Amy is one of the most well known members of the Sonic cast, but her story into recognition is less understood. Now she is a rather minor character, so in this video I explain where I believe mistakes had been made with Amy's character.
I dunno, I actually think that Amy's characterization was fine in Heroes. The whole "there's no way out of marrying me scene was probably intended as a joke much like the prison scene from SA2, and it's really only one scene that people either misinterpreted or blew out of proportion. Plus, Amy still shows her compassion by spending most of Team Rose's story searching for Chocola and Froggy, so I wouldn't really say that she spends the game only thinking about sonic tbh. Also, isn't the only time that she ditches Team Rose in the ending cutscene (the one before neo metal sonic I think)? I wouldn't really say that shows that she would just drop her team at the drop of a hat, since once again it was a single interaction in literally ONE scene.
It wasn't just that scene. She seemed to be rather dismissive of her team at numerous points, but as I said I am sure that's not what they intended. The main point of bringing that up was to show how Amy was interprited by many other people due to the game not doing the best are explaining itself.
I actually really like Amy in sonic x (with exception of the planet of misfortune episode I hate that episode). I thought she was funny and cute at times
@@TheRealMightyEmperor Yeah I mean I agree with the planet of misfortune episode but not so much with other episodes. She was in the wrong to try to trap sonic but I can forgive her since she was willing to risk her life jumping in after sonic at the end. Plus sonic clearly liked Amy back in that show so their relationship was different.
@@TheRealMightyEmperor I don’t think she was wrong to be angry when sonic emotionally manipulated her in the cruise episode and stood her up that other episode.
I feel like there was wasted opportunity to develop amy character. I think she should have interacted more with tails my ideas to expand on the relationship between Amy and Tails. I would have tails think Amy doesn't care about him and doesn't seem as a friend just an annoyance this is because to him he only thinks Amy cares about Sonic. Amy Arc will be to prove that she does care for tails and see him as a friend. I think this would be good development for Amy and also Tails.
Well during the "Adventure Era" whenever Amy was in a game/story without Cream, she was actually shown to be friendly/hang out with Tails in a natural way (Sonic X, Sonic Riders, Sonic Adventure 1&2, Sonic Chronicles) so there was a dynamic their (Unlike with Knuckles). Unfortunately that like many other relations has been buried under years of meta.
Amy was always a meh character in the series for me, she had a cool thing going for in Adventure but that version of Amy is long gone. Now her current portrayal (or how SEGA/Sonic Team want me to see her as) is the discount Sally Acorn of the IDW comics, because they are desperately wanting people to forget the freedom fighters ever existed lol.
Hence why I say they went wrong with Amy. She has had rapid personality shifts in Boom as well. I haven't read the IDW since zombot arc ended, but I'm pretty sure it was because Sega wants Amy to appear more mature and independent for modern audiences but couldn't be bothered to make it make sense.
Yeah that’s not the Amy that I loved for years. I felt like she was turning into Sally Acorn. Sort of and she never hid her feelings about Sonic before, so I felt it was out of character of her to feel awkward in Boom when she stops UT from translating her thoughts.
Have you seen the issues after the metal virus story arc? I think Evan Stanley’s run improved IDW Amy a lot and has her closet to sonic adventure Amy in years. Also while I can see the criticisms of Amy being like sally I do want to point out that Amy in the games and sonic x has always had a take charge personality and leader potential. I don’t think it’s fair to act like Amy becoming a leader (especially in the circumstances of sonic forces and knuckles stepping down after the meta sonic arc) is out of character for Amy. Imo a lot of Sally’s traits are pretty universal and can be obtained through maturity so I still don’t like this comparison as it comes off as a bit biased. With that said I do think she became more watered down and less expressive throughout most of these few arcs (I guess depending on the scene I thought her moments with cream were good). I have to say her interaction at the very beginning with sonic was spot on.
Amy is the same as Sally Acorn? The difference is that Amy has matured more. Managing a group is not just Amy's thing. Amy learned this in Sonic Heroes when she led Team Rose, even in the comics, she motivated the group.
With you saying about Amy's Boom redesign, Sonic's tan arms get coloured in blue to match his fur colour, but yet Amy's arms don't get coloured in to match her fur colour... bit of a strange one that when you think about it. Also with you saying about Free Riders Amy, I feel her and Fleetway Sonic would be made for each other, given how horrible they are towards their friends. Plus her new English voice is TERRIBLE! Thank god the Japanese one has remained largely consistent, save for Shuffle, with Taeko Kawata giving Rosy the Rascal her voice. The current one has her sounding more like Minnie Mouse!
To be fair to the current Amy Voice Actress, she has gotten better over the years, but has also received less screen time so we don't hear her as much. In Free riders though the voice was defiantly grating on the ears.
@@TheRealMightyEmperor maybe abit, but give me the original Japanese voice actors any day of the week, preferably with accurate subtitles. For all you said about not being able to finish the story mode of TSR there was abit when Big was getting confused about a metaphor, thinking it to be some kind of cookie, as Amy says says just because someone offers you something doesn't mean they're nice. As Big says about being confused Amy simply remarks in a pretty condescending way of "we know big, we know." Where as in the Japanese version she's more caring towards her friend. ENG ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-qPqv0xyh4RE.html JPN ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-6JdSFCY7R0o.html But I guess that's just par for the course with TSR's English script, what with the whole "watch out Silver, this blue hedgehog's gonna force fed you your own car!" Where as the Japanese Sonic has abit of friendly banter and doesn't try to totally run Silver into the ground, like some sort of bully. So again, could we please get accurate subtitles for the Japanese dub?
I hope they put her in the sonic movies. I think if they go back to her roots and make her like Sonic adventures Amy but more independent that could improve her characters reputation and give her another chance.
Maybe. I feel that with all the characters the movie wants to juggle as is there just isn't enough space for Amy. Ibwould rather she doesn't show up over having a half hearted role.
I've never really gotten the issue with "If I had to choose between the world and Sonic, I would choose Sonic" line. To me she's never been saying that "I'd choose my love over the fate of the rest of the world", she's saying "Even if Sonic were to accidentally cause the apocalypse (not intentionally) she would protect him and not allow him to be murdered as a way of preventing it." She's saying that she isn't going to just allow Sonic to be murdered for some disaster that she knows he would not intentionally cause and she will protect him from being hurt by Silver for that. Obviously she would then go on to find out what it is that Sonic would inadvertently do to cause the disaster and help prevent it without taking his life. She's saying that even to save someone else murder isn't justified when it's killing someone who would only be accidentally causing a disaster. She knows Sonic is a good person and a hero and she knows that if that were to ever happen it would be 100% accidental and not something he would do out of malice. This is something I agree with as you can't justify killing an innocent person just because the world might be safer with them dead. This is similar to how in Sonic X Shadow wanted to kill Cosmo because of her being an inadvertent spy for the Metarex and her being alive greatly decreased the chances that they'd be able to save all lives in the universe. Even with that being true it's wrong to kill her because she is a good person and so they will just have to take their chances with her alive no matter what. I think 06 was Amy at her best alongside SA2.
I think Amy was at her best in SA1, because she actually had a main story. SA2 is also fine, but she is barely in it. 06 similar issue. Heroes Amy I actually like a lot - maybe X Amy as well - but there are just a few large things that make me rank SA1 on top over all.
I just have to correct you. In SA2 Amy did not say she would let sonic out if she married him. What she said was in response to sonic asking about shadow. She said “if I tell ya will you marry me”. She never said she wasn’t going to let sonic out. That’s something a lot of fans misunderstood for some reason.
@@DaGhostToastRoast I have not read any past Zombot Arc, which I had by the time this video was made, so my opinion on IDW Amy is the same as whatever I say about it in the video.
@@TheRealMightyEmperor There’s also a 30th anniversary comic that has classic Amy and in my opinion is the closest they’ve gotten to her original personality in a while. Also the sonic mania adventures holiday special.
Okay, you argued that you felt Boom Amy was an attempt to make her less feminine and more tomboyish. I feel they also tried to take parts of Sally Acorn's personality and or some of Blaze the cat's personality and mash it into Amy's personality in a bad attempt to make Amy seem calmer. Unfortunately, I feel they still kept the girly girl attitude in Boom Amy: showing her in the dress rather than shorts or skort or leotard or whatever, showing her trying out various hobbies such as painting and writing, her house being pink, and such. They also made her seem bossy, needs to have things her way, and other negative traits. I didn't really think of it before now but I suppose the Sonic team for Sonic Forces could've had her be in disbelief Sonic is alive and touch his shoulder or cry or something other than "Oh yay, you're alive but we need ya to go right back out there". It's sad that the Sonic team did so good with the Sonic Adventure games and then just, ugh. I get it takes time to change and some people just seem incapable of changing for long periods of time - my mom and step dad would fight, my step dad would promise to change, seem changed for some months, and then he's back to how he was - but video games, cartoons, and such don't follow real world logic. I liked how Amy tried to tone it down in Sonic Boom but man, I still don't fully like her, she reminds me of one my former step mother: a person I DO NOT want to be around!
Hey, when characters reflect things we have gone through in life or have known it can make them even more impactful to use, good or bad. Sorry to hear about what went down with your family, obviously I don't know the situation but I hope you are in a stable condition at the moment. As for Amy, yeah after the Adventure Era Sega just seemed to do whatever the wind told them to do with her. She lacks any consistency in her recent appearances.
@@TheRealMightyEmperor Luckily, I'm 29, I live alone but I live in a trailer park right behind my mom and step dad but my dad and his wife live in another state in the US. Thank you.
Follow Me, to me is the superior Amy theme song; no innuendos, no sexual references, just pure Amy! My Sweet Passion basically just says that Amy literally wants to get laid with Sonic lmao. To make some quotations from the song to prove my point; "He reminds me of parsley when he's standing there all alone Makes me wanna be his specialité" "Are you okay you seem to be a little bit tense (You don't have to worry 'bout a single thing) We are free to get whatever that we want to have (We're also free to do whatever we want) That's what we'll do that's what we'll do" Yeah, this all went over my head when I was a kid lol.
Sweet Passion without the verses was ok, but never my thing. Whenever I first actually listened to the full version... Talk about the Crazy Amy Sonic Heroes vibes. And Ironically it is the Heroes theme that suits her better... Despite supposedly being a team theme. Poor Cream, she never got her won song.
@@DanielFahimi The problem is Blaze doesn't have enough wrong for me to talk about, but she also hasn't been used enough to warrant a where she went right. She has more just been put in a box and left alone.
@@TheRealMightyEmperor that's fine but I think Amy is better than Blaze as she has much more of a bloom than her! She is also the most popular Sonic female character!
I never understood where all the sonamy fans came from...well at least in the US. I was born in the mid 90s so I was introduced to the series with SA1 and during that time I watched shows like Fairly Odd Parents, Ed, Edd, and Eddy, and Chowder. What do they have in common? Female "Love Interests" whose advances make the protagonists scared or uncomfortable. That played a role in me disliking her character for a LOONNNGGG time. Looking back though her best moments didn't involve her "Love" for Sonic, it was her ability to connect and help better others. Shadow, Gamma, Silver are all results of this and with her mentorship of Cream you see Cream do the same for Blaze in Rush.I like the adventure era Amy but would like to see her mature beyond her crush, one of my fav moments of the Dark Brotherhood is her accepting that she would only be friends with Sonic by what choices you make. If there is going to be a game paring let it be player choice.
Making it player choice won't work long term, because otherwise any game with Amy would need to be written to account for both outcomes which would be a waste of resources. The current Amy is more mature than adventure Amy, but I don't like what we got.
@@TheRealMightyEmperor yeah the only way I see it working is in spin off games being non cannon, the best option would to keep it pairing free to avoid pissing people off.
@@TheRealMightyEmperor i bet her portrayal in sonic free riders is way worse than Tootie, one of Timmy Turner's main love interests from Nickelodeon's Fairly Odd Parents
Long Comment ahead, so apologies in advance. Interesting video. You make a lot of good points. I also think Amy is very badly written in Battle and Free Riders, and while I have nothing against people who like her in Boom, I feel a lot of what her made her character unique and interesting was lost in translation. Now there is one big thing in your video that I very much disagree with, and that's Amy's portrayal in Sonic Heroes. I've seen a couple other people in the comments section bring this up as well, but I'd like to throw in my two cents since Amy is my favorite Sonic character, Sonic Heroes is my favorite Sonic game, and I whenever I replay the game I tend to go through Team Rose's story. There are four main things about Amy's portrayal in Sonic Heroes I want to discuss. To start, let's talk about her feelings for Sonic. Yes, she does mention him numerous times throughout the game and wants to find him. However, there is a good reason for that other than her love for him. In the very first cutscene of Team Rose's story, we see Amy holding a newspaper that shows Sonic running while holding Froggy and Chocola. Cream then says that Amy should be more careful with it as it's their only clue to Froggy and Chocola's whereabouts. Thus, I feel it makes sense for them to want to find Sonic. Now I will agree that the cutscene before the Team Sonic vs Team Rose fight could have been handled better, there actually is dialogue in the fight itself that shows Amy getting upset that Sonic isn't giving Froggy and Chocola back to Cream and Big. Yes, we the players know Sonic doesn't actually have them, but remember that Team Rose only had one clue, and that was Sonic. Plus, I think it's unfair to call out Amy for having a stupid reason to fight Team Sonic when every team battle has almost no good reason for happening, except for arguably Team Rose vs Team Chaotix. Another thing to mention is that after the fight with the Egg Albatross, Amy doesn't mention Sonic AT ALL until the end of their story. I think this shows that Amy realizes Sonic, in fact, does not know where Froggy and Chocola are, and realizes that she should be thinking more about helping her team, than thinking about Sonic. Next, I want to bring up Amy's energy and her can-do attitude. She remains quite optimistic throughout Team Rose's story, saying stuff like "C'mon let's get going" and "Alright! Let's go!" with a lot of passion. She loses that attitude at one point in their story, and that's right after their fight with Team Sonic. Even with that, she bounces right back and is ready to go after Eggman. Even when they defeat the Egg Albatross and they find the fake Eggman, Amy doesn't lose faith like the rest of her team does. She's not ready to give up. Next, let's talk about how brave Amy is in Heroes. In CD, Adventure 1, and Adventure 2, at some point there is something that will prevent her from taking action or cause her to run away. That thing mainly being Eggman. She's kidnapped by Eggman's robot in CD, she backs away in fear of Eggman in Adventure 1 when he wants the bird she's trying to protect, run's away from Eggman on Prison Island, and is held at gun point when they're on the Ark. Now, compare that Amy to the one we see in Heroes. She shows no fear when interacting with Eggman in Heroes. On the contrary, she is ready to take him down when need be, even calling him names like "moustache monkey" and "bloated buffoon." Really big contrast from the Amy in the past that would either run away or freeze in fear of him. She's not even too afraid of Metal Sonic, the robot that kidnapped her in CD, in the final story of the game. When Team Rose fights him, you can hear the anger she feels when she realizes that Metal Sonic not only pretended to be Sonic, but did so to kidnap Froggy and Chocola. She is angry and wants to help defeat him. Again, Amy in Heroes is much braver than she was beforehand and I think it's important to mention. Finally, I want to talk about Amy as a leader. When you think about Team Rose as a whole, Amy is the one with the most experience with adventuring and taking on Eggman. Thus, it's only natural for her to take up the mantle as leader. Now, I'm sure there are plenty of people who would say that Amy is a bad choice for a leader, but that could not be further from the truth, and I believe Heroes is a great example of why she's a great leader. Throughout Team Rose's story, there are numerous times where Cream and Big will become sad, thinking they should just give up on trying to find Froggy and Chocola, or doubt their abilities to do so to begin with. Such as after they fight the Egg Albatross and Big says they should just go home or when they start Hand Castle and both Cream and Big are afraid of their new surroundings. Due to this, Amy steps up as leader and makes sure they never stop fighting. She makes sure they keep moving forward by maintaining both her can-do attitude and her bravery, saying stuff like "C'mon, let's get going!" and "Alright! Let's go!", while also trying to boost the morale of her team by making them believe in themselves, like when she says "We can do this!" Amy shows plenty of traits of what can make a great leader. Bravery, optimism, compassion, and putting aside their own needs and wants for the sake of those they lead. Amy is a great leader, and we can see how she's inspired her team at the end of their story. When Team Rose is fighting the Egg Emperor, we see how much braver Cream and Big are than in the beginning of their journey with lines like Cream's "I won't quit until Cheese and Chocola are reunited!" and Big's "Okie Dokie. I'm ready!" They've come a long way since the beginning of their story. Also, a little detail I like is that in their final cutscene, Cheese and Chocola bow their heads and say "Amy, chao chao" which I always took as them saying "Amy, thank you", showing how Amy is a big reason why they were able to make it as far as they did. Sorry this comment is so long. As I said, Amy is my favorite Sonic character and Sonic Heroes is my favorite Sonic game, so I really just wanted to give my input on the matter. It just saddens me when I see Amy getting flak for her portrayal in Heroes when I think she's actually really well-written. It's actually my favorite portrayal of her character, as I think it does a great job at showing her personality and how far she's come since her Sonic CD days.
It is surprising how many people feel strongly enough about Amy to leave me these long comments, I love reading them though! Something I feel a lot of people misunderstood is that the main reason I pick apart Amy in that way for heroes, is I was trying to show why the general perception of her character shifted around this timing and it started with heroes. I do mention in the video that I doubt what I am saying was the writer's true intention, but unfortunately the presentation was flawed enough that she could be interpreted in the negative way I explained. And if you look at the history of Amy's public reception, it was the image I painted that the majority of people took away from heroes, not what you were talking about. That said, I agree with the things you brought up about Amy's go-getter attitude, positivity and compassion. It was a true and natural progression of her characterisation from the Adventure games, making true on her vow at the end of SA1. Also out of the members of team Rose, of course Amy makes the most sense to be the leader, I don't know who would have argued otherwise. I think the voice actress for Amy in heroes did an excellent job at making her character traits shine through, and I wish we got more of this Amy. Sonic Heroes was actually my first video game, so I have a great love for it as well. When I play though I am usually going with team Dark. Thank you for sharing your thoughts with me, I hope you stick around to see some of my other videos!
I actually never finished heroes and didn’t know these things about Amy in heroes. I didn’t know they thought sonic had Froggy and Chocola either. Very interesting
You know I actually like her origins as a fangirl. In the Archie comics she was a little girl who grew up in Merica during Robotnik's reign and heard stories of a heroic blue hedgehog named Sonic and began to write tons of fan mail to him and after being rescued by him vowed to fight along side him and the Freedom Fighters. With the help of a magic ring and some training from Julie-Su, in about a year, Sally acknowledged has a fully fledged member of the team. Amy to Sonic is like Deku to All Might. Deku who grew up watching All Might saving people as a little boy and wanted nothing more than to become a hero like his idol who strives to protect the happiness and smiles of those around him. Amy who while has a huge crush goes above and beyond a fangirl sits by the sidelines but a fangirl who worked to become the kind of hero like her role model. Also in Archie there was a moment where she wished to become older but it only made physically older and still had the mind of a child. I actually like this because to me it means the idealistic child that wanted to fight bad guys and refuses to give up did not die. And this brings me to my personal favorite moment in Archie Sonic; after suffering some repeated losses after losing Sally, Antoine and Bunnie, Sonic had fallen into a depressed state believing that the Freedom Fighters are done for. But it was Amy (along with Tails) who snapped him out of it; to quote Amy: "You didn't quit when you got arrested. You didn't quit when Robotnik came back. You didn't quit when we lost old Mobotropolis, or Knothole, or our families, or any other time! So get up! We've got Freedom Fighters to save!". This to me sums up Amy's character; even if the world has gone down hill and even in the face of her hero losing his will to fight, the child like spirit in her heart refuses to cave in to despair and instead re inspire her hero to continue the fight because even he has given up she hasn't and she has him to thank him for that.
All forms of Sonic media used to be rich in character and history. The depth and variety of the characters were a large part of what made Sonic, Sonic. Unfortunately such qualities have evidently not been valued by Sega for the last 10 years. I respect what you value from Amy, it's just a shame the main series does not reflect that in any way.
All these ‘where it went wrong’ videos make it seem like people don’t like the direction they took the Sonic characters. I’m happy with Amy as a character, but will there be a ‘where it went wrong’ video for Cream, Rouge and Blaze too? Cream was once part of the core five characters, but got dropped, and is hardly relevant in any game now days. Blaze is the messiest character in the series having two backstories. In Rush she is an aggressive princess from another dimension that doesn’t get friendship, while in Sonic 06 she is calm and polite but hails from the future. Today she is only slightly more relevant than Cream. Rouge was going strong for several games, but like a lot of other characters, her original role is lately dismissed.
Where Sonic Went Wrong is completely my own opinion. I understand that some people think the same as me, but I do not assume everyone does. Any conclusions drawn from these videos are naturally my opinion and not fact. So I am not trying to say you cannot like Amy in her current form. To me, she is simply worse than she used to be and it is a huge shame. As for the characters you listed, that is a good question. All of them have a good cause to be discussed, however, I am not sure if they have been featured enough negatively for me to claim they have "Went Wrong". My Video's on Silver and Elise are not named "Where Sonic Went Wrong" for similar reasons.
*Massive wall of text incoming* I figured I should give my lengthy page-long take on Amy, as I do agree with a lot of what's said in this video, as adding my own points into what you've already made. There's quite a lot I wanna digest here, maybe in multiple parts even, so bear with me if you will. *Pt. 1* The first thing I would like to add on is in Heroes, which one person in this comment section already addressed, albeit in a rather-hostile tone. Many would argue that this game in particular has overblown Amy's banter she had with Sonic back in Prison Island in SA2 to the extreme, but it should also be worth noting that part of this was due to how this game was made. Both SA1/2 were designed in a way that the story would be the first thing to be conceptualized and then the gameplay comes in afterwards to complement the story. However in Heroes, the game was solely made first and foremost, with the story coming in later to fill in the gaps. It's designed in the similar fashion to the classic games, in which they have two acts in every stage which then leads to a boss fight. Seaside Hill and Ocean Palace can both be seen as Act 1 and 2 of the same beach level theme respectively, with the team battles and the Eggman boss fights concluding those stages. I don't see Amy's clash with Sonic to be any different from Rouge initiating a battle with the Chaotix for unexplained reasons, Sonic and Shadow clashing once again despite both of them supposedly being on good terms by the end of the previous game, and Espio wanting to snatch Cheese away, as part of their mission they were undergoing. At the end of the day, all four teams have their own missions and goals, and even during the Team Sonic battle, Cream, Big and even Amy herself were as equally concerned about the possibility of Sonic being the one that stole Froggy and Chocola, as he was indeed framed for it in their opening cutscene. I never in all my life have heard anybody say Amy was taking advantage of her teammates to further her goal to be with Sonic, although that could simply be due to how the team battle cutscene kinda overshadows everything Amy has done in this game, while also relating to her criticisms at the same time, but I recall seeing both Cream and Big laughing with each other and waving goodbye to Amy as she runs off in the ending cutscene, so I don't think it was ever the writer's intention to portray her as what you thought of her to be, therefore I wouldn’t think too hard on it. Even then, Rouge teased with Knuckles of stealing the Master Emerald in the same ending cutscene which Knux then chases after her, and it can be assumed that Sonic wasn't running at his full speed as Amy was chasing him so that Amy could keep up with him, so this can all be singled out as playful banter as well as Sonic enjoying the thrill of adventure. I think the whole Amy taking advantage of her teammates to further her goal to be with Sonic, applies way more to Free Riders, and even Vector himself leaves the group as he was only in for the money, and Amy herself just wants a date with Sonic. Sonic Battle in particular is just as, if not more infamous as her Heroes portrayal among the Amy fanbase and what I believe to be pretty overhated. Battle introduced her hobby of boxercising which adds into her tomboyish portrayal that I'll elaborate more on later in this wall of text, as well as calling back to her tarot card hobby. It's also the perfect time for me to address Cream as well, as I can assure you that you're not the only person that's a little disheartened about Cream's existence. A lot of Amy fans have now noticed that a lot of Amy's empathy from SA1/2 have been given to Cream instead, as seen in Battle and Rush, where she empathizes with both Emerl and Blaze respectively, which has lead into those said fans expressing distaste towards how Amy was flanderized in those games in favor of making Cream seem like the more mature and level-headed of the two. This has also kinda lead into some questioning whether they were truly best friends to begin with, and I’m not saying that only Amy should have empathetic traits and everybody else that has a slight hint of them is an Amy clone, as I do actually enjoy Cream’s role in this franchise of being a cute, polite little girl that holds a weapon and pet of mass destruction, and Amy being the one that’s quick to anger does play a little fun role-reversal that sets them apart from the Sonic and Tails duo, in my opinion. But I think it’s important to know that Cream has always respected and looked up to Amy, she just doesn’t agree with everything Amy says or does. Furthermore, Cream can also act a little naive towards her surroundings, much like Amy back in CD and Adventure. The best example of this being in Heroes after the Team Sonic fight, where Cream wonders why Sonic ran away, which then angered Amy enough to snap back at her and Cream immediately drops the subject. It’s moments like these that prove that Cream can be a little unaware that some things can get to people. The main point I wanna get across here is that while Amy can act immature at times, which is a part of her character that shouldn’t be silenced altogether for reasons I’ll get more into later, she can still step up when she’s needed, whereas Cream can’t fill in a leader role despite generally being the level-headed one. They both have their own flaws, but they SHOULD have them, as again, I'll discuss why later on down the road. They do have a sister-like bond and it's not uncommon for sisters and siblings to argue and disagree with one another. The whole “Amy mentally exhausting herself” motivation can also be played off as Amy simply going through “changes'' herself, as evident by the line Amy says in her story about Cream acting weird and I have actually seen people in comment sections jokingly playing her characterization off as her going through puberty, as hysterical and unorthodox as that may sound. And honestly, I find Amy exhausting herself to impress that special someone to be actually relatable, as I’m constantly obliged to push myself through night shifts and doing crunch time in projects to satisfy either my co-workers, team members or my parents. It just adds more into her go-getter personality, as well as her love for adventure. I think that Battle and pretty much the rest of the Dark Age games have used Amy rather nicely despite the shift in tone, as they didn’t shy away from giving Amy a distinctive personality as well as giving her an active role in the stories she’s in. Besides, I’m a sucker for pretty much every game Amy’s playable in that allows me to do badass shit with her hammer, well almost. While her empathy isn’t anywhere to be found here or debatably in Heroes, I think that introducing her love for boxercise as well as bringing up her tarot card hobby is at least doing something to her character. I still firmly believe that entertaining and fun characters can make even the most basic stories memorable. Heroes’ plot may seem like child’s play in comparison to SA2 and might as well be the cheesiest game in the series up until that point, but the character interactions make it all worthwhile in my eyes. Battle may be a fighting game on the GBA on surface level, but it actually has a rich enticing story, by GBA standards anyway. It’s really engaging to see everything happen from Emerl’s point of view as he sides from one character to another and I love seeing the characters bounce off one another. I think once people become one with the fact that this is a fighting game in which Sonic and co. do whatever it takes to take ownership of Emerl, it’s not too bad. The way Battle treated Amy is leagues better than watering Amy’s traits down to just being a background girl character with no substance like in the 2010s, but I’ll get more into that later. Since this is a game where I believe every single character to act how I expect them to act and is a game I thoroughly enjoy, I’m not one to complain on how Amy is portrayed here. (continued)
*Pt. 2* I deeply adore your stance on Advance 1, as you perfectly sum up why it’s still one of my favorites in the series, due to how it carries on the trend of adding a new playable character in the roster. Besides, Amy’s gameplay was also pretty fun and rewarding and is the campaign I go back to quite frequently. Advance 2 does carry on that trend as well by adding Cream to the playable roster. However, I’d say that the Advance series made its first blunder by removing Amy from the Advance 2 playable roster and having her locked under getting all 7 Chaos Emeralds with each character. In other words, you'd have to obtain all 28 emeralds in total just so you could play as pink Sonic, as that’s practically what Amy is in this game. It was such a tedious activity anybody has to go through just for that, and when I found out about this for the first time, I knew it’s an absolute requirement to use an emulator and a Gameshark code just so I can play as my favorite girl. What should’ve been the outcome would be to at least have Amy be unlockable during the story where you save her just like the rest of the playable cast and have her contribute into saving Cream. That would’ve been a perfect introduction to the Amy and Cream duo which then leads to them being a team in Heroes. When it comes to 2000s Amy portrayals, I think Rush did her worse, as it greatly reduced Amy’s playability and her role in the story to just being one of Sonic’s friends that cheers Sonic on in the end to save the day, because of course, he's the hero and the good guy. I also think that this alongside Shadow the Hedgehog were the first instances of Sonic’s friends being reduced into being cheerleaders and background characters. I get it if they needed Shadow to interact with the rest of Sonic’s friends to expand his story, and I also understand if they wanted to tell a self-contained story about valuing friendship featuring Sonic and Blaze, and I’d still take these stories over any story in the 2010s any day, but I still think it would’ve feared better if Amy simply wasn’t in the game alongside Knuckles. It probably wouldn’t have been an issue if Amy wasn’t the way she was in this game, but the rather out-there confrontation she had with Cream, as well as the original script that made Sonic come off more of an ass towards her twitter.com/SpinStellar/status/1394350947933954050?s=19, is sadly the odd case I can’t really defend all that much. It's not something I would consider to be the end of the world for her or anything, but even Knuckles by that point seems to feel more shoehorned into these stories with each game that doesn’t have him guarding the Master Emerald, which is why Rush Adventure got it right by not having Amy nor Knuckles shoved in, in order to prevent them being flanderized even further. I should get this outta the way immediately before I forget and besides it relates to my next point, that I 100% agree with you on Modern Amy’s outfit being her best as I can’t even imagine Amy having any other design than this one. Her dress+boots outfit gives more of a spunky, yet still cute look, which is complimented really well by her red and white color scheme. Heck, I’ll probably go the extra mile that this is the best redesign for any character in the entire series. I just love how much the red stands out from the pink. After all, both pink and red blend together really well and red is known for being the most powerful of all colors, so it’s a natural instinct that it usually attracts the most attention, along with the white highlights. Yuji Uekawa’s artwork in the 2000s did a perfect job showcasing Amy’s spunky cute appeal, with the dynamic poses as well as the black outlines and shading. Silhouettes are one of the key factors of making a character design work, and you nailed that point perfectly. I always felt like character design is something that the Sonic series just doesn't get enough credit for. Sonic, Tails and Knuckles' designs all work for that same reason, as their classic and modern silhouettes are all recognisable. Even Eggman's modern redesign is still just as recognisable and iconic as his classic design just by looking at his silhouette. It's pretty crazy to me to think that Amy went from looking like a pink genderbent Sonic, to something more valley girl-esque, while still keeping the cute appeal and being distinct from the cast. Which is why her Boom outfit and characterization... is a complete downgrade in literally every single way. It should be worth noting that as feminine Amy is, she also has a slight hint of a tomboyish side as well, both in design and character. Amy may still like dresses, the color pink and other girly things, but she also likes to go on adventures with the boys, smash things with her hammer and go on “masculine” activities such as the aforementioned boxercising. Her quills were also designed to act as short hair, also a tomboyish attribute. It really took me a long time to figure out the reason as to why I was never fond of her Boom redesign to begin with, but I’ve always had a strong distaste towards her Boom counterpart. Everything from her design to her personality, which is by the way such a forceful desperate attempt into making her likable rather than interesting, just screams “Strong Female Character” and it makes me cringe seeing the show itself making woke feminist jokes around her (which Knuckles actually made at one point), as well as hearing her voice. It’s not as bad as the Minnie Mouse voice since Free Riders, but god, is it so bland and uninspired. Boom Amy to me just feels like a huge slap in the face towards anybody that liked Amy to begin with, and the way she acts towards either the main cast or the Boom-exclusive characters doesn’t even feel like something Amy would normally say or do. It feels like Boom Amy’s entire creation was made deliberately to appeal to people that never liked her to begin with. “Oh, you hate how she was super girly and those panty-shots? Well here’s a completely full-on tomboy design!” “You hate her loud, obsessive personality? Well now, she’s completely hidden with her crush so you now won’t even have to complain about her being annoying anymore!” “Getting tired of seeing her lash out and acting on impulse? Well she now gets along with everybody with no friction or any everlasting impact made!” “You think she was weak before? Well now, she can land on her feet and can do acrobatics! Totally not something you’ve seen before!” (continued)
*Pt. 3* I joined the fandom rather late during my Sonic fan binge, and it was a completely miserable and dreadful time to even consider myself to be an Amy fan. Literally every single discussion I’ve seen about her just starts with the same statement that Boom “fixed” her, while also disregarding and writing off 10+ years of her established character as annoying. I mean it when there’s literally everybody, including SonicTubers and critics that don’t even like Sonic to begin with, that jumped aboard the bandwagon. Even if there were like 1-2 people that thought otherwise, they get bombarded and proven “wrong” by people that bring up a paragraph-long bullet-point list as to why. I sometimes wish I would be more lenient towards Boom for being a spinoff separate from the games or whatever, but that isn’t really saying much as Boom Amy started this trend I hate very much. Whenever a new incarnation of Amy gets introduced and brought to the table, everybody praises it to high heavens and immediately goes into a statement that can go along the lines of: “Wow, why caN’t wE get THIS amY iN THE GaMeS? i’m glaD sHe’S MaTureD and No LongER chASinG sonic. ShE waS TOTALLY ANnoyiNg aND cRINgy In the oLd GAMEs, BUT noW, sHe’S indEPENdenT, no longeR REliANt ON SonIC ANd iS Now a STRONG FEMALE CHARACTER! tHAT’S IT! The MagiC pHRASE rIgHt tHErE LaDIes AND gEntlemEn! MAN, i’M sO hApPY IDW FixeD her sO muCH! iAn FlYNN, seNd me feeT PicS!” This mindset first started in Boom, and has happened in Mania Adventures, it’s still happening in IDW, and it’s going to happen in the Sonic movie assuming that Amy will be in either the 2nd or 3rd, as well as in Sonic Prime, assuming the leaked rumors and concept art eventually comes true, and I’m just so fucking over it. I first joined the Sonic Twitter community at the start of 2018, and I remember all of the praise given towards the 2nd issue of IDW, y’know the Sonamy issue, and literally everybody was praising it while also completely disregarding literally every single other portrayal she had since, pretty much the Boom fiasco all over again. While you didn’t bring up her IDW portrayal anywhere in the video, I’ve seen your comment about it in this comment section and I honestly agree with you on her maturity and leadership feeling forced and unearned. Despite never reading a single IDW issue outside of preview pages, I’ve been kinda pressured into liking IDW Amy for quite some time now ever since that over-glorified 2nd issue. Since everybody’s saying that Amy has found her way in IDW, then it must be true right? Not exactly. While I can’t deny the fact that it’s leagues better than Forces and what her Forces portrayals should’ve been, there’s always been an underlying question as to why I never seem to bring IDW Amy up in a lot of discussions I make about Amy in general, and that’s because I don’t really like her all that much. You see, for the first couple of games in the 2010s, Amy, like you said, has been reduced into being defined by one singular trait which is being an annoying obsessed Sonic fangirl. Then Lost World came in, which a lot of Amy fans seem to believe was where Amy has officially matured. You can probably tell already that I think this is a whole load of bull, but I also can't help but laugh because her Minnie Mouse voice still made her as detestable as ever and that line she says… oh boy does it still make me physically ill and like you said, it doesn't sound like anything Amy would say herself. At absolutely no point during the Meta era is there ANY line Amy says that sounds in-character. When I look up at the way Amy was portrayed in Lost World, Forces and TSR, I noticed that for like 95% of the time, Amy was really just… worried. People go on about how the "old Amy '' didn't have a distinct personality of her own but then let THIS slide, as being worried isn't even a personality trait, it's an emotion. The thing with Forces being the next mainline game afterwards and IDW supposedly being a loose adaptation of the Forces plot is that we never really got to see any depth and the main driving force as to why Amy's now suddenly the leader of the Resistance. The only thing I could've possibly find was Ian Flynn's quote on the matter explicitly stating that the only reason why Amy was a leader in the first place was because nobody would take the mantle, which to me just feels like Flynn downplaying femininity just to make Amy a "tomboy", a common practice in his style of writing I might add. This is something that’s gonna come off more of a “hot take” than anything, but this is not to discredit many of Amy’s achievements and accomplishments in the comic, as seeing Amy tag-teaming with Sonic is cool and all, but Heroes and X kinda already fulfilled that leader Amy role for me, and even by the time of Unleashed/SatBK, most of the main 4Kids cast have already perfected and rounded off their performances, so those games did capture a mature-sounding Amy perfectly for me. You go to virtually any video comparing Amy’s voice actresses or even some of Amy’s game appearances from the mid-late 2000s, and it’s no surprise that you’d see how a large majority of people seem to miss Lisa voicing her and for good reason, as she really made Amy feel and sound like, well... Amy. I miss her as well too, but enough about her, because now that I think about it, the X Metarex Saga actually did the tactician, mission control leadership role with Amy way before IDW, and I would argue it did that even better, as X never shyed away from showing both sides of Amy’s established character. Everybody pretty much gloss over what X and the mainline games have brought to the table in favor of painting IDW to have done something new to her character, which can go by saying that she was never a tough competent fighter before IDW fixed all that, which she literally fucking fought in both X and the games. It's pretty frustrating to me, as they make it seem like IDW is this second coming of Christ that can't be topped. Virtually every single preview page I've seen of Amy just gives off the "strong female character" vibe I've seen from Boom, with Amy being portrayed as being capable of doing pretty much everything whether that's being the voice of reason, the tactician or being a competent fighter. I know that this is literally war we're talking about and yes, it makes sense for a character to eventually mature, but the thing is, I can't help but feel like the writers are afraid from showcasing Amy's more immature boy-crazy side, because like you said in your comment, we really only got to see her positive traits being built up rather than her negative ones. It's very hard for me to believe all of this to be maturing when they're still forgetting an established part of her character. She can mature but not at the expense of losing all of her defining traits that have been built upon for years. Isn't it surprising why some people would now be so resentful towards IDW Amy, whether that's her being a Mary-Sue or even a Sally clone? I also have to admit that I can't even look at any of the issue #2 panels, yes, even the one where Amy screams out that she accepts Sonic for who he is and does not want to change him, without cringing or looking away because all I can hear and see from them is "Look at Amy finally mature and all, y'all can stop calling her abusive now!" If anything, it feels out-of-character for Amy to not be clingy towards Sonic’s return in Forces. But no, we don't have enough time to justify each of the characters’ existence and we gotta need that money shot with all the heroes in battle, regardless of how out-of-place it may seem. (continued)
*Pt. 4* And I didn’t just mention Sonic X out of thin air either, because I feel like Amy’s X portrayal is getting more scrutiny nowadays due to the existence of Boom and IDW, which I think is saying a lot given that her X portrayal is still regarded as one of her well-known portrayals to this day. In response to what you said about X Amy, I would be here all day if I were to go through every refuting detail, but I would argue that Amy herself wasn’t at the same level of popularity and recognition before X. SA1 was the first appearance of Modern Amy and even then, it was the shortest campaign out of all of them. In SA2, she was completely sidelined, which also kinda made her role in the story easy to miss. The point I’m trying to make is that I don’t see her X portrayal to be anywhere worse than anything that has come before it. If anything, X elevated Amy’s character and I honestly don’t see how Amy or the Sonamy ship would even reach the same level of recognition without Sonic X, as it was kinda the first piece of media to shift deep focus on their relationship. So many criticisms I’ve seen garnered towards X Amy is the aforementioned aggression, when people always forget that even in the Adventure games, there were a few moments were Amy has acted on impulse with a slight hint of hostility, such as when she first encountered the bird from her SA1 story, she literally told it to watch where it’s going, and in SA2, she told Knuckles to move aside, it’s literally just part of her character to speak her mind and her initial gut feeling. It kinda breaks my heart to see people single out X Amy in favor of making it seem like Boom/IDW fixed her because it feels like all people talk about is how X was the starting point of her being detestable among fans, when literally the only reason I saw people give praise towards Boom and IDW for is that they don’t make Amy obsessive towards Sonic. Another common practice I’ve seen more of with each waking day from people is that she’s a bad role model for young girls or at the very least not a good fit for Sonic, which I could never agree with. It’s true that Amy DOES have an obsessive side, but what’s also important to know is that it’s not the only thing about her character. I don’t see anything wrong with showing both sides to her, as I would argue that even her theme song in the Adventure games, My Sweet Passion, was a play on showing both sides of her crush. The sweet sounding vocals and instruments being synonymous with her sweet innocent side, whereas the whispering parts represents her more crazed fangirl side. The screenshot you provided with Amy sitting on top of Sonic, I feel like it;s getting spread around more commonly among her detractors, when I literally just see it as a hot-headed girl keeping a noisy, rambunctious boy in check. I just happen to like Sonic and Amy’s dynamic a lot in X. An overprotective girl that’s madly in love with the hero/celebrity. Even if she clashes with Sonic and bosses him around more than in the games, Sonic always seems to take her advice and values her input in missions, and Amy’s bossing never comes from the wrong place in her heart. It’s just too bad Boom had thrown all of that down the drain, in favor of making more Sonamy jokes and “teases” but without any of the character and chemistry they had before. Just gotta cater to the “girl likes boy but is too shy to admit it” crowd, I guess. It’s unanimously agreed, by most of the fanbase anyway, that Amy’s empathy was shown the best in SA1 and 2, but if I have to be honest, any character in the series can have empathic traits. Her temper and her crush is what fleshes and balances out her character. I never saw these two different sides as an inconsistency or a stereotype even, I see it more as subverting the expectations of what is needed for a strong female character. Amy in X and in the games pre-2010, I feel was a strong female character in her own right without needing to pander so hard towards the whole idea. I find it ironic how people say that Boom Amy is more acrobatic and competent as a fighter, when I think X Amy would still win in a fight against Boom Amy due to her aggression and temper alone. In fact, I can imagine X Amy being somewhat disgusted at how much Boom Amy tries to act like she’s all likable when she can even be more aggressive and rude towards her friends than her X counterpart. I just look back at how people compare her X portrayal to Boom, and I’m just like “is this REALLY what people want?” Why don’t they want a girl that has an attitude, spark and a slight hint of edge? Why do they just want Amy to be a goody two-shoes that just smiles and speaks with little friction or impact made between interactions? What exactly is wrong with being girly? Because believe me, I’ve seen numerous people downplay Amy’s femininity when comparing her to the likes of Blaze, because I guess they feel like Amy is like stealing her spotlight or something. It’s also the same exact reason why I couldn’t really get myself to like Blaze all that much back in the day because the only reason I saw people giving praise towards Blaze in literally every single “best female Sonic character” all boils down to that she’s not girly or obsessive with Sonic. I would still consider Blaze as my 4th favorite female in the series, behind Amy, Rouge and Shade, but I would also be completely lying to myself if I said that all of this combined with how people seem to wanna push Boom Amy as their ideal Amy that they want going forward, didn’t left me feeling angry and wanting to smash the screen of my laptop during a prolonged time period where I was depressed and angry at everything. It’s super frustrating having to hear the “bad role model of girls” card being thrown around constantly, when I just really wanted to LIKE Amy. I just wanna enjoy entertaining characters and stories I love without needing to worry about whether it would have good morals for kids to learn, whether people would find it annoying, people bitching about age gaps or other trivial things or some stupid shit like that. I never had that problem growing up with Sonic. I don’t recall any moments in X where Amy had done something problematic enough to get this sort of reaction, and even then, I don’t NEED to condemn nor consider the “values” or “the message” her actions will get across, because it’s all FICTION. Modern Amy in X and the games pre 2010s, I think is a great representation and role model for young girls, because she teaches girls to be bold and strong with their beliefs, as well as not being afraid of liking girly, feminine things. On the contrary, I do think that Boom Amy’s entire existence of being just a strong female character is indeed a poor representation for girls, as she’s almost always the butt of the joke for the sake of pushing more female empowerment agendas. (continued)
*Pt. 5* In conclusion, without any bias, Amy seems to be an odd case compared to the rest of the cast. She isn’t regarded to be among the characters that have fallen from grace or been put on a high pedestal as the likes of Shadow, Tails or Knuckles even. But at the same time, she still has a sizable enough fanbase to not be considered a lost cause. I’ve noticed a clear pattern within the main cast, in which usually it’s unanimously agreed that Sonic, Tails, Knuckles and Shadow have all been regressed into being defined by a singular trait throughout the 2010s. Whereas with Amy, I feel is way more unclear because even if she’s regarded to be at her best in the Adventure games, there’s always gonna be a handful of people that will insist that pretty every media and game since Heroes but before Lost World as what “ruined” her, or even rub in the Adventure games as part of that “old Amy” everybody seemingly detest so much. Being part of a small albeit active Sonamy fan group, my biggest fear for the future of Amy as a character lies within the vast majority of the group being onboard with the Chief Brand Officer of SEGA confirming Boom Amy to be the ideal and the blueprint of where Amy should be handled next, even labelling it as a key for evolving Amy to be a more “empowering” character, regardless of what he means by that. It’s even to the point where the official SEGA of Japan livestreams would highlight Forces Amy as a huge accomplishment to her character, which is something I can never go by with. It feels more like people are willing to just parrot things said by corporations or large public figures, rather than forming their own opinions. I theorize that the vast majority of Amy fans seem to only like the so-called current version of Amy because they can no longer feel uncomfortable entering conversations about Amy or Sonamy, which leads to them proclaiming that Amy now has a thousand of fans, as if she never had any fans to begin with. And yeah, I won’t pretend that Amy never had garnered any form of criticism, and I won’t deny that X’s popularity did lead to some polarizing opinions on her like you said, but I still think it’s completely unfair and judgemental to act like she was never loved during the late 90-2000s while also painting the 2010s as where people started liking her, as there were indeed a large portion of the fanbase that did like her during her so-called fangirl phase, and there was also a JP poll made by SOJ back in 2006 that acts as canonical evidence of Amy being of the most popular Sonic characters, implying that life can still go on with her character going forward. In retrospect, you may have seen a lot of people point towards Heroes as the starting point for Amy’s flanderization, but from a non-critical standpoint, the only common thing I could find that supports this is people joking about “Ew she’s seeking marriage at 12 yrs old?!” and that kinda got me thinking. Maybe a huge part of the criticism she gets is due to how she was INTENTIONALLY written and created to be that way. A fangirl parody of pretty much every trait of the average teenage girl, which I can’t help but find to be absolutely brilliant, not gonna lie. I can already sense people going out there way to call me crazy for saying that, and don’t get me wrong, I still love me some sweet empathetic Amy, I love me some of that Sonamy spice, and I love me some badass mature serious Amy shit. But I’m also a fan of fun, entertaining characters. I don’t think any part of her character should be forgotten entirely, as I believe that Amy is a very well-written character in her own right, that can work as a gag character while at the same time being a likable hero. You don’t see Amy fangirling over Sonic when all the heroes were faced with the Metarex because it was a serious, crucial moment. You don’t see Amy being all jealous and violent at Elise because Sonic’s life was at stake and it wouldn’t be such an appropriate thing ever to do at that time. If Amy being annoying is the main complaint people had with her, then I can easily write Sonic off as an arrogant jerk, Tails as a cowardly wuss, Knux as a gullible idiot, and Shadow as a brooding emo. I feel like since this is, or at least was, an action game series and how Amy debuted at a time where female characters in gaming were literally only known for being a damsel-in-distress or being playable in spinoffs, I feel like Amy’s just bound to get hate regardless, which is something I wish a lot of her fans would pay as little attention to as they usually do, as giving attention to detractors resorting to sound cheerypicking just only implies that their opinions matter more than those that liked her to begin with. As you can easily tell from my 8+ pages worth of paragraphs, this is a subject and character I’m obviously passionate about. Part of my passion was due to how I’ve spent the first half of my Sonic fan binge just playing the games I enjoyed and being completely unaware of the entire Sonic fanbase’s existence. When evolving into the Sonic fanbase for the first time ever, I was immediately thrown off by some of the things people have said about Amy, and I would literally spent countless of hours and days going through page after page, article after article, RU-vid video after RU-vid video, trying to figure out what is it that people hate about her and trying to force myself to agree with them, as if that’s somehow the general consensus, but I just... couldn’t. Y’know, I was never perfect. As the brainless, adolescent self I was, I never knew how to deal with seeing conflicting opinions, particularly ones for something I have an emotional attachment to. I was incredibly uptight by even the most harmless jokes people throw and make about Amy, and I was constantly preaching about pushing Amy further to the spotlight in hopes that people will stop “hating” on her. But once I grew some thick skin and eventually grew out of parroting other people’s views, I pretty much became one with the fact that Amy doesn’t need to be constantly pushed into the spotlight for me to enjoy her, and I don’t need to be all hellbent on people making the most harmless jokes at her. It’s always good to get a clear understanding and even update your own opinions on the thing you just endured and what could’ve been done better or worse, but was I really THAT bent up over Amy chasing Sonic down with her hammer? N-no. Was I bothered at all by all the times where Amy acted on impulse, mainly in X? Eh, not really. Do I really think that Amy’s crush and love for Sonic is inherently a toxic trait anybody could have? Absolutely not. I always felt like these sort of things that’s kinda expected for her established character. Something I find amusing is how despite many criticisms aimed towards Sonic and co. not emoting enough and how Sonic is seen as this way past cool dude with an attitude, Amy seems to be the only character in the series that can make Sonic lose his cool factor and act all shy and weary around her. That’s something I find charming about the Sonic cast. They all have (had) their own distinct personalities and interact with each other differently. I’ve always enjoyed seeing Sonic treat Tails like his little bro. I always got a laugh out of Sonic joking at Knuckles’ expense and I always found it cute when Sonic sticks up for Amy despite not reciprocating her feelings. It’s that charm and character I miss in Sonic nowadays, which is why I wanted to share that with you and I guess the rest of the people viewing this comment section. I’m so sick of this now lifeless nothing character being pushed into the forefront and people writing off Lost World and Forces as her maturing. I’m so sick of seeing politics and feminist bullshit being shoved into my favorites games. And I’m so sick of seeing stereotypical one-noted versions of my favorite characters, because yes, I also miss the times where Sonic, Tails and the rest of Sonic’s friends were portrayed with such edge and were actually relevant. I used to always be so excited whenever I see characters like Knuckles, Shadow or Silver show up because they all used to look and act so cool, but nowadays I just see the Team Sonic trio and just go “Eh look it’s Team Sanic, big deal.” I think it’s fair to say that games since Heroes haven’t all been consistent with their characterizations, but I still firmly believe that every character pre-2010 was still written to be likable and memorable enough for me anyway to not care that much. (continued)
*Pt. 6/Final* Even though you may not be anywhere as concerned about Boom Amy as I am, I’ll forever stand by my statement, as even seeing the slight hammer design change from Rosy Red to pink just fully solidifies that change in wanting to dumb down her character even further for me. Deep down, I’ll always strive in wanting the best for the future of Amy’s character, but even if the series were to go back to the so-called ambition of the Adventure era, I feel there’ll still be a huge portion of the fanbase that’ll act more favorable towards the “new” Amy as their definitive version of her, and I can’t help but feel alienated by that thought. I hate this idea that Amy should just be a blank slate girl character so as to not offend anybody stuck with the stigma from the past, when back then she was literally a go-getter energetic girl with a huge crush. I’ll never forget seeing Modern Amy for the first time after having been familiar with Classic Amy. Finally playing the games she’s in, watching Sonic X, and seeing her in official 2000s artwork as this bright cute cheerful girl than more so happens to wear red, I’ll admit that as a young wee lad, my young mind has developed a crush on Amy, as I always thought she would be the type of girl I would love to go shopping with. But now, the Amy I admired and looked up to as a young child is being referenced as moot and is being supplanted by this “new” Amy that smiles and chuckles, but without any spark or substance seen beforehand. And knowing that the “old” Amy, the Amy I’ve grown up with, is the direction they’re not going for anymore, just more so reminds me of how everything I’ve said doesn’t matter. But regardless, I’ll forever stand by my own beliefs and opinions and what I believe is right. And that’s why I made this whole hellhole of a comment in the first place. I know you might be all confused or even dumbfounded by how much I’ve written, and I don’t exactly blame you for not being able to sink this all down in one go, as I myself have taken at least a couple of days to type all of this with lots of procrastination in between, but I just want you to know that I indeed enjoyed your video and am glad I found it. Your comment on how you think Amy was better in the 2000s made me truly feel not as alone, as I too believe she was better written in that time period too and I’ve always been pressured into not admitting that. To me, the REAL Amy died in the early 2010s upon flanderizations and lack of care, and by 2013, she was pretty much replaced by an entirely new character. As much as I enjoy a lot of Amy character analysis videos that point out her sweet, kind-hearted side, I always felt like this time period of her, as well as her obsessed side to her character, is always overlooked. So I’m glad you didn’t immediately single out every one of her 2000s portrayals in that regard. I gotta say, I’m quite amazed as to how far opinions on her have changed over the course of only a couple of years, because even back when the Boom subseries was new, literally everybody didn’t even hesitate to jump aboard the Boom Amy bandwagon. Now in 2021, at the time of this comment being posted, I can say that there’s now people coming out to give what was known as the “old” Amy a second look, while also giving Boom and even IDW another thought as to whether there’s room for improvement. It does give me a little hope for the future of Sonic discussions. I apologize if there seems to be a lot of grammatical errors here, but I’ve been typing well long enough. I hope I didn’t fry your mind by forcing you to read all of this and I hope I’ve at least given you somewhat of a new perspective, and I hope you’ve understood and enjoyed reading my perspective too. You’ve officially got my like and sub, and I’ll be sure to check out the rest of your Where Sonic Went Wrong series.
Well, I’m surprised I haven’t thought much about Amy and you’re right to point out she’s become more of a supporting character over the years. Now that I’m thinking about her, I feel just a bit sad for her because she obviously likes Sonic as more than a friend, but she’s just wasting her life. Hey, you know I’d love it if Sonic Team ever finally decides to make a Sonic game featuring a dramatic story with some emotional depth and considers making some canonical spinoffs that will be about other characters. Maybe in one case, it should be about Sonic’s specific relationships with his friends or one about Amy going on her own adventure and learning a few things about herself in the process. When the world is in danger yet again and Sonic is expected to save the day, he makes an unexpectedly rare display of arrogance and selfishness and neglects his friendships and downplays his friends. If this happens, I’d really like to see what becomes of Sonic’s and Amy’s relationship. If Sonic isn’t willing to give the kind of commitment Amy wants an earnest try and won’t see her as anyone more than a friend, she really needs to give due thought to whether it’s worth it for her to continue waiting for him to reciprocate her feelings despite the investment on her part for the sake of their friendship. And if she makes the bold and possibly overdue decision to move on, I'm sure the audience would like to see how Sonic reacts. I don’t know how Silver is able to appear in Sonic Forces because he’s supposed from the future, but I can kind of imagine him and Amy being compatible because a) they’re the same species and b) he’s naïve and kindhearted.
Considering Amy and Sonics relationship has been an element present in the series for a long time but is never explored, it would be interesting to see it properly addressed at some point. I get the feeling that Sega wouldn't want to make such a commitment like that with their mascot though, not because it couldn't work, but because they want the series to be a blank slate that resets each adventure.
@@TheRealMightyEmperor Well, you're probably right. But if Amy ever has a serious relationship with Silver or Shadow, I'm sure Sonic will be in as free a position as ever to lead a carefree, unrestricted life.
It's never explained how he travels back in time, but based on the circumstances he had arrived to, he did so because he was given another bad future, later confirmed by the prequel comics.
Amy in Sonic Lost World might have been over the top, but it has been the first and only time where she actually tried to tell Sonic that she loves him.
I think the best way to rectify Amy's personality is to broaden the concept of her character. Her fur color is pink, pink is associated with love, but love comes in many forms. Amy could correct someone with the intent to help them. Inversely, she'd receive correction because, deep down, she knows it's the loving thing to do.
I would venture to say that Amy is the most misunderstood character in the entire Sonic franchise. Sega was wrong to listen to the criticism from fans who simply didn't like Amy or hated her. Amy was supposed to be a fangirl with a crazy, outgoing and sassy personality, but with a good heart that is willing to help others. Sadly Sega turned her into a character who is simply good and you love her friends blah blah blah, a boring and generic female character. That's why I never like it when they make a character too mature, it kills her core and what made her most memorable and popular.
The Amy you speak of is long gone, post generations she vanished without a trace and after many terrible itterations we arrived at the current Amy which is safe but boring.
@@TheRealMightyEmperor The problem is that she also feels so similar to Cream and Tails in terms of personality. I guess marketing has a bit to do with it since if they kept the original Amy, possibly a lot of new fans wouldn't like that Amy, since Amy now appears in a lot more media these days.
They didn't believe it worked, there was plenty of criticism about Sonics Stupid Friends, and for Amy you would see a lot of people say Amy being about her Love for Sonic was problematic. Just another casualty when the Sonic series began to throw it's integrity out the window.
@@WSBM14 It really depends on what the scope of the series wants to be going forward. Would the character be written out or replaced? If so go crazy. Are we trying to go for the long term? If so that tone and attributes will suit the new direction best and how well do they relate to Amy's past character?
I like how the Battle arc of Sonic X didn't include the game version's aspects of her character. I wouldn't say it's impossible for Amy to go through such a phase but it definitely wasn't necessary and kind of sad to see her be so weight conscious and dependent on Sonic's approval. I think Game Amy is overall my favorite version of her for the Adventure games and 06, but I do still like X Amy because she's mostly the same even with her more bratty demeanor (Which can be endearing in a way). Plus, Sonic confessing his love to Amy (Silently) in the Japanese version of X in Episode 52 will forever be Heaven for me.
Well the battle arc of X really only used a few bits and pieces. It was nice to see, but it barely touched it. And yeah I have no issues with Amy's actions in battle being left in battle.
Imo sonic x Amy is actually really misunderstood and a lot of it is because of mistranslation from 4kids and a misunderstanding of the humor they were going for. I believe Amy was meant to be like other type b tsunderes of the time which were popular in Japan. Like people give Amy a hard time for episode 69 where she tried to trap sonic in a love ritual and my perspective of that episode is it was after the point sonic had actually shown return feelings for Amy showing up at her house giving her a rose (this scene is actually brought up in the episode) and I believe the humor was meant to be Amy want sonic to commit and sonic was shy and she scared him off. Amy impatient with sonic decides she will try to catch him in this supposed love spell/ritual so they can be together. I don’t believe Amy in this episode actually believes she’s being rejected but more so sonic is avoiding commitment to her because that’s how he is. It’s not that he doesn’t have feelings but romance is not his thing. Her portrayal in that episode really is a prime example of Japanese humor where their culture is different than it is in the west. In Japan it’s seen as the woman’s initiative to “catch her man” and they have a culture of effort where your encouraged to try your hardest to for things including relationships. It’s not the same as if Amy ever received a “I don’t love you” from sonic and is defying his wishes. Amy’s determination is something that would be seen as endearing to Japanese audiences while here in the west it’s seen as abusive. That’s just one moment I believe is far more nuanced than people realize. Another thing is 4kids removed entire scenes of development for Amy that showed she did have other goals than sonic like her relationship with Ella leading her to try and open a restaurant. This was removed in the 4kids dub. Overall 4kids butchered the dialogue real bad for Amy. One scene they butchered is when she jumps into that water planet going after sonic. In the English dub it was changed to have her say “oh sonic it’s you I knew you would save me” while in the Japanese it was “I won’t let you die here. We will go back to our planet together”. See the huge difference. I strongly recommend people watch the Japanese dub because Amy’s dialogue is very different and she shows a lot more good traits.
For me where Amy went wrong was when people blew heroes out of proportion, and Sega lost that wholesomeness in her personality, like when she finds kindness in people whether good or bad. And Sega can't hire people that can write female characters properly. While I'm on it now, Sega has completely messed up Sonic and Amy's dynamics, in fact the way her character is a type b tsundere trope used in Japan, and there must've been a big mistranslation if you mess up her character this bad. They can make SonAmy canon without changing Sonic at all, in fact, they can keep the 'cute girl chases her hero trope' , just age up Amy 2 years and they will be more functional than Mario and Peach. Also this might be my opinion but she needs a new design, maybe everyone even, but she needs one. I also hope Ian won't make her a knock off Sally Acorn because lets be real here, that doesn't fit her character, there are other ways to show characters growth and maturity without changing the character, look at her in Sa1 and 2. And this point whether frontiers does her justice or not, we won't be getting that wholesome and cute side to her ever again.
And this is why I don't like her character in Boom despite everyone saying that is the best Amy. She is just "insert independent woman" trope with almost nothing in common with her previous versions.
@@TheRealMightyEmperor That's what all Amy fans say, I wouldn't mind it if the games actually showed it, but because of graff and pontacc we got Minnie mouse Amy Not grown up Amy, he'll I think meta Amy is actually the flanderize version, because at least dark age Amy had SOMETHING to her character
