Coconuts

Coconuts is a robot monkey from the early years of the Sonic the Hedgehog franchise. He has a somewhat rounded body, lanky limbs, red fur, black/brown eyes, peach/white face and wears gray jumpsuit with chest screen and buttons with red boots. Coconuts speaks with a New Jersey accent.

Personality
Coconuts is grumpy, cynical and obsessive over proving himself better than Scratch and Grounder. He has a lot of tenacity and doesn't back down easily, and has often times proven himself the smartest of the three bots, even managing to actually capture Sonic on more than one occasion. He despises his role as Robotnik's janitor.

In the games
This particular Badnik was first seen in the Emerald Hill Zone stage of Sonic the Hedgehog 2, where he would be seen climbing up trees and throwing coconuts. He was named Aiai (アイアイ) in Japan. A similar badnik called Monkey Dude later appeared in the Angel Island Zone stage of Sonic the Hedgehog 3, also throwing coconuts from trees. True to his name, Coconuts would throw coconuts at Sonic and/or Tails whenever they passed by. Coconuts made a return in Sonic Blast except he went by his Japanese name, Aiai, Coconuts also appears in Sonic the Hedgehog Pocket Adventure in the Neo South Island Zone. This Badnik did not appear in any of the other primary Sonic games although a similar badnik named Kiki appeared in Sonic Adventure and its sequel.

The particular Coconuts from the cartoon and comics appeared in Dr. Robotnik's Mean Bean Machine as a stage boss.

Adventures of Sonic the Hedgehog
Coconuts was featured more prominently on the animated series Adventures of Sonic the Hedgehog. There, he had been demoted to Dr. Robotnik's janitor, a position he was not very happy with, so he wants to capture Sonic, hoping that doing so will earn him a promotion. Even though he was seen in the show's introduction sequence, Coconuts did not appear as regularly as fellow Badniks Scratch and Grounder. Whenever he did appear, he would usually attempt to go after Sonic himself and make sure that Scratch and Grounder did not beat him to the punch; however, they did team up to go after Sonic on occasion. In the episode "Super Robotnik", he got his wish for a promotion (to First Lieutenant) when an accident of his led to Robotnik acquiring superpowers, with the added bonus of Scratch and Grounder getting demoted, though he lost it when Sonic defeated Robotnik and used a serum designed by Professor Von Schlemmer to depower Robotnik.

Despite his low status and general disrespect by his peers, Coconuts has proven he is much smarter than Scratch and Grounder, often being the only one to see through Sonic's disguises. His plans also seem to almost succeed until Scratch and Grounder come along and screw things up. Coconuts also has some tools like in episode 44 where he had scissors to cut the rope (because he was trapped.)

While Dr. Robotnik, Scratch, and Grounder were drawn differently on the show than in the games (except in Dr. Robotnik's Mean Bean Machine), the AoStH version of Coconuts looks similar enough to his video game counterpart. The most noticeable difference between the two is that the animated Coconuts has a light bulb on his head. Coconuts' voice was provided by Ian James Corlett.

Sonic the Hedgehog (Comic Series)
The AoStH version of Coconuts also appeared occasionally in the early issues of the US Sonic comic book, making his first appearance in issue #2's "Tttriple Tttrouble", which marked the closest resemblance the comic had to the aforementioned cartoon. Here, Coconuts' head was colored light brown rather than red, and his face a light orange rather than the flesh tone used in the games and cartoon. However, this same color scheme was also used for the character's sprites in Dr. Robotnik's Mean Bean Machine (even though the box art used the cartoon's color scheme).

Unlike Scratch and Grounder, Coconuts appeared prominently a few more times in the comics. In issue #11, he captured the Freedom Fighters to lure Sonic into a trap in an attempt to get a higher spot on Robotnik's top ten favorite Badniks list (a list on which even Scratch and Grounder outranked him). He later starred in a short story in issue #30, in which he tried to prevent "an anteater" (Bunnie Rabbot, actually) from stealing Robotnik's Chaos Emeralds, using Wile E. Coyote-type traps that, needless to say, failed. Like his old costars, Coconuts' last appearance in the comic was part of a flashback in issue #57.

Coconuts ended up living on the Island of Misfit Badniks with a number of the other robots from the early games. However they were all destroyed, with Coconuts being the only one who was able to get away. (StH: #185)

According to an article on Sonic HQ, writer Karl Bollers had planned for Coconuts to return to the comic by teaming him up with an amnesiac Nate Morgan. This idea never came to pass, however. Coconuts later did return in the comic as a minion of Mammoth Mogul. Unlike his fellow lackeys Scratch and Grounder, who were envious of Coconuts' role as Mogul's right hand man, the robotic simian stated his disgust at being Mogul's "Butler Monkey".

Quotes

 * "I'm Coconuts and I'm Dr. Robotnik's favorite robot... because I'm going to finish you in a flash." -Dr. Robotnik's Mean Bean Machine
 * "I'm running away. Dr Robotnik doesn't love me." -Adventures of Sonic the Hedgehog Ep. 16 Tails' New Home

Trivia

 * In Sonic Blast, Coconuts is credited by his Japanese name, Ai-ai.
 * In the Genesis version of Dr. Robotnik's Mean Bean Machine, Coconuts shares the same dropset as Harpy from Puyo Puyo(the game on which Mean Bean Machine was based) as they both happen to stack their blobs to the sides.
 * In Dr. Robotnik's Mean Bean Machine, Coconuts is the only character that willingly lets the beans reach the top of the screen, this is due to his strategy.
 * The SEGA character Ai Ai from the Super Monkey Ball games has the same name as Coconuts' Japanese name.
 * Coconuts' card from Sonic Rivals is misspelled Coconut.