Sonic X

***Sonic X*** (Japanese: ソニックX Hepburn: *Sonikku Ekkusu*) is a Japanese anime television series created by TMS

  Entertainment and based on the *Sonic the Hedgehog* video game series published by Sega. *Sonic X* initially ran for fifty-two episodes, broadcast on TV Tokyo from April 6, 2003 to March 28, 2004. A further 26 aired in regions such as the United States, Europe, and the Middle East from 2005 to 2006. The show's American localization and broadcasting were handled by 4Kids Entertainment—which edited it and created new music—until 2012, when Saban Brands obtained the rights to the series, and in 2015 by Discotek Media.

## Plot

Sonic, Tails and Amy Rose are trying to rescue Cream the Rabbit and her pet Chao Cheese from Doctor Eggman, who has already retrieved the seven Chaos Emeralds. While attempting to destroy his base, one of Eggman's robots inadvertently shoots a machine containing the Emeralds, which activates the "Chaos Control" technique. This teleports Sonic, Eggman (and his robots), Tails, Amy, Cream, and Cheese, as well as Big the Cat (with his frog Froggy), Rouge the Bat, Knuckles the Echidna, and the Chaotix (a detectivecrew comprising Espio the Chameleon, Vector the Crocodile, and Charmy Bee) to Earth, the parallel-universe version of their world with humans. 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. Chris tries to hide the anthropomorphic friends 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.

Sonic and his friends still want to return home, so they repeatedly scuffle for the Emeralds with Doctor Eggman, his robot assistants—the hyperactive, attention-seeking Bokkun and the bumbling Bocoe 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 residents soon join the crusade and, when Eggman is defeated, they are all hailed as heroes.

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 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 cause space colony ARK to hurtle into Earth, destroying the planets in less than half an hour. Gerald did this in order to exact revenge on humanity, who he blamed for the death of his Granddaughter Maria after she was killed in a government raid on space colony ARK. Everyone teams up and works together to shut it down except Shadow, who is unsympathetic and believes he has fulfilled his purpose of revenge. Chris confronts Shadow, reminding him of Maria last wish for Shadow to be a protector of humanity; to guide and aid them. Moved to tears and with a new sense of purpose, Shadow teams up with Sonic and both power up using the Emeralds and teleport the ARK away from Earth, though Shadow is seeming killed in the process. Sonic, his friends, and Eggman reflect on Shadow's sacrifice and return to Earth.

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, forcing Cream and Cheese 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.

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. Along the way, Tails and Cosmo slowly fall in love with each other. Rouge finds Shadow alive in a capsule on Eggman's ship and he is later released (though he has lost his memory.) At first, he and Rouge assist Eggman (even saving Chris on one occasion) but after Shadow witnesses the death of resistance fighter who reminded him of Maria, both he and Rouge go off on their own to fight the Metered independently. Eggman eventually joins the Metarex though this is a ruse to gather more information. After discovering the origins, methods, and goals of the Metarex, Shadow 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. It was for this reason Shadow wanted Cosmo dead. 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, along with the Chaotix and Shadow, head 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. The Metarex then proceed to fuse together, forming a dragon-like plant monster that attaches itself to the giant seed. Sonic and Shadow use the chaos emerald to become Super Sonic and Super Shadow but are still unable to defeat the fused Metarex. 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. Tails hesitates, torn between saving the galaxy and killing Cosmo, but eventually finds the inner strength and annihilates the Metarex along with Cosmo, whose seed disperse throughout the galaxy along with the Planet Eggs stolen by the Metarex which return to their original planets. Dark Oak has a moment of repentance before dying while having a vision of being greeted by Earthia as he passes away. Shadow then apparently sacrifices himself to contain the ensuing explosion. After the battle, Sonic reappears and solemnly informs a heartbroken Tails that he could not save Cosmo and hands him one of her seeds. Back on Sonic's planet Eggman builds a device for Chris to return home, later claiming that this was done to reduce the strength of Team Sonic. The series ends with Chris returning home and business as usual for Sonic and his friends as they joyfully gear up to once again put a stop to Eggman's schemes. The final shots show Shadow's shadow on an alien planet (implying he survived) and Cosmo's seed sprouting in Tails' workshop.

## Why It Rocks

1. It is extremely faithful to the video game series it's based on, with several episodes actually being based on Sonic Adventure, its sequel, and Sonic Battle with some changes that were an improvement.
2. The plot is interesting and easy to follow. As it follows the same plots from the modern games, and has some new plots to make the show not look like rehash.
3. Excellent writing for all the episodes.
4. All of the episodes have some good morality.
5. The dialogue often had some cleverness and intelligence. There was even some in the 4Kids Dub.
6. Great animation.
7. Amazing music that uses tons of songs from the video game series.
8. Amazing character design that looks almost identical to the 2D designs of the Sonic characters on the cover art of the modern games.
9. All of the characters from the video game series appear in this show, (even the Chaotix) and they all kept their original personalities. However, there were some slight changes with Knuckles and Amy's personalities.
10. All of the characters from the video game series are given as much depth into their characters as they were given in the video games so they won't look tiresome and boring in this show.
11. The show tends to give all of the characters some good roles so they won't look like a useless background character. Even Cream & Cheese are given some of that.
12. All of the characters have some some good connections and relationships with one and other. Especially Tails and Cosmo.
13. Interesting and well developed new characters. Especially Chris Thorndyke and Cosmo.
14. Some hilarious moments.
15. Sonic Team worked on the show. They helped with things such as creating the characters, and has exclusively promoted new characters.
16. Awesome villains. Especially Dr. Eggman and Dark Oak.
17. Excellent voice acting. The voice cast from the games reprise their roles in the original Japanese, and voice actors from 4Kids voice them in the English Dub. It went as far as to Sega let the 4Kids voice actors voice the characters in Sonic games from 2005-2010.
18. Both the American and Japanese theme songs are awesome.
19. All of the seasons have a great climax that is both spectacular and very heartwarming.
20. It's the first (and only) Sonic show that actually has Sonic go into his super form. It's also the first that accurately implements the Chaos Emeralds, which were poorly represented in Adventures of Sonic The Hedgehog and Sonic Underground, and it's the first to feature the recurring ability in the video game franchise known as Chaos Control.
21. The action is amazing.
22. Tons of amazing and memorable fight scenes.
23. It has the first and only appearance of Dark Sonic.
24. The voice cast (especially Jason Griffith as Sonic and Shadow, Dan Green as Knuckles, Amy Palant as Tails, and Mike Pollock as Dr. Eggman) for the dub is very spot on.
25. Mike Pollock's career as voicing Dr. Eggman in the video games started because of his role as Dr. Eggman in this show, and he along with the other 4Kids voice actors that were voicing the characters at the time were casted to voice the characters in the video games starting with Shadow the Hedgehog, and he was the only voice actor that wasn't replaced when all of the characters were recasted in 2010.
26. There is a lot more emotion and meaning than any other Sonic show.
27. There are tons of heartwarming moments.
28. It uses material that not only makes it enjoyable, but incredibly memorable.
29. Despite the dub not including some of the characters' deaths, Japanese culture or text, and one or two plot holes being created, 4Kids was okay with editing the episodes.
30. All of the seasons had excellent finales at the end of each one of them.

## Bad Quality

1. Despite the show revolving around Sonic and his friends, Chris Thorndyke (who shares the role as the main protagonist with Sonic) sometimes gets more screen time than the the other characters due to him being a surrogate.

## Trivia

* In Brazil, it was distributed by Spot Films, which is actually none other than an alternate name for Vídeo Brinquedo.
* Out of all the Sonic cartoons, this one for odd reasons has the lowest rating on the Internet Movie Database, despite it being so popular in the US and France, and it's often considered the best Sonic cartoon out of all of them.
* Despite this Sonic cartoon being a lot more closer to the source material, the Sonic wiki says it's "loosely" based on the video game series.
* The voice actor for Sonic at the time, Ryan Drummond, offered to voice Sonic for the dub but was rejected by 4Kids for not living in New York. Eventually, Drummond was removed as the voice actor for the Sonic games, after Sega of America decided to replace the entire voice cast for the games with the 4Kids cast shortly before the death of Deem Bristow, the previous voice actor for Dr. Eggman. Allegedly, he was only told when he asked if he would be needed for voice recordings in Shadow the Hedgehog from the beginning. Even though Drummond wanted to continue voicing Sonic, he was rejected from voicing him for Shadow the Hedgehog, which resulted in many complaints from fans of the previous voice cast.
* When the first thirteen episodes of Series 2/Season 3 were released on DVD in the US, they were packaged as the The Complete 5th Season (with thirteen episodes being a "season", and those episodes being the fifth division of thirteen episodes); also, the cover art to the DVD resembles the poster for the movie Firefox, with the Blue Typhoon in the same space as the MiG-31, the movie's titular jet fighter.
* Sonic X once had the most number of episodes among the Sonic television series at a total of seventy-eight until it was surpassed by Sonic Boom with their episode "Robots From The Sky Part 2".

## Reception

Sonic X has a 6.1/10 rating on the IMDB, a 6.5/10 on MyAnimeList, a 8.3/10 on TV.Com, a 3.7/5 on Common Sense Media, 3.1/10 on Hulu, and a Metacritic User rating of 8.2/10 based on 53 reviews.