User blog comment:Blitz1995/Least Favorite Sonic Characters?/@comment-4714730-20120218005436/@comment-1889468-20120220205934

Shadow has been "useless" because he overtook the entire series. Shadow did this and Shadow did that, and he can do this and he can do that. If you play back games from Sonic 06 and back he was always more the center of attention than Sonic. (Realize that this was also the case for Chris in Sonic X who also got canned) They have put the series back on track by making it about Sonic and Tails again, of course they needed a reboot first and thats where Unleashed, Colors, and Generations comes into play. It focused on Sonic again and Tails as well. Now with Sonic 4 Episode 2, Tails is also prominent again which is finally getting Sonic back where everyone in general wants it to be. We will have to wait about what the "New Standard for Sonic" will be, but it will be something of this formula.