The Television animated adaptions of Sonic The Hedgehog. From worst to first.

This year marks the 25th Anniversary of Sega’s Sonic The Hedgehog video game franchise. I will feature what I think are the top Sonic The Hedgehog video games to date, and perhaps “Sonic Mania” (an HD widescreen throwback to the early Sonic games) and “Sonic Forces” (a combination Classic and Modern Sonic game similar to “Sonic Generations) both could make my list. These games were just released this year of Sonic’s Silver Anniversary. For now, with a live action/CGI animation movie (ala The Smurfs (2011)) based on Sonic The Hedgehog in the pipeline I would like to focus on the five Television animated adaptations (not counting the two-part min series Anime from 1996) of Sonic The Hedgehog so far to date. I have ranked them from worst to best. Also of note; depending the series I will refer to Sonic’s best enemy Dr. Ivo “Eggman” Robotnik (produced Row-Bot-Nick) either by his original name of Robotnik or the current Eggman handle.

5. Adventures of Sonic the Hedgehog (1993): This was the first of two adaptions of Sonic during the year of 1993. This series aired on television first via syndication and was the first of three Sonic adaptions that were produced by the now defunkedDiCEntertainment. Contrary to the title, this adaption played more like Bugs Bunny cartoon or any character you could think from the golden age of animation… only played for a half hour. The overall plot was that Sonic and his sidekick Tails (a twin tailed fox and an official Sonic character) were thwarting every plot Dr. Robonik came up with and carried out by his henchbots (modeled after the game’s ‘badniks’) Scratch (a robot chicken), Grounder (a robot mole), and the recurring Coconuts (a robot monkey) in his attempts of taking over Sonic’s planet of Mobius.Jaleel White who is best known as Steve Urkel in the sitcom “Family Matters,” voices Sonic (and is the voice of Sonic in the other two DiC adaptions) and while he does a good job on ‘AoStH’ he does sound a bit fake at times… but that is also part of the running gag of this series. But making Sonic a Bugs Bunny styled character and Dr. Robotnik his Elmer Fudd might by good in the short term, but I think I would take the real cartoon classics over this attempt to recreate what was already recreated… but then again there was “Ren &Stimpy” at the time… who could do a better job at animated slapstick comedy.

4. Sonic Underground (1999): The third and final DiCEnterianment adaption of Sonic, and also the final time that Jaleel White voices our favorite Hedgehog. In this series Sonic is joined by siblings (characters created for this series only) Sonia and Manic (both of them also voiced by White). There are the children of Queen Aleena who was overthrown by Robotnik. Aleena is forced into exile, and had to separate her children from each other and from herself. The siblings are eventually brought together and they fight against Robotnik’s tyranny. Aleena was forwarned of a prophesy that she and her offspring make up the Council of Four that will overthrow Robotnik. Sonic Underground combines elements of ‘AoSth’ and Sonic SatAM (which I will get to later) that makes it lighter but is still focused on being an action series. Underground adds a unique element to this adaption. The hedgehog siblings are also rock musicians and can also use their music instruments as powerful weapons when they call for them.There are musical numbers as well but White was only hired to do the speaking parts. The singing voices of the hedgehogs were Sam Vincent (Sonic), Louise Vallance (Sonia), and Tyley Ross (Manic). This Sonic adaption has the most Fantasy elements than any other Sonic adaption.Robotnik has the best voice portrayal here to date played by Garry Chalk (who also voiced protagonists Optimus Primal& Optimus Prime in several animated Transformersadaptations as well as applying his Robotnik voice to the character Mungus on ‘Dragon Tales’) and while his character might be a bumbler, he still likes to turn animals into his robot slaves (i.e. SatAM). One of Robotnik’shenchanimals Sleet (a wolf),was voiced by Maurice LaMarche who also voiced the lab mouse ‘The Brain’ (Animaniacs, Pinky & The Brain) and applies that same Brain voice to the evil wolf in Underground. This show only lasted for 40 episodes and the series storyline sadly was never resolved.

3. Sonic Boom (2014-Present): This is the current TV adaptation of Sonic the Hedgehog and its produced in CGI animation. Like ‘AoStH’ this one is played for laughs, but takes more of a sitcom approach than ‘AoStH.’ But it also contains lots of action in each 11-minute story. It’s also the second Sonic adaption to use the official characters form the Sega Games (as well as the same English voice actors) although Sticks the Badger was created for this series but is featured in the video game “Sonic Boom: Shattered Crystal.” The core characters are residents of ‘Hedgehog Village’ which used to be called Badgerville which is located on some seaside island. In spite of the name Hedgehog Village, the community mayor E. Pluribus Fink is actual a mouse (and your typical bureaucrat loving double talk elected official) …and like all the adaptions of Sonic there are other animals anyway or a planet with such creatures and anthropomorphic as well. Other supporting characters created for this series include Soar the Eagle (TV News Reporter), Fastidious Beaver (the community’s librarian) and Leroy the Turtle (a postal worker). In spite of leading everyday lives more/less they all have to contend with Sonic’s best enemy Dr. Eggman and his attempt to turn their community into an Amusement Park…or whatever…did I say that this was part sitcom? (laughs). One story had Eggman playing the bad roommate to Sonic while his base of operations was being restored. Another episode had Sonic, his friends and others in the community (thank you Mayor Fink and eight months of red tape) in an auto race in which everyone involved in the competition end got a participation trophy including Eggman… and kind of wins by getting the last word of that respected episode. I am not crazy about the comedic adaptions of our favorite video game hero… but if you must do that, then Sonic Boom has set that standard that appeals to Sonic fans old and young alike. Makes you forget about ‘AoStH.’

2. Sonic X (2003-2005): The Japanese anime series was likely inspired by the recent two Sonic Adventure video games at the time in which the anthropomorphic character is not only in a 3D environment; there are in our world with us humans.In the first episode Sonic, Tails, Amy Rose, are trying to rescue their comrade Cream the Rabbit (who is always with her pet chao she named Cheese) from Dr. Eggman who recently stole the seven ‘Chaos Emeralds’ (recurring elementin most of the Sonic games). One of Eggman’s robots however shoots a machine by mistake that contains the emeralds and activates the “Chaos Control” technique causing Sonic and company along with Eggman, Big the Cat, Froggy (who is Cat’s friend), the Chaotix team, and then Sonic antagonists Rouge the Bat, and Knuckles the Echidna to our world. Sonic eventually teams up with 12-year-oldChris Thorndyke who was born into wealth thanks to his movie actress mother and corporate executive father and more importantly his grandfather Chuck who is also a scientist. Team Sonic and their human allies must work together not only to defeat Eggman but also find a way to return to their homeworld. This series was intended to run for only 52 episodes, but 26 episodes were added and were aired in Non-Japanese regions (78 episodes total). This was due to the face that Sonic X was more popular in America than it was in Japan. In that final series of episodes Chris manages to find a way to Sonic’s homeworld and eventually helps Sonic’s friends/allies, and even Sonic’s enemies to save their world from a greater evil race of alien robots called the Metarex. This series was the first time (in the English dub) that Mike Pollock voiced Eggman and would eventually win the role of Eggman in most of the Sega Sonic videogames as well and the current CGI animation series “Sonic Boom.” While Sonic X was the best animated adaption to date overall, I still think one other series does better than this one.

1. Sonic the Hedgehog (SatAM) (1993-1994): This was the second DiC Entertainment produced show which aired on the now defunked ABC Kids Saturday Morning Lineup and debuted a few weeks after ‘AoStH” had its premiere in syndication. In spite of being a Saturday Morning kids show; its storyline was the darkest of any of the other adaptions produced past and present. While there are no deaths in Sonic SatAM (Star Trek: The Animated Series showed the death of an animal and Superman: The Animated Series would enact a death of a human by the powers of Superman’s arch enemyDarksied in just a few years) and the show had room for humor, it did show how Sonic and his love interest and ally in the fight Sally Acorn lost loved ones due to Robotnik’s war for power and his passion to destroy anything organic in his pursuit to equal or better the likes of the Cybermen or The Borg in the universes of Doctor Who and Star Trek respectfully. Another recurring element in war has Sonic having a recurring nightmare about failing to rescue Sally from Robotnik’s evil clutches. Also in this adaptation, Robotnik is a cyborg himself with his left arm turned mechanical by his own assimilation machine called a Roboticizer (not necessarily by his own choice) which was created by Sonic’s uncle Sir Charles (created for the final two DiC adaptions) to allow older animals to have longer life spans and cheat death at least for awhile. However, there was a flaw in the invention for it robed those who used it; their free will to think for themselves. Robotnik took advantage of this and when he was able to conquer the city of Mobotropolis (which he renamed Robotropolis) and forced the citizens to be turned into robots and become his unwilling servants and slaves…. includingUncle Chuck. ABC would renew the show for a second season and at their request the darkness of the story was toned down just a bit but not too much in order to keep it real… alsothere was a greater backstory to how Robotniksuccessfullyconquered Mobotrpolisalthough a few things were changed when Sonic and Sally time traveled to the past in getting involved in past events. The other big change was that Uncle Chuck was permanently given free will and siding with his nephew in spite of being stuck in robot form. The series would end on a happy note with Robotnik given his biggest defeat while Sally and Sonic share a passionate kiss…. but it also left on a cliffhanger with Robotnik’s long suffering henchman and nephew Snively plotting his revenge against Sonic with the goal of being the alpha tyrant. This would be the kind of Sonic adaption I would like to see in the future. I don’t see the upcoming motion picture revisiting this Sonic, but I would not mind some kind of GCI adaption of it either.