Review: Season 2, Episode 15

Considering that this episode was the result of an emergency eject of the episode I’d actually planned to put here, this turned out just about as well as I could’ve hoped. In fact, I think the season as a whole is going to be a lot stronger for it. This episode conveniently tied together the separate plot threads of Omega, Cyber Sonic, Shadow, SCOPE, GUN, Johnny, and the Commander all at once, in a way that otherwise would’ve been done rather frantically in the finale. What’s funny is that this whole thing was actually a mishmash of two entirely separate episode ideas.

On the one hand, we have Shadow’s first days with GUN, told as a flashback while exploring the ruins of GUN headquarters. This was always planned as a follow-up to S2 E9 A Shadow of Myself, originally planned to happen around now, but deferred off to next season when I realized how crammed the episodes would be around this time. On the other hand, we had Omega’s backstory with Omochao, which was planned to be told under very different circumstances. Left with an episode slot to fill, it quickly occurred to me that I could combine the two ideas to produce this nice tying together of things.

Shadow’s episode definitely would’ve been a little different as it was originally planned. I always had it in mind to be “The Expert Mode Episode.” I thought it into existence purely for the purpose of canonizing the Expert Mode of the Shadow the Hedgehog game, where Shadow undergoes an unspecified training, getting cheered along by all his friends, and finally making amends with the Commander. Given some of the questionable claims made by some of the characters in that mode, it would be easy to dismiss it as non-canon. But then Sonic ’06 rolls around, and now Shadow is a trained GUN Agent. And the sad thing is, a vast majority of players probably have no idea Shadow actually led directly into ’06 like that. Heck, even I didn’t know that Expert Mode existed when I first started writing this story, and Shadow the Hedgehog is one of my all time favorites. So I made it my mission with this episode to draw that line for all to see. Of course, in my original vision, that would’ve meant putting a bit stronger of a spotlight on that particular event. We would’ve had Shadow offering himself to the mercy of the Commander first, then Shadow getting settled in the mess hall second, and finally seeing the training third, which then would’ve lasted a majority of the rest of the episode, instead of being cut down into highlights. But since there’s technically no new content in there, is was the easiest place to cut down to make room for Omega’s story. In that original format, Omega’s distress call likely would’ve come at the end, and that story would’ve been deferred to some other episode. Which wouldn’t have made sense considering that Omega was just on the base for Shadow’s training, but I wasn’t thinking that hard.

So anyways, then there’s Omega’s story. I’ve talked about how weird of a place Omega has been in this season, and now that I’m committed to making it a proper character arc, taking advantage of this newfound episode space for him seemed like a must. I had the Omochao story idea on one side, and the Iron Jungle/Lava Shelter on the other, and I knew that neither of them would make a particularly complete story arc on its own. The former was intended to be a brief flashback to add context to a present-focused Omochao episode, while the latter had no particular plans at all. It was obvious that I could fit them on either side of the Expert Mode ideas to create a complete narrative that shifts focus back and forth between Omega and Shadow, and the clean weaving that could be done between them is definitely what encouraged me to go ahead with the episode in this way. So why did I want Omega and Omochao to be best pals? That’s…an interesting question, actually. It probably started with the simple thought of “if I were to bring in Omochao as a character, how could I possibly integrate him into this otherwise serious world in a way that makes sense?” I can definitely tell you that this was among some of the earliest plans for the series, as I referenced them before the series even began! I used Cast by the Light, the SA2 novelization, to test run my idea of Omochao being a defecting Eggman robot. Apparently I didn’t hate how it came out on paper, because the idea persisted all these five years since. But anyways, as with any character who gets an introduction into the series, I wasn’t going to bring in Omochao without exploring the character, and pairing him up with Omega just…kind of made sense to me, in an ironic sort of way. Besides the fact that I just needed more character development for Omega in general, I also just really liked the idea of these two polar opposites being not so different after all. And with Omochao being the older and more experienced of the two, combined with his innate drive to help, and the fact that the circumstances of Omega’s rise to sentience have always been ignored and left ripe for exploration, the pieces all just kind of fit together. And once I decided that I wanted to dive deeper into Omega’s whole rival complex that I’ve been setting up, it was clear that it needed to be something rooted in how he defines himself, which means looking back at how he gained sentience, which means fasttracking the Omochao story.

Hmmm…what else? I thought this would be a long one, but I’m thinking a lot of this episode turned out to be mostly self-explanatory. Another advantage that came of doing this episode now in place of my original plans was refreshing Johnny’s role in the season. He hasn’t really done anything since before the midseason arc, even though he was theoretically introduced to be an important part of this season, so it’s probably for the best that he stepped back into the spotlight here so he can be better prepared for the finale. I’m not super thrilled by that fact that Johnny has still appeared for more total screen time in flashbacks than he has in the present day, but at the same time, him being the guy who was everywhere and saw everything is pretty much the entire point of his character, so it sure doesn’t surprise me. Hopefully that can be turned around soon enough, anyways. The other shame is that, with so few episodes under his belt, being relegated to a sequel to one of the few episodes he’s already been in sort feels like a cop out. On the one hand, I keep seeing nothing but flaws with this character I’ve created. On the other hand, I wonder if I’m just judging him too harshly because of the intentionally awkward circumstances surrounding him, with him supposed to be out of place among the rest of the Sonic cast. I don’t know.

I suppose I also ought to mention Maria. The new Maria, that is. As I mentioned above, part of the entire point of making the “Expert Mode Episode” was to make sense of all the theoretically important things that happen there, and showing this scene—which the game implied would happen but never showed for itself—was just the logical extreme of that. The man who swore to kill Shadow invited him to his home to meet his newborn grandchild, and that’s just…that’s the kind of thing I wish we had more of out of the Sonic world. These raw, real, touching moments, in all of their awkward glory. I knew I had to write this scene, and nothing was going to stop me. The only barrier in my way was navigating around the Commander’s awkward dodging of the baby’s identity. I had the opportunity to do whatever I wanted in that area, and giving the Commander a granddaughter named Maria just felt too perfect to pass up. Anyways, as of the present, Maria is now five years old, quickly getting close to six. Old enough to meet the minimum age requirements of a Sonic character, if you know what I mean…

And now for the trivia!

• The title of this episode, “Arrival,” is a simple yet meaningful pun. The episode, in general, is marked by things arriving. Omochao arriving to Omega was a pretty important event, as was Shadow’s arrival in the GUN base. And of course, there’s the Commander’s little new arrival. But, read as it is, the episode title also refers to “A Rival,” a quote which popped up at least a couple of times in the episode, and should hopefully have a pretty obvious meaning by now.
• The following locations/levels from previous Sonic games were shown or mentioned in this episode:
  • Eggman’s Secret Base (seen in Sonic Heroes)
  • Final Egg (Sonic Adventure)
  • GUN Fortress (Shadow the Hedgehog)
  • Egg Fleet (Sonic Heroes)
  • Central City (Shadow the Hedgehog)
  • Iron Jungle (Shadow the Hedgehog)
  • Lava Shelter (Shadow the Hedgehog)
  • Westopolis (Expert Mode, Shadow the Hedgehog)
  • The Doom (Expert Mode, Shadow the Hedgehog)
  • Mad Matrix (Expert Mode, Shadow the Hedgehog)
  • Space Gadget (Expert Mode, Shadow the Hedgehog)
• This episode features the Chaos Project introduction of both Omochao and the President (and also his secretary, I guess). However, both characters have already been referenced in the past.
  • Big and Froggy were transformed into Omochao by Heavy Magician, and Froggy remained that way, in S1 E16 Maggie Magician’s Magic MacGuffin.
  • The President has been cited often as the authority figure who authorizes GUN arrests and the distribution of medals to civilians. He is mentioned as having played played a slightly more direct role in S0 E13 Black Cloak Forever Part 2.
• Omega’s first moments of life call back heavily to the similar experiences of Gamma seen in Sonic Adventure.
  • Gamma being “too sappy” is used as a justification for why Omega was programmed to be so extraordinarily violent.
• In this episode, Omochao frequently refers to himself in the third person. While this happens occasionally in SA2, it is generally not recognized as something that Omohchao commonly does. However, in Japanese, Omochao has a verbal tic, causing him to end a majority of his sentences with the word “chao”. (Personally, I’m glad they chose not to translate that—he’s perfectly annoying enough as he is.) I chose to use the third person reference as an English equivalent to that quirk.
• Omochao’s dialogue frequently references quotes from SA2, and a couple from Heroes. His speech pattern was designed, in general, to always sound like he’s giving a tutorial, even without the particular references to buttons and control schemes.
• The scene showing the epilogue of Sonic Heroes drew attention to many particular plot points that have been introduced in the last few seasons of The Chaos Project.
  • Metal Sonic using the last of his strength to look up at Tails is a canon thing that actually happened in the original scene. I was pleasantly surprised to see it.
  • Eggman claiming that the Eggman Empire will pay the Chaotix is a line that was added in. Wait a minute, you don’t know about that one yet…
  • The most important one of all, Omega picking up Metal Sonic, as if with the intention to keep him, is the canon sequence that pretty much created this entire season.
  • The scene goes on after the original cutscene ended, showing Sonic coming back around to talk to Shadow about a medal. This is the medal that Sonic was recently shown being offered in Adventures in Hedgehog Hunting, and the fact that Shadow’s always had this medal waiting for him was introduced as far back as Black Cloak Forever Part 2.
    • The fact that Sonic ignored and dismissed Shadow so hard in the original Heroes is just…ugh. I can’t believe I had to jump through these hoops to make this scene work, when Sonic should, by all rights, have been very concerned about Shadow.
    • The scene goes on to show Sonic and Shadow taking the picture which is seen on the President’s desk (next to a medal) in Shadow the Hedgehog cutscenes.
    • I’ve often seen people questioning when this photo could have possibly been taken, and wondered why they didn’t make the easy assumption that it happened…well, right here. They’re right in thinking that it couldn’t have happened any other time, but…whatever, just one more question I get to have fun answering through flashbacks, I guess.
• The flashback scene win which the photo is taken flashback was originally planned to appear (slightly modified) in Shadow of Time, as one of the typical once-per-chapter flashbacks, but it never ended up fitting in anywhere particularly well, so it was left out. Glad I got the chance to write it somewhere!
  • This scene features Shadow using (*gasp*) an edgy swear word for the first time!
    • Sonic’s utterly shocked reaction was meant to be a joke on that fact. The purpose is to show that we have now left the territory of kid-friendly Sonic Heroes and entered the edgy Shadow the Hedgehog.
    • This is also the first time that an uncensored swear word has been used in The Chaos Project, with the exception of Future Sonic using the conjoined word “hellscape” in S2 E1 Time Heals All Wounds (which evoked a similarly shocked reaction from our Sonic).
  • In this scene and the one before it, Shadow also cleverly uses the phrase “I am what?” referring to the theme of Shadow the Hedgehog, “I Am All of Me…” for similar reasons.
• “Goodbye forever, Shadow the Hedgehog.” What a strange way to end a game, I’m sure many people thought. Ignoring that fact that it’s a translation error, and that he should be ending on the same words that Sonic used to end SA2 (Sayonara, Shadow the Hedgehog—or “Adios” in Japanese), it regardless has a pretty strange implication. Under what context would a person say goodbye to themselves? It was always sounded pretty suicidal to me, if we’re being honest. And in the context of the last conversation he had with the Commander, which we saw a flashback to in Final Mode, making it definitively canon? To me, this was never a theory, just an obvious conclusion from the facts presented. Shadow’s next move, at the end of that game, was to offer himself to the Commander for execution—to “respectfully accept my fate.” And this is what I thought even before I knew that Shadow became a GUN agent in ’06. That just made it all the more perfect. That’s what made me want to write this episode more than anything else. In many ways, it’s shocking to me that it took me this long to CP-canonize this theory. Although I suppose I mentioned it back in the Black Cloak arc. This is just the first time I’ve shown it.
• This episode seems to feature the return of the main character from Shadow of Myself, the Shadow Android who we all believed was the real Shadow. Sonic suggests that this could merely be a replica of that particular android, but Omega doesn’t quite seem to believe that. There’s no way to know for sure…
• This episode features the triumphant return of everyone’s favorite background character from Chaotix and the Computer Room Caper, Phil the uninformed GUN soldier! Poor guy’s always left out of the loop.
• This episode showcased the lighting system power surge that Shadow mentioned having seen before in Shadow of Myself.
• This episode features the events of Iron Jungle and Lava Shelter in the Neutral Story of Shadow the Hedgehog, though taking place slightly out of order compared to what one might expect. Given the oddity that is Shadow the Hedgehog canon, this is simply the next step in piecing it all together in a way that makes sense. There is no justifiable reason that these events should take place while an alien invasion is going on outside, so in this interpretation of canon, those things just got delayed a little bit.
  • The Egg Breaker fight that would ordinarily take place between the two levels was removed, and many lines from that scene were adopted into the Egg Dealer fight instead. This is because the Egg Breaker fight was already confirmed to have happened in Mad Matrix, seen in Chaotix and the Computer Room Caper. Also to improve the flow of the episode.
• The orders to eliminate a particular number of Shadow Androids was intentionally meant to sound like a typical level completion mission from Shadow the Hedgehog, even though no such mission actually existed in the game, and despite the fact that this mission ended up being ignored. You might say, in this reinterpreted level, that destroying the androids was the Hero mission, destroying the Egg Balloon with Eggman still on it was the (failed, time sensitive) Dark mission, and following Eggman into the base was the Neutral mission.
  • Omega greets Shadow in Iron Jungle with many of the same or slightly altered lines used in the original level.
• Johnny’s jump mech is a vehicle from Shadow the Hedgehog, which appears for use in Iron Jungle (although not the armed variant). I thought it’d be nice to show Johnny actually using one of the experimental weapons his unit is supposed to be known for. A joke was made about the fact that Shadow was successfully able to commandeer and pilot such a mech without any prior training, an ability he is stated to have in In Too Deep.
• Eggman tries strongly to convince Shadow that he is an android. This would seem to contradict a statement made by Eggman during the Devil Doom fight, apologizing for the android lie and assuring Shadow that he is the original. Most players have likely never heard this dialogue, as it only plays after the player has somehow managed to keep the boss fight going for longer than 10 grueling minutes. It is assumed that the fight canonically took less time than this, therefore, Eggman never said it. Instead, this speech was adopted into Eggman’s Expert Mode dialogue later on in the episode.
  • Eggman tries to use this manipulation to turn Shadow and Omega against one another. Seriously, why was that not a plot point in the original game? Omega was designed to fight Shadow, and is obsessed with destroying Eggman Robots. If he learned that Shadow was an Eggman Robot, and even Shadow believed it, they should have fought! Omega was created to fight Shadow, they hinted at that for years without ever making it a reality! That would’ve been an awesome fight! Certainly, it would’ve made more sense than battling Eggman immediately after siding with him in the previous level.
• After defeating the Egg Dealer, Shadow gives a unique new variant on his usual “this is who I am” speech, minus the dramatic flair of the Chaos Emeralds
• Johnny explains that his grandfather, Mr. U.G. Naka, was among the team that shut down the ARK 50 years ago. This refers to the fact that a random line of dialogue from the GUN soldiers in Shadow the Hedgehog (“Mr. Yuji Naka is alright”) can be heard both in the present day and in ARK flashbacks, suggesting that he was present for both events. This is the reason why Shadow recognizes the name.
  • This odd factoid is one of the inspirations behind creating Johnny’s character in the first place. There was a brief consideration of making Johnny himself U.G. Naka, before I realized that would make him much too old.
• The training room used by Shadow is stated to be based on the same technology that allows Shadow to travel inside of Eggman’s Computer in the Mad Matrix level.
  The existence of this level was canonized to The Chaos Project in Computer Room Caper.
  • Before I remembered that it was canon, I instead had the training room functioning very differently, with a VR-like device on Shadow’s head, and the panels in the room moving and adjusting in order to simulate the experiences he would be feeling in the VR. I considered a proper virtual world approach, but that felt like too much of a stretch for Sonic world technology of the time. (Again, I completely forgot that level existed, let alone was canon.)
• As the Commander explains the training to Shadow, he uses the phrase, “I know you’ll prove yourself to be an expert,” referencing the fact that this training course is literally expert mode.
• The encouraging words given to Shadow are mostly direct quotes from each respective character in their correct places, with the exception that references to game mechanics such as the Goal Ring, Lives, and the Pause Menu, were removed or substituted for more generic language.
• Each time Shadow pauses the simulation, the context of quoting the game is removed, freeing me to have the characters say whatever I need them to before resuming the original dialogue.
• Eggman’s encouraging words to Shadow adopt several quotes that were originally used for Eggman’s second such appearance in the game (“Are you upset with me for something?”). This was purely to streamline things, so I could use the content without bothering to bring back Eggman a second time.
• In an ideal scenario, where this episode wasn’t sharing the spotlight with Omega, Shadow hearing the words from Maria might have gone down a bit differently. Perhaps Shadow would’ve been angry about words being put into her mouth like that, or perhaps the Commander would’ve taken the time to explain to someone why Shadow seems to be okay with it. Regardless, the flow of that scene was already interrupted a bit in that particular moment, and I thought it was important to get things back on track with the episode wrapping up by that point.
  • For similar reasons, the level where Black Doom would speak to Shadow was cut out entirely. This would’ve been sure to evoke some kind of reaction, and I decided the scene was better off without stopping for that. Theoretically, it probably did still happen, somehow, and I can always flash back to it if I need to.
• During the President’s scene in Expert Mode, his secretary whispers something into his ear. In the original game, this dialogue was heard quite clearly. “Mr. President, you’re late with your tee time with the Chief Cabinet Secretary of Japan.” There are obviously several problems with this. One, Japan doesn’t exist in Sonic’s world. Two, the implication is that the President is out playing golf when he claims to be working on the reconstruction efforts following the war. The same joke repeated later discussed his “karaoke party with the Minster of France.” Which, I mean, sure, he could be doing these things. But I like to imagine he’s a little more competent than that. I couldn’t realistically use the line either way, so I drew attention away from it as best I could.
  • A scrapped ending scene for this episode would have had us seeing the President’s political karaoke party, perhaps with them singing Live and Learn or something of the like. It would’ve been written into canon the same way as the Commander’s later discussions with Shadow. And it would’ve been absolutely hilarious. But in the end, I could bring myself to bloat the end of the episode with a joke that has no right to be canon.
• The scene with the Commander’s family was originally intended to show both the mother and the father, but one unnamed character felt like enough as it was. I’m worried about the awkward possibility that it might look the Commander is the father, which is…very wrong. The father probably just left to go get milk or something. It’s not important.
• At the end of the episode, the Sergeant mentions the “Postcursors.” This is a new concept which will be explored in the future. The name is intended to sound mysterious and timey-wimey.

And that’s all for now! Join us next time, June 23rd, for our big anniversary celebration! That’s 30 years of Sonic, and 5 years of The Chaos Project!

-Until then, remember to live and learn every day!