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In StC issue 3 were are introduced to Sally Acorn and her little brother, Tufftee.

Drawing Sonic characters that only 5 people know about

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StC Post-Mortems: Tufftee Acorn

Starting off the “characters requested by you” bonus round of Post-Mortems we’ve got Tufftee Acorn, Sally’s younger brother who appeared in a single issue of StC during the early Mark Millar era. It’s funny that StC has its own specific lore for Sally when she didn’t even appear that much in the comic, so let’s take a look at Tufftee’s sole appearance

How it started

We’re introduced to Tufftee by finding him trapped in the Marble Garden Zone, being threatened by badniks, as Tufftee explains that he just wanted to rescue people, like his hero, Sonic. I always forget that in the beginning of StC, badniks were chatty. They quieten up later on in the series and while there are a few examples showing that they still can talk, it’s a lot less than they do in the beginning. Again, I believe the talkative badniks might’ve been more of a Millar thing that the other writers didn’t carry on as much

How it went

After the introduction, we cut away to Tails & Sally telling Sonic that Tufftee has gone missing. Sally explains that Tufftee found an old pair of Sonic’s shoes and is using them to try to be like Sonic. Upon hearing this, Sonic takes off to go find and rescue Tufftee, since he thinks the shoes still might have a bit of his speed left in them, but this will quickly run out (again, a bit of lore about Sonic’s shoes that I don’t think was ever brought up again lol). As Sonic travels, we even see the first appearance of the Special Zone in StC, which would go on to feature a lot more than Tufftee did, before Sonic finds and rescues him from the badniks, much to Tufftee’s delight

In the process, one of the badniks escapes and lures Sonic towards what the comic calls a Crusher Weight (did those even have official names? I’ve never thought about it before), which Tufftee is able to jump in to save Sonic from at the last moment. It’s a blow to Sonic’s ego, but this is enough to make Tufftee feel like he’s a hero as well. “Sonic the Comic” might’ve been a much shorter series without Tufftee saving Sonic’s life in issue 3

How it ended

After this, Sonic brings Tufftee home to the Green Hill Zone, where he’s reunited with his older sister, Sally. Aww, a nice happy ending!

…Which is a little spoiled by Sonic holding him upside down to take his old shoes back from Tufftee and warn him never to use them again. This is typical Millar Sonic bluntness, but honestly, I can’t imagine I’d be too happy if someone had stolen my shoes either lol

Were there any unused future plans from the StC writers?

Unsurprisingly, there doesn’t seem to have been any unused plans for Tufftee. Millar’s StC stories were seemingly written in a single sitting and then used in the comic until the backlog ran out and none of the other stories he wrote featured Tufftee. Sally was in quite a few of them, sometimes featuring quite prominently, and I assume if the comic had carried on using Millar as a writer, we would’ve likely seen more of her, which would’ve been the only chance of also seeing Tufftee. But as it stands, he never appeared again after this story

What would I personally have liked to see next for him if StC continued?

Y’know, I was thinking while writing this about a potential in-universe reason for the lack of Sally (+Tufftee) after the Millar stories are over and honestly, I think an easy answer could be that they’re not Emerald Hill folk, they’re Green Hill folk. We know already that Millar used levels from Sonic 1 and when Kitching came along he switched to using levels from Sonic 2, which included making Emerald Hill the main focal point for the Freedom Fighters and civilians who Sonic saved. Kitching also didn’t use Sally, so you could say that her and Tufftee just live in Green Hill and that’s why we never see them again outside of Sally’s cameo as a TV newscaster

For Tufftee specifically, it’s easy to say that there wouldn’t be much need to bring back the character, because we already have Tails filling the role of the younger character who wants to be recognised as a hero like Sonic, but that’s the boring answer. Instead, I think you could potentially lead into this by having Tufftee team up with Tails and making him an extra in the Tails solo stories. Yes, they already did this with Tantrum the Mouse, but Tantrum was (intentionally) annoying and that story was dragged on way too long. I’m thinking of something more tied to the other Tails-specific story arc that got brushed under the rug…

…Namely, the Nameless Zone. I’ll forever be sad that the Nameless Zone stories were left on a cliffhanger that was never resolved. And I feel like if you’re going down the “have Tails look after a younger character to put him in Sonic’s shoes” route, then here’s a kid who literally wore Sonic’s shoes one time who could follow Tails to the Nameless Zone without Tails knowing about it and then try to help him out, assuming that Tufftee still wants to be a hero. Have Tails needing to save Tufftee from his own reckless actions. Maybe have Tufftee be the one who accidentally bumbles into saving the day and gets praised for it, leaving Tails to realise that he himself has grown past that point where he was saving the day by accident and all of his wins are now ones that he’s earned

And maybe somewhere down the line, they could discover that Tufftee & Sally have a secret older brother from the Nameless Zone, so they also have ties to the place that they didn’t realise. Yes, this is absolutely a long-game ploy for my Elias Acorn x Errol Blackthorn crackship, but what are you going to do about it? ;P

What if he was in other Sonic media?

While technically Tufftee never appeared again, in the recent Chaotix 30th Anniversary Special from IDW, artist Tracy Yardley! did include a lot of nods to Sonic the Comic within the story, including what he’s said could be seen as Sally Acorn with a younger child character. Yardley! has said on Bluesky that he didn’t intend for the child character to be anyone in particular, so it’s not really Tufftee, but I like to pretend that it is

Outside of that, I talked above about how if given complete free reign of the universe that I’d like to bring Elias Acorn into StC (or maybe even bring Tufftee into Pre-boot Archie?), but that’s mostly because Sally has always given me such middle sibling vibes and that could be another explanation for the poor girl’s suffering :’)

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