Sonic the Hedgehog # 251- Worlds Collide Part 12

By Mark Rodriguez

Wily and Eggman joined forces to create their own pocket dimension and use the Chaos Emeralds to reshape both worlds to their liking. Sonic and Megaman teamed up, fought their way through the Skull Egg Zone and made their way aboard the Wily Egg fortress. After defeating Bass, Treble and Metal Sonic, the heroes were defeated and captured by the Egg Wily Machine X, and are now helpless as the evil scientists prepare to reset history, while their friends are still fighting off an army of Robot Masters. How will this end?

The issue starts with the bad guys bragging about their victory, and even though Sonic and Megaman got past all their defenses, they still lost, and all their friends are busy fighting the Robot Masters, and Duo is also too busy fighting the Chaos Devil to help.

The other heroes are also getting tired and worn out in their fight against the Robot Masters, and plus, they have to tend to an injured Tails as well. Just then, the original Light Robot Masters show up to help. Cut Man, Fire Man, Elec Man, Guts Man, Bomb Man, Ice Man, Time Man and Oil Man all join in on the fight. Knuckles and Protoman decide to help Light get into the fortress to stop whatever the scientists are up to, while the other Robot Masters help out in the fight.

Megaman and Sonic try to warn the scientists that re-shaping reality too many times might just break all of reality. Eggman admits that some damage has been done and they even broke a few rules, which surprised Wily, but he says any damage to the space-time continuum will be fixed once they reshape everything. Megaman and Sonic are both trapped in energy rings inside an energy capsule, both unable to move or break free.

Just then Knuckles and Protoman bust in and start shooting up the place. Light helps Megaman and SOnic escape, but the scientists run to the Machine X. Light doesn't have any E-Tanks for Megaman, but he can regain his power by fusing with Rush (ala Megaman 6). Megaman uses the Super Adapter and fuses with Rush. This gives Sonic an idea.

Eggman and Wily bicker about how to use the Machine X, since it is also powered by the Chaos Emeralds and they need all their power for the Genesis Drive, while Knuckles and Protoman continue to attack them. Wily tries to fry Knuckles with 50 thousand volts of protective shielding... but it's been sabotaged. Eggman also tries to blast Protoman with death lasers but sees his weapons are offline. Eggman and Wily each one realize they sabotaged the other.

Light, Sonic and Megaman find the Genesis Drive, but the Genesis Dynamo is fully charged and ready to go, so removing the emeralds won't stop it at this point. Sonic says they can still use the gems and asks for Megaman to give him a lift.

Wily and Eggman scramble desperately to fix their own sabotage before Knuckles and Protoman can bust them up. Even though they continue to bicker and toss threats, they call a truce for now and manage to fix the machine to over 100%. Now fully powered they're ready to start the Genesis Wave... just as Megaman and Sonic are about to reach out and touch the Chaos Emeralds.

Before the Egg Wily Machine X can blast Kunckles and Protoman to ashes... Sonic and Megaman appear... both in their golden super forms (cause I guess the Chaos Emeralds affect Megaman the same way they do to Sonic, but who cares, it's cool). Protoman, Knuckles and Light get the hell out of the way as Eggman and Wily fire everything they got at the Super Saiyan heroes, but nothing stops them.

Sonic tells Megaman that they're practically invulnerable in this form, and the scientists continue to shoot them desperately. The heroes move in and continue to attack the giant machine as the Genesis Wave starts to activate. Wily and Eggman have no choice but to abandon ship. Super Megaman fires off Super Sonic with the same kind of Sonic Shot he used before to turn the Roboticized Masters back to normal, only this time packing the power of the Chaos Emeralds.The blasts completely destroys the giant Egg Wily Machine X.

With the Genesis Wave already passed, Sonic shows Megaman how they can both use Chaos Control to undo all the damage that has been done. Wily admits his defeat, but Eggman doesn't want to lose this time and flies off at them. Megaman and Sonic focus their Chaos Energy towards their realities, but Eggman smashes into Sonic. Sonic tells Megaman to take the shot and he can handle Eggman himself. Megaman fires the Chaos Control towards his reality and everything starts to return to normal for him. Eggman continues to attack Sonic saying that if he can't the universe his way, he won't have it at all, and the golden hedgehog has no choice but to hastily throw his Chaos Control towards his reality. Eggman open fires upon the blast and it looks like reality is shattered. Eggman is confused at what he's done and Sonic asks what has he done this time as everything fades to white. 

My Opinions-

And so ends this dramatic crossover.... sort of. While Megaman returns to his regular comic adventures, with Protoman being reverted back into the evil Break Man and Wily continuing the Ra Moon storyline... Sonic and Eggman have to deal with the continued devastation of their own universe in their own comic series. Man. That's almost like Turtles Forever ending right in the middle of the Shredder War (that never happened by the way, despite the first episode of Back to the Sewers suggested it would) seconds after the 80's Turtles returned home. Sure, THEY'RE ok... but the 2K3 bunch are left with their hands full. Weird way to end this crossover.

In case you're wondering, the next few Sonic issues deal with a brand new reality that somehow turned Sally back to normal (or maybe it never happened), and only Sonic, Tails and Eggman remember what happened. Sonic hopes Megaman is ok, and Eggman blames Wiley for his failure. Eventually the cast gets their memories back thanks to a machine named Nicole, which devastates Sally to learn all the evil stuff she's done as Mecha Sally, but the cast has to accept their new reality and move on.

I do have to say, it was kinda weird that this crossover would throw in random hints or flashbacks here and there reminding us that when all of this was over, Sonic still had to deal with Mecha Sally once he got back home.... only for her transformation to be either magically undone or flat out retconned into never happening. I guess that's what random crossovers and Ken Penders lawsuits do for storylines, but I do wonder why the crossover was set now and not after the 250 milestone whenever the Mecha Sally arc was done? Like, what threw things off schedule? Did Archie just decide 'I don't care what storylines are going on right now in both comics, you make this crossover happen NOW'.

As far as I know, the Megaman crew doesn't remember any of this and carry on with their next arc involving Ra Moon.

As for this story was as epic as it gets and you can't get much better than Super Sonic AND Super Megaman wreaking havoc on the bad guys. Knuckles and Protoman got to shine quite a bit in this issue, especially Knuckles since he spend the first part of the story as Knuckles Man before he was turned back to normal. Still a few references here and there. The notable one was when Eggman was trying to undo his own sabotage by 'fixing the confusion between the battle and chase commands' which is a sly reference to the Megaman Battle and Chase racing game. And Super Saiyan forms aside, we got to see Megaman fuse with Rush like he does in Megaman 6. Awesome.


There's one odd little detail when the Super Saiyans started smashing up the Machine X, namely these little panel pic of Wily and Eggman freaking out... which are basically re-used several times. It was weird but kinda funny.

So yeah, this crossover was a stroke of genius on both parts, and did a great job meshing well both worlds and it was fun seeing all the characters interact. Camoes and flashbacks aside, it also kept the original Archie characters out of this (Sally, Antoine, Rotor) so newcomers coming to read this based strictly on what they know from the games only, won't be confused by seeing random non-game characters run around as main characters. But wow, you get to see Sonic's friends become Robot Masters, you get to see ALL the Robot Masters from Megaman 1-9, the Wily Wars and the Game Boy games. There's also the funny way Wily and Eggman were so chummy at first, and a decent mix of traps and bad guys based on both games and all the callbacks to it. Stuff like Sonic struggling to get past the infamous vanishing blocks, and a Roboticized Shadow names Shadow Man fighting alongside the classic Robot Master Shadow Man. Things like the red and blue password code and Sonic grabbing rings off of Ring Man. The comic never missed a beat.

Now there is another  12-part crossover that happened years later called Worlds Unite that involves not just classic Sonic and Megaman but also Megaman X and Sonic Boom. I'll see if I can track those issues down. I just wonder if Megaman will remember Sonic this time.