Dr. Robotnik (American TV series and comic)
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This article is about the American TV and comics incarnation of the character. For other versions, see Dr. Eggman, Dr. Robotnik (other media) or Dr. Robotnik (Sonic the Comic).
Dr. Robotnik is a fictional antagonist in the Sonic the Hedgehog Saturday morning cartoon and the subsequent comic book series. In the television show, he was voiced by Jim Cummings.
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[edit] Sonic the Hedgehog (TV Series)
In the Sonic the Hedgehog Saturday morning cartoon (aka "SatAM"), Robotnik is a recurring villain. He is depicted differently from his counterpart in the Sonic the Hedgehog series of games in that he is not a mad scientist; instead, he is a dictator who has conquered most of Planet Mobius. His principal weapon is the Roboticizer, a series of machines which transform innocent Mobians into robot slaves. Robotnik is one of only three video game characters who appear on the show, the others being Sonic and Tails.
Robotnik's history is visited during the second season, when Sonic and Sally travel back in time. His real name is Julian, and he once worked as an assistant for Naugus, a wizard who discovered a limited dimension known as the Void. Julian betrayed Naugus and trapped him within the Void, but continues to dread the possibility of Naugus getting loose.
Julian later headed up the Ministry of War in the King's regime, and was instrumental in winning the Great War for the monarchy (the Great War is not explained any further than that). The King allowed Julian to dismantle the military — from his perspective, this was because the War's end no longer necessitated it, while Julian's motive was to set up a coup. Julian stole the plans for the Roboticizer from Sonic's uncle, Sir Charles Hedgehog, who originally had positive intents for the device.
Robotnik's left arm was replaced with a robotic substitute when Sonic knocked him off-balance during an early encounter (his arm getting caught in a roboticizer as he tried to steady himself). His legion of SWATbots make up the majority of Robotnik's army. He will occasionally engage his enemies by himself if need be, using laser weapons either handheld or as part of his left arm. He also employs his nephew, Snively, as his chief adjutant and overall lackey; Snively often serves as a target for Robotnik's rage whenever his plots are foiled.
In the show's final episode, "The Doomsday Project", Sonic and Sally used the Deep Power Stones to destroy Robotnik's headquarters, forcing Robotnik to flee in his hovercraft. The cartoon ended after two 13-episode seasons, but the same characters continued to appear in the American comic Sonic the Hedgehog comic book series based on the show. Television writer Ben Hurst has explained that had the cartoon not been canceled, it would have been revealed in the third season that Robotnik survived the destruction of Doomsday as he has been captured by Naugus, serving as the wizard's lackey just as Snively had served Robotnik himself before.
[edit] Ivo Robotnik/Robotnik Prime
| Dr. Ivo Robotnik | |
 Robotnik Prime |
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| Publication information | |
|---|---|
| Publisher | Archie Comics |
| First appearance | Sonic the Hedgehog (1991) (As Robotnik) Sonic the Hedgehog (mini-series) issue #0 (As the comic version of Robotnik) |
| Created by | Sega |
| In story information | |
| Alter ego | Julian Kintobor of the House of Ivo |
| Team affiliations | Kingdom of Acorn, Snively Kintobor |
| Abilities | *Genius level intellect
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The character of Dr. Robotnik initially used in the Archie Comics series was based on the version that had appeared in the Saturday morning cartoon, Sonic the Hedgehog. As the comic series progressed, more details were added to his background. Although the comic series began with a stand-alone storyline, it later evolved to incorporate elements from the games. To reflect this, the character of Dr. Eggman has been introduced into the comic storyline; "Robotnik" and "Eggman" literally appear as two different people.
[edit] Early life and rise to power
In the Archie Comics Sonic Universe, Dr. Robotnik begins his existence as Julian Kintobor of the House of Ivo, born in the city of Megalopolis. He studied under the genius scientist, Dr. Nate Morgan for an extended period of time. Once his mentor passed unto him everything he knew, Julian conspired against Morgan and had him banished. During the breakout of the Great War between the animal-like Mobians and humanoid Overlanders, Julian worked as a high-profile weapons engineer for the Overlander armies.
But when his superiors discovered that he was using live test subjects to perfect his inventions, Julian was tried in court by the Minister of Justice, Colin Kintobor (his brother), and sentenced to 10 years of imprisonment. Sometime after his arrest, Julian somehow escaped confinement.
After barely evading a death squad sent after him, Julian made it to the Mobian border and found himself rescued by Sonic's father Jules Hedgehog and uncle Sir Charles (aka Uncle Chuck); Both hedgehogs brought him to the Kingdom of Acorn, where he was welcomed.[1] In gratitude, Julian swore allegiance to King Max and pledged to impart inside knowledge on the Overlanders to turn the tide of the war..
In addition to the Royal Family, a titled "Warlord" was charged with overseeing military matters. The Warlord at the time of Julian's arrival was a scheming lion named Kodos, who tried to take Julian under his wing in a plot to overthrow King Maximillian and rule. Kodos planned to stage a coup and send his enemies, such as King Maximillian, to the Zone of Silence. Julian liked the idea of conquering the Kingdom, but would never share power. Instead he tricked Kodos and banished him to the Zone of Silence. Following Kodos' "disappearance", Julian assumed the mantle of Warlord.
After defeating the Overlanders in the Great War, Warlord Julian (like his SatAM counterpart) used Charles' invention, the roboticizer, to his own twisted ends. After sabotaging it to turn Charles' brother (and Sonic's father) Jules into a drone,[2] he secretly had Sonic's mother, Bernie, roboticized as well.[3] Bernie's roboticization was blamed on a lab accident, and soon Tails' father Amadeus was likewise turned into a robot. Julian's plotting culminated with a successful coup to overthrow the kingdom, using the 'dismantled' fleet of warships and an army of robotic troopers to take over. Changing his name from Julian Kintobor to Ivo Robotnik, he transfigured the once beautiful capital city of Mobotropolis into an industrial wasteland he dubbed Robotropolis. Robotnik's most symbolic victory was exiling King Maximillian Acorn into the Zone of Silence.[4]
Once his power was secure, the tyrant then focused his attention on consolidating the rest of the planet. Soon enough, he had nearly all of inhabited Mobius under his thumb; only a select few managed to hide from his expanding reach. He would continue to rule Mobius with an iron fist, with his loyal robotic henchmen and his wayward nephew, Snively. As time went on, Robotnik disseminated various regional governors across the planet called "sub-bosses" to enforce his will and to lead campaigns against local rebels.
[edit] Sonic the Hedgehog
Some of the continuity surrounding Sonic's enlistment in the Freedom Fighters is murky (due to retcons), but Sonic was already a longtime enemy of Robotnik at the onset of the series. As a child, he had encountered Robotnik while he was still Warlord -- a young Sonic used to play with Princess Sally in the palace, since his father and uncle were officers of the King. After Robotnik took power, a young Princess Sally and the rest of the future Freedom Fighters were taken (as children) out of Mobotropols and hidden by their elders in the Great Forest.
Sonic takes an immediate dislike to the belligerent Robotnik, foiling several of the evildoer's plans before he is even a teen.[5] Sonic's Uncle Chuck, who operated a chili dog stand and raised Sonic like a son, is eventually captured by Robotnik's SWATbots and robotcized. Sonic recklessly tries to break Chuck out of Robotropolis all by himself, but once he sees that Chuck is a mindless robot, Sonic realizes he cannot help him.[6] Instead, Sonic joins forces with Princess Sally Acorn and her friends (who will grow up to become the Freedom Fighters). The underground resistance grows until their base of operations, Knothole Village, is established (hidden deep in the same forest where the Mobians had fled); The discovery and extermination of this secret headquarters is Robotnik's primary goal in the early issues of the comic.
Championed by Sonic, the Freedom Fighters become a real threat to Robotnik's reign. He continually attempts to crush the resistance for 50 issues, until the four-issue "EndGame" story, where he tries to have Sally killed while framing Sonic for her murder.[7] Robotnik also infiltrates the rebel base using a robot clone of King Acorn. With Knothole's location now known, Robotnik arrives at the Freedom Fighters' doorstep and holds them at gunpoint. Rather than kill all of them immediately, Robotnik decides to make his victory more symbolic by using Knothole as a testing ground for his new "Ultimate Annihilator", a satellite weapon capable of warping reality. Sonic attacks Robotnik as the Ultimate Annihilator backfires, tearing the sparring adversaries apart atom by atom. Unfortunately for Robotnik, Snively tampered with the Annihilator and programmed it to only affect him; while Sonic and Knothole emerge unscathed, Robotnik remains vaporized by his weapon.[8]
[edit] Temporary return
Robotnik's displaced molecules recombined with the help of Knuckles' reality-warping abilities and a device invented by Dr. Eggman. The reborn Robotnik soon formulates a plot with Eggman to reverse the process as a way to destroy Sonic and his comrades. Robotnik tricks his former enemies in Knothole Village into thinking Eggman had resurrected him in order to steal his memories, and that he had escaped in hopes of forging an alliance with Sonic. King Acorn goes along with the scheme, but it is revealed that the Freedom Fighters only granted him amnesty in an attempt to sabotage the device that had brought him back. Robotnik's return is cut short during a quarrel with Eggman. He finds out that the process which recombined his dispersed molecules was only temporary, and he once again disappears into nothingness.[9]
[edit] Robo-Robotnik/Dr. Eggman
| Dr. Eggman (Robo-Robotnik) | |
 Robo-Robotnik before his 'upgrade' to Eggman |
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| Publication information | |
|---|---|
| Publisher | Archie Comics |
| First appearance | Sonic the Hedgehog (1991) (As Robotnik) Sonic the Hedgehog issue #19 (As Robo-Robotnik) |
| Created by | Sega (as Eggman/Robotnik), Archie Comics Robo-Robotnik variant |
| In story information | |
| Alter ego | Ivo Robotnik |
| Team affiliations | Eggman Empire, Snively Kintobor |
| Abilities | Human form:
Robot form:
|
[edit] Origin
Early in the series, another Robotnik from an alternate reality appeared, calling himself "Robo-Robotnik." In this universe, Robotnik succeeded in crushing the Freedom Fighters along with the royal family, essentially conquering Mobius.[10] However, rather than kill Sonic and his cohorts once he captured them, Robotnik transformed each into cyborgs with half robotic/half organic bodies; this proved to be a mistake once the cyborg Freedom Fighters retained their self-awareness and mounted an assault on Robotropolis. In a desperate move, Robotnik used his own Roboticizer on himself, becoming Robo-Robotnik.
In his first appearance, Robo-Robotnik seeks a legendary giant robot called the Giant Borg. With the help of Scourge the Hedgehog (aka "Evil Sonic"), he succeeds in discovering it. Robo-Robotnik pilots the Borg by himself, wreaking havoc until he is struck down by the force of thousands of alternate Sonics, each arriving from their own reality to pummel the Borg to pieces. The scattering of Robo-Robotnik's weapon seemingly destroys him, reducing him to a severed head. Unbeknownst to anyone, he survives by transferring his brain to an empty space station in orbit, where he remains in a stasis.
Meanwhile, the Dr. Robotnik of Mobius Prime is vaporized by E.V.E., a machine that was designed to kill Sonic, but ended up attacking Robotnik instead. Rather than dying, Robotnik is actually sent to the alternate reality of Robo-Robotnik, where he meets his robot self.[11] Robo-Robotnik appears on a monitor and explains that the station itself is still incomplete, keeping him mired in space until his systems run down. After assisting Robotnik Prime in returning home, he later follows him to Mobius Prime. After conspiring from the shadows for several issues, Robo-Robotnik-wearing a skin disguise to fool everyone into thinking he was Robotnik back from the dead-eventually lures Sonic and the Freedom Fighters to his orbital platform in space. A brief battle with Sonic ends with Robotnik being doused with acid, removing his disguise.[12]
The Freedom Fighters enlist the help of Snively to blow up the orbital platform with Robo-Robotnik in it. His body destroyed, Robotnik retreats into a new robot shell back on Mobius, a design based on his character model in the Sonic Adventure video game.[13] With his new body he takes on a new name: Eggman. While in this form, he also briefly has the power to roboticize anyone by touch, similar to the Midas Touch. If the victim is unwilling to be roboticized, however, they are rendered little more than a metallic statue instead, a fate shared by Nate Morgan and others.
Eggman continues to lose his body numerous times, only to download himself into a new robot shell. He later finds himself, Snively (who had by this point been roboticized), Sonic, and Tails captured by an alien race known as the Bem. Eggman and Snively are transformed back into flesh and blood, and forced to battle for their lives against a roboticized Sonic and Tails in order to prove whether or not flesh is superior to metal.[14] Eggman and Snively are later re-deposited on Mobius without being changed back, and have remained that way ever since, unable to re-roboticize themselves (due to an after-effect of the Bem's deroboticizer).
[edit] After the Bem
Not long after this, Mobius is attacked by another alien race: The Xorda. After Sonic is accidentally lost in outer space, Eggman takes advantage of his absence by creating the "Eggman Empire." He strikes a deal with the Dingoes, providing weapons and other support for them, in return for their allegiance and becoming his enforcers on Angel Island. With the Dingoes now an ally, he successfully conquered the Floating Island and maintains control of it to date. His robot legions were controlled by a sentient computer named A.D.A.M. (short for Autonomous Digital Assault Microbe), prior to A.D.A.M.'s betraying his 'father' and subsequent destruction. Eggman also changes his main base of operations from the nuclear wasteland of Robotropolis (after being tricked into lowering the shields, nuclear missiles infiltrated the city and irradiated the area) to New Megalopolis.
Most recently, he has launched a large-scale offensive against the Kingdom of Acorn, using an Egg Fleet that appears to be a carbon copy of the armada seen in Sonic Heroes to inflict heavy damage via aerial bombardment, and taking nearly the entire population prisoner with the intention of using them to power his operations via his Egg Grape Chamber. He also engaged in a one-on-one duel versus Sonic wearing a fearsome suit of power armor, thrashing the hedgehog physically and psychologically before departing, though would come to regret leaving Sonic free when the Hedgehog and a handful of other survivors launched a rescue mission that foiled his plans and liberated the prisoners, though appears intent on rectifying this, deploying his egg fleet to the newly-revealed New Mobotropolis to try again. When he arived, he had Snivley and the Egg Fleet open fire on New Mobotropolis' shield. Sonic, the Freedom Fighters, and the Chaotix fought and defeated Eggman, sending him back to his base. He was most recently seen in issue #184 forging an alliance with the Dark Legion, reinstating Dimitri as Grand Master over Lien-Da, whom had assumed control in his absence.
[edit] Family
Robotnik's name is a reversal of his family's surname (Kintobor → Robotnik). After conquering Mobius he adopted the sinister moniker of "Robotnik" to differentiate himself from his past. He has several relatives — Snively, his nephew, being one of them. His estranged brother, Colin, managed to survive the Great War but was roboticized and later destroyed by Eggman (as punishment for imprisoning Julian while Magistrate). Robotnik has a niece, Snively's stepsister Hope Kintobor. Finally, from Station Square, there is his deceased grandfather and cousin, Gerald and Maria Kintobor — just as in the games. Robotnik also had an ancestor named Brutus Kintobor who, along with other overlanders, made a failed attempt to invade Angel Island around the time of Steppenwolf. Robotnik's family even is around before the Xorda's gene bomb is launched as Ivan Kintobor (born June 6, 2006, an omen to the year of the beast) was under guard in a statis tube by his creation Issac. As Issac had had his information taken by Dr. Finitevus, Ivan's status in the comic is unknown.
Although Eggman has other blood relatives besides Snively, he has disowned them, preferring the company of his robots. To this end, he has designed a "daughter" named Mecha (or "M" for short), a female bodyguard dressed in a sci-fi version of 80's New Wave attire. Once A.D.A.M. gains self-awareness and starts sabotaging Eggman's operations, he becomes paranoid and orders M to self-destruct, an order she obeys.
[edit] Alternate selves
As with other members of the main cast, Robotnik has numerous counterparts in parallel universes. The first of these is the Anti-Robotnik, named so because he is the 'good' equivalent to Robotnik. Hailing from the universe of the Anti-Sonic "Scourge the Hedgehog", Dr. Kintobor is a kindly veterinarian who opposes the Anti-Freedom Fighters. This role reversal is a thinly-veiled spoof of Crime Syndicate of DC Comics, as well as Alex Luthor, the lone hero in a world where Superman and other Justice League members are evil. In Sonic Underground, the good version of Robotnik has red hair, which is also a reference to Alex Luthor. While Robotnik and Lex are bald, their good counterparts have red hair.
Robotnik has another heroic self named Mayor Kintobor. In an experiment gone awry, he exposed an atoll to Chaos Emerald radiation, mistakedly believing the island to be uninhabited; the resultant effects mutated the Freedom Fighters of this universe in Godzilla-like monsters. The Mayor's appearance is the same as Eggman's, except the color of his outfit is reversed to be primarily white, with red stripes.
A female version of Robotnik exists in a Mobius based on themes from Sailor Moon: Ivana Robotnik. She is stopped by an alliance of Sonic, her nemesis Sally Moon, and Sally's boyfriend Tuxedo Knux.
[edit] References
- ^ Sonic the Hedgehog #50
- ^ Sonic the Hedgehog #78
- ^ Sonic the Hedgehog #79
- ^ Sonic the Hedgehog #43
- ^ Sonic Super Special: Sonic Kids (#1)
- ^ Sonic the Hedgehog #0
- ^ Sonic the Hedgehog #47
- ^ Sonic the Hedgehog #50
- ^ Sonic the Hedgehog #108
- ^ Sonic the Hedghog #19
- ^ Sonic the Hedgehog #22
- ^ Sonic the Hedgehog' #74
- ^ Sonic the Hedgehog #75
- ^ Sonic the Hedghog #118
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