Alright. It has all come down to this. All the awesome moments that I was surprised to find in Sonichu, and all the sucky moments that I expected in Sonichu... it all comes down...
To a fucking Christmas Special. Seriously, Wataru, why the fuck should I do this? Oh wait, to see it through to the end... Fuck it, let’s get it over with.
It’s apparently Christmas in July since the lawn looks like it hasn’t been snowed on. Yay. A horrible abomination is quoting Family Guy. Yay. Turns out Sonichu and Rosechu had kids. Yay. A horrible abomination makes a candle cookie for a Jewish kid (I suppose the candle is meant to represent Hanukah, but it’s not the same candle, or Menorah as they call it). Yay. The cookie is vanilla flavoured to avoid allergies. Yay. The unholy demon knows we exist. Yay. Nothing really happens. Yay.
We’re done. No. Fuck it. I’m done. The fun part is that it would have had a clipshow had it been finished, which gives me only vibes of Hikonin Sentai Akibaranger. There’s also an alternate ending that some guy made that’s a Kill Em All and is more like what would happen if Gainax decided to write the ending to Sonichu ala End Of Evangelion, complete with an indecent exposure scene. Not gonna cover that because the art seems to be worse than Sonichu. I can only keep up with the horrific art and writing to a certain extent. And yes, I am aware of Stylistic Suck.
And from the looks of What Could Have Been, Sonichu would have probably be on the right track to be a “bad for some, good for others” kind of story where those of a certain level of Willing Suspension of Disbelief is required to enjoy a story. As much as I loathed some of these issues, I actually enjoyed reading some and typing out this liveblog in response to it. That is until #10, in which I really see how stupid the entire series was... So I guess this is where I will do my final thoughts on Sonichu.
It... Well, it had its bad moments. Moments that give this comic the reputation it had. Though it seems that the reputation made me raise my suspicions and so I thought that maybe Sonichu would leave everyone in the dust and destroy any arc it made. Turned out I was right. Damn comic was like revolving doors. I wasn’t really that blind, and I was making some ironic statements, such as how certain characters would be interesting, to prepare myself for the Spotlight-Stealing Squad that is Christopher Thorndyke. I mean Chris-Chan. I came into this expecting shit, and while I got shit, I noticed something in the shit. It’s not diamonds, but it was shiny.
There weren’t any actual good moments I could remember. I don’t recall laughing at any moment intentionally, there were only three major heartwarming moments in a sea of scenes that make me want to bash my brains in a wall, and while the fights were probably interesting, they were too short and often anti-climatic, with one of the more epic ones being traced. Among some cool characters, there were cheap deaths. Among some okay scenes, there were stupid filibusters. Among one pulled off arc, dozens of other arcs and even characters were dropped off. Compared to American Kitsune, Sonichu is the worst of the two, since American Kitsune tried to go back on track, unlike this comic, where it died the moment it said to be on track.
I feel like, if this reboot were to happen, it probably wouldn’t be as bad as the other issues, since the ones I hated seemed to be the ones that had a lot of Author Tract in them, which was promised there’d be less of. Mind you, I’m not saying I liked Sonichu and wished for it to continue, but I just felt like there was potential that was wasted. And that’s what I think this is what Sonichu is: Wasted potential. In the right hands, this could have been something... well, not great, but at least tolerable. However, in the current hands, I can see why Sonichu stopped.
The art, I won’t lie, is bad, and sometimes it barely feels like an actual comic book. Even bad comic books like One More Day looked like comic books. At most, there’s walls of texts, and then either a character’s head, or if we’re lucky, their entire body. Even when they do go for panels, the panels are so small, you could drive a car through the spaces between the panels. Dialogue balloons go from left to right, and then back to right to left. I only managed to keep up because I usually read manga, which is known for being read left to right.
I am sure that in some place, or in some time, Sonichu will be remade by someone else, or maybe even Christian himself, and it will be deprived of filibusters and soapbox drama and instead stick to stolen references from other, better shows, along with stolen characters. At least it won’t be as bad as what I had to go through in this comic. It won’t be as bad as Sonichu #8 or #10. It would be just another stupid piece of Sonic fanfiction, but with a niche amount of fans who liked it for some reason.
The point of this liveblog was to see for myself, from the perspective of a guy who has heard of Sonichu but hasn’t really taken the time to really read the comic or the wikia entries, if the comic was as bad as everyone, including a guy who makes a living filming himself reviewing comic books, said it was. I wanted to read this as a comic book. But Christian wouldn’t let me. He took over the show with his avatar and mixed reality and fantasy together to the point where I couldn’t read the story without having to read the wikia along side it.
And so, here’s the bottom line: Sonichu is nothing but wasted potential. While remarkably good at times, can’t avoid the reputation it had, even from a guy who hasn’t dedicated time to reading why Sonichu was bad, or even figuring out that several people took the time to liveblog Sonichu, like The Webcomic Relief who finished this exact same crusade a year ago. It’s as bad as I thought it to be, maybe even more so, and while a few moments were fun, the rest of the moments were downright horrible. And now, do I recommend it to you, or do I tell you to avoid it? Well, what do you think? This is the same webcomic that Linkara wished to avoid at all costs, even when asked to review it. What I will recommend are three issues I actually liked, a link to someone whose ripped this series even more than I could
, and three Sonichu issues to avoid like the plague.
The three Sonichu issues I recommend are Sonichu #1, #5, and #9. #1 was one of the more basic plots of Sonichu and introduced a villain who’d become a good guy later on. It was a nice teamup with Sonic. #5 kicked off an arc and introduced a character that would be scooted away later on. I felt like it was more okay than the rest. #9 was an epic battle with some good romance in the beginning. Yes, I was ticked off at some moments, but they were somewhat enjoyable.
The three Sonichu issues you must avoid are #4, #7, and #8. #4 was nothing but an Author Tract, and it was pretty stupid. There were only a handful of good sub episodes in there, but even then, there was no saving it. #7 made no sense what so ever, and it’s a stupid autobiography of Bionic’s origin. It was just boring and stupid. #8, however, was more stupid and anticlimactic. A large chunk of the issue was dedicated to bullshit and I didn’t even wish to link it. Why wasn’t #10 mentioned? While it was the stupidest of all, it had some semblance of a Grand Finale and so it barely saves itself.
And there. My thoughts towards it was that it sucked, with mixed levels of good and horrible in them, imbalanced to unholy levels. I hoped you enjoyed this liveblog as I had making it. Hasta la vista baby.
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