression in this episode. It left me with the distinct impression that there was a good deal more to know about the Wolf Pack and the other Freedom Fighter cells. In fact, that’s the one most major peice of evidence of story compression in this episode. Instead of ending with some dialog about how it was good that the Wolf Pack had joined Knothole and that there were others that were also willing to join, we get a jumpcut from Lupe reading the note about how the other cells were willing to join Knothole and the Wolf Pack to the leaders of all the Freedom Fighter cells in Knothole joining together to unleash their battle cry of “To Freedom,” which was once famous at least on AOL. Personally, I would have liked to see more about the challenges of finding the other factions. But since that wasn’t an option, we had to take what we could get.
Since this review is like the one for the episode entitled _Sonic Conversion_ in that it is based on a recording of the USA Network version of the show, some of what I feel I experienced in the way of story compression may have come out of the editing that USA is frequently accused of having done. All the same, there is also evedence of story compression. My theories on what we were *really* supposed to see in seasons two and three will come in a seperate document all its own.
Overall, this episode was good, which is on par for the series. Unfortunately, this was also one of the last episodes, meaning that there will only be a few more reviews. I sadly look forward to the end of this project.
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