Sonic the Hedgehog
Scrape Your Knuckles, Catch Some Tails!

Well, we all love game animes, don't we? Most videogame animes are much better than videogame based cartoons, they follow the game more, play by the rules and are often supervised or even made by the game's company. Sonic is pretty cool and very fun to watch.

I've enjoyed the Sonic games(except that new one on dreamcast) for a long time now, and it's always fun to see hte characters you know so well in true action. The first thing to mention though, this is based on the classic Sonic games, not the new Dreamcast one, so Sonic has his older, better desing without the green eyes and long spines, and the voices sound similar to the ones from the children's cartoon, more like the voice from Sonic CD when you get an extra life(When Sonic yells "Yes!!").

This anime is also really more for the fans of the game rather than the fans of the three TV shows. Every character has been drawn true to the game unlike on the cartoons when each character had been edited to make them look more childish or comical. Also, this contains some adult content, and although A D Vision changed some of the language on the english version so the younger viewers(Fans of the cartoon show) won't be watching a load of swearing.

The storyline is not bad. Dr. Robotnik(Dr. Eggman) tells Sonic that his creation, Metal Robotnik(Black Eggman) turned on him and with an army of robots took over his town, Robotropolis, then sabotaged his electricity generator, meaning if it isn't turned off by sunrise the next day there will be a huge explosion. He says he wants Sonic to go because he's fast. Sonic doesn't trust his arch nemesis but enentually Sara, the president's daughter persuades him and Tails to go. On the way, they encounter Metal Robotnik and a quite good battle takes place. After Knuckles appears and Metal Robotnik is beaten, the gang go off, and it is revealed that Robotnik was actually driving Metal Robotnik, so the Sonic, Knuckles and Tails are heading into a trap! They manage to shut off the power, but shortly after, Sonic get's trapped in a wall of electricity. Then the whole place falls down, and Sonic, Knuckles and Tails meet their most deadly challenge yet, The Hyper Metal Sonic! The story continues from here with two battles between Sonic and Metal Sonic, a lot of ice and some wicked plans from Robotnik.

The dubbing isn't very good. The acting's pretty bad for A D Vision, actually, it's probably ADV's worst dub I've seen, but it's still fully acceptable. All the voices do suit the characters well, just the acting is similar to that off Pok�mon of Dragonball Z, and the translation has that thing, also like Pok�mon and DBZ where everything is made as clear and understandable to children as possible(e.g. "I'm Knuckles, I'm Sonic's best friend!") it's possible that ADV may have done this on purpose so the the younger viewers can understand. the artwork is pretty good, but there's lack of shading so at times the characters can seem a little "flat".

All in all, Sonic is a pretty good anime, and if you're a fan of the game, you'll love it. Although intended by ADV for the younger viewers, it has a lot of action, explosions and some slight adult themes(e.g. There's a picture of Sara breast-feeding a baby Robotnik, Tails falls onto her, toughing her in the wrong place, Sonic flicks someone off, etc.) making it seem a lot like Dragonball Z.

All in all, Sonic is a very fun, quite simple anime and is great if you're a fan of the game.

Rating out of 5: ***

Sonic the Hedgehog Screenshots
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