Sonic the Hedgehog (franchise)

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."Why does the Sonic Fandom get such a bad reputation? 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===
* Adventures of Sonic The Hedgehog
* Sonic The Hedgehog (SatAM)
* Sonic Underground
* Sonic X
* Sonic Boom
* Sonic Prime
===Comics===
* Sonic (Archie Comics)
* Sonic the Comic (Fleetway)
* Sonic (IDW Comics)
* DC X Sonic
===Films===
* Sonic the Hedgehog (Live Action Films)
* Sonic OVA
==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====
*Sonic
*Tails
*Knuckles
====Villains====
*Dr. Eggman
*Metal Sonic
*Black Doom
====Team Dark====
*Shadow the Hedgehog
*Rouge the Bat
*E-123 Omega
====Team Rose====
*Amy Rose
*Cream the Rabbit
*Big the Cat
====Team Chaotix====
*Vector the Crocodile
*Espio the Chameleon
*Charmy Bee
====Others====
*Mighty the Armadillo
*Silver the Hedgehog
*Blaze the Cat
*Tikal the Echidna
*Chaos
*Omochao
*Maria Robotnik
*Majin Sonic
=== 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.
*Princess Sally Acorn
*Bunnie Rabbot
*Antoine Depardieu
*Rotor the Walrus
=== 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.
*Tangle the Lemur
*Whisper the Wolf
*Surge the Tenrec
*Kitsunami the Fennec
=== Live action characters ===
*Tom Michael Wachowski
*Maddie Wachowski
*Agent Stone
==Fandom==
 
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:
===Fan Games===
Sega has been openly supportive of Fangames and has even hired fans who worked on them, leading to a strong culture around the games.
===Horror===
Despite being a family-friendly franchise, Sonic has spawned a number of Horror themed fanworks and Creepypasta, including Sonic.EXE and Shin Sonic
===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:
*Sonamy
*Sonally
*Shadamy
*Sonadow
*Taiream
*Knuxouge
*Shadouge
*Knuxadow
*Shadow the Hedgehog & Maria Robotnik - a Canon Friendship ship
*Robotnik/Agent Stone
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.
===Online fandom history===
One of the early Sonic fansites was Rat.org; its history is described in this Sonic Retro article.
* Sonic Retro wiki page on the Sonic scene
** Hidden Palace Zone: ACLA-ATD4 - Ayla/Nayr T'nargh/Samantha Clarfet's history of the Sonic Secrets Community and Sonic Stuff Research Group (SSRG).
** The Sonic Community: More Than A Perfect Existence - RattleMan's history of the Sonic the Hedgehog Area 51 community
* In a May 2001 post to the alt.fan.sonic-hedgehog Usenet newsgroup, fan Dave Bulmer described his memories of his perspective of the early online Sonic fandom in the 1990s. Subsequent replies by Raz Masters and Alex Weitzman contained additional details.
==Notable Works & Authors==
===Fanfiction===
*Fractured Dimensions
*Memory Lane
*El Pendrive Azul by Sinuois (2011) - Spanish-language creepypasta.
===Authors===
*Tirainy - Sonadow author responsible for the highest-rated stories on AO3.
===Fancomics===
*Ghosts of the Future - Alternate Universe fancomic drawn and written by Evan Stanley, or "spiritsonic", artist who worked on Sonic (Archie Comics) and currently works on Sonic (IDW Comics).
*Hangin Out - A Sonic Comic not Quite Starring Sonic - Alternate Universe Futurefic starring Amy Rose and Metal Sonic, written and drawn by "The_Hydroxian".
*Pen Pals - Sonamy focused comic, drawn and written by "SallyVinter".
* Sonichu - Originally a crossover fan webcomic with Pokémon by "CWC"/"Chris-Chan"
* The Sonic Ideal - A fancomic by Dave Bulmer (a figure in Sonic the Comic (Fleetway) fandom) and Abigail Ryder (who later worked on covers for Sonic (IDW Comics)). Two issues were made, in addition to a prequel issue that began to retell the events of the games Sonic 2 and Sonic 3; the prequel issue was released (along with a Flash-based website revamp) to coincide with the June 2001 release of the Dreamcast game Sonic Adventure 2. (The webcomic also had its own message board.)
* Not Enough Rings - webcomic by Veronica Vera (@Taeshi) and Oliver Bareham (@SuitCase874).
===Fangames===
*Sonic Before the Sequel - a prequel fangame by Lake Feperd set between Sonic the Hedgehog 1 and 2.
*Sonic.EXE - a horror fangame made by MY5TCrimson, based on the creepypasta by JC-The-Hyena.
*Sonic Robo Blast 2 - a 3D fangame by Sonic Team Junior, made with a modified version of the Doom Legacy source port.
*Sonic Time Twisted - a fangame made by Overbound Game Studio, modeled after Sonic CD and Sonic the Hedgehog 3.
=== Zines ===
* Sonic World Adventure
==Archives & Fannish Links==
* Sonic the Hedgehog fanworks at FF.net
* Sonic the Hedgehog - All Media Types fanworks at AO3
* Sonic Script Zone an archive for fanfics written in Script Format.
==Resources==
* Sonic News Network
* Sonic Retro, and its associated Sega site, Sega Retro
* Sthgbooru
* Ken Penders
* Chao Island
==References==