#penders is an asshole

[fortemelody]

i was visiting chicago last weekend and i walked around and found a comic shop. i’ve been trying to find a place that sold archie sonic comics (becus i’m a collector even of subjectively bad and not cannon media) and i happen to find a handful so i was super excited! i picked up 3 of them.

it was issue 30, 41, and the knuckles spin-off 14.

what’s so special about this you may ask?

the first two are relatively normal. knuckles 14 however is the issue where charmy’s friend (mello) gets a laced chili dog from a carnival stand and proceeds to overdose on LSD -oh i’m sorry “lemon sundrop dandelion”- and dies (and then the chaotix eventually overdose too but live obviously)

i have watched way too many archie sonic youtube review videos and so when i realized that i had found that specific issue i almost lost my shit. i treated this like it was some rare collectors item that the world has never seen. i legit almost screamed. in reality this is just another horrible pender’s story that was worth a whopping 4 dollars. but listen y’all THIS SHIT SHOW OF A COMIC IS SPECIAL TO ME IN A COMEDIC WAY OKAY ☹️☹️☹️

i have yet to read it becus it’s been a hectic week but when i do i’m going to curl up by the fireplace, relax, and absolutely laugh my ass off.

OKAY NVM DID SOME RESEARCH AND APPARENTLY ITS A 3 PART COMIC AND THE SET UP (THE PLOT THAT I JUST DESCRIBED) WAS ACTUALLY IN 13 GODDAMIT there’s way too much lore to remember help me and why did this fuckass story have to go on for so long??? i’m sure some kid in the 90s was just dying to know the ending of the LSD caper their parents definitely wouldn’t approve of them reading 😭

[sonknuxadow]

just learned that ken penders doesnt claim ownership of fiona despite helping with her redesign and reintroduction because he doesnt want to claim ownership of a character he didnt make... isnt this the same guy that says shade the echidna is his character when he didnt create her and sega owns her

[heroes-rise-again]

(edit: some of my tags were remooved after I hit post so to summarize the missing tags: I rambled more and was sick more and ended up just wanting people to enjoy the iteration and reiteration of Sonc Honk and his Fronds and the world and story they live in)

sonic character analysis is like fighting over which spiderman is the objectively correct one. sonics is superheroes in the way where everyone thinks they know their guy better than anyone else and we are all WRONG

[proudfreakmetarusonikku]

People being such assholes to Ian Flynn over, let’s be real, extremely minor story changes is getting to the point fucking Ken Penders is calling them out like I’m not even going to dunk on Ken here he’s right (I mean, I’d argue sonic games stories are completely fine, but that’s a personal opinion) people are genuinely just being an absolute prick to this guy for literally no reason. And like, Ken pretty notoriously doesn’t like Ian at all. Genuinely if you’re enough of an asshole to Ian Ken's like “guys what the fuck are you doing this is extremely stupid” then you’ve gone way beyond the pale. It’s not even funny it’s kinda just sad Ian Flynn literally has done nothing wrong and people are calling for his fucking death over making minor changes to a sonic storyline like. I'm not even the biggest Flynn fan I'm the Metal Sonic fan of course I don’t agree with all his decisions but like he’s just a genuinely cool seeming dude who just wants to write engaging stories he should not be getting death threats.

[ponett]

Just checked out your Ken Penders myths post. You think after learning all this stuff about how some stuff is misunderstood or exaggerated about him that you might have a more softened view of him than you might have had previously? Maybe even think that his large hatedom is misplaced? Seeing all that makes me feel less mad since it looks like he didnt go out of his way to fuck Archie or anything.

i definitely think the hatedom around penders is exaggerated, yeah. some of the shit people will say about him is wild, and i've tried (in vain) to correct people where i can. people get the facts of the lawsuits wildly incorrect and make it sound like archie never did anything wrong. people also take all sorts of shit out of context to try and paint him as a Literal Actual Child Predator for wanting to write typical dumb teen soap opera drama with sonic characters. people are just always frothing at the mouth looking for any excuse to dunk on him

that being said, i still think he's a weird asshole who never misses a chance to rile up reactionary nerd hate campaigns against any other sonic comic contributors he's perceived as being against him, particularly ian flynn. and also he still does shit like tracing the work of other artists, or threatening legal action because the sonic movies depicted knuckles as having a dad, which is an idea he thinks he owns. so some of his negative public image is definitely deserved. but i also have to pity the guy

[cartoonrival]

HEY YOU Hit me with some Julie Su propoganda cuz I'm mostly lukewarm on her character and don't know all that much about her.

OK OK ... well baseline info she's the daughter of dark legion general luger, and half sister of lien-da and kragok, who are twins and both high ranking legion soldiers. when their mother (merin-da) died and luger remarried, ld and kragok hated his new wife (julie-su's mother) (mari-su) so bad they orchestrated her death, info which was they kept on the DL for a long time until js eventually found out about it. memory situation, js is raised by other folks who actually love her and doesn't learn who her blood family is until later. she joins knuckles because she feels inexplicably drawn to him (soul touch) (echidna soulmates) so she defects from the legion to join the chaotix. the soul touch thing sucks and i hate it but this is how it goes. ill talk about my au version of her at the end lol bc things ive built on top of canon are part of the reason why shes one of my fave charas in the series lul

ANYWHO i honestly find it pretty frustrating when people talk about js as just being pink knuckles, shoehorned into the story to give knuckles an obligatory girlfriend, because it really demonstrates that they like. weren't paying a lick of attention to anything because she genuinely has a LOT of personality but since people just go in anticipating anything penders touched to suck they don't even bother to think about her for longer than half a second.

js fills a niche that, imo, could always use filling, especially with regards to girl characters, which is to say shes a well meaning asshole. shes incredibly blunt, she's pessimistic (immediately assumes knuckles must be dead when enerjak returns and they cant find him, tells knuckles not to search a fallen ship that his mother was on because shes probably dead and she doesnt think he'd want to see that). shes terrible at handling interpersonal conflict (knuckles confesses to her that he feels guilty and stressed over all the pressure put on him as guardian and she scolds him and says "this isn't just about you", which results in a minor shouting match when she really had zero intention of starting an argument), she's almost constantly beefing with vector (tbf its because hes sexist he refuses to see past her history as a member of the dark legion). these might suond like cons but i love characters like this LOL and they fit especially well in archie where people love to get mad at each other and make dumb mistakes and it just feels very genuine and interesting and endearing to me. shes rough and difficult but she's also DEEPLY loyal. she'd die for knuckles and the chaotix and the way she interacts with them always makes me soooo ........ im just gonna give some examples i can find.

(knuckles is on the phone with her)

^ this was the genuine conclusion of an argument they had and im obsessed with it because both of them suck with emotions so they both give the worlds strangest apology and know that the other means it and they move on. plus putting her arm in front of SHADOW THE HEDGEHOG while theyre confronting eggman even after watching him CHAOS BLAST, primarily because she feels like this is more her fight than his (its about knuckles).

theres def more and i could find them if i was more on top of archie but unfortunately im #narutopilled rn. BUT ANYWAYS. shes just a very fun character with a messy personality and fun interactions and she loves her buddies sm even tho she bickers with them. shes just very special. she fits well with knuckles in a way that makes their relationship actually feel plausible instead of just forcing him to have a girlfriend (tho ofc the writing is fumbled sometimes like. ITS ARCHIE. bffr. but thats the case with literally everything ever in archie so you take what you can and its amazing). also see below. BASED AS FUCKKKKKKK

and ill discuss my au briefly bc u r asking me my opinion on js and that does play a large role in how i feel abt her, but rly im just expanding on elements of her story that werent discussed as fully as i wouldve liked. her relationship with lien-da is obviously BAD in canon, but theres not a lot of time spent lingering on precisely how lien-da and kragok feel about julie-su as the product of their fathers second marriage to a woman they KILLED because they hated her so much. ive also given her much more internal strife over turning away from the legion, originally joining the chaotix planning to betray them from the inside then being slowly convinced to join them for real after realizing how much she'd been brainwashed by the legion and what its like to have people who truly love and care about you. her story as someone who is trying to find herself outside of her history as a child soldier is something that TOTALLY deserves to be expanded on and its a bit sad that it wasnt explored. but i mean really im not changing her actual PERSONALITY at all because as i discussed shes oozing with it.... im honestly never going to make the full comic i wanted to so at some point im just going to compile all the lore and concept art and stuff into one big post to share. but thats like a spoiler free taste.

she also has a gun. which is fucking awesome because not enough sonic characters have guns. people make shadow the guy with a gun but he hasnt been seen with one since shth. hello....

[toaarcan]

I've seen a fair few people make videos where they discuss how much the quality of the Archie book jumped up after Flynn took over (which it did, let's not downplay how much better he was than Penders), whether as a focus of the main topic or just as part of a wider statement, and there's something that baffles me about the B-roll that often gets chosen for this sort of statement.

Sonic and Tails' reconciliation from Issue 179 is normally part of the examples of things Flynn fixed, and I fucking hate that scene and think it's one of the lowest points of Sonic's entire character in the book.

And like, on some level, it makes sense why people look at that and go "Yes, this is better", because Penders broke the friendship between Sonic and Tails and Flynn repaired it, that's good. Bit weird that it took him 19 issues to get there but whatever, he's only got so many pages a month.

But it's the way Flynn has it happen that pisses me the hell off, because it ends up repeating one of the major mistakes of Penders' run, and people just kinda ignore that.

Sonic tells Tails that his entire relationship with Fiona was a farce, and he only agreed to be her boyfriend because he thought that doing so would make Tails move on from his unrequited crush.

So first of all this is a really stupid plan. Like, hey, Sonic, you're friends with Amy Rose, why did you ever think "My crush isn't single" would convince anyone to stop crushing? I know this version of Sonic isn't far out from saying that he "takes everything Amy says with a grain of salt" (which feels unbelievably mean to Amy. I've never been an Amy fan but even when my opinion of her was at its lowest, I never thought she deserved that shot across the bow), and I know Tails is generally treated as being somewhat more mature than Amy despite them being the same age in Preboot Archie, but this nonetheless should've been a major sign that this was a stupid plan.

But the thing that pushes it over the edge into "Sonic you unbelievable asshole" is that it's very, very apparent that Fiona didn't know. She probably still doesn't know. He was using her.

And I know some people will argue that Fiona was also using Sonic, but she makes it clear that she was desperately trying to find the thrill she got from being with Scourge with someone who wasn't, y'know, this creep.

In 172, she describes Sonic as 'boring', and no wonder she did, it was fake the entire time and nobody told her.

(This is part of why I dislike the take that Fiona has much more agency as a villain, because she basically never makes an informed decision under Ian's pen. She has no idea that Sonic never loved her-though knowing that would probably only make her angrier- and she has no idea that Scourge is an omnicidal maniac who has already tried to kill her by proxy at least once. She never really knew either of her partners, despite her relationships to them being the driving force of her character)

At the end of the day, this story reduces Fiona to an object to be fought over, without her ever being fully aware of that, and the resolution of it all isn't making things right for her, it's having the two protagonists involved make up, while she gets left stuck with Scourge, who has demonstrated the capacity to kill her if it suits his goal.

[beevean]

Sadly I don't have any visual proof, but chalk this up to yet another similarity between NFCV and IDW Sonic: this weird whataboutism that assumes that critics hold a double standard lmao

"I don't like IDW"

"GET OUT OF HERE YOU ARCHIE VETERAN YOU ARE JUST MAD YOU LOST YOUR SQUIRREL WAIFU, I BET YOU'RE A PENDERS STAN TOO"

"I thikn Surge is too much of a tryhard"

"OH YEAH OF COURSE SCOURGE CAN BE ALL COOL AND BADASS BUT Y'ALL HATE SURGE, JUST SAY YOU HATE WOMEN AND GO"

"man lanolin sure is a bitch, and she's dumb for trusting duo just like that"

"AH BUT Y'ALL LOVE KNUCKLES AND SILVER YOU SEXIST ASSHOLES"

"Fans don't take Lenore's crimes seriously because she's a hot woman"

"OH BUT Y'ALL STAN DRACULA, WHY DOES YOUR BLORBO DESERVE A SAPPY ENDING BUT NOT MINE"

I never read Archie. I don't give a shit about Scourge. I was there in the 2000s and I can assure you Knuckles and Silver were not spared from the mockery. And I think both Dracula and Lenore are horrible creatures who should have not been portrayed as tragic meow meows. In fact, I agree that the writing of NFCV played favorites! But not in the way Lenector shippers think :P

Noticing a pattern is one thing, and it's unavoidable, but can we please get better arguments? Unless you have proof that the other person holds a double standard, this is an attack out of nowhere and it doesn't get to the root of the criticism.

[canyoufucksoniccharacters]

CAN YOU FUCK MILES "TAILS" PROWER?

...

APRIL FOOLS, ASSHOLES. THAT'S A CHILD.

NO COURTESY FOR THIS ONE. NO FLOWERY SPEECH. NO PROPER MANNERS. WE ARE GOING FOR THE FUCKING THROAT ON THIS ONE. THE LARGER FURRY COMMUNITY HAS INCURRED YEARS' WORTH OF BUILT UP WRATH UPON THE BLOG'S OWNER AND IT MUST BE RELEASED. JESUS CHRIST CAN YOU FOR FIVE SECONDS STOP DRAWING PORN OF THIS CHARACTER I CAN'T GO 5 TURNS WITHOUT SEEING HIM THERE HE'S EVERYWHERE JESUS FUCKING CHRIST ON THE CROSS

THAT'S A CHILD. THAT'S A FUCKING CHILD. OH THE AGES AREN'T CANON ANYMORE RIGHT HE'S BEEN THERE SINCE THE START OF THE SERIES RIGHT? HEY DICKHEAD HE WAS LITERALLY ALWAYS PORTRAYED AS A CHILD, HIS AGE IN THE SONIC 2 MANUAL WAS LISTED AS 8, THE CARTOONS CONSISTENTLY PORTRAYED HIM AS A KID AND AOSTH EVEN MADE SURE TO LET THE VIEWER KNOW SONIC ALWAYS SAW HIM AS HIS YOUNGER BROTHER. WANT MORE PROOF? YOU WANT MORE PROOF? FROM A MORE MODERN SOURCE, WITHOUT NUMBERS EVEN BEING STATED? HERE! HERE YOU GO! HERE YOU FUCKING GO!

There is undeniably, long-running, canon proof that Tails is, and has always been meant to be a child. "Oh, just age him up" Yeah yeah, real nice of you sit there imagining what a child would look like as an adult so you can fuck that character. Fun stuff, really. That was sarcasm, by the way. OH, AND DON'T EVEN THINK OF RESORTING TO ARCHIE FOR THIS ONE.

First of all, this is a Penders-ism. The whole Light Mobius plotline seems to have been thought up by him, same for coupling Tails with Mina. All the romance stuff in Archie involving Tails is really weird as is, anyways. And if you're really over here looking to a super niche strange part of pre-SGW Archie just have an excuse to be able to fuck the character who's been known for being the child prodigy of the series, you really, really need to reconsider trajectory here. Please, for the love of god. It's fine if you want to imagine Tails as an adult for writing opportunities, or to examine what that would look like from a design perspective, maybe play with the whole Kitsune angle and mess around with the tail count, but if you're doing all that for the sake of being able to fuck him, in no universe could I ever endorse that, and I really think no one should. It's fucking weird. Fuck off.

If you want to fuck Tails, in any way shape or form, you are banished from setting eyes on this blog. There will not be mercy. There will not be opportunity for negotiation. You will be cast off to realms known not to mankind. You shall never be seen again.

YOU CANNOT, WILL NOT, AND NEVER WILL BE ABLE TO FUCK MILES "TAILS" PROWER. AND THAT. IS. FINAL.

Anyways, back to normal posting. Goodness, I don't know what overcame me there. We shall never speak of this again.

[visionoasis]

I bought it.

I preordered the Lara-Su Chronicles.

To say I bought it as a hate-read would be entirely incorrect. But I won’t obscure the fact that I don’t like Penders. I think this dude is an asshole. The real best way to put it would be… genuine curiosity based on my nostalgia for the original comics. And while I think he’s an asshole, I don’t hate him. Both can exist I think.

I want to see how he connects it to Archie. I want it for archive purposes, even if it isn’t good. I want to see what he actually does with this thing and these characters. Is it still a Sonic comic? He keeps connecting it to the Sonic comics. So maybe. Penders also just makes weird decisions both artistically and writing wise. I kinda want to see how that pans out in a not patronizing way. I want to see what he changes about characters and lore. Has his writing style changed now that he’s not under as many restrictions? He’s free to write what he wants in this setting. That’s going to be fascinating! And I’m not even expecting to hate it. I very much expect it to be a meh nothing experience. But I want to know for sure. In fact I am hoping this experience is as bizarre as it looks. For better or worse.

And if it’s good I’ll be as honest about that as I am the bad.

And if I feel that way why would I buy it all? Simple. I’m the lore lady. The “I’ve read it all” lady. I like being an archivist for Sonic works and this applies. I want to read everything both obscure and not. Hell, I’ll buy stuff just for the flavor text. (Like those Amy tarot cards coming up.) And in my time with “fan” works, stuff like this gets pricey later because there aren’t typically reprints. If I’m wrong that’s okay. And if I’m right then… that’s okay too. Ha ha.

But expect several reviews when this thing finally ships to my doorstep. I’ll cover it all so you can enjoy it by proxy.

[sonknuxadow]

The mandates were created to prevent an Archie 2.0 fiasco from happening.

im not really sure what the tone of this ask is supposed to be but i Know that ken penders and the particularly bad parts of archie sonic are the reason sega acts the way they do with the current comics and im not against sega having rules and being strict with the characters? ive read archie sonic ive seen what can happen when people are just allowed to do whatever they want with no input from sega and i do not want a repeat of that at all. the only rules that i know about and actually have a problem with are the ones that require shadow to be sonics asshole rival who has no friends and the one that says sonic isnt allowed to show much negative emotion

[greenyvertekins]

What's your opinion on Sally Acorns decrepit father?

Pre-reboot? An incompetent asshole whose complete lack of leadership ability justified the monarchy losing some of its power. Ideally, it should've lost all of its power. Funny how Penders wrote Acorn as having unparalleled, uncontestable wisdom and judgment based on his connection to the Source of All yet practically every single one of his decisions was to the detriment of his kingdom, his children and his people.

[macaron-cosmos]

Honestly playing Sonic Frontiers made me think about how Ian Flynn basically has the career Ken Penders wishes he could have,

Like yeah, Flynn’s writing can be contentious, esp the idw era stuff but he has a genuine love  for the franchise and treats his coworkers with respect while Ken. just. didn’t.

Like even putting aside the deranged things Penders wrote during his tenure on Archie’s Sonic, the man is a massively unpleasant asshole. He constantly disparages other creators, actively screwed over his coworkers, and is constantly trying to make sonic fans pay attention to him by saying dumb shit.

Like he wants to be the cool uncle of sonic or whatever but he screwed over the franchise for a better part of a decade. And like yeah, he’d have a point about creator’s rights if he weren’t a selfish prick, but that’s the thing. He is.

[sonicunleash]

anyways i said it once a long while back but while archie sonic had a lot of weird stuff and drama going on with the old writers and shit they pulled, and it can be fun to talk about all of the crazy stuff that went on behind that, I do think its like. A huge shame that that's what they get known for.

Like the writers and artists that came after ken penders and co. were dedicated sonic fans that had to revive the comics from that weird flame heap pretty much with very little warning. Ian Flynn went from being a fan to being hired as the new Head Writer and it couldve gone very badly, but it didn't. Instead they came to make tons of memorable and engaging plots, including characterizations of game characters that people often argue is written better than in the games themselves; and came to create iconic exclusive characters like Scourge and Shard that are still remembered fondly today. Not to mention the fantastic artists who took the art of the comics from this:

to this:

Idk i just think its a shame that the sonic archie comics are remembered for the mistakes of an asshole like ken penders, and not for the amazing work of ian flynn, tracy yardley, jonathan gray, evan stanley, and the other fantastic writers and artists that worked on it afterwards until it's cancellation.

[navii-blaze]

Theory trying to rationalize why Sonic is King in Mobius 25 Years Later: Maybe the reason Sonic became King was that King Max (assuming Elias didn't take the throne since the M25YL issues were before Penders decided to make Elias King) screwed the pooch so badly that he provoked a revolt that threw the Acorns out of the throne regardless of past service (poor Sally gets lumped in with her asshole dad) and Sonic found himself saddled with the crown because he's the 'hero' and heroes must be 'rewarded'. Sonic only reluctantly became King to keep Sally and her family from risking execution. Max and his wife are exiled, while Elias just stays with his wife Megan in Feral Forest and never returns home. Sonic marries Sally after things calmed down as a way to make it up for her, though this wasn't a popular decision. Sally is deeply affected by the events and makes absolutely sure not to show any indication that she's influencing Sonic's decisions or show any visible protagonism so as to not show she's 'pulling rank on Sonic' or 'stealing his thunder', hence why she's so passive in M25YL.

Interesting theory, I'd like to know if your theory includes Pender's intent that the M25YL arc is the future continuation of the main comic line, or if this is geared more towards an au.

One thing I will pick out from this is that if Sonic has already gained the respect of being known as a hero by that point, wouldn't Sally as well? One of her most defining traits, especially during the early run of archie, was that her title of princess didn't really matter and she was simply leading a group of children to take back their freedom. Even when Max came back she never put herself above her peers, she continued being a field leader until the 1-year time skip. I feel like even if the royal family was thrown out, Sally would be pretty excempt because she's already earned her people's favor.

If anything, I don't think the kingdom would be against her taking the throne, out of her entire family she's the one who truly acted as a leader for those 10 years of fighting. Though it would be a neat source of conflict if there were some people who were skeptical of keeping the monarchy around, and would be highly critical of Sally's actions to ensure she doesn't end up like her father.

As for Sonic, I could see him being involved since Sally would still need a husband to rule as a queen (if we keep that plot point from the comic), but he would be the one to have a very passive role. He already made it year in the M25YL that he doesn't feel fit to be a king, and that Sally was the real leader people should look up to.

The M25YL run could have been a neat way to show the aftermath of robotnik's rule and introduce a next-generation arc, but it focused too much on petty drama with poorly written characters. Very few characters felt like they were an actual progression on the ones we know from the mainline story, with too many being reduced to passive background characters (thx 90s misogyny).

[proudfreakmetarusonikku]

ken penders is actually decently progressive he just is a massive dick to everyone. he is fucking weird with a lot of stuff like female characters (not just them there’s some weird stereotyping shit with blatant poc coding in some of his sonic comics) but he’s in general pretty supportive. he’s just really self centred and an asshole to everyone around him.

SO UM

HUH???????????????????????????????