#omni-viewer

[stc-readthrough]

Another important character appears! The Omni-viewer! I'm not entirely sure what is powers are, but here he shows Sonic and friends visions of the past.

If you don't already know Sonic and Robotnik's backstory in this continuity, here's the recap.

Robotnik used to be Dr Ovi Kintobor. Sonic used to look... like that. (Wait where are his ears?) Kintobor has the chaos emeralds in a machine called the ROCC (Retro-Orbital Chaos Compressor), which is supposed to transfer all the evil on the planet into the emeralds. Sounds great, right! I'm sure there's no way for evil to leak back out of the emeralds once it's all in! Anyway, the machine is unstable without the seventh emerald, so Kintobor employs Sonic to find it. As payment, Kintobor helps Sonic train to become even faster and gives him his iconic power sneakers. The sneakers are so effective that Sonic breaks the sound barrier and becomes blue. (This story is in accordance with the original Sonic Bible, and StC is the only long-running continuity to adhere to the bible!)

Things are great for Sonic and Kintobor for a while, until Kintobor picks up a rotten egg, immediately trips on a cable, and crashes into the ROCC. You know, the machine with the evil emeralds in it. Heeeere's Robotnik!

As Sonic and Omni-viewer finish telling the story in the present, Robotnik takes control of Omni-viewer to send Sonic and friends to six months in the future. The End of this issue!

[robotnik-mun]

Today, I’mma gab about Fleetway. Cuz Fleetway stuff doesn’t get talked about often, and I’ve nothing better to do. 

So, anyway! At one point in the series, Amy Rose and Tekno stumbled upon this thing- The Ring of Eternity.

The Ring of Eternity was a powerful, sentient object that could teleport you anywhere in the universe and even send you through time, while simultaneously existing in every time period- it recognized Amy and Tekno after sending them into the past and was able to send them back into the future, after explaining why it sent them back to begin with. It claimed to be ‘The Spirit of Mobius’, and was created by sentient space dinosaurs millions upon millions of years ago to let them transport themselves onto other worlds so they could be seeded with life.

(Incidentally it’s strongly hinted that they are in, fact, working on the behalf of God. Fleetway could get pretty out there itself.) 

Now then, what’s fascinating here is that the Ring of Eternity bears a strong resemblance in a lot of ways to another character from earlier in the book- The Omni-Viewer. 

The Omni-Viewer is an ally of Sonic’s, and one of the biggest mysteries in the Fleetway book. We have no idea where he came from, how he came to be, or how he met and became friends with Sonic- the only hint we have is that it happened in the past, as by his first appearance he’s introduced as an old, established friend of Sonic’s. 

Much like the ring of Eternity though, the Omni-Viewer is able to transport people to anywhere on Mobius or the Special Zone and possesses a dazzling array of abilities, including the ability to send people through time and to de-accelerate time. It’s fascinating because the two are remarkably similar in that they are both sentient portals with rather vast powers of transportation, and it makes me wonder if there is some kind of connection there. Like if Omni-Viewer is a Special Zone version of the Ring of Eternity or an attempt by someone to create something similar. The comic never delves into this, but all the same it does make me wonder. 

On a lesser note- man, Proctor Speckle and Grimer look awfully similar. 

For those of you not in the know, Proctor Speckle is a re-occuring bad guy in the book, an alchemist who can turn himself into a hulk like monster called ‘Mr. Fry’. But one thing I do notice is that Speckle and Grimer are eerily alike in looks, to the point where I think Speckle might actually be the same species as Grimer... whatever THAT is. Much like the Omni-Viewer, Grimer is a bit of a mystery- according to Nigel Kitching he’s a native of Mobius and SOME kind of reptile, but otherwise we don’t know squat. Ergo, I feel fine in headcanon-ing that Grimer and Speckle are of the same species, whatever that species might be. 

[transgirljewelthebeetle]

The Big Decision - Sonic the Comic #76

Script: Nigel Kitching

Art: Richard Elson

Letters: Ellie De'Ville

The decision to make StC Sonic a bit of a dick is one that doesn't sit well with a lot of the wider fandom, but I'd say many fans act as if the StC writers took one look at the Storybook games and went "fuck this shit", when in reality (and what makes the creative choice a lot easier for me to swallow) they were primarily working with Sega of America's vision of the character (which emphasized on him being a Cool Dude rather than a genuinely nice guy) mixed in with the early Mark Millar stories being written by, well, Mark Millar (Kitching has mentioned in a podcast interview a while back was that part of it was that he felt that cool people are just generally jerks; again a creative decision that I feel is a lot less deliberately disrespectful of the character if you take into account the context of Kitching mostly going from SoA marketing). And it's not uncommon for Sonic to get some blowback and comeuppance for being a jerk either, as seen here when everyone tells him to lay off of poor Porker, and needing Porker to save his bac-

Okay I just got completely sidetracked by noticing The Omni-Viewer's expression

[smugbugunderarug]

Drew the flat-screen boy... very bright and colorful. He’s kind of neon... fits right in the Special Zone.

The Omni-viewer has got to be one of the most unique Sonic character designs I’ve seen yet...

He just looks so humanoid in StC’s cartoony art style, it doesn’t fit but at the same time it works since he resides in the Special Zone, an already unusual place...

Gosh what a face.

You think Sonic lets him watch T.V. sometimes?

[smugbugunderarug]

Smug Bug Reads: Sonic the Comic #8

        The Origin of Sonic is something I’m sure most Sonic fans have vaguely heard of once or twice. Or at least the basic story line of it, anyways.

        Issue #8 gave readers more info about how Sonic accesses the Special Zone, and I just gotta point out the very 1st big

        R e t c o n

        of the series.

        So remember in issue #3 how Sonic got into the Special Zone?

        Using rings, he just boosted into the Special Zone just like that. Now, though...

        I wondered why they didn’t just go with how the games did it at first, but I guess it’s good that they’re establishing this early and not waiting till later.

        I’m getting ahead of myself: I never explained why he was going to the Special Zone to begin with. So Sonic, Tails, Johnny, and Porker are on their way to the Special Zone so that Sonic can show them his origin story of how he became so 90′s cool and radical and how Dr. Robotnik became a rotten egg. On the way there, we learn another thing, and I’m not sure if I can call this a retcon...

        Cool, so Sonic has the Chaos Emeralds out of Robotnik’s reach (as far as we know), however in issue #3 we see six of the Chaos Emeralds in the Special Zone.

         Maybe the crew behind the series just wanted to add in a little easter egg or nod to the Chaos Emeralds before they realized they wanted to use them in the story, so they sort of just back tracked a bit. That’s fine I guess. Maybe there wasn’t much communication between the writer and artist at the time.

        That brings up a question though: when exactly did Sonic get a hold of the emeralds? It’s been confirmed in issue #6 that this takes place after Sonic 2, so he must have been able to collect the emeralds sometime between then and now. Only question left is where they’re really at...

        Anyways, so Sonic and co. safely make it to the end of the Special Zone to meet up with... this guy.

        Apparently he and Sonic are really good pals, cause in the very next panel they’re all buddy buddy with each other. No backstory, no origin, just... “oh yeah this dude and I are chill.” I’d like to see if there’s more of this guy in the future cause there’s got to be a story for that...

        Moving on!

        Thanks to the Omni-Viewer, Tails, Johnny, and Porker get to see the moment where Sonic and Robotnik first met who knows how long ago. This origin story closely follows the Sonic bible from ‘91. There are a few differences, the bigger ones being that the comics don’t take place on Earth and Sonic does not have a family (that we are yet aware of).

        It all begins with Dr. Ovi Kintobor working in his lab trying to fulfill his dream of transferring all the world’s evil into the Chaos Emeralds using his invention: ROCC (Retro Orbital Chaos Compressor). Sonic somehow managed to find his way through an underground vent of sorts into the laboratory. Kintobor is pleased to have unexpected company, and Sonic is intrigued with the machine the doctor had been working on that held six of the seven Chaos Emeralds (the machine is not stable without the seventh and final emerald, so Dr. Kintobor has been searching for it). The two form a friendship of sorts with Dr. Robotnik being curious about Sonic’s speed and conducting tests to help him go even faster. One day while testing out a new set of sneakers, a freak accident happened after Sonic passed the speed of sound that turned him from this:

        To this:

        In addition to the new look, he’s able to go faster than ever before.

        Even though he’s got his speed improved, Sonic decided to stick around since he sees the doc as a friend. One day though, a freak accident with the machine holding the emeralds, some loose cables, and a singular rotten egg turned Dr. Kintobor from this:

        To this:

        The evil in the emeralds combined with the six-month old rotten egg transformed the good doctor into the Robotnik we all know today.

        Real talk though, Kintobor’s fridge was completely empty, and he was willing to eat that rotten egg. The dude clearly did not take good care of himself! Also, his lab looked like a mess with cables running all over the floor which caused him to trip and crash into the ROCC and turning into... that. If the dude had some organization skills and at least took care as to when he was running low on food, this whole thing could have been easily avoided...

        I guess the lesson here is to take care of yourself or else you’ll turn into Robotnik.

        So back to the story... this really makes me wonder if they’re going to end up retconning the whole “going Super with just rings” thing, cause it would make sense that Sonic, in his Super form, would go crazy if the Chaos Emeralds had some evil energy left inside them. That would explain a lot actually. We’ll see what happens...

        Before anything else can happen...

        Not sure how Robotnik can control the Omni-Viewer or anything else in the Special Zone for that matter, but we’ll just roll with it for now.

        Anyways, the issue ends on a cliffhanger since it looks like Robotnik has won. The next issue is titled Sonic No More? We’ll see what kind of trouble he and the rest of his companions get into after supposedly being sent to the future...

        TL;DR: Sonic and co. get trippy to see Sonic’s origin story but they stayed trippy for too long oh no.

[robotnik-mun]

Sonic Mystery #46

The Omni-Viewer

The UK Sonic Comic could get rather odd at times, and one of the more consistent and longstanding bits of oddness was the Omni-Viewer, a re-occurring character and ally to Sonic. 

An old friend of Sonic’s by the time of his first official, the Omni-Viewer was a supposedly an all knowing, all seeing machine capable of seeing anything anywhere at any time and capable of transporting anywhere between Mobian and the Special Zone. It was in this capacity that he got the most play, enabling Sonic and company to travel to the Special Zone when needed or allowing the Chaotix to head to Mobius. 

Yet despite how long he was in the book and evidently having some history with Sonic, nothing at all is really known about the Omni-Viewer or his origins- who built him, why he was built, how he met and befriended Sonic... none of these things are so much as hinted at throughout the story. We know as much about him by the end of the book as we did at the beginning. 

One thing is clear though- whoever built him would have a truly formidable command over technology, even compared to Kintobor/Robotnik and Grimer, given the kinds of things Omni is capable of in addition to his status as a wholly sentient AI.