<< Previous episode | — | Sonic Prime From the Top |
"From the Top" is the twenty-third episode of the Sonic Prime television series, serving as both the seventh and final episode of season three, as well as the series finale. It premiered on Netflix on 11 January 2024.
Synopsis[]
- Reality will cease to exist unless a selfless hero makes the ultimate sacrifice. But will it be enough to reverse the damage Nine caused to the universe?
Appearances[]
Characters[]
- Amy Rose
- The Kraken's crew
- Badniks
- Big the Cat
- Flicky
- Birdie (Boscage Maze)
- Chaos Council
- Cubot
- Dr. Eggman
- Eggforcer
- Froggy
- Jack
- Knuckles the Echidna
- Miles "Tails" Prower
- Orbot
- Resistance
- Rouge the Bat
- Scavengers
- Shadow the Hedgehog
- Sonic the Hedgehog
- Nine
- Thorn Rose
Locations[]
- Prime World
- Shatterverse
- Boscage Maze (mentioned)
- New Yoke City (mentioned)
- No Place (mentioned)
- The Grim
Vehicles[]
Objects[]
Moves[]
Miscellaneous[]
- Prism Energy (mentioned)
Plot[]
The episode carries on where the previous one left off, with Sonic and Nine fighting through the Paradox Energy Beam towards the lab, eventually landing in the lab. Sonic sees the two palm trees and the hammock attached to them, realizing that Nine was attempting to make a home for the both of them. Touched by this, Sonic stops fighting and attempts to tell Nine that he didn't understand what his initial intentions were, but Nine, blinded by fury and madness, refuses to hear him out at this point, demanding him to be quiet, stop dodging, and just fight him. The moment is cut short when an explosion destroys one of the lab's walls and Shadow emerges from the smoke to confront Nine once again, joined by the Chaos Council, Resistance, Scavengers and The Kraken's crew as he declares that the power-mad fox's plot is over.
Outnumbered and backed into a corner, a frightened and disheveled Nine orders them to get back before he's forced to destroy them all, prompting Sonic to ask him if he really wants more destruction and point him towards the new hole in the wall to witness the amount of destruction that he's already caused outside; there's almost nothing left of the Grim as a result of the forcefield shrinking, and the Gateways to the other Shatterspaces are collapsing. This vision finally shakes Nine out of his mania and gets him to back down. Sonic uses the opportunity to apologize to Nine for wanting his home back to the point of not listening to him or his considerations, claiming that he had no intentions of hurting him, but Nine turns his back, saying he did that regardless; Sonic responds that they should talk their issues out, not fight over them. Mr. Dr. Eggman loses his patience and starts firing at the fox, but Sonic protects Nine and desperately calls for everyone to end the fight, stating that continuing to antagonize the fox "isn't the solution" and surprising the rest of the group. Mr. Dr. Eggman then demands that both Sonic and Nine should be taken out; in response, a weary Sonic once again tells everyone to stop, finally ceasing all hostilities by explaining that it won't be long until there's nothing to fight for. Nine begins to panic and become upset with himself over losing control and pushing his plans too far, answering Sonic's apology with one of his own and dramatically announcing the end of reality unless there's a "great sacrifice".
Everyone starts either sobbing or accepting the end with the ones they love (except Dr. Babble, who is only amused by it and instead happily giggles and claps his hands). Shadow looks at Sonic, the latter then stepping on the other Shatter Drive in the lab in an attempt to grant Nine's wish and save everything by sacrificing his inner Prism Energy to stabilize the Shatterspaces. Nine is surprised at his decision, but he promises Sonic that he won't cause more damage to the other Shatterspaces. With that settled, Sonic says that if he's going through with this plan, everyone else has to agree to leave Nine alone from now on. Knucks becomes suspicious over Nine's trustworthiness, but Rebel tells him that there's no choice, reassuring Nine. With Sonic on the Shatter Drive and Dr. Done-It prompting him to hurry up, Nine starts setting up the Paradox Prism's reformation by typing on the keyboard, but halts midway through, becoming stressed; he tells them that without his Prism Energy, there's a risk of Sonic disintegrating. After a long moment of hesitation, Nine works up the nerve to activate the Shatter Drive with the press of a button.
The Shatter Drive lights up, and Sonic struggles with overwhelming pain as the Prism Energy is ripped out of him, his gear shifting through all its appearances in the Shatterspaces. The Paradox Prism starts shaking, and as it begins absorbing its missing energy, the seam lines between each shard mend themselves. Sonic's Regulators also come off and explode, and the Prism, now completely restored, begins to emit a white light. Sonic, with no energy left, collapses. Everyone checks to see if Sonic's okay, especially a visibly-concerned Shadow. Fortunately, Sonic is simply weakened by the experience and helped to his feet by Knucks, his voice taking on a radio-like quality and his body becoming see-through and involuntarily twitching from time to time. Rebel is pleased to learn that he survived, but Nine informs everyone that with Sonic's energy extracted, even though his body is holding together now, he will eventually shatter. Suddenly, Mr. Dr. Eggman and the rest of the Chaos Council claim possession of the Paradox Prism. Nine tries to get to the keyboard, but is grabbed by Dr. Babble's mech. The Council threaten him and Shadow, meaning a fight is likely to break out.
However, confident to verbally have the Chaos Council turn on each other, Sonic points out that while Nine could barely handle the Prism, even in its unstable condition, the Chaos Council have no hope. It worked, for as Dr. Deep claims that he'll wield the power of the Prism, the rest of the Council start arguing against him. As soon as Dr. Babble slams his arm on the ground, all five of the Chaos Council members lose their cool and battle against one another. Shadow wants to get involved, too, but Rebel holds him back. Mr. Dr. Eggman calls to stop the fight to no avail. Nine, with an agreement (via a wink) by Sonic, hides himself and successfully makes his way to the keyboard, commanding the Paradox Prism to open a Portal to the Void. Dr. Babble sends Dr. Deep and Dr. Done-It through it, getting a telling off from Mr. Dr. Eggman. It's at this point that Rebel lets Shadow loose, with the dark hedgehog delivering a Homing Attack that sends Dr. Babble through the Portal. After more Rebels walk in to join the fight, Dr. Don't surrenders and travels through the portal by himself. Nine then works together with his fellow New Yoke counterparts to stop Mr. Dr. Eggman, with Rebel dealing him one last kick him through the Portal, which closes before he can entirely declare their eventual return.
Afterwards, Nine, relieved about the dismissal of the Chaos Council, types on the keyboard again and starts the reformation process in a chance attempt to bring back Green Hill. After the process begins, the Paradox Prism shakes, then disappears. While Rusty assumes the attempt failed, Nine sees something across the hole in the lab, alerting everyone to take a look. In the Void are the Gateways to New Yoke City, the Boscage Maze, No Place and Ghost Hill, reforming after the damage Nine's meddling with the prism caused to them. Black Rose and Prim Rouge notice their respective ones, whilst the Ghost Hill one confuses Birdie and Thorn Rose, and Shadow sees that he was wrong: Ghost Hill was and is Green Hill, which Sonic calls out. He doubts that he'll make it in his current state, but Nine and Rebel encourage him to leave now, as the Green Hill Gateway "won't be there forever". Nine then hugs Sonic goodbye, which surprises Sonic for a moment before he returns the hug. With encouragement from his friends, Sonic agrees and hops onto Birdie's back, taking off. Sonic's allies wave at him before Shadow reminds them that he has to come along as well; he is offered a ride through the Void with Rusty and Black Rose. Meanwhile, Birdie hits her wing on a rock, causing her to fall, but the Yolkomotive, driven by Black Rose, rescues her, Thorn, and Sonic. Soon, the Yolkomotive itself takes too much damage from the rocks to continue effectively, losing an engine and slowing down. With time running out, Shadow steps up to take Sonic the rest of the way by himself, jumping from rock to rock to get closer to the Green Hill Gateway. However, Sonic becomes limp and unresponsive as his body starts to give out, and Shadow-- now even more concerned about his rival's fate-- tells him to hang on and pushes himself to run faster in order to save him, creating a powerful sonic boom on a rock with his air-shoes and giving them enough momentum to finally make it through just in time.
Sonic finds himself back to normal and inside the Green Hill Temple Mountain in a temporal freeze-frame of the original battle over the Paradox Prism moments before he impulsively shattered it, becoming ecstatic to see that his and Shadow's home reality was restored and-- though they can't hear it-- reuniting with and voicing his appreciation of the original versions of his friends that he'd been apart from for so long, especially Tails. As time resumes, instead of shattering the Prism as before, Sonic dashes towards Eggman, clinging onto and hugging the doctor's windshield to his and their teammates' surprise. When questioned on this, Sonic claims that he missed both his familiar friends and foes, but Eggman becomes annoyed, knocking Sonic off his mech with multiple punches. Sonic lands by his teammates and tells them some instructions, and together, they protect the Paradox Prism as they battle against Eggman and his Badniks; Sonic's friends, unaware of his Shatterverse adventures, are left confused over his sudden focus on teamwork, but still pleased that he learned his lesson. As Eggman begins approaching the heroes, Sonic spots Shadow as he arrives at the cave's entrance, holding the green Chaos Emerald once again as a result of being brought back in time to a point where he still had it; Sonic gives him the signal to make his move. A few moments later and to Eggman's shock, Shadow teleports to and poses on top of the Paradox Prism, then uses Chaos Control to teleport out of the cave to an unknown location, taking the Prism with him and ensuring that it can never be misused or shattered again. Dismayed at losing the Prism, Eggman retreats out of the cave with Orbot and Cubot, promising to return; Sonic mockingly continues his threat while imitating him, having heard such threats countless times before, then says he's looking forward to the next time. Later, Sonic and the rest of the gang are relaxing on the beach after the battle, but as soon as Sonic begins to tell his friends about his adventures in the Shatterverse, an explosion and subsequent shockwave blows them back and causes Sonic to drop the tray of Sea Dogs he'd made to share with them, all while a massive unknown object appears offscreen (although its shadow is visible). After mobilizing the rest of the team to join him in battle (and briefly expressing annoyance at dropping the Sea Dogs), Sonic peels out, speeding towards this new threat head-on.
Regional differences[]
- The term "whippersnapper" by Dr. Done-It towards Dr. Don't is replaced with local jargon or idioms in the following dubs:
- Indonesian: Congkak ("arrogant").
- Mandarin Chinese: 少年人 (Siàu-liân-lâng, lit. "Young person"), used in the Taiwanese Hokkien dialect.
- Spanish (Latin America): Bobalicón ("idiot").
- Spanish (Spain): Pardillo (lit. "Linnet"), a colloquial term for "sucker".
- Thai: เด็กอมมือ (Dek-om-mue, lit. "hand-sucking child"), referring to an ignorant person.
- After teasing the line of "You will pay for this in ways you'd never imagine!", Sonic claims hearing it for only a hundred times in the Italian dub.
Goofs[]
- When Sonic twitches, he's audibly heard groaning in pain, but, in some scenes, his mouth isn't synced up, potentially to the audio being reused for scenes like those.
- When Dr. Eggman is about to grab the Paradox Prism as time goes back to its normal flow, a small piece of the Prism Crater which should be at the back appears at the front of the Prism Crater, specifically where the blue Shard is located.
- When Dr. Eggman says "Say goodbye to your trees and beaches", the Paradox Prism looks like it's slightly shifted to the left side of the screen.
Titles in other languages[]
Language | Title | Translation |
---|---|---|
Chinese (Simplified) | 回到从前 | Return to the past |
Chinese (Traditional) | 回到最初 | Return to the beginning |
Croatian | Od početka | From the beginning |
Czech | Od začátku | From the beginning |
Danish | Helt forfra | Right from the start |
Dutch | Terug bij af | Back to start |
Finnish | Pysytään yhdessä | Let's stay together |
French | Recommencement | Starting over |
German | Sonic gibt alles | Sonic gives all |
Greek | Από την αρχή | From the beginning |
Hebrew | שוב מהתחלה | Start again |
Hungarian | Vissza a kezdetekhez | Back to the beginning |
Italian | Da capo | From the beginning |
Japanese | やり直そう | Let's try again |
Korean | 처음부터 | From the beginning |
Polish | Od początku | From the beginning |
Portuguese (Brazil) | Do começo | From the start |
Portuguese (Portugal) | Regresso a casa | Returning home |
Romanian | De la început | From the beginning |
Spanish (Latin America) | Desde el comienzo | From the beginning |
Spanish (Spain) | Borrón y cuenta nueva | Clean slate and new account |
Swedish | Tillbaka till samtiden | Back to the present |
Thai | สู่จุดเริ่มต้น | To the start |
Turkish | En Baştan | From the beginning |
Vietnamese | Từ đỉnh tháp | From the top of the tower |
Trivia[]
- The title of the episode comes from the phrase said by stage directors "once again from the top", meaning the beginning of a scene in a play or movie.
- The ending of the episode is similar to the ending of Sonic the Hedgehog (2006), in that Sonic Prime effectively wipes itself out from existence. The main difference, however, is that Sonic and Shadow are shown to still remember the events of Sonic Prime, whereas the events of Sonic the Hedgehog are largely forgotten about aside from moments of déjà vu (though Sonic may[1][2][3] recall at least some of the events of the game). The Shatterverse may also still exist, since its fate is left ambiguous.
- This is the 23rd episode, despite the series being described as having 24 episodes. This was due to "Shattered" being double the length of a standard episode, as confirmed by Duncan Rouleau.[4]
- According to Duncan, the ending of the episode was not meant to imply a continuation, and was instead just intended to show that Sonic was already off on his next adventure.[4]
- The music that plays when Shadow carries Sonic to the Green Hill Gateway is a slower version of the music used when Sonic saved Shadow in "Avoid the Void".
- The last words of Sonic, and the show, are "We gotta go fast!", which is likely a reference to the North American theme song of Sonic X, "Gotta Go Fast".
References[]
- ↑ Backbone Entertainment (November 24, 2006). Sonic Rivals. PlayStation Portable. Sega. Silver cutscene. "Sonic: Hey! You [Silver] sure have an attitude. Who are you, anyway?"
- ↑ Sumo Digital (May 21, 2019). Team Sonic Racing (in Japanese). Nintendo Switch. Sega. Area/level: Haunted Castle. "Sonic: You've come all this way from the future so let's just take this chance to enjoy a race! / Silver: You're right... There's no point in getting concerned now... / Sonic: Heh! What happened to your energy from when we first met? Weren't you like, "I will destroy you!"? / Silver: I don't recall ever saying anything like that...? / Sonic: Well, the race is about to start! Let's rock!"
- ↑ Sonic the Hedgehog's 900th Adventure
- ↑ 4.0 4.1 Duncan Rouleau on Twitter. Twitter (January 18, 2023). Retrieved on January 22, 2023.