Sonic the Hedgehog (franchise)

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Video game fandom
NameSonic the Hedgehog, ソニック・ザ・ヘッジホッグ
Abbreviation(s)Sonic, STH
Developer(s)Sonic Team
Publisher(s)Sega
Release dateJune 23, 1991 (original Genesis game, US)
Platform(s)Various
External link(s)Official website
Sonic the Hedgehog (1991, American) - H3D Boxart by Nictrain123 (2013), fanart recreating game cartage style art
Related articles on Fanlore.

Sonic the Hedgehog is a video game franchise created and produced by Sega. The franchise began with a series of speed-based platform games and quickly expanded to cartoons and comics as well.

Sub-Fandoms

The fandom is very large and fragmented; some Sonic fans love certain games and hate others, while some ignore the games completely to focus on a comic or cartoon. It has been said that the Sonic fandom is made up of "different sub-fanbases" or "mini fanbases."[1] This leads to shipping wars and other forms of wank.

Video games

The games are generally divided into 2 categories: 2D and 3D, sometimes called classic and modern. Sometimes the 3D games are broken into modern and boom categories, or adventure and boost categories.

Television

Comics

Films

Characters

The Sonic the Hedgehog franchise, while initially focused on the central character of Sonic and his arch-enemy, Dr. Ivo "Eggman" Robotnik, has expanded to include a large cast of both-one-off and recurring characters. While most games introduce at least one new character, games such as Knuckles Chaotix, Sonic Adventure, and Sonic Riders each introduced multiple new characters and broadened the side-cast significantly.

The central trio of Sonic, Tails, and Knuckles are the most prevalent characters in canon, often going by the moniker "Team Sonic". Other regulars include Amy Rose, Sonic's primary love interest; Shadow, Sonic's dopple-ganger and rival; and Rouge the Bat, Knuckles primary love interest.

Team Sonic

Villains

Team Dark

Team Rose

Team Chaotix

Others

Archie continuity

A separate continuity, based first on the Saturday morning cartoon series, and then the Archie comic book series, introduced a number of unique characters not featured in the main canon.

IDW continuity

Following the cancellation of the Archie comic book series, IDW began publishing its own series unrelated to Archie's canon, instead following closer to the main canon. This has lead to some of its new characters going on to be featured in the main game canon.

Live action characters

Fandom

Sonic 30th Anniversary by hikariviny (color) and Kohane01 (line art) (2021), highlighting the character's difference over the years

The fandom is known for its many original characters- so much so that it led to the creation of the "Sonic game," which simply involves typing one's name plus "the hedgehog" into an internet search engine and seeing what images pop up.

The fandom is known for being toxic and cynical. Fans often fight with each other and complain about how Sega is handling Sonic. There are also many ship wars, with some of the oldest DeviantArt Anti-Shipper groups being for the Sonic fandom.

Sonic is often considered a "cringey" fandom, featuring in cringe compilations.

Appeal to Different Demographics

Sonic, as a character and franchise, is said to attract some types of people better than similar video game characters and series. The fandom is stereotyped as having many autistic fans. There is also a great deal of religion-themed fanworks. In "The Pious World of Christian Sonic the Hedgehog Fan Art", Colin Spacetwinks explained:

It’s entirely possible that you might have trouble remembering a time before Christian Sonic the Hedgehog fanart. You might find it difficult to pinpoint exactly when you first became aware of it. Christian Sonic always been around you, usually in countless DeviantArt uploads — lush renditions of Sonic charging into the distance, with quotes from the book of Psalms etched into the black border around him — or in snarky blog posts.

Sonic is far from the only piece of pop culture to have a Christian fandom. You can find Christian Naruto fandom, Christian Undertale, and Christian Master Chief in just a few keystrokes. Christian youth-group kids will inevitably modify the pop culture around them in order to fit in. It’s like an inverse of the internet’s infamous rule No. 34, “If it exists, there is porn of it.” If it exists, there is a pious version of it.

But there is, I would argue, something different about Sonic the Hedgehog. And what makes it different in its space within online Christian fandoms is also such an important part of what makes Sonic such a seemingly inescapable aspect of online existence, from the years of phpBB fan forums to the endless waterfall of content that is social media in 2020. Anywhere you turn online, you’ll eventually find Sonic the Hedgehog turn up with a smirk on his face and a dismissive, cocky wag of his finger.

Sonic has a specificity to him that makes him universal.This is, of course, a self-contradicting statement, but it is still one I feel to be true. But perhaps it could be better said with this: For every possible niche of internet fandom, Sonic the Hedgehog is just edgy enough.

Sonic the Hedgehog is the most perfectly crafted piece of pop culture to pull into the Christian youth demographic. In the ’90s, Sonic the Hedgehog was legitimately cool. There is also nothing immediately objectionable about his existence. He’s made of bright colors and a family-friendly design with poppy music with no lyrics to be misconstrued as corrupting. When Sonic does feature lyrics, they come from Crush 40, whose musical aesthetic is right at home on a Christian rock CD. There is no blood. While Mario is more popular worldwide, he’s a blank slate. Sonic, on the other hand, explicitly distinguished himself by having attitude and a personality. He was the cool alternative at the height of the Sega-Nintendo console wars.

The Sonic games and TV shows might not have any explicit references to the church (could you even imagine?) but there was plenty of room for a kid in a somewhat stuffy Christian household to participate in being a fan too.

[2]

Fan Games

Main article: List of Sonic the Hedgehog Fangames

Sega has been openly supportive of Fangames and has even hired fans who worked on them, leading to a strong culture around the games.

Ships

Sonic is home to a number of ships, with the large cast enabling for a near-endless number of possibilities. Most of the larger ships were established prior to pairing tools being added on sites like FanFiction.Net, and so Portmanteau-style Pairing Names became the standard way of labeling fanworks.

More popular ships include:

A A Sonic Shipping is a DeviantArt group, now inactive, that has an extremely wide array of ships and ship types within it.

Connections with Other Fandoms

Sonic and Mario had a famous rivalry during the 90's Console wars, however it dissipated once Sega stopped making consoles. Now, since the two franchises have crossed over on many occasions since then, their fandom's have become much friendlier toward each other.

For a time, My Little Pony crossovers were also common, as were Klonoa crossovers.

Notable Works & Authors

Fanfiction

Authors

  • Tirainy - Sonadow author responsible for the highest-rated stories on AO3.

Fancomics

Fangames

Zines

Archives & Fannish Links

Resources

References

  1. ^ Why does the Sonic Fandom get such a bad reputation?
  2. ^ https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2020/02/why-is-there-so-much-christian-sonic-the-hedgehog-fan-art.html
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