#thank you for the ask 'anon' who is totally not my friend cinderheart

[eggrobo]

what r ur thoughts on metal sonic

God, he's so cool. Metal Sonic is an effortlessly sleek character. His design has aged so well. In both conception and execution, he's fascinating. If there weren't so many good Sonic characters competing for my attention already, he'd be one of my favourites.

Metal Sonic is the original not-Sonic. He was designed by Doctor Eggman to be this perfect weapon --- to take Sonic's finest qualities and not only turn them against him, but improve upon them. Machines do not tire, or sass you, or possess pesky little things like "free will". That's the idea, anyways.

Of course, Metal Sonic isn't really better than Sonic, is he?

He is a real threat. He can easily go toe-to-toe with Sonic. But he's only a simulacrum of the original. A copy. No matter how many times he fights Sonic, no matter how hard he or Eggman try to improve upon his programming, he'll never quite measure up. Sonic will always win in the end.

This ties in nicely with the environmentalist themes of the Sonic series. As a robot, Metal Sonic is undermined by the very things thought to make him an improvement. He does not have Sonic's level of free will, or his thirst for adventure, or his love of helping others, all of which empower Sonic to keep fighting when things are down to the wire. Sonic's speed is a natural part of him, whereas Metal Sonic is propelled by circuitry and engines, things particularly susceptible to overheating and self-destruction when ran at high speeds over a long period of time.

Metal Sonic was created to destroy Sonic, and yet, he never will be able to fulfill this purpose. He'll never be "as good" as the real thing. This leaves him in a bit of an existential pickle. He externalizes these feelings of existential dread by challenging Sonic, attempting to surpass and defeat him, and to prove himself superior to his progenitor once and for all. He pursues this goal with a ruthless vengeance. My favourite Metal Sonic content, though, is the stuff that approaches Metal from a more introspective angle.

"Reflections" from the IDW 2020 annual comes to mind immediately when talking about quality Metal Sonic content. I'm not breaking new ground with this take, but it's absolutely worth mentioning anyways. Written by Caleb Goellner with art by Aaron Hammerstrom and Reggie Graham, it's this incredibly striking little story with almost no dialogue. It conveys Metal's mental state and existential discomfort with being an inhuman copy of Sonic really well! Just thinking about it is giving me shivers. AAH.

LOOK AT IT! LOOK AT HIM! The poor little guy... er, I mean, the poor little evil killer robot.

Oh well. I adore the "guy who has identity issues over being not being Sonic" trope to no end. It gets me every time. A lot of my feelings surrounding Metal are amplified in the context of, say, Shard, who's this Metal Sonic trying to define himself and be a hero in his own right (despite that fact that he has a limited understanding of how to do that beyond copying Sonic). Now there's a poor little guy for you. But Shard is a can of worms that could deserve his own post entirely.

Anyways, I love Metal. He's a really neat dude with a lot of potential. I hope more Sonic writers moving forwards take advantage of the more introspective angles to his character. I always enjoy seeing that kind of thing explored in media. Thank you for the ask!