Tales of the Metal Virus | Sonic Speed Reading

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to order soon so you can get that sent over before father's day arrives and you can save yourself some cash that you can then put back into your wallet hey don't skip on the fries mac my lady's eating good tonight thank you again to extra for sponsoring this video and uh let's get on with it welcome back to sonic's speed reading and welcome back to the metal virus now while we did deviate away last time when we covered the tangle and whisper mini series we are returning to the middle virus but not to the main narrative not quite yet anyway things are about to heat up in that story so before we do that i actually wanted to cover the second annual of idw sonic now if you don't know what an annual is that's basically a comic that comes out once a year that's just a little bit bigger and just tells a little bit different stories from the main core comic book all the big superhero books do this archie sonic even did it in its own way with the super specials and in idw's case they've done a collection of short stories in the first year all of them were very pleasant little nothing stories nothing super impactful like there was a sonic fan club and tangled up for a second like silver and blaze went and put a garden together just really cute stuff like that nothing major the second annual on the other hand focuses entirely on the denizens of sonic's world and how they handle the metal virus so as you can imagine the stories are a little bit more intense this time around the biggest of the stories in this annual would have to be well big's big adventure this story basically tells us where big the cat has been during the entirety of the idw run and wouldn't you know it he's actually been around this entire time just right off screen each page of big's journey actually shows where he's been during a major event in the comic book so like we see sonic zip by in the sewers below a battle he had in issue one hanging out in barricade town when rough and tumble took over the place in spiral hill village when tangle is tangling with all the egg bots in the mountainous forests where sonic and shadow were doing battle right outside of windmill village just cute things like that like even up in the egg fleet during the neometal fight or on the shuttle when the entire cast came together to go to angel island to fight off super neo metal it just takes you through the entire series just from a slightly different perspective think of lion king one and a half that's basically what you're getting with big story here and at the same time it also is a lovely callback to how he was portrayed in sonic adventure 2 where they removed him from a main playable character but he would still show up in these incredibly random spots and it's all beautifully drawn by jonathan gray i gotta admit when jonathan first started off in the archie series while he did have a very defined look to everything i was not a big fan of his stuff but it just goes to show you how an artist can vastly improve because he has some of the most detailed line art i have seen from any artist for this franchise seriously this art is so busy yet so much fun to pick apart and you can still tell it's grey stuff but at the same time it still feels more like sonic we'll talk about his art a little bit more when we cover the older archie issues but this is just a really fun really cool story and we won't get into every single detail because we are going to be covering some of these other scenarios a little bit later but just for example when rough and tumble first got infected and then thrown down into that pit we get confirmation they are still alive because we see their glowing red eyes when big almost comes across them and it is so creepy it is such a fantastic panel we even get hints of zombot charmy in one of the panels and just man look at the composure of this arc this is amazing you can even see the metal virus starting to infect the panels ah oh it's so good and it keeps going yes like the panels get more infected with each passing page it's ah this is so beautiful but yes uh back to the story itself long and short of it big is going through all these different scenarios going to all these different places in search of froggy big surprise so while he goes through the entirety of all the story lines of idw up to this point he finally catches up with froggy and say what you will about this character i know there's a lot of detractors of him thanks to his gameplay in the original sonic adventure but man he's just the most precious boy he barely shows any emotion but the moment he comes across froggy is just so much relief so much joy and it's kind of incredible that he's been somewhat oblivious to everything that's been going on but at the same time has managed to avoid infection even though all this chaos is happening just right around the corner from where he's at and you think you might be in for a happy ending for froggy and big but it's only when he finally comes across his amphibian friend do we see that the zombots start to take notice of him but that's okay because if you also recall big can take care of himself and he actually fights off zombots and so does froggy who uh just hops onto a random zombot uh-oh so while we were looking over this beautiful vista in the first page of this we finally come back around to the end of the book where we see that froggy has indeed been turned and big as well as his home and the surrounding environment are also infected i really would never expect to find this much beauty and this much of an emotional rollercoaster when it comes to big the cat this is a fantastic short story the beginning and end beautifully juxtaposed every panel is just ah like you could re-read this thing over and over and over again and find new details every time that's the kind of art on display this is just fantastic but we're not done there because uh well this is gonna keep hitting you right in the heart the next story features two brand new characters knight the owl a disc jockey and don the rooster a custodian these two are employees of ktbr sunset city's number one station for news and advice wow there's that sunset city place again well golly i just feel like subscribing to a channel that would blatantly steal that for their own sonic based podcast anyway we see knight the owl who's burning the midnight oil with everybody he runs a collins show so he just waits for people to call in and he just basically spouts off advice to them and i gotta say i love that they use two species of bird that generally have specific characteristics applied to them every time you see them in a cartoon and then just completely reverse that so night the owl is bright sunny friendly and chipper but meanwhile you got don who's a rooster but has dark muted colors and is bitter and cynical and short tempered it's j that's fantastic like i said dawn is a custodian and they even point out he's not a night person i can't imagine a rooster would enjoy an overnight shift so you can understand why he's so cranky dawn's busy picking up a bunch of trash that knight just seems to leave around everywhere and while they share a little back and forth knight gets his first caller of the evening hello you're on the air what's your name waves off donnie about to start his show he's done this a hundred times before you can tell this dude is ready for any kind of problem thrown his way except for this one instead of looking for relationship advice or trouble at work this caller gala starts things off in a shaky tone she says she's sorry she didn't know who to call and i always hear this number on the radio now a nervous voice is probably nothing new tonight so he carries on just wants to know what's on gala's mind but the shakiness quickly shifts over to desperation she says that she needs help these people they're following me they look sick knight looks clearly shaken and even don stops what he's doing to turn around gala goes on to describe what we already know to be the zombot and since this is sunset city we already know that this takes place before the infamous shadow story the virus has just hit town and knight does his best to calm gala down while keeping his own fear in check and don who has stopped his custodial duties looks on clearly nervous knight tells gala that this sounds like a job for the police but it's cut off gala has tried that but there's no answer i think they found and then she's gone don asks what's going on knight just responds he doesn't know he's gonna take a listen and he keeps trying to pick up the phone you're on my son came home looking sick i took his temperature but now a scream and another click another phone call road's blocked i can't get out somebody else someone's covered in metal another person they think it's spreading each word bubble another cry for help a panic plea until there is finally nothing but a radio hiss don has heard enough clearly the city is in deep trouble and if they take the truck now they could get 100 miles away by sunrise knight responds but sunset city's in trouble and we're the number one station for news and advice and don responds as i would and knight tries to plea saying that the people need but before he can get the obvious word help out his lips or beak i guess dawn snaps on him telling him for once in his life to shut up about the people i'm not waiting around to get killed by some metal monsters because of your feather-headed sense of pride i didn't expect a sonic comic to flat out use the big k word but here we are so yeah dawn's looking out for number one he ain't sticking around just to be a noble hero and who can really blame him something crazy is going down it's time to hit the road but knight shockingly sees another phone call coming in and immediately picks up desperate for any kind of information hello you're on the air can you tell me what's going on and a desperate voice responds thank goodness you're still there the voice says that they're with the restoration and they say that there's a metal virus spreading across the city turning people into zombots which we already knew but more importantly they are setting up a safe house but they have no way of getting the word out to survivors their station is the last in the area still broadcasting and people are listening knight is the only one that can help them meanwhile outside don tries to start his truck turns over a couple times and finally roars to life and when it does a radio station comes through and can i just say how precious it is that dawn's truck has ktbr's radio station ready to go clearly he listens to it on the way home i i think that's precious because yes the voice that comes out is none other than knight the owls who says that you think reading the restoration's emergency instructions really will help and the helpful person on the other end who let's be real is probably amy tells knight that it's the only chance they've got knight says that if even one person is spared then it's worth it to him and once you know what that cranky comes back in oh that's a it's a bird name don't worry about it guys with a hammer and boards he says that he had to go get some supplies from out back you just keep on yapping and i'll make sure nothing gets into the station and that's what they do we have another funny little quip between these two again but as we pan out from outside we see a zombot has found the radio station giving us a dark implication of what's gonna be happening for these two characters they're probably not gonna last too long but as long as they can broadcast they're gonna do their best for the people out there these are two brand new characters to the sonic universe at least the idw universe they've had a grand total of six pages to endear us to them and i think they did the trick showing us that yes sonic does make a massive difference in this world but it's empathy and kindness of everyday people coming together that really helped make a difference and sunset city would have been much worse off without these two giving it everything they got and if this is the only time that we get these two i mean that'll be a shame but man i won't be forgetting these characters anytime soon i also want to point out that i love i love that when knight is surprised by don's return he flips his entire head around like an actual owl would i love little details like that the next story is probably one of my all-time favorite narratives dealing with metal sonic we don't get a lot of time to reflect on the robot himself and it's only fitting that his story is called reflections not a single word is spoken and we don't need it because we know everything that's going on with this robot without him needing an utter a single word there's playback between his battle with silver and sonic that catches his eye and after he watches himself get flung off into the horizon he continues his walk down the hallway clenching his fists he then walks by a jar of the metal virus and next to the screen he sees sonic being infected by it he watches intently and then turns back to the vat reaching a handout then pulling back trepidatious about touching this and then with a bit of determination he sticks his finger into the metal virus he looks upon it pondering and then watches it slide down his finger and back into the vat and metal sonic just stands there staring at his hand until a snap from everybody's favorite platypus are your sensors malfunctioning i said get out so yes i lied there is a little bit of dialogue when starling comes in and just ruins the moment saying that he can't believe this the doctor's greatest creation shambling around my lab like a zombot so on its shiny surface there might not seem like there's a lot going on here but this is actually some of the most characterization metal sonic has ever gotten especially since it was decreed that he was not allowed to speak and if you've heard me argue with channel pup on our podcast that's kind of how i like him but that doesn't mean he is without character and he's without motivation you see metal sonic is designed to replace and surpass sonic metal must know that he was built to be sonic superior he was built to match him but he never has despite all of his best efforts he never really has been the same as son and he very clearly desperately wants to be sonic to the point that he is willing to infect himself like sonic is to better replicate him and seeing the virus just slide off of him is telling him is telling the reader that he isn't sonic he will never be sonic also on another level what's to stop eggman from replacing metal sonic with an actual zombified metal sonic even the things that make him unique not even that he can keep to himself anymore we have seen time and again that eggman is capable of building robots with proper sentience and despite how scary and silent metal sonic usually is and should be he is an incredibly advanced robot and there's no reason to think that there isn't some sense of autonomy to this character a vicious murder machine sure but one with his own ambitions and worries and frustrations he quite literally has no mouth and must scream i don't think metal sonic should ever speak partially out of utility partially out of presence and also because of things like this this is fantastic storytelling and this would not exist if metal was allowed to blabber on whenever he wanted i don't know who said this but somebody in the comments of one of our episodes of sunset city also said that they liked that metal seemed to be what eggman didn't understand about sonic he's sonic without the soul without that wit without that charm eggman only sees the power and the speed but doesn't understand what makes sonic who he is what gives sonic that drive that keeps eggman a brilliant scientist always on the losing side of things metal as fantastic of a character as he is and a rival will always be a monument to both eggman's genius and his own failings and metal sonic unlike knuckles unlike shadow will never actually step out from sonic's shadow he has it in his name he is meant to be a copy of sonic and even there in his one purpose he falls short man that's a lot of talking for a short story that didn't give us any that is until that quick ironic quip from starling at the end there about zombot just man what a great story but unfortunately this is where things kind of take a dive in terms of quality it's not to say these next two stories aren't good but the art isn't quite up to snuff and the basic premise of these just not great either and they certainly aren't gonna give you the emotional gut punch these first three did we get starline in this next one for eggman's day off and this is before starline starts to question everything eggman does but we do see a little bit more of that in the story and all this really is is starline looking through his portals seeing how everything's going with the metal virus but comes across eggman screaming in the middle of a room starline freaks out and jumps in to aid him and then just collapses in on him and just very confused he thought he was in trouble but no robotnik was just being dramatic he's just looking for the light switch and now that starline's here he might as well show him to the egg it's his inner sanctum his home away from home which is actually still at home just a little more underground i just i love that it's a quick nod and a jab at batman that's adorable and yeah eggman's a little bit of a nerd we see a bunch of models in the background here this is where eggman spends his day just to take some time off and have a little me time he works on personal projects in a quiet space where he can get the egg and it's kind of cute because he says that he's never had visitors here before so he just starts showing off all this stupid toys to starline i like this weird mega man inspired like super metal sonic in the background there i'm sure that's just a little placeholder thing but they went and colored it so i don't know what's going on there i do love that hit also has fully articulated sonic toys like i i don't think we've ever gotten toys that look as good as what we're seeing in this comic i would definitely like something this nice look is sonic's oh sanke even has a rotating torso we don't have that i don't know if we need that but whatever i have enough sonic toys he basically says that these toy robots he uses to figure out strategies and battle plans for the weeks ahead it just starts smashing the sonic and eggman toys together and even there sonic comes out victorious and iggy's like well it's not always hedgehog this and hedgehog that sometimes it's the fox and chameleon saying soon my enemies will be zombots nor more will they get in my way but rather they will do my bidding but i do have to say that these particular toys do not look like zombots they look like metal series robots and i think this was the artist trying to get away with making a metal sbo and a metal tails and i'm sure just like every other person that was reading this was trying to absorb as much as they could from the shelves and whatever robot designs they could get away with as opposed to whatever the hell this silly ass story is starline of course is just complimenting the crap out of everything his scene saying that these are so impressive so detailed so and then he comes across a metal star line and there's an awkward pause between the two [Laughter] clearly alluding to eggman potentially turning on starline when the time is right well eggman snatches the toy out of starline's hand and shoves them off saying that it's eggman's day off not his so get back to it what happens in the egg cave stays in the egg cave knock next time also i do love that they use the same type paints that they use in sonic 3. i forget what it's called but batman and the animated series is like art deco or something like that i don't know a cute little callback but yeah that's all that story was really nothing going on there just a cute little whatever something i would expect from annual one definitely a weaker story after everything else we've seen so far we then carry on to the chaotix and flock together in this story we focus on vector and espio as they go on a mission to track down charming who as you might remember was the first of the main game cast to be turned into a zombie and i'm not gonna spend a great deal of time on this this is a more action focused story basically they've been searching around everywhere they can they are on a shuttle of some sort i don't know if it's full of survivors or they're helping out their point is they're up in the sky in a shuttle and before page one is done the shuttle runs across a flock of zombot flickies who are all clearly the ones from 3d blast a lovely little callback there and in their mists is zombot charming and victor ain't wasting no time he hops on out with an item capsule and a riot shield you just need a riot shield ever heard of it but yeah like i said i really don't want to spend a great deal of time on this story it is some fun banter and action featuring two fantastic characters but at the end of the day you know what's going to be happening here it's vector and sbo teaming up trying to dodge metal flickies and with a mix of sbo smoke bombs and vector sharp hearing discerning charmy's buzz between all the metal flapping they managed to contain charmy in the item bubble because even in the event of a zombot apocalypse the chaotix always find what they're looking for so again not a great deal here this is just kind of showing you how vector and sbo came across charming because the next time we come across them they will have charmy in their possession and this story just kind of bridges the gap and also gives us a little bit more time with two fan favorite characters and once again showing the bond between them we don't get a whole lot of opportunities to show the brotherhood between these goofy characters so this is nice to see them all here together even if one of them is a murderous robot zombie the last story focuses on jewel and some of the members of the sonic fan club we saw from the first annual and one of these kids is running into town looking for tangle because he doesn't know where the rest of the fan club is his friends need help fortunately tangle is not around but jewel is still walking around town in high heels in a business suit fantastic and while we have seen jewel be a bit of a coward when she's around a bunch of crazy villains and all the wacky that seems to happen when tangle's around she's still courageous in her own way and certainly isn't gonna turn down a kid who is looking for their friend so they head on out of town and start looking around they head on over to spiral hill farms and jewel makes note that it's strange because usually there's a flicker to a round but no sign of anything but as they arrive they hear a call for help and as they rush they find one of the friends surrounded on all sides by the goo of the metal virus thankfully tingle had the wherewithal to tell jewel not to touch this stuff so she in turn tells the kids not to touch this stuff so of course they go and touch that stuff kids are just idiots now that this friend has been saved they head on out of the barn to be greeted by that's right a vomiting face ship has returned and i still love that visual they rush away from the gushing metal virus spotting two more of the sonic fan club who have already been zombotified so uh they're just gonna have to just keep on moving zombots begin to surround them on all sides but jewel rushes them back to the center of town where they're supposedly gonna be safe except for the fact that jewel has the metal virus on her hands because as we've been prominently shown over and over again gloves are just a part of their anatomy because they can just be infected with their gloves so yes the stupid kids have doomed everybody and even if they hadn't the faceship has made its way to spiral hill where it's about to dump another gumper on their faces jewel calls for help from tangle saying that things are looking bad probably should have mentioned that she's covered in the metal virus that probably would have been helpful because we catch up to them later with tangle right outside of jewel's little mineral museum and we end with tangle looking for her friend who has already been turned into a zombie but to see how that encounter actually shakes out we will have to jump back to the main series but we're not gonna do that today because uh we've already covered quite a bit with this annual and i gotta say i'm not usually a fan of these secondary stories i usually just want the main plot and just carry on from there i was never a big fan of that back in the archie days but when a story is told genuinely well it's gonna resonate with you anyway and while i could have lived without the jewels story or the chaotic story or that starline story i mean it gets us from point a to point b but i never really needed that anyway like there's enough hints of some animosity between starline and eggman i don't need to see vector capturing charmy and as we'll see later i don't really need to see that jewel was turned into a zombot not a massive deal to the overall story but it's there if fans want it that said the first three stories we've got in this annual are absolutely fantastic they are well written they are beautifully drawn and they truly stand out on their own like yeah we don't need big story when it comes to the metal virus we will see a zombot big later on so if you wanted to know how that happened now you know but more importantly it just it's just a great story on its own and it's also a brilliant way to catch people up with everything that's happened so far in the two years up to that point in the idw storyline it's a great recap and it's a great introduction to a largely overlooked large character and our two new characters the chicken and the owl here this was a far more humanizing story than i've seen in a lot of sonic media even stories that featured actual humans this is how a lot of people would first experience the metal virus you wouldn't be seeing it firsthand while you're in the middle of a battle between two pet guys you wouldn't be the central focus you wouldn't be the person saving the day you'd just be a person going by their everyday life and it's suddenly abruptly violently interrupted with a horrible bit of news and you have to watch helplessly from a distance as this terrible thing consumes everything it's genuinely unnerving and still bittersweet showing the empathy of just regular people doing their best to help the people around them and yeah like i said six pages with brand new characters they're quickly defined and they leave a lasting impression and of course if you're a metal sonic fan the metal sonic short story is the absolute standout here i have a hard time picking between that one and the big one just because it's so beautifully drawn but just as a single short story i think the metal sonic one has to be my favorite of this entire book and yes i'm biased metal sonic is one of my all-time favorite sonic characters in terms of design and everything i just i just love that character and without betraying the creepy coldness of this robot they've given him so many layers and they don't need to beat you over the head with long-winded diatribes or convoluted plans of revenge no stupid crap like that we know everything metal is feeling just from the pictures on the page here and like i said this stands out as one of the best narratives featuring this character and it's barely a handful of pages but it brings so much more to him than quite possibly most of the games he's appeared in and at the same time when he finally shows up in the metal virus saga it's going to hit that much harder we won't get into it yet but just trust me on this this is the one story out of this entire annual that i feel actually betters a big impactful climatic moment this is the one story i feel genuinely improves the metal virus if you've read it first and yes i know that annual technically dropped a little bit later than where we are right now in the metal virus but i felt it was important to get this stuff out here now because it's about to get real dark in the narrative so felt it was good to get out the door now so i hope you enjoyed your time with me today thank you so much for hanging out with me as you are discovering even in a show called speed reading the metal virus is indeed all-consuming we've been covering this for quite a long time and i do apologize we are going to wrap this up sooner rather than later we have two maybe three more videos covering the metal virus specifically and then we're going to move on from there if you want more sonic content from me be sure you're checking out sunset city my weekly show i do with my good chums channel pup suris and the grand return of wayne if you don't know these guys get familiar with them they push out phenomenal content on youtube they're fantastic people and they deserve your time so be sure to hang out with us every friday 9 a.m pacific time 12 p.m eastern time as we do the show live on youtube on that channel and of course i can't stress it enough thank you so much for the patrons who support me over on patreon i've been horribly disorganized with what i'm putting out there in terms of rewards but for what we got right now i think we're having a great time on discord we're going to continue to organize that up and make that a fun little space and i'm trying to do more q and a's more watch alongs more fun activities there especially for patrons so if that's something you want to do and you have the means please be sure you go and pitch in a buck or more if you feel like it over on my patreon and of course if you're on there message me i'm not the best at getting back immediately but i get back to every single message and i'm always listening to feedback and i always want to know how i can approve for you so yes all these amazing people think it's a good idea to do that and i i'm blown away by that so thank you but that's going to do it for today guys i've done enough rambling for one night and i got to cover balan i gotta talk about dinosaurs and we got some sonic it into because someone's getting a big birthday those months so i gotta get back to work on all that so until next time toot sonic warriors you

Channel: Game Apologist

Views: 100,521

Rating: 4.9722505 out of 5

Keywords: game apologist, sonic speed reading, metal virus, metal sonic, chaotix, big the cat, froggy, sonic adventure, dr. eggman, dr. starline, eggcave, metal starline, tails, nite the owl, dawn the rooster, sunset city, espio, metal charmy, vector, zombot, zombot arc, idw sonic, archie sonic, sonic comic, metal sonic infected, jewel the beetle, tangle, whisper, amy rose, knuckles, ekster wallets, videogames, gaming, sonic the hedgehog, shadow, sega, annual 2020, metal, issue 2, neo metal

Id: j9sSdJryEQ4

Length: 31min 40sec (1900 seconds)

Published: Wed Jun 09 2021