Sonic X

Plot synopsis:
=== Series 1 (Seasons 1 and 2) ===
==== Season 1 ====
Sonic the Hedgehog (voiced by Jason Griffith) attempts to destroy the base of Doctor Eggman (voiced by Mike Pollock) and retrieve seven Chaos Emeralds. One of Eggman's robots inadvertently shoots a machine containing the Emeralds, which activates the "Chaos Control" technique. This teleports Sonic, Eggman, and some of Sonic's other anthropomorphic friends—Tails (voiced by Amy Palant), Amy Rose, Cream the Rabbit (with Cheese the Chao, Big the Cat (with his frog Froggy), Rouge the Bat, Knuckles the Echidna, and the Chaotix (a detective crew comprising Espio the Chameleon, Vector the Crocodile, and Charmy Bee—to Earth, the parallel-universe version of their world. Sonic is chased by police, escapes into a mansion's swimming pool, and is rescued by a twelve-year-old boy named Chris Thorndyke, who lives there with his movie-star mother Lindsey, corporate executive father Nelson, scientist grandfather Chuck, maid and chef Ella, and butler Tanaka (voiced by Darren Dunstan). Chris tries to hide the anthropomorphic people from his family until Cream accidentally reveals them, but they all build up a good rapport with Chris' family and with Chris' friends Danny, Francis, and Helen.
The characters still want to return home, so they repeatedly scuffle for the Emeralds with Eggman, his robot assistants—the hyperactive, attention-seeking Bokkun and the bumbling Bocoe (also voiced by Darren Dunstan) and Decoe—and his larger, armed robots. Eggman plans to take over the world, catching the attention of the unnamed nation's President, so Knuckles, Rouge, and federal agent Topaz work to stop him. The other anthropomorphic people soon join the crusade and, when Eggman is defeated, they are all hailed as heroes.
==== Season 2 ====
However, the unfazed Eggman awakens a creature named Chaos from a huge gem called the Master Emerald. The animals fight a losing battle to retrieve the Emeralds until Chaos absorbs all seven and becomes giant, but an echidna girl named Tikal, who entombed herself and Chaos in the Master Emerald millennia ago, emerges to help placate him. After Sonic uses the Chaos Emeralds to become Super Sonic, he defeats Chaos, who returns to the Master Emerald with Tikal.
Shortly afterwards, Eggman finds his grandfather Gerald Robotnik's diary and Gerald's old project Shadow (also voiced by Jason Griffith) in a military base. After being released by Eggman, Shadow breaks into a museum to steal an Emerald, which gets Sonic arrested. Amy rescues him, but Shadow, Eggman, and the duplicitous Rouge escape to the space colony ARK, where Eggman threatens to use a weapon called the Eclipse Cannon to destroy Earth if Earth does not submit to his rule; he blows up half of the Moon to prove his power. Eggman collects the Emeralds to power the Cannon, but this triggers a program Gerald set up decades ago, which will destroy Earth in less than half an hour. Everyone works together to shut it down except Shadow, who is unsympathetic until Chris convinces him. Shadow and Sonic power up using the Emeralds and reroute the ARK away from Earth, seemingly killing Shadow.
Eggman rebuilds the Moon, seemingly out of remorse, but its position shifts, creating a solar eclipse, so he manufactures and sells "Sunshine Balls" to replicate sunlight. Sonic sees through his greedy motivations, and Eggman is arrested for fraud. Bokkun activates a robot named Emerl, who quickly allies with the anthropomorphic people, and Eggman escapes prison. Emerl wins an Emerald in a martial arts tournament involving numerous hero and villain characters, but he goes berserk and begins to wreck the city, so Cream and Cheese have to destroy him.
Later, two government physicists show up at Chris' mansion to announce that Sonic's' world and Earth were once a single world split in two by a cataclysmic event, but are rejoining, which will stop time irreversibly, and the only way to stop it is to send the anthropomorphic people back home. Tails and Chuck begin to build a gate to teleport Sonic and company back to their own world with Chaos Control, but Chris does not want them to leave. When it is finished and all their friends but Sonic have left, Chris suddenly shuts the machine down and whisks Sonic into the woods to hide out of fear his parents will return to never being home once Sonic is gone. Sonic is understanding, yet teaches Chris that as a fellow person neither can force the other to feel a certain way and that their friendship is free will. Chris tearfully acknowledges that he bound Sonic's freedom today and stopped his friend from going back home and remorsefully asks for forgiveness while Sonic tells him he'll be able to be strong even without him being there. Chris' parents find him and promise to spend more time with him. Chris having learned his lesson and grown as a person goes for one final run with Sonic before they mutually part ways and Sonic returns to his own planet, stopping the merging of the worlds. However, Chris vows that one day, he will see Sonic again.
=== Series 2 (Season 3) ===
Six months later, a race of villainous robots known as the Metarex attempt to steal the Emeralds from Sonic, but he scatters them across the galaxy. Meanwhile, on Earth, where six years have passed and Chris is now eighteen, Chris builds another device to return to his friends' world; he is twelve again when he arrives. A sick plant-like girl named Cosmo lands on their planet and they nurse her back to health, so she joins them, and they all board Tails' new spaceship, the Blue Typhoon. On the Typhoon, they scour the galaxy for the Emeralds and "Planet Eggs" (objects that allow life to flourish on planets, which the Metarex have stolen to depopulate the galaxy) and fight the Metarex at every turn. Eggman joins the Metarex shortly after. Along the way, Tails and Cosmo slowly fall in love with each other. Later, Rouge finds Shadow alive in a capsule on Eggman's ship and releases him. At one point, he saves Chris from the Metarex before disappearing, but he reappears and tries to kill Cosmo, much to Tails' anger. The Metarex's leader, Dark Oak, appears and reveals that the Metarex and Cosmo are of the same species and that they secretly implanted a tracking device in her brain while extinguishing the rest of their kind; she has been an unwitting spy ever since. Chris, Knuckles, and Tails notice that removing the device will likely destroy her sight and hearing forever. Knuckles pushes for it to be removed anyway (In the Japanese version he stresses to find a way to remove it without damaging her), but Tails can't make any decisions at the present time so the surgery is called off and the battle against the Metarex continues.
The heroes find the Chaotix and Shadow, and everyone heads to the center of the universe, where the Metarex are ominously controlling a planet that is made of water and contains a Planet Egg. After Sonic almost drowns in it, the planet begins turning into a giant seed; the Metarex reveal that, because they have lost the battle, they will destroy the galaxy with this planet. Cosmo sees a vision from her mother Earthia, telling her that she must sacrifice herself to save the rest. She fuses with the giant seed and instructs Tails to use the Blue Typhoon's cannon to fire Super Sonic and Super Shadow at her and the seed and destroy them. He does, in tears the whole time, and annihilates the Metarex. Back on Sonic's world, Sonic and Shadow reappear and solemnly inform Tails that they could not revive Cosmo and only found a seed of hers; Cream and Amy try to cheer him up. With a change of heart, Eggman builds a device for Chris to return home but promptly reverts to his old ways after Chris leaves. The series ends with Cosmo's seed sprouting and Chris returning home.

Tags: psychedelic, alternate reality

Review:
While the series does feature the same animation style and characters directly from the games, it also loses the atmosphere of the series by urbanising the entire thing, contradicting the character personalities evident in the series - we're supposed to believe Sonic is fighting against urbanisation and loves natural beauty, living every day with freedom and adventure in mind, he's now also living in a rich mansion on the suburbs of a city with a young pre-adolescent named Chris.While human characters have been evident in the series since Sonic Adventure in 1999, they've never been as overbearing as they are here.
The pace takes a serious drop after the first episode because of it.The first episode is perfect - blending amazingly fast animation with great character usage and wonderful set pieces - an action scene that continues for around 7 minutes is a wonderful way to kick off the series, and the humour and characters are all around for a purpose.
It's a terrible waste, and not only do the regular cast of Tails, Knuckles, Amy and Cream suffer, but also Sonic himself, who spends the series saving Chris with one-shot kill battles in the vain of the weak MegaZord battles of Power Rangers fame.
As a series working on it's own merits, it's still poor for it's lack of anything actually happening - the characters talk for five minutes at a time with useless sub-characters, and without a spark of humour or charm the series just feels weak and dull.It may feature all of the regular cast, but this isn't the Sonic we've known for the last 13 years.
The series is dull, inconsistent, and at times features very poor and jerky animation, filled with aesthetic mistakes which suggest the series has been rushed out in order to simply make quick money, without offering anything new - the fact that the series adapts in-game storylines means there's literally nothing we haven't seen before as far as Sonic the Hedgehog goes, unless fans can genuinely bring themselves to care about Chris - a hard task, due to his consistent ways of stealing the limelight from every character.Fans would be better sticking with the 1993 DiC cartoon Sonic the Hedgehog (or SatAM).
Within the ensemble, well, there are plenty of reasons why this show should have just been about Sonic and his crew (and adversaries like Eggman and Shadow) and had nothing to do with Chris or the world he lives in.Chris is seriously the most shallow character I've ever seen.
He's honest-to-goodness a Marty Stu. I'm no hardcore Sonic fan by any means, in fact the time when I could have come even remotely close to being one was years ago and Sonic is just something I play if it happens to be around, but speaking as a casual viewer, Chris Thorndike is probably the absolute worst sidekick ever.He comes from privilege even exceeding Bruce Wayne.
There's nothing engaging about any of these characters on a personal level; their chemistry is just horrible.Chris has everything a kid could possibly want and no evident problems relating with other people, so it's not as if he needed Sonic to enter his life at all.
However, I was really disappointed in Sonic X.It started off brilliantly, with a wonderful first couple of episodes, good music with exception of the theme tune and a great concept, and then it all went downhill just like that.My first major problem with Sonic X is that the characters are not well-developed.
Finally, I didn't find the English dub voice work that great, the actors try their best with superficial material but with the characters so underdeveloped nobody stands out.Overall, disappointing, started off great, but as the show progressed the flaws became increasingly abundant.
The Japanese version is decent for TV TOKYO, but the American is by far the worst of the worst of American cartoons (Yes, worse than the Super Mario Bros Super Show and Adventures of Sonic the Hedgehog).The first episode and Cruise Blues are probably the only episodes I would recommend because they don't follow the same story as every other freaking episode.
The human characters get most of the show time (Which makes no sense because this is a Sonic Cartoon), and the dialogue, even the Japanese, is poorly written.
Sonic sounds bored and emotionless; Knuckles sounds too loud and gravely; Tails sounds like a little girl; Robotnik sounds nothing like the menacing, evil and threatening Doctor he was in the SatAM show; Rouge sounds like she's in her 50s; Amy sounds even more obnoxious and irritating than she does in the games; and new characters like Bokkun, Decoe and Bocoe have really annoying voices.
He practically is the same way he was in Adventures of Sonic; Amy is her old self only for some reason they make it where Sonic actually likes her, which is way out of his character, since he just thought she was annoying in the games.Overall this show sucks.
Back in 2003, Japan released an anime show based on the video game franchise, "Sonic the Hedgehog", the show was called, "Sonic X".During that year, 4Kids entertainment did the English dub for the series.
The Japanese dub and the English dub also share one problem: The character, Chris Thorndike, is pretty lame.But there were some thing's I liked about the English dub: The theme song was pretty good, some of the voice acting was decent and most of the episode's were good because season's 1 and 2 were more like adaptations of, "Sonic Adventure 1 and 2" and "Sonic: Battle".Overall, "Sonic X", is not a bad show.
One of the biggest problems with Sonic the Hedgehog is the franchise's inconsistency with national identity, so when it comes to the voice acting, courtesy of Junichi Kanemaru, Ryo Hirohashi, Nobutoshi Kanna, Sayaka Aoki, Taeko Kawata, Sanae Kobayashi and Chikao Otsuka, it is really hard to tell whether it is good or bad, because international dubs are bad because they are nationalising a lot of elements in a foreign- language film or television series, even a simple translation is a nationalisation.
The environments really look like a place I would want to explore.I know I have been comparing this television series to Kingdom Hearts, but that is how I honestly feel about Sonic X, as well as the best way to describe this series.Note: This review is based on the original Japanese with English subtitles..
This is the worst sonic show.sure the first episode was awesome but after that don't even bother.I mean it's obviously a complete rip-off of E.T,but it's not just that.The human characters are mind-numbingly boring especially Chris.I swear he has no personality,not to mention he's a completely unlikeable character too and another thing.Poor Sonic looks bored out of his hedgehog brains,I mean why do you think he always sleeps in this show.Because he has nothing better to do,might as well take a nap or 5.You'd think that be bad enough,but no it gets worst.After they complete the first two seasons they then completely rip off Star Trek.why?also the animation at points is really choppy,like a character could look cool in one shot but in the next look like it's melted,so basically it is a really lame show,if you want to see at least a descent Sonic show try Sonic SatAM.Aside from that do yourself a favor and skip this one.
Frames skip or characters will sometimes look weird, all the while you wondering how the animation got bad and the artists didn't realize, however they do straighten their act up in special episodes, like Sonic's long-awaited transformation to Super Sonic.
Not only is Sonic a funny and cool person to be around, but the hedgehog is wise beyond his years, and he constantly teaches the new kid what true friendship is all about in a non sugar-coated way, like like Yu-Gi-Oh and Pokemon do for example, and it's very satisfying.
DiC entertainment pulled the characters right out of the videogames, did their own little makeover on them, and bought an adorably cute and fun piece of comedy, "The Adventures of Sonic", which admittedly even gives me the occasional belly laugh when I catch it on UK Sky TV nowadays(Doesn't quite live up to Spongebob there though, sorry Sonic).As a kid that show made me collect merchandise, the comic books, and the games.
Hearing that it was anime at least assured me that I wouldn't have to put up with DiC entertainment's growing obsession with drama and tears.This time we are treated to a cast of animal characters already known from the videogames and comics, an annoying little kid, and a bunch of other humans who seem to want to capture Sonic.
The new setting amongst the humans keeps the characters in a sort of stealthy status, hiding away and trying to keep their actions a secret whilst at the same time defending the world from the infamous(and ever varying in design) Dr. Robotnik(Now simply known as "Egg Man" o_o; Which comes from the Japanese name).
In a way it goes to show that the humans aren't always the good guys(especially egg shaped ones with oversized moustaches).After the first couple of seaons, inspiration from the (in)famous "Pokémon", another videogame based anime series, begins to show, mainly in the relation between cartoon and game, how the events which you played through in the game begin to happen in the show, with more characters thrown in and the inability to actually control it.
Many of the other voices are squeaky and annoying, as can be expected from a TV-broadcast anime, but it's a treat to hear Lisa Ortiz(The wonderful voice actress behind Lina Inverse of Slayers) as Amy, and a very deep, agressive Knuckles.Overall it's not too bad a series, especially after it's got into things a little.
Yes, I do understand that the 4kids version and all of the voice actors in it (except possibly Mike Pollock as Eggman) are annoying, Chris is the one of the worst characters ever though of and has way to much screen time, and Cosmo's character was somewhat lazy on the part of the writers.
If you can push back slight flaws and the presence of one or two annoying characters, I also recommend episodes 53, 73, 74, and quite a few of the ones from season 1 (How to Catch A Hedgehog, Chaos Control Freaks, that one with Knuckles and a guy who calls himself "Hawk", etc.).The episodes I mentioned have far less of Chris Thorndyke than most episodes, and even the ones with him being there for the majority of the time are mediocre at worst.
And we all know how much better the Japanese are at animating than we are, as evidenced by Dexter's Lab and Power Puff Girls.This show is produced by Sonic Team, so it's no surprise that most of the episodes will coincide with familiar events in the Sonic Adventure games.
If you've ever watched one of the Sonic X translated fansubs by WolfPac or Team Artail you'll notice that the Japanese used actual gun sounds instead of the more friendly laser fire sounds that are heard in the US dub.Also most of the Japanese voice actors in Sonic X also did the voices for the same characters in the Japanese Sonic games.Amy Palanth is the voice of Tails in the 4Kids dub?
I can't imagine what it'd be like with the English voice actors for the Sonic Adventure series (if that's who'll be used).
They turned an awesome anime show to its knee's and turned it into a show for two year olds with spit bubbling at their lips.Try watching the Japanese version, its much more accurate and follows the sonic games very well and keeps it entertaining for anyone around the age of 14 - 10..
Although it may have been said plenty of times that the English version is no match for the Japanese version, I'd say the dub is actually pretty good.It's also been said that Sonic X has a "robot of the day" feeling within each episode's plot advancement that makes it seem somewhat like the Power Rangers.
However, with all Sonic T.V. series that come out, there's always extra characters that weren't in the game to add a little bit extra to the plot.All in all, I like this show.
Now that I've seen the dub of episode 4, I think I can be fair.Well, after a really horrible English version of the first episode, 4Kids managed to make a pretty good comeback.
;-)  I'm not very fond of Amy's voice (never have been in the Sonic Adventure games either) since it just doesn't make her the appealing character she is the original.
Honestly though, even if the dub were more accurate to the original it still would not have been great.Sonic X is a series where its hero is so powerful and so competent that they have to focus on other characters fro the majority of the show, otherwise the stories would be over in half the time.
If they had been new animal people like the Freedom Fighters in SatAM and Archie Sonic that would be one thing, but these human characters are just given far too much focus in a Sonic the Hedgehog series.It's not very funny, the animation isn't very thrilling, and it gives too much attention to characters most audiences don't care for.
Not only did they add new characters that weren't in the video games and/or older shows (ie Chris, Shadow, etc), nut it just didn't have what made the older "Sonic" shows so great.In short, I'm stickin' with the classic shows.
Without losing to many Words about the Series, I'll just go ahead and say that it's worth watching Sonic X simply for the brilliant Ending !If you have set up any emotional relation to the Characters (especially Tails) chances are you are going to cry a little during the last Episodes.Speaking of Episodes.
I have to agree with other users I don't really get why people hate sonic x i think it is a great show I have to say its better than sonic underground and sonic boom sure there are good shows but sonic x is still better than those sonic cartoons Sonic x have lots of action violence like the other sonic cartoons and it have more action violence that sonic underground and sonic boom the characters are not not annoying and repetitive The animation is great The action scenes are epic Final verdict: 10/10 rating out of 5: 5/5 Nice job sonic..
It's everything you'd expect to see in a sonic series, high thrills, a great since of adventure, a good story, and episode plots.
Classic charactures; like Sonic, Tails, Amy Rose, Knuckles, and Eggman; are included as well as newcommers to the series ; Shadow (However he servived his fall to earth I'll never know), Cream, Cheese, and Rouge.
Sega is trying everything to make Sonic famous like it once was.The Bad: However, this is just another anime to me, nothing too special and everything that was expected has happened.
Now I never wanna see another episode of this sorry excuse of a cartoon ever again.The voice acting is tolerable and it has a catchy theme song (reason why I'm not giving it a 1) Like any dubbing for an American cartoon is any good anyway.80% of the episodes of Sonic X basically consist of the main humanoid character, Chris Thorndyke going to school and catching up to see how Sonic is doing and how Tails helps them find a way back home.
Sonic is good, Egg- man is evil, Amy is the fan-girl, Tails is a sidekick, Knuckles is the hot head and Chris is the annoying kid that nobody likes to watch.
Get rid of the humans, focus on Mobius, get some decent voice actors, get more character development and continue with the good animation and you would have a great show.
No, I'm here to review Sonic X, the latest and final animated series of Sonic the Hedgehog, and for good reason.1) The music-The music was fine, although the theme music did kinda get annoying after a while.
Tails, Amy, Knuckles, and Sonic didn't sound like that in the games!
Although Eggman sounds pretty good, not enough though!4) The characters-We got all the main stars (Sonic, Tails, Knuckles, Amy, etc..) but why the H3!!
The human supporting cast are generally good too, complementing the Sonic characters and the plot arc rather than simply stealing screen time.Most of the humour works well enough, despite the fact Japanese humour often doesn't go down well with Western audiences, and overall the series is well animated, the anime style suiting Sonic.
Making season 3 a full blown story arc was an amazing move for a show like Sonic and is almost never seen in a series originally intended for kids.
You'd better watch the uncut Japanese version of this Sonic Anime.
The Japanese version is a great anime which I want to recommend to any hardcore Sonic-fans who haven't seen this series yet..
I am a very big fan of Sonic the hedgehog and I liked the new sonic x series a lot when it came out.
I didn't care about the voice acting, I didn't care about the "cheesiness", all I cared about was that "It's Sonic." I didn't take this anime dub seriously though I do know that 4kids changed a lot of stuff (especially in the final episode of season 3) for censoring.
But I actually liked some of the 4kids sonic voice acting.