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"In the Midnight Hour" is the sixtieth episode in the Sonic Boom television series. It first aired on 31 December 2016 in the United States and on 8 April 2017 in France.
Synopsis[]
Sticks discovers Dreamcaster, a mysterious figure trying to hypnotize the village in the middle of the night. The gang doesn't believe Sticks, telling her Dreamcaster isn't real and her paranoia is out of control.
Appearances[]
Characters:
- Admiral Beaverton
- Badnik
- Bee Bot (multiple)
- Beetle Bot (multiple) (first appearance)
- Crab Bot (multiple)
- Motobug (multiple)
- Beaver Policeman
- Beth the Shrew
- Child Monkey
- Comedy Chimp
- Cubot
- Dreamcaster (only appearance)
- Dr. Eggman
- Fastidious Beaver
- Fennec Male
- Gentleman Wolf
- Lady Goat
- Lady Walrus
- Mayor Fink
- Mike the Ox
- Mrs. Vandersnout
- Old Monkey
- Orbot
- Rabbit Girl
- Reindeer Girl
- Sheep Villager
- Stratford
- Team Sonic
- Warthog Male
- Walrus Camera Man
- Walrus Male
- Wild Cat
- Wolf Policeman
- Wolfie
Races and species:
Locations:
Items:
- Amy's Hammer
- Communicator
- Meh Burger
- Super Slumber Satellite (only appearance)
- Wrist controller
Vehicles:
Misc.:
- Comedy Chimp Show
- Jujutsu Realism (only appearance)
Plot[]
Late at night in the Village Center, a paint-covered Sticks is using martial arts on a canvas to create works of art when she spots a strange figure hovering around the TV station. Panicking, she runs to Sonic's Shack, where she finds Sonic asleep and dreaming of sugarplums; after waking him, she leads him back to the TV station, only to find the figure is gone. Sticks is convinced the figure was around here, but an unconvinced Sonic leaves to go back to bed. The next day at Meh Burger, Sticks tells her story to the rest of Team Sonic, only for them to state that the badger is seeing things. Tails in particular is convinced that Sticks is suffering from sleep deprivation; after claiming she never sleeps (thus proving his point), she tells everyone she will prove the figure exists.
That night, Sticks lurks around near the TV station when she notices the figure return and broadcast himself over the TV airwaves, introducing himself as the Dreamcaster and soothing the villagers to sleep while claiming it is not an attempt at hypnotizing them. Sticks tackles him, only for the robot to escape, and tells everyone watching TV that Dreamcaster is attempting to hypnotize them all; the villagers quickly run to the TV station, led by Comedy Chimp, who is not happy that Sticks has destroyed his studio. Sticks once more attempts to convince them that Dreamcaster is real, but no one is believing her story, not even Team Sonic. Feeling upset that not even her friends are trusting her, Sticks runs off.
In the daytime, Sticks is in her burrow, taking out her frustrations on the paintings she created when Comedy Chimp barges in with the village policemen, ordering her arrest. Once again, the badger attempts to convince them about Dreamcaster, to no avail. She runs out of the house and is happy to find her friends there, but Sonic handcuffs her, believing they had no other choice. Amy claims that a night in jail might clear her head, and the policemen take her off; Dreamcaster appears from behind a tree and tells Team Sonic that they have earned their sugarplums, at which point they enter a hypnotized state. Sticks spends the night in jail, feeling depressed to the point of doubting her own opinions on the world. Soon after, however, she notices through her cell's window that the villagers have been hypnotized, the other members of Team Sonic among them. Eggman appears in the Eggmobile (with Orbot and Cubot alongside him) and proclaims victory, having been the creator of Dreamcaster all along; by having him broadcast mind-control waves across the Unnamed Village that grew in strength over time, Eggman gained control over the villagers as they slept, and he soon uses them to build the Super Slumber Satellite, a device which will let him broadcast Dreamcaster's mind-control waves all across the world, giving him complete world domination.
Sticks is relieved to learn her fears were vindicated and her viewpoints are still right after all. Soon after, Eggman notices her and is upset that she remains unaffected because she does not own a TV, which again convinces her that her opinions are justified. Meanwhile, the villagers continue to build the Satellite with the assistance of Eggman's Badniks, Beetle Bots included, as Sticks attempts to escape from jail; eventually, she lures a mind-controlled Knuckles to the wall of her cell and gets him to punch it down, but as she escapes, Eggman has Dreamcaster attempt to mind-control her, which she barely resists as she runs off to her burrow, packing objects into her backpack before exiting. Back in the Village Center, the satellite is completed and Eggman is going through a lengthy process to activate it when Sticks returns, having packed five tinfoil hats which are able to block the mind-control waves indefinitely when worn.
Sticks puts one hat on herself and one other on Sonic, telling him to place two of the other hats on Tails and Knuckles while she puts the remaining hat on Amy; eventually, the entirety of Team Sonic is once again in control of their own actions. This allows Sticks to confront and destroy Dreamcaster with her martial arts painting method, freeing everyone from the mind control for good, while the others smash the Badniks to pieces and destroy the Satellite; defeated once again, Eggman and his minions retreat. Sticks asks for an apology from her friends, only for them to state that it was Dreamcaster making them say those things, which convinces her to ask if they really think she is not crazy; still not entirely convinced, they hesitate to answer.
Continuity[]
Goofs[]
The Old Monkey's eye error.
- In the scene with the jail where Sticks says that she knew that Dreamcaster was real, her window's metal bars are much thicker and more evenly positioned between each other.
- As the hypnotized Beth backs away from the cargo being dropped by the Beetle Bot, she almost slides across the ground.
- As Sticks flips through the crowd of zombies to reach Amy, the Fennec Male ends up behind her. However, in the following shot where Sticks puts her tin foil hat on Amy, the Fennec Male has ended up behind Amy.
- When villagers are released from the mind control, the Old Monkey's eyes are much smaller than normal.
- In some scenes Sticks' eyes are green instead of blue.
- In the second shot of zombies where Sonic, Amy, Wild Cat, and Mike are walking, Fennec Male is sliding behind Mike throughout that shot.
- Eggman's machine could not have scanned his thumb print because he was wearing his gloves when the scan occurred.
Title in other languages[]
| Language | Title | Translation |
|---|---|---|
| Arabic | عند منتصف الليل | Midnight |
| French | Minuit, l'heure du crime | Midnight, the hour of crime |
| Italian | Spettro di mezzanotte | Midnight Spectrum |
| Polish | O północy | Midnight |
| Portuguese (Brazil) | À meia-noite | At midnight |
| Portuguese (Portugal) | Ao Cair da Noite | At Nightfall |
| Spanish (Latin America) | Delirio de medianoche | Midnight Delirium |
| Ukrainian | Опівнічна година | Midnight hour |
Trivia[]
- Two days before this episode aired on Boomerang, Bill Freiberger released the title card for this episode on Twitter as a teaser.[5]
- Dreamcaster is named after Sega's last video game console, the Dreamcast. His eyes, when cloaked, resemble the Dreamcast logo as well.
- Sticks' line, "You guys ready to rage against the machine!?", said after a group of angry villagers visit her at the television studio, is a reference to the band Rage Against the Machine.
- Dreamcaster's metaphor of sugar plums is based on the Christmas poem from Clement C. Moore's A Visit from St. Nicholas (1823). The line "Visions of sugar plums danced in their heads," of children sleeping and dreaming.
- The dance that Dreamcaster has everyone do and the music that plays is a reference to the song "Thriller" by Michael Jackson.
- When everyone starts building the Super Slumber Satellite, an altered version of "Funkytown" by Lipps Inc. plays.
- Sticks using a tin foil hat to block out Dreamcaster's mind-control is a nod to the real-world belief that such hats can shield against mind-control.
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."
- ↑ Bill Freiberger on Twitter. Twitter (5 December 2016). Retrieved on 5 December 2015. "Bill Freiberger: Episode 208: In the Midnight Hour. Written by Paul Shriver."
- ↑ Sonic Boom: In the Midnight Hour. Zap2it.com. Retrieved on 25 November 2016.
- ↑ Tous les Programmes (French). Canal J. Archived from the original on 8 June 2017. Retrieved on 28 March 2017.
- ↑ Bill Freiberger on Twitter. Twitter (29 December 2016). Retrieved on 30 December 2016.
