The Antoine and Bunnie Retrospective - 36

“Heart of Darkness” - Sonic the Hedgehog #36

Rotor finally discovers the Zone of Silence where King Acorn has been imprisoned. Only there’s one problem; the Zone is expanding and consuming other dimensions in it’s wake, including the one our heroes reside in. Or at least according to Robotnik it is.

So Sonic and the gang must trust their main enemy and journey into the zone with a “science bomb” to stop it from destroying the world and hopefully save their King while they’re at it.  

Antoine reluctantly agrees to join in on the quest out of loyalty; despite his fear. 

You can’t really blame him for his concern. This is another dimension we’re talking about. A world in which the very laws of psychics don’t apply. And as we’ll soon see, a world where our heroes are way out of their depth.

Upon entering the zone they are almost immediately set upon by a dark knight and his band of gargoyles. 

I like Antoine’s philosophy here: “Better to know who your enemies are than to be stabbed in the back by your supposed friends.” Yet another reason for why he’s so hostile towards Geoffrey. ( amongst other reasons….) 

The knight attacks them and in the ensuing fight his helmet gets knocked off to reveal……the king! 

Good Old King-y here doesn’t seem to recognize his daughter, whom he insults and strikes across the face. (Then again this is Max we’re talking about. He’s always a dick; with or without amnesia.)    

This causes Sonic to snap and leaves Antoine to be the voice of reason. 

Now I remember someone on the old Bumbleking forum siting this instance as the point where they believed Antoine started growing as a character. Now I don’t necessarily agree with that interpretation, given previous stories, but I do believe this is the first time Ant’s taken charge of a situation while his friends are still involved.

Before hand Antonie only stepped up when everyone else was either absent orphysically unable to protect Knothole.  Here he’s having to take control because everyone else is emotionally and mentally unable to take charge.

Sally’s in shock over finding out what her father has become. Sonic’s lost his temper and is unable to think straight. While Tails is still too young and isn’t ready to take on leadership. That leaves Ant to clam everyone down.

It works, just long enough to for Sonic to remember the “bomb of science” that Robotnik had given him earlier. Everything explodes and the King is lost once more in the void, while Rotor has to save everyone’s backside.

(Don’t worry about it Rotor. Give it a few more years and Tails will be taking your place as official science guy on the team. >_> )   

The last story in the comic is yet another entry into the Knuckles saga. This one introduces Dimitri / Enerjak. One of the few Knuckles’ relatives that’s worth a damn.