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"Chain Letter"[2] is the ninety-fifth episode in the Sonic Boom television series. It first aired on 2 September 2017 in the United States and on 27 September 2017 in France.
Synopsis[]
Sonic agrees to be Dr. Eggman’s friend on social media - a kindness he will surely regret.[3]
Appearances[]
Characters:
- Beth the Shrew
- Child Monkey
- Cubot
- Dave the Intern
- Dr. Eggman
- Fennec Male
- Ice Cream Vendor
- Justin Beaver
- Lady Goat
- Lady Walrus
- Leroy the Turtle
- Mayor Fink (mentioned)
- Mike the Ox
- Mombot (mentioned)
- Mrs. Vandersnout
- Old Monkey
- Orbot
- Perci
- Rabbit Girl
- Redd Heron
- Reindeer Girl
- Salty
- Staci
- Stratford
- Stunt Bears
- T.W. Barker
- Team Sonic
- Walrus Male
- Warthog Male
- Wild Cat
- Wolf Sidekick
- Wolfie
- Zooey
Races and species:
Locations:
Items:
Misc.:
- FriendSpace (only appearance)
- Scrambler (only appearance)
- SnarkChat (mentioned)
Plot[]
At Dr. Eggman's Lair, Eggman, Orbot, and Cubot are playing a game when Eggman receives a message on his FriendSpace that interrupts their game. Excited that someone sent him a message, he immediately checks it, only for the message to warn Eggman that if he does not forward the message to three friends, he will be cursed with bad luck forever. Realizing he has no friends, he commands Orbot and Cubot to follow him on FriendSpace. Eggman is initially excited to get friend requests, only to groan in irritation when he finds snarky posts that Orbot posted insulting Eggman (specifically over Eggman struggling to find the TV remote only to realize it was stuck to his butt the whole time), which causes Cubot to laugh at the posts and add insult to injury on Eggman's behalf by sharing the posts online and making them trend, much to Eggman's annoyance and disappointment. Eggman brushes aside the posts and quickly makes his way to Seaside Island at the Village Center where he attempts to attract a random individual to be his friend. Questioning why it is so hard for an evil villain to make a friend, he finds Redd Heron, who is having trouble moving boxes to his new house. Eggman attempts to convince Redd Heron to be friends with him on FriendSpace by helping him, but Heron states that he might not have Internet for a few weeks, prompting Eggman to give up and find another person to be his friend.
Eggman walks around the Village Center and finds the Rabbit Girl. Thinking she will have hundreds of friends because of her hip and condescending attitude, Eggman walks to up her and begins using hip slang in an attempt to become friends with her. The Rabbit Girl brushes this off, comparing Eggman to her mother attempting to be "cool". Eggman then convinces the Rabbit Girl to be his friend on FriendSpace, which she rejects since FriendSpace was "so two weeks ago" and how everyone uses SnarkChat instead. Just as she recommends Eggman to use SnarkChat, she then follows up by saying SnarkChat is "so over". Eggman then walks up to the Old Monkey, offering to help the senior citizen cross the street, in exchange for the Old Monkey to shoot up a friend request on FriendSpace towards Eggman, only for the Old Monkey, who is too old to understand the new technological terms, question what Eggman wants him to do for him. Eggman leaves the Old Monkey in the middle of the road, where Dave the Intern accidentally runs the Old Monkey over. The Old Monkey gets up as if nothing happened, while Dave, briefly checking up on the senior citizen, gets back in his vehicle, only to go in reverse and hit the Old Monkey again, who gets up once more.
Meanwhile, Team Sonic are playing a game of soccer, with Tails and Sonic on one team and Amy and Knuckles on another. As Sonic is about to kick the ball into the goal, Eggman grabs the ball, which causes Sonic to fall on the ground. Sonic gets up and asks Eggman what he wants, to which Eggman responds by wanting him to follow him on FriendSpace. Sonic rejects, as they are enemies, not friends. Eggman dejectedly whimpers, covering up that he only asked because Mombot made him ask the heroes. Eggman runs away, crying, to which Tails suggest to follow Eggman on FriendSpace, as they could keep tabs on him of his latest schemes. Sonic likes this idea and sends a friend request to Eggman, who was contemplating on changing his attitude and start becoming nicer to people. Sonic receives the chain letter that Eggman received earlier, to which Sonic deletes. However, Sonic keeps receiving numerous notifications from Eggman sharing posts.
At the Meh Burger, Tails suggests to Sonic that he should just ignore Eggman in order to save him from the numerous amount of notifications, similarly to how Meh Burger ignores the complaints of the customers. Frustrated, Sonic rants about during their discussion at the fast food joint alone, Eggman's sent three posts to Sonic, only for a fourth notification to pop up, causing Sonic to spill his drink. Later, Sonic intervenes T.W. Barker's announcement at the Village Center involving his false accusations of a pyramid scheme. As his Stunt Bears run to attack Sonic, the blue blur receives a notification from Eggman. Stunt Bear No. 1 tackles Sonic, who gets right back up and receives another notification from Eggman. As he continues to get distracted by the notifications, Sonic is ultimately forced to unfriend Eggman. Eggman realizes Sonic has unfriended him and attempts to send him a friend request again, only for Sonic to reject it. Eggman thus decides to make his own social media platform, where Sonic is prohibited from using it.
Orbot and Cubot help Eggman brainstorm ideas for his new social media platform, Scrambler. After running into Sonic at the Village Center, which Sonic explains that he unfriended him because of hi constant post sharing, Eggman moves Sonic aside as he talks to the Rabbit Girl once more. He tries to convince her to use Scrambler, but she passes on the idea. Eggman bemoans how no one will ever use Scrambler until the Rabbit Girl hears this, thinking the social network site is for uber exclusives. She and her three thousand closest friends sign up on Scrambler, which pleases the evil diabolical doctor. Scrambler soon after becomes the new hit trend, with everyone, including Amy and Knuckles, using the social media network to talk to each other online instead of in person. Sonic notices this and hates the idea, but decides to join anyway, only for his membership to be denied as payback for Sonic unfriending Eggman on FriendSpace.
Later that night, Sonic notices everyone in town going to an exclusive event for Scrambler users only. Feeling left out, Sonic makes his way to Eggman's lair in an attempt to sign up for Scrambler. However, Eggman is depressed, as no one comments on his posts as real friends, and Sonic decides that, if Eggman allows him to make a Scrambler account, he will comment on all of Eggman's posts regardless of how infactually inaccurate they are. Eggman allows Sonic to create an account, only for him to unfriend Sonic in order to have Sonic feel how he felt when he was unfriended. Fueled by the hate over how no one wants to be his friend on Scrambler and the rush from unfriending someone, Eggman deletes the app entirely. The next day, Eggman walks through the Village Center, with the Village people booing him for deleting the app, noting contently that if he cannot have real life friends, he can at least have real life enemies.
Continuity[]
- Dr. Eggman mentions Mombot, a robot he created in "Mombot".
Goofs[]
- In this episode, Lady Goat's fur has the same color it had during season one of the Sonic Boom television series.
- When Dr. Eggman asks Sonic if he likes Scrambler after letting him join, his mustache is a bit smaller than normal.
Production[]
According to Sam Freiberger, Sonic's complaints at Meh Burger about the messages Eggman sent him was a joke that was added late in production.[4] In the original draft for this episode, Eggman sent Sonic "An article about the Mayor not being born in Hedgehog Village" but the idea was rejected by the Standards and Practices.[5]
Title in other languages[]
| Language | Title | Translation |
|---|---|---|
| French | Chaîne de lettres | Chain letters |
| Italian | Amici cercasi | Friends wanted |
| Polish | Łańcuszkowy mail | Chain mail |
| Portuguese (Brazil) | Solicitação de amizade | Friendship request |
| Portuguese (Portugal) | Corrente Eletrónica | Electronic Current |
| Spanish (Latin America) | Cadena de mensajes | Chain letters |
| Ukrainian | Лист щастя | Letter of Happiness |
Trivia[]
- Nine days before this episode aired on Boomerang, Bill Freiberger released the title card for this episode on Twitter as a teaser.[6]
- The game that Dr. Eggman and his lackeys play at the beginning of the episode is based on Pong.
- The social media sites that appeared or were mentioned in this episode are all parodies of real-life sites:
- Sonic saying "And the Blue Blur lines up for what is surely to be his 25th consecutive goal" while he is playing soccer might be a reference to the Sonic the Hedgehog series' 25th anniversary, which occurred a year before this episode aired. Given that Sonic Boom episodes are generally recorded over a year before they air,[7] the recording of this episode would have taken place sometime around the 25th anniversary of the Sonic series, making this possible reference rather relevant.
- Eggman pulling away the ball when Sonic is about to kick it, causing Sonic to trip and fall, is a reference to the football gag in the Peanuts comic strip where Lucy regularly pulls off a similar joke on Charlie Brown; Sonic even utters the common Peanuts catchphrase, "Good grief", after he falls.
- The phone that Rabbit Girl uses is reminiscent of the Apple iPhone, with the same power button and a very similar interface.
- Sonic mentioning Eggman sharing an article concerning Mayor Fink using a private email server is a nod to Hillary Clinton using a private email server when she was secretary of New York as discovered during the 2016 presidential election.
- In this episode, Eggman mentions the "Eggs Benedict", a meal he had Tails serve for him in "Can an Evil Genius Crash on Your Couch for a Few Days?"
- Scrambler's name may be a reference to scrambled eggs (which fits with Dr. Eggman's egg-theme).
- Technically, this is the first episode where Eggman bests Sonic, though, not by domination over Hedgehog Village.
References[]
- ↑ Bill Freiberger on Twitter. Twitter (29 October 2016). Archived from the original on 11 May 2021. Retrieved on 29 October 2016. "Tailooey Fan: Jack Fletcher is still the dubbing director and Natalys Raut-Sieuzac is still the director in Season? / Bill Freiberger: Jack Fletcher is the voice director. Natalys Raut-Sieuzac is the director. / Tailooey Fan: In season two too? / Bill Freiberger: Yes, Jack Fletcher is the voice director and Natalys Raut-Sieuzac is the director in season 2 of #sonicboom."
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 Sonic Boom: Chain Letter. Zap2it.com. Retrieved on 29 July 2017.
- ↑ Bill Freiberger on Twitter. Twitter (31 August 2017). Retrieved on 31 August 2017. "Bill Freiberger: 247 Sonic agrees to be Dr. Eggman’s friend on social media - a kindness he will surely regret."
- ↑ Sam Freiberger on Twitter. Twitter (2 September 2017). Retrieved on 2 September 2017. "Sam Freiberger: We added this joke late in production. We "heel" with laughter. #AltRightEggman #HeelWithLaughter @BernieSanders @HillaryClinton"
- ↑ Sam Freiberger on Twitter. Twitter (2 September 2017). Retrieved on 2 September 2017. "Sam Freiberger: In original draft, Eggman sent "An article about the Mayor not being born in Hedgehog Village" but S&P said no. @barackobama #AltRightEggman"
- ↑ Bill Freiberger on Twitter. Twitter (24 August 2017). Retrieved on 24 August 2017. "Bill Freiberger: A #sonicboom preview for next Saturday: Ep. 247, "Chain Letter" Written by Peter Saisselin."
- ↑ Mike Pollock on Twitter. Twitter (18 March 2017). Retrieved on 18 March 2017. "That Person: How far in advance are lines generally recorded before the episode's air date? / Mike Pollock: Over a year."
