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Archie Mega Man Issue 26 is the twenty-sixth issue of the Mega Man comic series by Archie Comics and part 7 of the Sonic/Mega Man crossover "Worlds Collide".
Summary[]
Official Solicitation[]
The historic Sonic the Hedgehog and Mega Man crossover event rolls on! The hunt for the Roboticized Masters continues as Sonic and Mega Man face down Shadow Man and - Shadow Man? Meanwhile, Drs. Eggman and Wily gloat over the captive Dr. Light. But what is the brilliant, bearded scientist preparing to do? Featuring stunning new cover art from Patrick 'SPAZ' Spaziante, and a special throwback variant cover you just can't miss!
Story One[]
- Worlds Collide: Part 7 of 12-Evening the Odds
Mega Man, Sonic, Tails, and Rush are seen trekking through a forest area in the Skull Egg Zone. A giant snake robot attacks them but he blasts it, and the group moves on to a snow-covered area. They are ambushed by both Shadow Men-Dr. Wily's Robot Master and Eggman's Roboticized Master- but both Mega Man and Sonic identify their counterpart as Shadow Man and are unable to tell who's their target from name confusion. Shadow Man (Eggman) blasts Sonic with his Chaos Cannon, freezing him in an energy bubble. Mega Man uses Espio Man's Chrono Camo to sneak up on Shadow Man (Eggman) and follows up with Tails Man's weapon: Tails Wind resulting him in losing hold of Sonic's frozen time state. Mega Man then uses the Sonic Blast to revert Shadow back to normal. Mega Man then uses the Chaos Cannon to freeze Shadow Man (Wily) in place. Mega Man helps Shadow to his feet, who introduces himself as "The Ultimate Life Form, suffering the ultimate humiliation". As his first act of revenge, he coldly decimates Shadow Man, despite the battle already being over.
Sonic fills Shadow in on the situation and asks if he'd rather join them or Proto Man and the Chaotix, but Shadow refuses both options and warps out of the area using Chaos Control. This distortion in time and space causes Sonic, Tails and Mega Man to remember bits and pieces of their old lives. Sonic realizes that Dr. Eggman previously altered reality like this, and thinks about how the two doctors rewrote their worlds and suddenly starts to fear what this Genesis Wave might cause after this. Mega Man tells him not to worry about it for now and they carry on. Back on the Wily Egg, Drs. Eggman and Wily are gloating over the captured Dr. Light. And Orbot delivers the bad news on how and why the two Shadow Men were defeated. They leave and Rouge appears to speak to the doctor, explaining her efforts to undermine the doctors and rescue Shadow. Promising to rescue him later, she produces a downloaded schematic of the Wily Egg and asks him to analyze it and point out vulnerabilities that she can exploit.
Meanwhile, Sonic tries to use the invisible blocks-obstacles from Mega Man's world-to scale a large cliff, only for Blaze Woman and Silver Man to ambush both him and Mega Man. Mega and Silver Man end up blasting each other in the face, though Silver is reverted back to normal with the Sonic Blast. Just as Sonic was about to get roasted by Blaze Woman, Silver holds her back with his psychic powers while Mega Man blasts her with the Sonic Blast to revert her back to normal. The four and Tails sits down to rest and manages to get all their bearings together. Blaze explains that she was enjoying her time with Marine when all of a sudden she was abducted. Silver comes to mind, remembering that he came to warn Sonic of the time alter. Blaze and Silver say they'd love to help but are tired. Sonic tells them to rest for now and they can attack the two doctors together in the Wily Egg once they save Amy and Knuckles.
Meanwhile, the Chaotix and Proto Man found themselves in a snowy mountain region, unaware that the last two Roboticized Masters-Knuckles Man and Rose Woman-are preparing an ambush. Just then, they receive new orders from the doctors: eliminate Sonic and Mega Man, at any cost-including the use of their own self-destruct feature.
Short Circuits[]
Bass destroys an unknown object with his Bass Buster, and Omega wastes a city. Then there is a (childishly drawn) picture with a burning house on a rainbow, sad faces of Eggman and Wily, and the two robots holding hands while skipping, with the text: A MATCH MADE IN CROSSOVER HEAVEN: DESTRUCTION BUDDIES 4 LIFE!
Quotes[]
- Sonic: Jump, Mega Man, jump! Or are those big 'ole boots tripping you?
- Mega Man: They're designed for stability. Would you expect me to jump and shoot with noodle-limbs like yours?
- Sonic: "Noodle-limbs"? I'm lean, man! Aerodynamic! You can judge limbs once you graduate from your mega-undies.
- Mega Man (annoyed): It's ARMOR!
- Sonic: Sure it is! And these things on my head are rudders. HA!
- Tails: Can we save all the bragging until after we've saved everyone?
- Sonic: When have I ever done it in that order?
- Sonic: You keep Shadow Man busy! I'll take down the other guy!
- Mega Man: Um...right!
- Sonic: I told you to go for the other guy!
- Mega Man: That IS the other guy! You said you had Shadow Man!
- Sonic: That IS Shadow Man!
- Tails: They're BOTH called Shadow Man! Pick one and fight him already!
- Mega Man: Oh, sorry.
- Sonic: YOU pick one! Sheesh!
- Mega Man: I need to thank the doctors for all these new weapons!
- Shadow: The Ultimate life form. Sufering the humiliated defeat. VENGEANCE!
- Mega Man: He...he was already down.
- Sonic: How about some anger control?
- Shadow: Not now, Sonic.
- Sonic: Alright, alright.
- Dr. Eggman: This is the fellow that's given you so much trouble, Al? Santa in a lab coat?
- Dr. Wily: Oh, he's quite brilliant. But not smart enough to avoid getting captured!
- Mega Man: They disappear and reappear in a pattern! You've just got to time your jumps right!
- Tails: Look, you don't need to prove anything! Just let me fly you up there already!
- Sonic: NO! I am not getting beat by a bunch of stupid, annoying blocks!
- Silver... Let me see what I can do.
- Blaze: ...That was thoroughly unpleasant.
- Mega Man (watching Tails examine Rush): Well?
- Tails: I don't see any damage in the wiring. You and T-Pup should be fine.
- Mega Man: "T-Pup"?
- Tails: Sorry! He reminds me a lot of my dog.
- Blaze: ...And with Marine at sea, I was enjoying my first quiet day in a while. The next thing I remember are flashes of light, and then being here. I apologize for the attacks.
- Silver: So this zone, the fractured memories--they're all tied to the disruption in space-time I came to warn you about.
- Sonic: Yeah. Thanks for that.
- Silver: Hurtful sarcasm doesn't help us.
- Silver: We'll be fine! I'll look after Blaze!
- Blaze: And vice-versa. Good luck out there.
- Sonic: We still need to save Amy! And Knuckles! And Rock's dad! So let's do it to it!
- Mega Man: He never stops, does he?
- Tails: He's like the wind. Always has been. Probably always will be.
- Mega Man: Better not get left behind, then!
- Proto Man: You're really detectives?
- Vector: We found you, didn't we? And none of us even knew what a "Pogo Man" was before this.
- Vector: Say--that is a pretty cool scarf. I oughta get me one of those. Want to trade it for my chain? ...Hello? ...Pogo Man?
Events[]
- Both Shadow Men attack the heroes.
- Mega Man manages to de-roboticize the Roboticized Master Shadow Man back into Shadow, who immediately destroys the other Shadow Man.
- Sonic and Mega Man begin to remember what their worlds were like before the second Genesis Wave.
- Dr. Light meets Rouge the Bat.
- The heroes battle and de-roboticize Silver Man and Blaze Woman.
- Knuckles Man and Rose Woman prepare to ambush Proto Man and the Chaotix.
Background Information[]
- This issues "Game Sprite Variant" cover features a battle between Mega Man, Rush, and Metal Sonic, while Doctor Eggman watches from behind. The sprites for Metal Sonic and Eggman are both taken from the game Sonic CD, while Mega Man and Rush's sprites come from Mega Man 7. The location is the Stardust Speedway Zone, also from Sonic CD.
- An earlier version of the cover was labeled as a "16-bit variant". This was changed to match the variant cover of StH#249.
- The main cover art is based heavily on the "boxart" for the digital exclusive game, Mega Man 10.
- It's implied that Sonic and his friends have never met any of the DiC/comic-exclusive characters in this world, as Tails claims that he is unfamiliar with Mecha Sally. Interestingly, Tails does apparently remember T-Pup, though it's possible that this is an indication that the events of the Tails Adventure game took place in the altered reality.
- While the Chaotix are travelling with Proto Man, Vector incorrectly refers to him as "Pogo Man". This could possibly be a reference to Quint, a future version of Mega Man that was captured and reprogrammed by Dr. Wily and equipped with the pogo-stick weapon "Sakugarne".
- Apparently Mega Man did not remember his encounter with Break Man before the Genesis Wave struck, even though his world was simply pushed into the future, and therefore should still remember it happening.
- This technically marks the first in-canon appearance of Shadow-in organic form-since SU #24. It is also his first appearance-both as himself and as Shadow Man-in the Mega Man series. Silver and Blaze also make their Mega Man series debuts in this issue, in both their organic and Roboticized Master forms.
- Rouge officially makes her crossover debut in this issue, despite having already appeared much earlier on the covers to Mega Man issues 24 and 25, respectively. It is also the first Mega Man issue that she appears in.
- This marks the first appearance of Blaze since US #24, as well as her first appearance in the Mega Man issue.
- This issue confirms that the effects of the Eggman/Wily Genesis Wave have bled into worlds other than Mobius Prime and Mega Man's world, including the Sol Dimension.
- Dr. Eggman refers to Dr. Light as "Santa in a lab coat". Whether or not this means the concept of Santa Claus still exists on Mobius from its early days as planet Earth, or if Eggman's knowledge of the famous holiday icon is simply a bi-product of the Genesis Wave, is unknown.
- Sonic mentions the Egg Viper boss fight from Sonic Adventure in this issue.
- Interestingly, Sonic also boasts to Mega Man about "quality over quantity" when comparing Mega Man's defeat of dozens of "snakeys" to Sonic's defeat of the Egg Viper.
- Like at the end of the previous issue, the prison capsule containing Snively once again makes a cameo in the chamber where Dr. Light is being held.
- On the orb containing the weapons data of Shadow Man (Roboticized Master), the symbol used for the logo of the Shadow the Hedgehog video game can be seen.
External links[]
- Mega Man Issue 26 (Archie Comics) at Mega Man Knowledge Base, the Mega Man wiki.
- Archie Mega Man Issue 26 at Sonic Wiki Zone, the Sonic wiki.