Free Comic Friday: Sonic and Mega Man Worlds Unite

Sonic and Mega Man Worlds Unite: Free Comic Book Day Edition
“Into the Unknown”
Script: Ian Flynn
Pencils: Adam Bryce Thomas
Inks: Gary Martin
Letters: Jack Morelli
Colors: Matt Herms

“The World of Payne”
Script: Flynn
Pencils: Patrick Spaziante, Jonathan Hill, Powree, Ryan Jampole & Jamal Peppers
Inks: Martin, Spaziante & Rick Bryant
Letters: John Workman & Morelli
Colors: Herms & Spaziante
Covers: Evan Stanley, Jamal Peppers, Gary Martin & Ben Hunzeker
Assistant Editor: Vincent Lovallo
Editor/Executive Director of Editorial: Paul Kaminski
Editor-in-Chief: Vince Gorelick
Published by: Archie
Released: May 2, 2015

What better way to celebrate Sonic the Hedgehog's return to movie theaters on a #FreeComicFriday than with the kickoff to the blue speedster's crossover with another video game icon, Mega Man?

Don't answer that. I'm sure there are better ways, like focusing just on Sonic. Or maybe going with the Free Comic Book Day prelude to their first meeting, “Worlds Collide,” instead of the follow-up, “Worlds Unite.” But here we are.

Although by the time this was released I had learned comic books didn't require energy blasts and punching to tell a compelling story, these are the types of characters that still would have drawn me to Archie in my younger days: licensed, recognizable figures who I wasn't used to seeing interact. While only a passing Sonic fan – his hypersonic speed makes him at least superhero adjacent – I loved Mega Man, owning a few of his games and borrowing others from friends, as well as having a novelization of “Mega Man 2.” Not only did my friends and I frequently come up with new robot masters for the pint-sized mechanical hero to battle, but when I played through “Mega Man 5,” I often imagined it as unfolding in comic book form. I remember reading the first volume or two of the Archie series from the library but not following beyond that.

I did a moderate dive into the Sonic comics before writing about the character for my day job in advance of his first movie. You can check that out here. I was intrigued to find out that “Worlds Collide” resulted in an altered reality for Sonic and company in-story as a means of addressing some legal issues in the real world.

(I never did get around to seeing the first movie, even though he teams up with Cyclops.* I watched the second and enjoyed it.)

That's most of the backstory I had coming into this flip issue, with two covers and two approaches to the lead-in story, both written by longtime Sonic scribe Ian Flynn.

We'll start with Sonic because his name comes first in the legal indicia inside, although I would argue the space for the comic shop stamp on the Mega Man cover indicates that's the one to read first.**

It opens with Sonic running from the villainous Eggman, who I was reminded after reading my old column is an alternate reality version of Dr. Robotnik. That's not to suggest Sonic is fleeing from a fight, but, like the Flash, running is how he solves a lot of his problems. Also in his toolbox: rolling up in a ball and bouncing.

Before they can have a proper showdown, a portal opens in the sky and a massive fire creature emerges, which Sonic recognizes as the Ifrit. Helpful asterisked notes refer the reader not to a comic but the video game “Sonic Rivals 2” for their first face-off. Eggman skedaddles, and Sonic charges into battle, finding himself outmatched until the arrival of Silver the Hedgehog, a telekinetic time traveler. So... Sega Cable?

Together, they defeat the creature, and Silver informs Sonic that the events of “Worlds Collide” shattered reality and created Genesis Portals that cause alternate universes to bleed into one another. Silver's been traveling through them to repair the damage. Eggman overhears and decides to try to use the portals for his own villainous agenda.

That half tells a complete story and makes me feel up to speed on what's going on in Sonic's world. A two-page recap gives some more info, specifically focused on Worlds Collide and its aftermath.

The Mega Man portion of the issue spotlights a dude I'm pretty sure I've never heard of but may have read about in some of those early issues and just forgotten. His name is Xander Payne, and he does not like robots. This is understandable since ElecMan wounded him in battle, causing him to lose his eye. His brother okayed a cybernetic implant since, quote, “he needs to see to fight the bad robots.”

Xander did not appreciate this, leading him to join the Emerald Spears, an anti-technology extremist group that wasn't extreme enough for Mr. Payne. He started attacking robots and those who made and supported them, unconcerned about human casualties.

At one point, he tried to use an experimental time machine to do, well, something, and Mega Man and another guy blasted it. Payne apparently traveled into the future, saw something that upset him even more, came back to the present and wound up in prison, carving images of Mega Man, his nemesis Dr. Wily and Sonic into the walls of his cell. The upcoming crossover is key to his plans to “save us all.”

A two-page recap focuses on the broader Mega Man story arc but doesn't really do much to clarify the pages before it.

I felt lost in this one. With the number of artists listed, I wonder if a lot of the panels weren't taken from previous comics and kind of pasted together. I tend to prefer a story like the Sonic half to a clip show entry, but if you're going to do the latter, it needs to be clear and easy to follow. I suspect this may have made more sense to regular readers of the Mega Man comics, who are probably the folks who least need the information it summarizes.

I thought perhaps the problem was Flynn writing it instead of the regular Mega Man scribe, but apparently that was Flynn too.

As far as Free Comic Book Day issues go, this is pretty middle of the road. The Sonic half tells a self-contained story that informs you of what came before and points you to the future, while the Mega Man portion feels like an information dump and not a particularly well-curated one. My nostalgia for Mega Man and fondness of crossovers in general make me want to check out the story one day, but this issue doesn't really move the needle in terms of augmenting that interest.

* - Well, James Marsden.

** - I could probably do the whole post on that pointless debate, but even I have my limits.