Franchise: Sonic The Hedgehog

Ryan Drummond (voice of Sonic the Hedgehog from 1999 to 2004) revealed that during Sega's recasting of the Sonic the Hedgehog cast in 2010, he had auditioned for the role and had actually won. However, Sega requested Drummond to leave his union, so Drummond ultimately declined the offer.

The title screens of Sonic the Hedgehog and Sonic the Hedgehog 2, with Sonic (a character known for his super speed) posing and waving his gloved hand inside of a ring lined with stars and a ribbon banner at the bottom, could possibly be taken from the logo of the 1981 anime adaptation of the Akira Toriyama manga "Dr. Slump" and its speedy protagonist Arale. It should also be noted that the ring surrounding Sonic has giant wings protruding from its sides, which appear to reference the angel wings on Arale's cap that also feature in the intros to the anime and some of the Dr. Slump films.

While it's not known if any Sega employees have commented on this connection, it was acknowledged in the form of a small cameo appearance where Sonic gets outrun by Arale in the 1993 sequel manga "The Brief Return of Dr. Slump".

Before the singular story concept of Sonic fighting against Dr. Robotnik, Sonic's character development was very different. During the 2018 Game Developers Conference, game designer Hirokazu Yasuhara and character designer Naoto Ohshima revealed that the series almost had connections to World War II.

"Sonic" was originally going to be a fighter pilot who earned the nickname "hedgehog" because of how his hair stood up while flying his plane at high speeds, while the Sonic the Hedgehog design known today was merely a nose decal on the front of his plane. The details of his time in the war were then re-imagined as a children's picture book by the pilot's wife. She took the Sonic the Hedgehog design and based it on her war veteran husband, making the game a story within a story. American pilot Chuck Yeager, the first pilot to break the speed of sound, was also mentioned in Yasuhara and Ohshima's pitch summary.

Additionally, they showed off line art for a proposed dance sequence during the game, originally intending for Sonic to be a trendy dancer, but this along with the meta-story elements were scrapped during development.

In the third installment of the Untold History of Japanese Game Developers book series released in 2018, Ohshima reiterated that Sonic was going to be a human boy, but Sega rejected the design, not wanting their mascot to be a human, and Ohshima admitted that he does not have any concept art of Sonic as a human due to his proposal just being a basic outline. Despite this rejection, the core layout of Sonic the Hedgehog's speed-based gameplay and map design was set in stone by this time.

In the continuity of Fleetway's Sonic the Hedgehog comics (known as "Sonic the Comic"), Dr. Robotnik was originally a kind human scientist named "Ovi Kintobor", who wished to rid Mobius of all evil using a device called the Retro-Orbital Chaos Compressor (or "ROCC" for short) to absorb all the negative energy on the planet, eventually using the six Chaos Emeralds as a vessel for the energy (Issue #181 would reveal that this was because the Drakon Empire had used them in the past to contain an experimental energy source known as "chaos"). However, six emeralds was not enough: he also needed the seventh Grey Emerald to stabilize the process. During this time, he met and befriended Sonic the Hedgehog, who used his impressive speed to help Kintobor in his search for the Grey Emerald, albeit to no avail (Issue #36 would reveal this was because the Grey Emerald was on the Floating Island with Knuckles). Kintobor would also run experiments on Sonic to test his speed, which eventually lead to him gaining his iconic blue form.

The day after this (according to Issue #71), when Kintobor went to go make them some food, he could only find a six month old rotten egg in the fridge. While going to add salt to the egg, he tripped on a cable and slammed his head against the ROCC's control panel, causing it to explode. Both Kintobor and the egg were bathed in chaos energy, transforming him into Ivo Robotnik, the main antagonist of the comic, and revealing that Sonic was responsible for "Creating the most vicious dictator on Mobius". All of this is revealed in Issue #8 of the comic.

Issue #71 revealed that the accident was actually caused by a time-travelling Sonic, who both placed the rotten egg in the fridge and pulled the cables loose. This was done to save the future from the Brotherhood of Metallix, who could only be stopped by Robotnik. Additionally, Issue #26 revealed that the explosion had somehow "burned" Kintobor's brainwaves onto one of the Golden Rings from which the ROCC had been built: it would later be used to construct the Kintobor Computer, an important part of the Freedom Fighters' resistance to Robotnik's rule.

In "Sonic the Comic, issue #8, The Origins Of Sonic," Sonic was originally a normal, brown, and very spiky hedgehog. He had met Dr. Ivo Robotnik (known at the time as Dr. Ovi Kintobor) by finding his lab, and they had become friends. Dr. Kintobor performed experiments on Sonic's super speed, which helped him to run even faster, and with the aid of the Power Sneakers Dr Kintobor invented, it allowed him to run so fast that he broke the sound barrier, turning him into a more familiar blue form.

In 2008, the series was awarded the Guinness World Record for the "longest-running comic series based on a video game". Archie Comics' run of Sonic the Hedgehog lasted from 1992 to 2016, resulting in the publication of 290 issues (including specials) over the course of 24 years.

Sonic's favorite food is chili dogs. This trait was first introduced in the 1993 animated series "Adventures of Sonic the Hedgehog" and was later officially incorporated into the video game series starting with Sonic Chronicles: The Dark Brotherhood. Before the first appearance of the chili dog in the series however, Sonic's enjoyment of hot dogs in general was first established in Issue #5 of "Sonic the Comic", in a scene where Sonic is seen ready to eat three hundred hot dogs as a part of his breakfast. Since then, the chili dog has been established as Sonic's favorite food in almost every piece of Sonic media (for context, the only show to not reference chili dogs was "Sonic X", and even then a normal hot dog appeared in the episode "How to Catch a Hedgehog" during a scene where Sonic is stuck running in a giant hamster wheel), eventually making its way into the games as well, a rare example of something originating from the cartoons/comics being carried over into the mainline games.

The Japanese manual for Sonic & Knuckles alludes to the game's Special Stages in its story section, which includes a moment where Sonic gets sucked through a Super Ring and arrives at the Master Emerald Alter, where the player accesses the Special Stages in the game. However, writer Ian Flynn would later claim the Special Stages seen throughout the series are not considered canon, instead only existing as a gameplay mechanic.

In The Murder of Sonic the Hedgehog, when Sonic is found presumed dead on the ground, the pose he is laying in is a reference to a meme within animation circles known as the "Family Guy Death Pose". This pose is frequently used throughout the animated series of the same name created by Seth MacFarlane, which became criticized in later years for utilizing cheaper animation. This is not the first time this pose was referenced in the Sonic the Hedgehog franchise; the first time being in Issue #3 of the IDW comic book miniseries "Sonic the Hedgehog: Imposter Syndrome", where the character Surge collapses into the pose at one point.

Ben Hurst, one of the writers for the 1993 "Sonic the Hedgehog" animated series, attempted to pitch a continuation of the show to Sega in 2002 as either a third season or a movie. He consulted DiC Entertainment, who produced the show (as well as two other Sonic cartoons, "Adventures of Sonic the Hedgehog" and "Sonic Underground"), and was given the name of a Sega executive who wanted to talk with him more about the idea. Hurst then received a call from Ken Penders, at the time the head writer for Archie's Sonic the Hedgehog comics, who had been made aware of Hurst's interest in making a movie based on the series. Hurst offered to include Penders in the project, and told him his strategy for the pitch was to develop a satisfying storyline to conclude the show, and simultaneously giving Sega ideas for new games. This resulted in a long-standing controversy where Hurst claimed that Penders sabotaged his plan by telling Sega that he was trying to co-opt the franchise, resulting in Hurst's dismissal from the project. Over 13 years after Hurst's death, Penders would give his side of the story in a 2023 blog post, claiming that Hurst's joint proposal between the two would involve asking Sega to pay them to produce the series, and doubted that Sega would even schedule a meeting to let them pitch it if Sega funding the pitch was the premise, stating that "the owner of any IP is looking for a payday when it comes to using the rights for their properties."

In September 2003, Penders pitched his own concept for a Sonic the Hedgehog movie, titled "Sonic Armageddon". Four pieces of concept art were produced, and even a homemade pitch video was made to show to Sega executives. From what is known about the pitch (which seemed to borrow elements from both the 1993 series and the Archie comics), it would have involved the planet Mobius being destroyed and changed the depiction of the roboticization procedure to something much more gruesome than what had been previously seen. Notably, several major characters (such as the Freedom Fighters sans Sonic, Tails and Sally) are not shown in either the pitch video or the concept art, and the characters that are shown are given major redesigns. A common belief is that DreamWorks Animation was Penders' choice to produce the film, but Penders would later state in 2019 that he had pitched the idea to Sega only, and that DreamWorks had no involvement. The film never materialized; Penders would later claim on separate occasions that the idea was dropped because of "massive corporate upheaval", as well as the development of the animated series "Sonic X" affecting talks regarding the film.

On September 21, 2020, as part of his podcast BumbleKast, writer Ian Flynn expressed interest in adapting Cosmo and the Metarex from the animated series "Sonic X" into IDW's Sonic the Hedgehog comics, which would effectively incorporate them into the mainline Sonic canon. A year later, he would reveal that said arc would not happen anytime soon, as fellow writer Evan Stanley had more stories that needed to be finished. In January 2024, however, Flynn revealed that most content that comes from the show is off the table, including characters such as Cosmo, the Metarex, Topaz, Mr. Tanaka, and Ella.

However, there may be an exception to this in the form of the "Next Show", a fictional children's show featuring a purple mascot character named Next that Cream and Cheese are shown to be fans of during Sonic X. The show was first referenced in Cream's Sonic Channel profile, where it was listed as one of her likes. Later, 2023 would feature two seperate instances of the show being referenced: first during the "Otherworld Comedy" series of wallpapers posted on Sonic Channel, where it was mentioned in the story for the May 2023 wallpaper ("Story Act 5: My Vector Man"), then later as part of the official Christmas 2023 picture, where a toy based on Next appears amongst the pile of gifts.

Thrash the Tasmanian Devil, a character introduced in Archie's Sonic the Hedgehog comics, is based on a purple sprite that is created for several milliseconds on the game's title screen if the player quickly switches between Sonic and Knuckles' sprites. Notably, Ian Flynn stated in the graphic novel "Sonic Universe 3: Knuckles Returns" that Thrash was meant to be another rogue of Knuckles who could "throw down with Knuckles and have it mean something", which did not line up with his role in his debut during "Sonic Universe" Issue #11. However, this would later be conveyed during the "Endangered Species" story arc of the main comic, where it's revealed that he has a strong hatred towards the Echidna species due to their actions against his ancestors. When asked about the possibility of bringing Thrash back in the comic's reboot, Ian Flynn said he would love to bring him back, but "it comes with all that baggage... We can't really bring him back without people going 'Oh boy! And here we go!'"

There are two instances in the history of Archie's Sonic the Hedgehog comics where writers had attempted to write a same-sex relationship for characters originally created for the 1993 animated series that the comic was based on.

On October 30, 2009, former writer Ken Penders revealed that he had intended for the character Rotor the Walrus to be gay, stating:


It would later be stated that Rotor's "life partner" was Cobar, an Echidna scientist who only ever appeared during the MOBIUS: 25 YEARS LATER storyline. According to technical advisor Robert Repas (speaking on behalf of Penders), Sega feared backlash over the relationship, and thus ordered him to keep the relationship low-key, only allowing subtle hints, though Penders later clarified that it was likely then-editor Justin Freddy Gabrie that he had spoken with and not Sega. At the same time, this relationship has been critcized by fans for its lack of subtextual evidence, which was not helped by Penders only revealing it years after the fact. According to later writer Ian Flynn as part of a Q&A wrap-up, Rotor and Cobar's relationship is considered a piece of behind-the-scenes trivia and is not canon to the current Sonic timeline as, according to him, there had been no canonical build-up to Rotor's sexual preference regardless of intention.

However, Flynn would be involved in the second instance of trying to write in a same-sex relationship. In the first episode of the BumbleKast from October 5, 2015, he stated:


Shortly after the comic's cancellation, Flynn would confirm that he and his wife/fellow writer Aleah Baker had written subtle details hinting at this romance into the comic. He initially described these details as "blatant", but retracted it for "subtle", implying that there were some internal/editorial considerations at play for how far they could go with the hints. During the same BumbleKast episode, he also revealed that part of the reason why Sally and Nicole's relationship was made subtle was due to potential backlash from the Sonic fandom, as Sally had been commonly depicted as Sonic's girlfriend and love interest up to that point. One of Sega's mandates for the comic near the end of its run was that game characters like Sonic were not allowed to enter serious relationships, meaning Sonic would not be allowed to commit to Sally in the comic's reboot.

On March 17, 2019, in response to a post on the Sonic the Hedgehog Twitter account celebrating St. Patrick's Day, YouTuber Jacksepticeye jokingly asked if he could voice "Irish the Hedgehog", to which the Sonic the Hedgehog Twitter account responded:


A year later, they made good on this promise, releasing a video titled "Irish the Hedgehog" on the official Sonic the Hedgehog YouTube channel. According to Sega, the character was designed by artist Mark Hughes, and the video included a "folksy" remix of the song "Escape from the City" from Sonic Adventure 2 made by Hyper Potions and Jun Senoue.

A few years afterwards, Jacksepticeye would return to the Sonic franchise to voice another character: the appropriately-named Jack from the "Sonic Prime" episode "It Takes One to No Place".

On August 21, 2021, Ken Penders (a former writer for Archie's Sonic the Hedgehog comics) announced plans to license out various characters from the comic that he has claimed ownership of (Prince Elias, Geoffrey St. John, Queen Alicia, etc.). Notably, this list included Scourge the Hedgehog (originally known as "Evil Sonic"), much to the bewilderment of Sonic fans as the character was depicted as an alternate reality version of Sonic (Scourge's original design was, visually speaking, simply Sonic wearing a leather jacket and sunglasses). When asked about this, Ian Flynn stated that (in his opinion) Sega and IDW wouldn't think it was worth the trouble to license side characters from a third party, particularly due to the former's desire to move away from referencing the 1993 Sonic the Hedgehog animated series (commonly known as "Sonic SatAM", and a major influence on the Archie Sonic comics), and that it'd be easier to just make new characters. However, due to an inaccurate secondhand account of Flynn's response, Penders released an outline of the licensing deal insisting that he "really is easy to deal with", and accused Flynn of not wanting to work with non-game characters, despite that not being what Flynn said. The deal itself was criticized by fans due to both its steep asking price ($10,000 up front against royalties for a two year license) and for padding out the list of characters with obscure extras (Lt. Smiley, DYNAMAC-3000, etc.). Further complicating matters, the IDW Sonic spinoff miniseries "Imposter Syndrome" was announced, introducing the character of Surge the Tenrec, who many compared to Scourge due to their similar names and designs. Ian Flynn would later reveal that he had always intended for Surge (and her companion Kitsunami the Fenrec) to appear in the comic since the beginning.

On November 15th, RUSH! Comics announced that in association with Ken Penders, Scourge would receive a four-issue miniseries titled "Scourge the Speed Demon". The comic was immediately hit with backlash from fans due to Penders not only licensing out Evil Sonic, but his Scourge persona specifically, as Penders had no involvement with that version of the character (it was conceived by Mike Pellerito and Patrick Spaziante, and developed by Ian Flynn and Tracy Yardley), as well as continuing to blame Penders for the character's removal in the first place. The creative team behind the comic (which did not include Penders, as he merely licensed the character) also came under fire from the fandom: their previous comic, Rush! (for which the company was named after), had included a sexual harassment scene where the hero strips a pair of female villains nude in public because he thought they were hot. More concerningly, the lead artist was discovered to be following a large number of far right accounts (such as Breitbart, PragerU, Steven Crowder, and the Trump family) and had liked some controversial tweets from them (i.e. an Islamophobic tweet from far right activist Paul Joseph Watson), leading many to accuse the artist of being a white supremist. When asked about this, Penders responded:


The team would later release a statement in an attempt to clarify the situation, though it did not help. Likewise, "Imposter Syndrome" #1 was released, leading many to believe that Scourge was no longer needed due to Surge existing. On November 19th, it was announced that the comic had been cancelled a mere four days after its announcement due to the backlash from the fanbase. Ironically, it's worth noting that while Ken does own Scourge, he's forbidden from making new stuff that looks too similar to Sonic in order to avoid brand confusion. Scourge's design in the cancelled comic looked noticeably similar to Sonic's design (specifically the design from the Paramount films), meaning that by cancelling the comic, RUSH! Comics may have been able to avoid a potential lawsuit from Sega for copyright infringement.

According to former Sega employee Del Walker, from his experience working for the company in Japan, the Sonic the Hedgehog franchise is not particularly popular to domestic audiences there as the character was designed to appeal to Westerners. He claimed this disconnect is so strong that many Japanese gamers do not understand why Sonic is so popular abroad.

The appearance of Longclaw in Paramount’s Sonic the Hedgehog films is reminiscent of the tiles that resemble an owl's head in the Labyrinth Zone from the original Sonic the Hedgehog. In fact, the first film's opening scene features the tile design engraved on a rock as an Easter egg, further hinting at the connection.

According to the Archie comics, Sonic the Hedgehog's real name was originally "Olgilvie Maurice Hedgehog", and was meant to act as a part of a never-used plot. However, due to one of the comic writers leaving the staff, this concept was never touched upon, and was eventually retconned as Sonic legally changing his name at an early age, leaving his actual first name a mystery.

This would later be referenced years later, where the Netflix description for the animated series "Sonic Prime" claimed that Sonic's middle name was Maurice.

Sometimes when items are scanned at American gas stations, the sound effect when Sonic collects rings will play on the cash register. It is not known why this sound effect is used, but it's theorized that it stems from Sega's parent company, Sega Sammy Holdings, having some kind of involvement with Gilbarco Veeder-Root, an American technology company that produces point of sale/payment systems and fuel dispensers. The software used in cash registers produced by the company, Gilbarco Passport, is widely used at convenience stores across the United States and was developed by an unspecified third party, which could be Sega Sammy Holdings. The reason why the Sonic ring sound effect was specifically used is likely a result of the merger between Sega and Sammy Corporation allowing the latter to own the rights to some Sega IPs like Sonic the Hedgehog and primarily use them for pachinko machines.

Tommy Tallarico, credited composer for the "Molten Mine", "The Cauldron", and "Great Megalith" music tracks in Sonic and the Black Knight claimed in 2022 to have been the first American to work on the Sonic the Hedgehog video game series. Even if one refuses to count external work such as localization, marketing, and multimedia adaptations, this is not true, as Americans have worked on art, programming, and music for Sonic titles as far back as the 16-bit version of Sonic the Hedgehog 2, with Tallarico having previously shown awareness in 2014 of American pop star Michael Jackson's involvement in Sonic 3 & Knuckles. In 2023, his involvement in writing the three tracks came into question when it was discovered that they contained similarities to several demos originally credited to Todd Dennis, a composer at Tommy Tallerico Studios in the 1990's, and originally written for the games Black Dawn and Adrenix.