Adventures Of Sonic The Hedgehog - Sonic The Matchmaker (Review & Screenshots)
It's been a while since I've visited the ol' blue pincushion and his Badnik "buddies"! This one's another episode based around relationships, so it's probably gonna get weird!
The story starts with Scratch and Grounder coming home to Robotnik after yet another botched attempt at murdering Sonic, which results in Robotnik getting blasted by a stick of dynamite. Now in a very poor mood, Robotnik demands that the two badniks pamper him and fluff his pillows. Scratch comments that he sounds like he wants a maid, and Robotnik goes on to say he wants someone to love, cherish and (most importantly) obey him. Scratch takes this to mean he wants a wife (though it's just as possible he could want a husband, Scratch!) and Robotnik is inspired to build a wife of his own, Bride-of-Frankestein style.
Showing a surprising amount of observance, the two badniks express concern that this might not be a good idea as when he recently made both Breezie and Junior, they both ended up betraying him. Robotnik decides he is going to kidnap Breezy and Junior so he can examine their programming and find out why they betrayed him. He sends the two badniks off to do just that.
(This Hippo kid is a terrible friend, and his hands creep me out!)
The two badniks easily in doing so, but as this occurs we do get a neat little glimpse into the lives of these two robots since their introductory episodes.
Robotnik Jr. seems to have a made a friend with a hippo kid, and is helping to repaint a playground (though the see-saw he is painting with a red spray can is purple...how did the colorists mess that up?!). The hippo kids hands disturb me as they just look like swollen nubs with a few holes on the sides. I think he needs to see a doctor! Also, when Junior gets abducted, the Hippo kid is incredibly nonchalant about the fact. Not a very good friend! Fix your personality and your gross hands, Hippo kid!
As Scratch and Grounder catch up with Breezie, we see that she has her own talk show on TV. She is interviewing a coyote and a mouse about lost love, and I am curious what went on with these two! Neither the coyote or mouse seem particularly upset about the subject - I like to think it's because the two of them are now interested in each-other. :)
Breezie gets abducted just as she's starting the interview, and fortunately Tails just happened to be watching the show on a window TV display at the time, so he's able to let Sonic know. (I can't recall the last time I saw a TV store window display, that must have been something that ended in the 90s). We see that inside Scratch and Grounders stranger-danger kidnapping van, Junior is trying to untie Breezie but is somehow so incompetent that he just ends up tying them both together, much to Breezie's annoyance.
After Sonic & Tails arrive and rescues the two, the four of them hang out in a snowy field and talk for a while. Breezie makes fun of Junior, likely for his inability to navigate a rope, and Sonic calls her out, which a pleasant surprise as Sonic can be very rude sometimes (though the artists again do the weird thing of having Sonic show a vacant smile when he should have an expression more of concern or disappointment). Breezie then asks Sonic if he missed her, attempting to flirt. Sonic says he did, and even wrote a poem about it: "I miss my Breezie, I miss her lots, but it makes me queasy, because she's a robot!" Wow, looks like Sonic doesn't really practice what he preaches in terms of being nice. Nobody can help what they find unattractive, but there's no need to be rude about it!
Unfortunately, Breezie doesn't seem to get the hint that Sonic is saying she makes him uncomfortable, and she continues flirting and hugging on him, even after Sonic straight up tells her that they wouldn't work as a couple because she's a robot. Junior is saddened by this because he himself finds Breezie attractive but so far all she's done was make fun of him. Tails concludes (with all the logic of a 4 1/2 year old) that Breezie would like him more if he was a hero like Sonic, and tries to stage a fake rescue for himself by Junior to impress her.
(Without context, it looks like Junior is giving flowers to Sonic! Honestly, if it wasn’t for Sonic’s discomfort with robots, they might work better as a couple)
To Junior’s disappointment, as Tails pretends to fall into a ravine so Junior can catch him, Sonic is already saving Tails before Junior can even get close, and Sonic ends up having to save Junior too when he loses his balance! After the incident, tails and Junior explain what they were trying to do, so Sonic decides to give Junior some flowers to offer to Breezie and he and Tails leave the two alone to talk. Shortly after they do, Scratch and Grounder return and manage to recapture the two.
Back at Robotnik's lair, we see the rather grim sight of Junior and Breezie's severed on a table, still conscious as Robotnik scans their minds and finds out what went "wrong". Once he figures it out, he dumps their heads and bodies out the window into a junk pile, and prepares to go on a honeymoon with his new robot wife on a nearby mountain, where he is planning to cause an ecological disaster.
Sonic and Tails arrive and reassemble the two, and the robots tell our heroes that they overheard Robotnik's plans for the mountain - he is going to block off the river flows there so as to make sure no water will splash on his new wife Omletta and cause her to malfunction. As an added bonus for Robotnik, the lack of water flow will cause a nearby drought and make people go hungry, much to his delight. Sonic and Junior head off, and this gives Tails and Breezie a moment to talk. Tails tells Breezie about Junior has a crush on her, and she seems to be starting to have a crush on him, too.
(The rivers/waterfall at the mountain were quite pretty and nicely animated, too! The water looked quite inviting.)
At the mountain, we can see Omletta pampering Robotnik, as Scratch and Grounder destroy the ground under the river, causing the water current to redirect into a cavern system below. Sonic and his friends arrive, and Sonic knocks a boulder into the hole that the two made, bringing the water current back. Unfortunately, Junior ends up falling into the river and Sonic isn't around at the time, so Breezie jumps in to save him herself! It's nice to see her get to do something besides fawning over a male (though she's about to immediately start doing so again). After she brings Junior back to the shoreline where Sonic and Tails are waiting, she seems to want to be in a relationship with Junior because "he needs her too much, and she likes that!" (that sounds like a really unhealthy and even predatory basis for a relationship, Breezie) and Sonic puts his arm around Tails saying "he understands", which makes it sound like he and Tails are a couple, too.
As this unhealthy and likely doomed relationship er, blossoms, we see that Sonic is fixing the river flow caused Omletta to get splashed with water, causing her to "malfunction" in such a way that she seems to gain free will, and as any self-respecting gal would do, she immediately begins clobbering Robotnik for creating her to be a mindless slave for him. Good for her!
The Sonic Sez segment touches on dangerous playground stunts, featuring Sonic catching Junior after he's flung really high off of the seesaw from his creepy hippo friend. Sonic says to be careful with stupid stunts on the playground, and also don't trample over little kids there! I'm sure most little kids do appreciate not being trampled, so that sounds like good advice.
This episode was definitely another one of those weird "the straight are not okay" sorta episodes. It was nice to see Breezie and Junior again, especially with Breezie getting a chance to do something heroic, but the fact that she wants to have a relationship with Junior based on him being too dependent on her doesn't sound healthy. It's also kinda weird that the writers wanted to pair a robot who looks like a sexually mature woman with a robot who looks like a child/adolescent. On the other hand, we did get to see Robotnik get beaten up for trying to make a robot woman his slave, which was cool. Now that Omletta has gained her free will, I wonder what she'll be doing?