#(keeping in mind that im sure the most hardcore of fans are invested but im talking abt the general population)

[marklikely]

i really do wonder if we'll see the end of the mcu soon though cause the quality of the movies has undeniably been getting worse, and ive noticed a lot of casual fans (which is what most people i know are, including myself, at least a few years ago when i would have actually considered myself a fan at all) are completely uninvested in phase 4 and havent really liked any of the movies lately. plus with how fast theyre pushing them out, overexposure could lead to a huge backlash soon

#when i say soon i mean like within 10 years because the disney project plans stretch out so far into the future #i mean idk we might get a big collapse that cancels a ton of future projects like with star wars but i doubt it #avpost #but idk i think mcu backlash is definitely a lot more common now than it was five or six years ago #but then again i think of how like all they had to do was get people from the raimi trilogy to stand on screen #and that was enough to get a ton of people to consider nwh to be great even though it sucks #not that thats necessarily proof that the movies are gonna survive either since a lot of people also didnt like nwh #i dont know it just feels like every release is either middling reviews or extremely mixed reviews. only those two options #plus they all get like almost no hype and excitement and then they leave the conversation so fast #people were talking about infinity war for MONTHS before release. like IN DEPTH talk. big major hype. #and then after it came out people were speculating and writing theories the ENTIRE time until endgame #nobody is talking about doctor strange 2 anymore and that was like two months ago #in two weeks or less nobody will be talking about love and thunder anymore im sure #nobody even noticed eternals. nobody talks about shang chi or black widow. #even the shows like the only one that left any sort of impact was wandavision. #the rest just like. air. and i dont ever see them come up in conversation or online after like the first couple episodes #(keeping in mind that im sure the most hardcore of fans are invested but im talking abt the general population) #(which is like. probably more important cause you cant keep a project this big alive on a specific fanbase alone)

[laviarray]

Why I can’t stand Ian Flynn’s writing style.

 Ever since I read his stuff from issue 160, he consistently makes fundamental mistakes that no professional writer should ever make. He incorrectly builds his story lines, doesn’t know how to handle characters unless told, his themes are poorly thought out and shows no imagination in his fantasy or action beats. However, I tend to ask for positive opinions before because I wanted to get more insight into why people like his stuff. While I am glad for the input, I can’t get past how his writing is ambitionless and lacks basic understanding of storytelling, leading to a very unengaging script.

 EXAMPLE?

A good example of this is in issue 267, where Sonic and Rotor meet an Eggboss and Rotor’s father, Tundra for the first time. Flynn said he wanted to try to set up the mains to have rivals, with Rotor’s being Tundra. In this story Rotor meets Tundra after not seeing him for years, gets mad at him for working with Eggman, Tundra throws them into prison and then they break out with the ending being Rotor and Tundra looking up to the sky to show a parallel of… something?

Rival?

There are a lot of problems here, but the main one is that the story fails to establish these two as rivals, mainly because they have nothing to be rivals about. Being rival isn’t just being on different sides of a fight, it’s about two characters who want to beat each other for their own personal reasons and are usually written in for the writer to challenge something about at least one of the characters. Ash from Pokémon shows this pretty well. Each of Ash’s rivals are usually written in to challenge him on some element of his character. Gary challenged him on his lack of privilege and struggling to keep up. Paul challenged him on his kindness and loving nature to his Pokémon. Sawyer on his pride and his seniority getting the best of his ego. Just to name a few.

 Tundra on the other hand, doesn’t challenge anything about Rotor. Tundra does call his technology interest “hiding behind his toys” and calls him weak, but so what? Besides the fact that working for Eggman contradicts this worldview, what does this mean to Rotor? None of what Tundra speaks here contradicts Rotor’s beliefs. Rotor has never defined his strength or character to his technology nor does he have any world view that deals with strength or lack thereof. Neither of them have any reason to want to butt heads over or to compete against each other and neither of them have anything to prove by beating the other. Rotor doesn’t even have any anger or animosity towards Tundra after meeting him. He just sulks in the cell before Sonic tells him to get over it (remember this).

Maybe this could’ve worked as a revenge subplot for Rotor wanting to get Tundra for failing his home town, but that ends up being undermined when Rotor isn’t mad or vengeful towards Tundra during this whole issue. Sonic gets more upset at Tundra than he does. However, this still falls flat because the only reason you would know or care about Rotor’s home town is if you read supplementary material. Not universe issues, which still would be a bad place, but special issues that most people couldn’t get. So… yeah, there is no animosity between these two.

 Rotor’s character

I’m not surprised this doesn’t work, mainly because Flynn doesn’t know how to write characters and Rotor suffers from this the most out of the leads. Throughout the shattered world arc, Rotor is never given any major character traits besides being super focused on saving the world, and by that I mean being a straw man for why the characters keep getting distracted from the A plot to focus on side missions. He’s never given any personal moments or conflicts before this, nor does he have any motivations or wants outside of the conflict of the arc. So by the time we get to 267, the only thing of note about Rotor is that he is into technology, but not in any way that is personal to him. So having him get a rival was always going to be pointless.

 Give Flynn a break!

However, as I hear from every Flynn defender, “This might’ve been fixed later”. Two problems. One, why would any sane writer introduce and have the rivals interact without establishing some animosity or reason for them to see each other. Two, if that wasn’t the goal of this issue, this comic issue is beyond pointless. Nothing else of note happens in this issue. They have a light show of a fight scene, get caught, meet Tundra, breakout, leave. Besides getting a Gaia key, that could’ve been anywhere, there is no other reason to get these two on their own to meet Tundra, other than to establish their rivalry. To be honest, I’m not sure what’s worse. The fact that they dedicated half an issue to this half-baked idea, or that they wasted the other half on Eggman getting Metal Sonic back, that should’ve been 3 pages at best, instead of writing a story that is a major game changer for a lead character to the fullest.

(We totally needed to cut pages from learning about and developing a lead character and dedicated the same amount of time to seeing Eggman get Metal sonic back... Im not kidding they are both 10 pages.) Now the reason I was asking you guys for your thoughts was because I want to gauge how others view the comics too. However, when I get outside of comic fans, I get… interesting views. For example, I showed this issue to a group of people that all have daddy issues (as in they had to fight their dad to protect their mom kind of issues), so it should’ve been easy for them to relate to Rotor. They were also a wide range of opinions on Sonic, ranging from hardcore fans to ambivalent. However, after reading it, they all had the same reaction of “Well… That happened…” with all of them feeling nothing after reading. And after we discussed it, we figured out why. The story never gives you a reason to care about Rotor, Tundra just shows up and leaves, leaving no impact on the story or audience and there isn’t a reason to get invested with the conflict when Rotor isn’t.

 “OK, that was a bad issue, but that isn’t all of them?”

Except it is. Every last problem that I brought up here shows up throughout Flynn writing.

Poorly developed main characters?

All of them written around this quality and the ones that aren’t usually have characterization mandated or coming from other parts of the franchise.

(ok... we were five stories in at this point... Why were their 12 characters in the main cast (Chip not pictured)? Longer slice of life stories would have issues developing characters with a cast that big.) Rivalries that don’t go past superficial elements of the characters and don’t challenges the leads well?

Pretty much all of them, but especially Antoine’s with Hood, Nicole’s with Phage, and Bunnie’s with Cassia

“What about Sally and Clove?” I don’t count them as Flynn said in his podcast “Sally would be too busy to have a rival”. Which speaks volumes about his writing priorities.

Having characters get Pep talks to get them over writer inflicted trauma and to never address again?

Flynn did this 8 times in Shattered world and already 2 times in IDW (Issues 1, and 3)

B plots that go nowhere and should’ve been cut early in production?

Most of the issues during shattered world

Dedicating an entire issue to one plot detail that may or may not be relevant to later issues?

This is practically his brand at this point.

(These two are going to be soooooo relevant and integral to the story. Just... you know... Not for this entire arc...) And these aren’t his only problems.

  What is your point?

So why am I going through all of this? Why did I just type all of that for you guys? For 3 reasons.

1) I want you to understand where my vile for Flynn’s writing comes from. Not because of one thing he did wrong or that he doesn’t get a certain character right. But from a comprehensive look at his written patterns and worldview on writing.

2) I do genuinely want to understand why this man is well liked as I’ve seen some writers do half the crap Flynn does and get flogged by their fan bases.

3) If possible, try to get us to ask for better. I don’t hate Flynn or anything, but it boggles my mind that he is seen as a great writer when he is subpar at best. I don’t want him fired or anything but I don’t want him on any other branch of the franchise, nor do I want to see anyone thinking he should be either.

Now I’m fully willing to admit I’m wrong on all of these points, so feel free to tell me what you think.

In the meantime, I’m going to get ready for the completion of the arc in IDW. Expect a full essay by Janurary!

#ian flynn #idw sonic #sonic idw #archie sonic #anti archie sonic #sonic the hedgehog #lavi's thoughts