Sonic The Hedgehog Issue #16
November 1994
Awesome cover. As you can tell from said cover this marks the first issue that Sally is brown.
"Sonic Under Glass" is the first story. Robotnik lures the FF to Sleepy Hollow with a "Free Chili Dogs" sign, which he had covered with sleeping gas. For once he successfully captures them, but instead of roboticizing them he places them in sleep tanks augmented with virtual reality. The trick here is that the VR consists of their most valued dreams and wishes, which would make them not realize it's an illusion and thus never escape. The "under glass" part comes from a giant glass bowl where Robotnik can see what's going on in their minds. So let's check out the VR world.
Sonic and Sally are set to get married, but Antoine forces the world to change where he ends up marrying Sally instead, and the world gets all weird and **** with melting clocks and all (I can't remember the name of the artist that did this crazy art, but it's clearly a tribute to him). Anyway, Sonic eventually thinks that if something is too good to be true, it probably isn't, so he creates a terminal that shows what Robotnik is doing in the real world (remember, the VR is a product of their minds, so they can create anything). He sees that Robotnik is tearing up Mobius, but he debates whether it's better staying where he is (all his friends are happy, and Uncle Chuck/Muttski are back in their normal form). Sonic's conscience gets the better of him, and he hacks the terminal to mess up Robotnik's machines (I don't know how he can manipulate real life stuff from VR, but I'll deal with it). This forces Robotnik to release the FF from the tanks, and Sonic busts everyone out of there. The End.
"The Man From H.E.D.G.E.H.O.G." is up next. Robotnik gets pissed that all his operations fail because of the FF (he has a sign on the wall depicting names of these operations, all of which are named after James Bond movies, heh). He believes that there's a mole helping them out in Robotropolis, so he sends out Snively and Crabmeat to find out who it is. They show examples of the FF always finding the bots committing crimes and stuff. Sonic and Sally then head to Renobotnik to gamble a bit (why they willingly go there knowing they'll be cheated, I don't know). Sonic gets shocked from a ray and captured by Robotnik, but the spy turns out the lights and helps Sonic escape. Who is the spy you ask? Wait for it...
...
The tootsee roll pop owl. You may have to read that twice.
In reader mail we learn that Sonic is 15 years old (it'll be awhile before he gets to 16), someone asks what animal Sally is for about the 7th time since the comic started, and some kid punched another kid in the face because he called him a Sonic freak.
A great story to kick things off (other than the one bit I mentioned), but the payoff of the second one was garbage. It would have been perfect to reveal Uncle Chuck as the mole here (like he had been on the show at this point), but alas, we can't win them all.
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HBJ Dubs
~Project 1000~