Honestly I want that hat too.png

I just finished watching the Knuckles series. There are both good and bad aspects to this series. First, the good: It's properly lit! It wasn't shrouded in darkness and I could tell what was happening on screen and who was doing what to whom. The candy-color oversaturation also called back to the bright shades of a 90's videogame. I don't have any quibbles with the director's choice as he knows how to frame both action and comedy. Knuckles got his hat from the OVA. A nice little nod to continuity. Dad Rock on the soundtrack! Cary Elwes is in this! When Knuckles actually did get to appear in his own show, he was generally fine and fought well. This was not one of those bait-and-switch shows where the supposed hero constantly gets humiliated and disrespected. The not so good, and some of these are due to the nature of this thing being an interquel. They want to save the big guns for the movies (speaking of movies, the subplot of the human buddy becoming a fugitive was recycled from the first film as was his taking refuge at a family member's house.) The villains. None of them have the gravitas of Dr. Eggman (Robotnik). The main two would sometimes use unfunny Marvel humor: Knuckles (to Mason): You won't take my power! (throws a hook at Mason) Mason (using a mecha glove to block Knuckles' punch) Does it look like I need your power? Willoughby: What're you talking about!? Of course we need to steal his power! That's why we're here! Mason (frustrated): I was trying to say a cool line! A large part of this story focused on Wade Whipple (the doughy manchild deputy from the movies) and not Knuckles. Much of the last two episodes were spent on Wade overcoming something from his childhood and winning a bowling trophy. I can see a lot of fans being less than happy with that choice, as well as the amount of time spent with Wade's family. I also thought it was odd for the bowling championship Wade attenteded to be shown on ESPN 8 the Ocho! Isn't bowling recognized as a cromulent enough sport by now? It's gotta be higher than dodgeball. As far as the focus on Wade, I wonder if that was due to the fact that Knuckles began the story as a mature character and they weren't quite sure how to write an arc for him in the story, so moving the camera's attention from him to Wade allowed them to make another human/wacky talking animal story. The cynic on me says that's also to limit the amount of scenes with Knuckles in them, as he's difficult and expensive to animate and forces the human actors on the set to react to a green tennis ball on a stick or a sockpuppet or some other contrivance. Now despite the many flaws, I ended up liking it to the point where I wouldn't say my time was completely wasted watching this. I went in with low expectations and I ended up liking Wade's journey, his attempt to get closure for something in his childhood, and Wade's battle to win the bowling tournament. Do you need to see this before watching Sonic 3? Probably not. We already knew GUN was somewhat shady from their actions in the second movie and Knuckles doesn't need a tv show to explain how he got his hat. Final grade: high C+ on the cusp of a B- It's streaming on Paramount+ but you could always get it via torrent.
knuckles' hat from the 1996 Sonic OVA .png
Honestly I want that hat too.png
Wearing that hat makes you 20% cooler.png

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