Fridge / Sonic Boom

Fridge Brilliance

In General

• The overuse of athletic tape on the main cast has athletic applications instead of just being an everyday fashion statement. The hand version is to protect the hands, whereas use on the feet is known as spatting, with the same medical benefit. Amy's sarashi also doubles as a backbrace, which keeps her from throwing out her back whenever she swings her hammer (her’s is a two handed weapon like in the games). Given the young audience the show is aimed at, it helps to reinforce athletic safety.
  • Due to how a sarashi can be worn under a shirt (this has combat applications such as reinforced protection from abrasion), the games could EASILY get away with retconning Amy to having been using a sarashi the whole time and no one would question it.
• Knuckles' design makes more sense in the trailer, where he's using his upper body for things such as digging and using his knuckles to climb and hang on ceilings.
• Perhaps rather obvious, but the goggles included in Tails' design are there because he pilots an open cockpit plane (although, curiously, he isn't wearing them in the trailer).
• Amy is the team's Jack of All Stats, and it's reflected in her design. She's a hedgehog like Sonic, she has her quills down like Knuckles, and she uses a tool like Tails.
• When you think about it, the characters' cartoonish and exaggerated designs make sense, since it shows an aspect of their personality and what they do. Sonic and Shadow have lanky legs because they’re runners (skaters in Shadow’s case) with Super-Speed, with Shadow having broader shoulders to show he’s more powerful than Sonic; Knuckles is beefed up to emphasize his strength; Tails got extra gear in his wardrobe to show his talent in machinery; while Amy's outfit symbolizes her feminism and her now being able to keep up with her friends.
• Tails, Amy, Knux, and Sticks all have warm-hued fur, whilst Sonic is blue. Like with his primary counterpart, this helps Sonic stand out more, visually, and in this case also hints a bit at his loner tendencies (he would initially be an outsider to the first three even if this wasn't everyone's first-ever adventure together).
• The stakes are actually higher than they appear - keeping in mind this is a universe for younger viewers. Eggman is trying to build a theme park, but they live on a paradise island so what he intends to do is build a holiday resort for rich people. While of course this doesn't have the emphasis of taking over the world, it would result in the building of hotels and golf courses, the spoiling of the land, everybody losing their houses and having to work for Eggman for whatever wages he would pay (aka slave labour!), and living in whatever staff accommodation is provided. In holiday resorts all the amenities are for paying customers so they'd lose their beaches and parks, all the prices would go up and the shops would be replaced with souvenir shops and cafes full of tourists. Eggman's basically licking the landscape so that nobody else can use it. If only they'd put more emphasis on that...
  • This is also why the villagers sometimes turn on Sonic - some people might be of the opinion that they would like some of that delicious tourist trade, while not fully contemplating the long-term consequences. They're not so much turning against him as they are giving up, or trying to make him give up. It's also why Eggman has to constantly apply for things like licences to do evil things like build on other people's land - they provide his evil lawyers and do his evil paperwork.

• Fridge Humour more, but in one episode when Knuckles is lawyering for Sonic, he says "Heck, I don't know how to do simple stuff, like putting on mittens!" Well, you know what he wears in the main series? Mittens (well, boxing gloves technically). And in Boom, he doesn't wear them - he uses sports tape.
• Sonic being more rude and sarcastic in this continuity starts making a lot more sense when you realize that the people he tends to save come from a village filled with people who often take his heroism for granted and even turn on him at the first opportunity. With that kind of treatment who would be in a good mood?

The Games

• Lyric's instant animosity towards Sonic makes sense, especially when you consider that snakes and hedgehogs are natural enemies.
• Lyric's accusations at the Ancients in the Robotics Facility make more sense when one thinks of Marie Curie and her work on radiation; prolonged exposure to radioactive materials made her and her husband sick and eventually killed them both, and the medicines of the time could not help them, seeing as they were pioneers into the field. Lyric, by contrast, went omnicidal after building his Powered Armor for life support, as he was beyond their help.
• Shadow called Sonic weak because of "[his] loyalty to [his] pathetic friends". It seemed like the usual "I hate friendship!" spiel that folks like Solo spew, but there's more to the story than just that. Sonic didn't move an inch to help his friends fight off the waves of robots at the entrance of Lyric's Tomb, even trying to open the tomb door despite Amy warning him not to, and only actually acting (by opening the tomb door anyway) when Metal Sonic showed up; Shadow was seen in the background at the end of the scene, meaning he saw the whole thing. His fight with Sonic was to see if he had the strength to look his mistake in the eyes and fix it. Tails being around didn't matter to him; he felt Sonic was too weak because he let his concern for his friends paralyze him, and wanted to know if he had the strength to overcome that problem. When he arrived at Lyric's Lair at game's end, he immediately looked at Lyric, and walked away with the answer firm in his mind.
  • In fact, Shadow actually seems to very much be a Stealth Mentor to Sonic. Every single time he arrives, he somehow forces Sonic to improve himself, and when he finally shows up on the show, he gives him a major challenge, and Sonic has always been able to defeat his foes easily before.
• Lyric's name may sound odd for a Big Bad, but it actually makes some sense. "Lyric" and "Sonic" both have five letters, two syllables, end in "-ic" and refer to sound.
• We all know that the games pretty much fail at being prequels, but consider this; the show runs on Negative Continuity, and the games also follow that logic.

In the Series

• In "The Meteor", Eggman-In-Sonic's-Body throws a pie at himself and shouts "Eggman threw a pie at me!" Technically speaking, he's not lying...
• At the end of "Eggman Unplugged", Eggman assesses the damage and mess caused by the Lightning Bolt Society screwing around with his lair, and proclaims that it'll take weeks at best to get his lair back up to par, in which he says afterwards "no attacking each other until then." Coincidentally, "Eggman Unplugged" is also the last episode of the first half of Season 1.
• In Let's Play Musical Friends, Orbot and Cubot are shown a game where "you run, roll, and collect rings as fast as you can," which Cubot immediately says sounds terrible. While it's a pretty funny Who Would Want to Watch Us? gag, remember that they were built by Dr. Eggman. Of course they'd think a game about Sonic would be bad.
• Amy does not want to eat a rabbit in Into the Wilderness because it's too cute. Easy to think it's just a lead-up to the literal Killer Rabbit joke, but then you realize it's a Mythology Gag to the main franchise — Amy wouldn't want to eat her good pal Cream the rabbit, either!
• Eggman destroying Amy's couch at the end of "Bro-Down Showdown". He messes with Sonic's attempt to win the new couch, just to watch him squirm, and waits until the last second before Amy sees the ruined couch before saving him, to maximize Sonic's suffering while keeping him out of the doghouse. This fits right in line with the episode directly before, "Tails' Crush", where he says the bro code is more important than the enemy thing. Moreover, the couch in the game show would have done little if anything to save them because Amy is an interior decorator and the couch is a completely different color; naturally, Sonic and Knuckles don't consider this at all.
• Also applying to the games, Shadow is an Adaptational Badass. He also has developed a heavy I Work Alone complex. Most likely, working alone has led to him forcing himself past the limits of what Sonic & co. are, since he has probably had to contend with similar threats. Him kicking Lyric's ass in Shattered Crystal also points to this.
• Shadow's plan in It Takes A Village To Defeat A Hedgehog is absolutely genius, and so subtle we didn't notice it. He:
  • Heads into Eggman's meeting, taking advantage of his popularity to piss off all the villains, and actually ensure they do ally together.
  • Waits for Team Eggman to attack Team Sonic, and split them up, so that he only has to go after Sonic.
  • Attacks Sonic just as he's about to win, henceforth gaining the advantage via surprise.
  • Insults Sonic's craftsmanship. It gets funnier when he uses a similar line to criticize Sonic’s floristry skills in LEGO Dimensions.
  • Kicks Sonic's ass, and have him right where he wants for some Evil Gloating and a Finishing Move.
  • Let his team win, just finish off Sonic.
• In "My Fair Sticksy", when Eggman is attacking the group, Sticks refuses to fight back due to trying to act ladylike. Only when Eggman starts attacking her and has her literally in a corner does she "get primal". She was a feral animal, domesticated, who then fought back when she was aggressively backed into a corner - just like how real life animals, especially pets, behave.
• In "Multi Tails", when Tails clones himself, each clone is one-fifth as smart as Tails is... so they end up even dumber than Knuckles. You'd think they'd be slightly below average intelligence at worst, considering he's a Child Prodigy. But remember that Tails is a kid (usually eight years old, rarely if ever more than ten). If his intelligence was split up, his maturity and common sense might have been as well, meaning every clone would just act like little kids. Hence their gullibility, curiosity, hyperactivity, and tendency to be distracted.
• Considering the show's already made a few jabs at the more negative parts of the Sonic fanbase, it could be the town they live in is meant as a much longer-term jab: no matter what Sonic and his friends do (no matter how many well-received games they make), everyone turns on them at the first opportunity (the Sonic franchise is declared dead with every bad or mediocre release), and the rest of the time ranges from apathetic to outright hatred (the franchise as a whole is frequently mocked by all but the most loyal fans).
  • The town's government could be seen as a jab at Sega themselves. While officials like the mayor will ultimately support Sonic in the end, they tend to be apathetic to what's going on until things get really bad (Sega's infamous management problems), dealing with strange town bylaws (Sega setting bizarre rules on Sonic projects), or dealing with crazy demands from the townspeople (fans).
• Of course Perci in "Fire in a Crowded Workshop" had the most coherent story. She doesn't know Sonic, Knuckles and Amy well enough to flanderize them. Meanwhile Sonic, Knuckles and Amy know each other very well - and for Perci's own personality in each of the three characters' stories, each one just went with what they thought would be the most likely to happen (Sonic thinks Perci would act as a fangirl, Knuckles thinks Perci would develop a crush on him, and Amy sees her as a flirt).
  • And even though Perci gives the most coherent version of the story, it does not break the rules of RashomonStyle, which works under the assumption that everyone is an Unreliable Narrator to some degree. Perci's story isn't too different as she portrays the other three in an unfavorable light while showing no fault of her own. It's probably just as inaccurate as Sonic, Knuckles and Amy's stories.
• Knuckles being cheerful but stupid, compared to his hotheaded mainstream personality, may be because he's living in an actual town rather than isolated on his own with only a few people (or animals?) as occasional companionship. By not living alone his whole life, he grew up to be more social. Considering mainstream Knuckles is pretty gullible and dense himself (getting fooled by Eggman into helping his schemes is almost a Running Gag), it's just masked under his attitude, it's likely his intelligence really isn't different between the two at all; it's just more obvious in this incarnation, because interacting with others more often has made him more open with his thoughts. Thoughts that are often rather odd.
• Zooey is shown in "Fuzzy Puppy Buddies" to be a fan of the game Fuzzy Puppies. No wonder her and Tails get along so well, Rescue Romance aside; both of them have dorky habits and hobbies. And both seem to be suckers for puppies, considering in "Tails' Crush", Tails is shown to have a "Hello Doggy" notebook and is at first ecstatic to receive a matching pencil.
• In "Tails' Crush":
  • Sonic's attempt at romantic advice is to tell Tails to act cool and pretend he has no interest. This would explain a lot about how he acts around Amy.
  • Why does Eggman of all people give Tails the best romantic advice out of everyone? He's a Card-Carrying Villain - of course he knows the importance of being confident in yourself!
• Sure, Sticks not trusting technology is amusing, and could just be a stereotype of her having been a feral animal previously. But Eggman frequently attacks the town with robots. Having grown up living in the wild and fighting for her own survival, she doesn't quite grasp the difference between good and evil technology like her friends do, and just plays it safe by not indulging in any technology so Eggman can't get the drop on her. And, to her credit, it works.
• Knuckles speech on feminism in "Eggman's Anti-Gravity Ray" already shows us that Knuckles has quite a bit of experience with the subject, but the fact that Knuckles is the one who says it says another message: the writers think that typical feminism is so dumb that an echidna that eats napkins and builds with bananas has something to say about it!
• In "If You Build It, They Will Race", Team Sonic is shown creating their signature vehicles for the first time...even though they had already been introduced in the three episodes airing prior to this one. However, Soar the Eagle states 8 months had passed in order to get the legal permits in order for the race, and it's possible the previous three episodes took place during those months.
  • In the same episode, when designing their cars, Sonic, Tails, Knuckles, and Amy use the computer themselves, while Sticks has Tails (and previously Amy) do it for her and just tells them what to put in. Her usual distrust of technology probably means that, even in cases like these where she's getting involved, she has no idea of even the basics of using a computer (whereas even a ditz like Knuckles can pull off the bare minimum).

Fridge Logic

• When Buster grows in size and sprouts tentacles "Buster" (season 1, episode 4), Sonic asks Eggman if those were the same tentacles he stole from the warehouse even though Buster was in Sticks's possession at that time.
  • The tentacles seem to have been given to Buster through the bone that Eggman gave him, which was after he robbed the warehouse.
• When Amy decides to help one of Eggman's broken beebots, Tails helps her rebuild and reprogram it. However when she brings the new Bea to meet the team, Tails is just as hostile as everyone else.
• Why did Eggman act shocked to find his particle accelerator missing, even though no one else was around, when he was behind the theft?
  • Metal probably went rogue, but then figured out what happened and decided to roll with it.
• So, where was Metal Sonic until episode 44? Was he in storage or something?
  • Either in that factory or Volcanic Crater from Shattered Crystal. That's where he was last seen.

Fridge Horror

• By the end of Rise of Lyric, Lyric is ensnared by Sonic's Enerbeam unit, his armor's levitation unit nonfunctional, and his control unit ripped out and tossed away by Knuckles (and picked up by Eggman later), with him unable to move. You have to keep in mind that the armor's life support function is vital to Lyric's continued survival; he explicitly stated that he built it in the first place to keep himself alive. Should his armor's power supply expire before that of Sonic's Enerbeam unit, the rest of his life will be very miserable indeed.
  • Earlier in the game, after losing a game of Keep Away with one of the Chaos Crystals to Sonic and co, Lyric breaks off his partnership with Eggman and takes control of Metal Sonic and has him raze half of Slowpoke Isle. So, anyone care to wager how many people were killed during the attack?
• Lyric's backstory, specifically regarding the Chaos Crystals. Just trying to study them nearly killed him; in his rage and despair, he lashes out at the Ancients for their (alleged) negligence and vows to mechanize the whole world, any faith he may have had in organic life prior to the tragedy shattered...however, he's also hell-bent on retrieving the very artifacts that nearly ended his life, when you'd think that he'd want nothing more to do with them, ever. What else did the Chaos Crystals do to him?
• Escaping from Buddy Buddy Temple requires teamwork, so anyone who happens to get trapped in there alone is doomed to die.
• Shadow instantly swears vengeance on Lyric for mind-controlling him, as if he's been manipulated before... and, knowing about the mainstream Shadow's tragic backstory, which made him into an Anti-Hero, this version is a Knight of Cerebus villain. Which begs the question: What the fuck happened to this version of Shadow to make him so much worse than the main timeline one?
• Another Shadow one: In main canon, Shadow's friends and allies are usually either Killed Off for Real (remember Maria?), or he becomes a victim of Chronic Backstabbing Disorder, his I Work Alone attitude becomes much more serious.
  Shadow: You're weak. And you know what makes you weak? Your loyalty to your pathetic friends.
  • With no Boom versions of Rouge and Omega around to keep him company, Shadow might be this way due to dealing with heavy isolation and no healthy way to cope with his anger/depression that the main series version managed to avoid.
• Eggman's plan in "Can An Evil Genius Crash On Your Couch?" involves tiring Sonic out so he'll be unable to fight back against his Obliterator-bot. While Eggman is explaining this to Sonic, he falls asleep, so Eggman reaches out and slaps him across the face. Just think for a second about how utterly helpless and vulnerable Sonic was at that moment. Eggman didn't need a giant mech to fight Sonic; he could have just reached out and throttled him to death with his bare hands, and Sonic would have been completely unable to fight back.
• "Beyond the Valley of Cubots". Cubot prototypes were lucky to escape Dr. Eggman and avoid getting recycled. However,in this episode Eggman mentions the "Orbot Series" he started after giving up hope on Cubot, implying that the Orbot we see in the show wasn't the only of his kind. Where are his prototypes though? Let's hope they are just not found yet...
• Does nobody realize what could've happened in "Mech Suits Me" if nobody removed the mech suit or COULD remove it? Sonic basically became the Boom version of Scourge.
• In "The Biggest Fan", Mark takes advantage of Sonic being in a cast in his house to enact his fanfictions. The one he was about to use is stated to be family-friendly, but what was stopping him from doing one that wasn’t? Mark also admits he doesn't care much about pairing Sonic with Amy. The implications are horrifying on their own, but what's worse is that we don't know what was in that fanfiction - and guessing only makes it worse. Mark even asked Sonic to enact one of them.
  • The concept itself is creepy. Sonic has been kidnapped and put in casts by his biggest fan, then said biggest fan presents what are basically real person fanfictions in that world, and then asks him to enact one of them. Imagine if your favorite actor or musician was kidnapped and forced to go through the same...
  • Then again, it was based on a Stephen King novel...
• You can’t help but feel sorry for Eggman in Hedgehog Day. Being forced to relive the same day repeatedly and slowly going insane. No wonder he started getting aggravated at his robots making him breakfast.
• Eggman snaps and chops off part of his mustache in one episode. Understandably, the robots were terrified.
• Shadow in the continuing episode. He pummels Sonic and his friends just because Eggman made him think that Sonic was smack-talking him, and only when Shadow is about to crush Sonic’s ribs does he finally understand that he’s been had. Unfortunately, it’s short-lived, because he then expresses glee in watching everyone suffer during a storm. YIKES.
• The Fridge Horror doubles when you learn that according to the show's writers, Shadow was written to be 50 years old. In other words: Shadow is a grown man beating up children. Let that sink in.
• So Eggman's lair blew up in "Lair on Lockdown", no worries, it can be rebuilt...Wait, weren't Nominatus and his cronies last seen imprisoned there?

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