| Written by: | Iasmin Omar Ata |
| Year: | Six |
| Release Date: | December 13, 2023 |
| Story Count: | 1 |
Eggman is once again forming plans to destroy Sonic and his friends. This time his research comes from one of the most horrifying and ill-fated forms of entertainment yet — Reality TV. With the doctor sitting at his chair, obsessed with watching reality TV, he gives his two lackey bots, Orbot and Cubot, the brunt of the planning, researching, and work on new ideas.
Orbot, at his limit of the workload, enlists an impromptu and ingenious plan to break the doctor out of his television trance: capture Sonic and his friends to have them participate in a reality TV game show of their own: Orbot and Cubot's Winter Jam! The prize? A Chaos Emerald. With the rules set, Sonic, Tails, Amy, Cream, Rouge, Omega, Big, and Froggy all compete for the grand prize in a series of wintery-themed challenges.
The one-shot contains examples of:
- All Is Well That Ends Well: Tails' words at the end after going through the trouble of getting a Chaos Emerald thanks to Rouge.
- Are You Pondering What I'm Pondering?: Parodied, where Orbot describes their current predicament of trying to get Eggman off his butt from watching reality TV, and then has an idea come to him when he spots the plan for a "Winter Jam" on their noteboard. Orbot starts off with this question, but gets interrupted by Cubot before he can finish.Orbot: (while looking at the Winter Jam blueprint) Cubot...are you thinking what I'm—
Cubot: I don't think. Ever.
Orbot: You know what I mean.
Cubot: I do? - Author Appeal: The art was done by Min Ho Kim, who was the character designer for The Murder of Sonic the Hedgehog. As such, there are plenty of references to the game.
- Cover A, which is done by Min Ho Kim, features snowmen in the resemblance of Barry the Quokka and the conductor.
- The conductor and his wife on TV doing a baking show, the two baking cookies.
- Barry and Gadget are shown together on TV, which is a nod to the unexpected but popular pairing of the two that cropped up after the release of The Murder of Sonic the Hedgehog, with Min Ho Kim being a shipper of the two.
- The early designs of the conductor and Barry
are included in the comic as a cameo in the reality TV shows that Eggman is watching. - According to writer Iasmin Omar Ata, the cameo of Mecha Sonic Mk. III specifically came from them as they really wanted him back in the series.
- Big Ol' Eyebrows: When Cubot activates his TV Game Host voice chip, he's also taped up two big paper eyebrows on top of his head, mainly to emphasize his personality as a sleazy TV host. Despite being made of paper and are taped on, they somehow manage to emote. They fall off when their game show falls apart.
- Big Red Button: When Eggman shows up near the end of the story, Orbot and Cubot realize the jig is up, causing a giant panel with big red button adorned with a yellow star to pop up, with text under it that reads "Press if Hecked Up." Cubot presses it, sending Sonic and friends out of the base with a spring-based catapult beneath their feet.
- Curb-Stomp Battle: In a race to safely carry a fragile Eggman Doll to the finish line, the teams are allowed to use snowballs to attack their opponents and their dolls. Rouge and Omega win easily by using the robot's arsenal, loaded with snowballs. Team Rose loses their doll at the start while Team Big gives up under pressure. Team Sonic loses as well due to their Eggman doll disintegrating under the force of Sonic's speed.
- Cutting the Knot: When Orbot and Cubot present the Chaos Emerald as a prize for winning the Winter Jam, everyone doesn't buy their crap for a second. Tails suggests finding exits, Rouge posits the idea of just stealing the Chaos Emerald and getting it over with (which she tries a couple times during the show), and Omega suggests blasting open some new exits. It takes Cubot promising a new Badnik for Omega to destroy that it gets him to play along with the Winter Jam. Once things fall apart by the end, Omega open fires on Orbot and Cubot, Rouge steals the Chaos Emerald, and Eggman arrives to berate the two. By this point, Cubot hits a button that catapults Sonic's gang out of the base.
- Cameo Cluster: On the second page where Eggman is watching reality TV, it features cameos from select characters across the franchise:
- Barry the Quokka, the conductor, and his wife from The Murder of Sonic the Hedgehog are all on TV. The conductor and his wife are doing a baking show making Christmas Tree-shaped cookies, while Barry and Gadget (the default avatar shown in the marketing of Sonic Forces) are building a gingerbread house.
- Ian Jr. (a popular depiction of the Forces Avatar who is the "son" of storyboarder Ian Mutchler) appears as a contestant on a quiz TV show.
- One of the koalas from Blaze's dimension make a cameo as they point to a picture of Tails surfing.
- Continuity Nod:
- Cubot has different voice chips that also host different personalities, which was previously established in Sonic Colors. He uses a brand-new voice chip in this issue, a TV announcer.
- The Egg Shogun Z from 900th Adventure can be spotted as one of the drawings on Orbot and Cubot's board.
- Cordon Bleugh Chef: During the decoration round, Cream and Amy create a delicious batch of desserts, which all look rather appropriate for the season and tasty-looking, since Amy and Cream are both decent bakers. Cream then creates a strange gelatin dish loaded with fruit peels, veggie stalks, and "everything else in-between" to avoid throwing away any leftover ingredients.Amy: It tastes great, Cream. (To Cubot) You could also say it's...environmentally friendly...
- A Day in the Limelight: While Sonic and his friends are present and are the contestants in this one-shot, Orbot and Cubot take center stage as they are both the hosts and central characters who kickstart the events of the story.
- Exact Words:
- Cubot manages to have Omega not attack the base during the competition, under the promise that he gets to destroy a new Badnik in the end. The moment Cubot reveals that they switched Froggy (who escaped capture) with a powerful laser-firing replica Badnik, Omega finally opens fire.
- Tails and Amy note that what Cubot was hyping up what they were gonna reveal wasn't as climactic as it turned out to be. Cubot only quips that they technically still revealed something, even if the results are "devastatingly disappointing."
- Foreshadowing: When the gang gets eaten by the Giant Chopper, Big is wondering where is Froggy. While it can be taken as his usual self, it actually hints that Froggy was replaced by a Badnik.
- The Friends Who Never Hang: An aversion, where Rouge and Omega hang out with Sonic, Tails, Amy, Cream, and Big on the beach, without Shadow being present (while Cubot and Orbot tried to bring him in for the Winter Jam, he adamantly refused). Not only that, Big hangs out with Sonic and his friends for the first time in this continuity, as his previous appearances were quick background cameos.
- Humiliation Conga: Team Sonic loses all three contests thanks to their title character's strengths being not suited for the tasks given, causing Sonic to enter a Heroic BSoD. As the robots put it, maybe Eggman was on to something after all...
- The decoration contest loss is caused by Sonic's high speed causing him to trip and get into a tangled mess of lights.
- The Eggman doll loss is due to the high speeds shredding the doll itself despite not being hit.
- The ice sculpture loss is due to the product being not properly planned and built, with the thin legs giving way under the weight.
- Inconsistent Coloring: The button that Cubot presses to catapult Sonic out of the Winter Jam stage is first shown as a yellow button with a red star, but then changes to be a red button with a yellow star in the next page/panel.
- Mythology Gag:
- Cover A features two snowmen based on Barry the Quokka and the conductor from The Murder of Sonic the Hedgehog. The same cover also features a similar-looking snowboard Sonic uses in a piece of Sonic Adventure art.
- While Sonic is chilling on the beach, he says "Man, nothing can interrupt this Endless Summer."
- Several Badniks note as well as Akatento, Egg Pawn, Flickey, Gaogao, Ginpe, Guard, Pierrot, and Snowy, can be seen in the audience watching the Winter Jam.
- Team Big (consisting of Big and Froggy), are introduced as "Big guy and little guy," a reference to the lyrics of the cat's theme, "Lazy Days (Livin' in Paradise)," from Sonic Adventure.
- When Omega starts targeting the wreaths, his reticles on resemble those when playing as Gamma in Sonic Adventure and Tails/Eggman in their mechas from Sonic Adventure 2.
- Sonic's Ice Sculptures of himself and Tails are modeled similarly to the Sonic the Sketchog series of Line stickers and drawings in the game manuals.
- When Cubot reveals that Froggy was a Badnik all along, Omega immediately unloads his weaponry, while shouting "Annihilate-Charge-Annihilate-Charge-Annihilate-Charge—" which he frequently repeats when attacking in Sonic Heroes.
- In Eggman's lab, a capsule containing Mecha Sonic Mk. III can be seen in the background.
- Cover A features two snowmen based on Barry the Quokka and the conductor from The Murder of Sonic the Hedgehog. The same cover also features a similar-looking snowboard Sonic uses
- Pride Before a Fall: Played for Laughs. Sonic is used to his speed being the solution to everything, but it causes him to mess up most of his team's attempts at winning events, such as decorating a scene. More than once, he suffers a Heroic BSoD because of it.
- Rage Quit: Eggman, after an untold amount of time watching reality TV and finding out that Cubot and Orbot's Winter Jam was both the culmination of his research and a bust, promptly calls reality TV garbage, hits a button that says "delete literally everything," and angrily starts scrapping the notes he had on his board, which Cubot and Orbot wanted to happen anyways.
- Reaction Shot: Played for Laughs, where Cubot reveals that the Froggy Big has been teamed up with is a production planted Badnik. Panels then show various reactions from the contestants of the Winter Jam and the audience, complete with a "LIVE" indicator in the top left. While Sonic, Big, and Cheese aren't particularly surprised, Amy, Cream, and Tails are shocked/horrified, while a Snowy Badnik is the most taken aback. Omega meanwhile is ready to unload his arsenal since he was promised a new Badnik to destroy.
- Refusal of the Call: Shadow and Knuckles want no part in Orbot and Cubot's Winter Jam, as shown in two quick flashback panels (Shadow just glared at the two to leave, while Knuckles chucked them off his island).
- Shout-Out:
- One of the TV shows that Eggman is watching on the second page is based on Hole in the Wall, Brain Wall, or Human Tetris, where a contestant must contort their body in order to fit through the hole in the moving wall.
- Eggman's new Winter Base is inspired by Industria from Future Boy Conan.
- Skewed Priorities: While everyone concedes that Orbot and Cubot's game show is incredibly shady, Omega immediately opts to shoot his way out. Cubot then hypes up how there will be a brand-new Badnik who is "ready to be destroyed by any nearby vengeful robots," which is enough to get Omega to stay.
- Take That!: The entire issue can taken as one towards Reality TV, showing all the mental stress the competitors go under such a production, along with other less-than-savory aspects like disappointing reveals/prizes and poor quality writing. This is seemingly punctuated with Eggman's last line in the one-shot after he spent so much time watching reality TV.Eggman: Garbage...absolute trash TV.
- Tempting Fate: Right after Sonic says "Man, nothing can interrupt this Endless Summer," a Giant Chopper appears over the shoreline, capturing everyone on the beach and throwing them into Orbot and Cubot's Winter Jam show.
- Trivially Obvious: Big and Froggy are described as having "the friendship of all time."
- When All You Have Is a Hammer…: Deconstructed and Played for Laughs. Sonic relies on his trademark speed in order to try and win every challenge, much like does when tackling Eggman's schemes. Unfortunately, none of the challenges are truly suited to his skill set, where it only gets in his way and causes him to lose. Incidents include him running too fast gets him tangled in Christmas lights, his speed destroys the Eggman doll he was supposed to protect, or the ice sculptures falling over after building them so quickly (or to be more precise, building them with very thin legs that couldn't handle the heavier upper portion).
