I haven't really been active here on TKP in a while. I figure it's probably long overdue for me to post a general status update for the blog, to let y'all know where I'm at.
The TL;DR version is that further coverage of the Archie Sonic comics is still on hiatus. I'd like to get back to reading and discussing the rest of Ian's run, I just don't know when it'll happen. But it will happen. Eventually. It'd be really nice if it was this year. No promises, though.
The long version is that a lot of time has passed. It's been over 11 years since I started this blog and almost five years since I paused my Archie coverage to focus on getting @slarpg done. Things have changed a lot in that time.
I've changed, for one. I've changed as a person and a critic. I still love Sonic, but my perspective, my thoughts on storytelling, my familiarity with things that influenced these comics, my choice of words, all of this has changed over time. I'm now 32, and while there's a lot I still stand by, it's inevitable that I'm going to look back on things I wrote at age 20 at the start of this blog and cringe at things I didn't articulate well, or fannish takes about how it's bad writing when things I don't like happen to my faves, or things that feel like a relic of a different era of feminist pop culture criticism, or cheap "is this the writer's thinly veiled fetish?" jokes, or complaints that I hammed up for comic or dramatic effect.
Because it's been so long, it's kind of hard to fight the urge to just... start over, in some way? I already toyed with this in the format of the four TKP Addendums I wrote in 2021-2022, going back over the first three issues of the main series and also the Endgame arc in greater detail and nuance. But truly starting the whole thing over would probably be insane. I've covered almost 300 issues, and it would be foolish to redo all of that, even if I cringe knowing that the recommended chronological reading order of this blog means starting with a bunch of writing from when I was barely out of high school before getting to the stuff I'm really proud of. So how much I do and don't want to retread old ground is something I'm still considering, especially since I need to reread everything anyway as a refresher before I get back to analyzing Ian's continuity-dense run.
But perhaps more importantly, Sonic has changed in those intervening years, and with that change comes a very different cultural context for these comics.
When I began this blog, the Archie comics... well, they were still being made, for one thing. But they were also just a niche curiosity off to the side of the mainline Sonic franchise. They were a self-contained evolutionary offshoot of regular Sonic for the small subset of weirdos who were into them. Now, though, the IDW comics are canon, and the people making them are major contributors to the wider franchise. And make no mistake, I think they've absolutely earned it and that they're doing great work. But the level of scrutiny even the defunct Archie comics are under is completely different now that their most prolific writer is now the go-to writer across the franchise.
In other words: the constant needlessly heated discourse about Ian Flynn (and the rest of the western contributors) is fucking miserable, and it's made thinking about the Sonic comics significantly less fun for me. Not to the extent that I wanna quit, but, like, man. It sucks.
It used to just be some weirdos on DeviantArt posting unhinged Pepe Silvia conspiracy boards about how that damn Ian Flynn killed their ships because of his SJW agenda. Now that the IDW comics are canon and he's writing the games, it's everywhere in the fandom. For a lot of people, you can just disengage, just read the comics and ignore the internet and touch grass. But I run this blog, and that inherently means partaking in The Discourse and having people declare their Sonic opinions at me all the time. I can block fandom reactionaries and people will still just send me asks on Tumblr about my thoughts on their rage bait. Younger fans online also seem to be increasingly hostile towards the Archie comics and their fans as a whole in this climate where canon compliance is treated as the most important thing in the world. It's tiring, to say the least.
Almost a year ago now I started writing a longform post about this state of things, using the then-recent Lanolin discourse as a springboard to discuss how it's become miserable to talk about the Sonic comics online, and how I worry that that constant deluge of bad faith criticism anytime anything interesting happens is affecting creative decisions made on the IDW series. That should be the next big Sonic-related thing you see from me, whenever I get around to finishing it. I delayed it partially to see how the stuff with Lanolin played out long-term. But also, again, this shit is just such a drag now that I would usually rather focus my attention elsewhere, such as the various other things I write about on The Ponett Gazette. I'll get it done, though, because I think there are things in that post that need to be said.
Also, as a side note, the big video essay I announced the intent to do a while back is probably not going to happen, for anyone still waiting for that. I felt motivated to do it after thinking about all the times my writing about Archie Sonic has been ripped off for some clickbait bullshit in the wake of Hbomberguy's plagiarism video, and also Hbomberguy literally personally encouraged me to do it. But I am not a video essayist, and I need to prioritize my gamedev work. Maybe I'll still make it happen someday, but it won't be anytime soon. I also haven't felt the need to keep posting updates on Ken's Archie Sonic reprint collections because I feel like I'd just be repeating myself. Though the plagiarized variant cover for the hardcover collection he's doing of all his Shadow stories is at least ostentatious enough to be funny. It's always something with him. I just don't want this blog to devolve into a Penders callout blog in the absence of regular updates.
But, yes. Thanks Ken Penders will return. I just might need to rethink how I want to approach it a little, and also rediscover my passion for these comics in this strange new era we find ourselves in.
I literally JUST got recommended this blog from a pal in a group chat, so perfect timing to find it I guess - plenty of back log, but a feature to be picked up.
I'm just some rando (aren't we all) but as someone who enjoyed the sporadic copies of the archie comics I could get as a kid, I sincerely appreciate you having started this project and having it to explore. :)
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hey so don't use this. RabbelLabs, the company actually creating this platform, trains AI models. Jack Dorsey is best friends with Elon Musk and they both advocate constantly for the abolition of IP law because it stands in the way of AI 'growth' (theft). They're banning AI on the platform so they can use it as a clean slate to train more fucking AI. They're also using images of Divine, the drag queen, to push their shit and I guarantee they didn't get permission from her estate.
The DiVine website says that it's made by Rabble.
If you go to their website you can find this:
if you click that And Other Stuff you're taken to an entirely different website that explains what all that 'other stuff' is: five pillars of building Nostr AI.
You have to wonder why they're hiding it, right? Why is it so hard to find? Why register an entirely different domain (it's andotherstuff.com, not like rabblelabs.com/andotherstuff) just to talk about the AI stuff you're doing if you're so proud of it?
Stop simping for billionaires just because they jingle keys in your face, start doing some fucking research.
The Trump administration just opened a three-week comment period for revoking the Roadless Rule, which keeps wilderness intact.
"The U.S. Forest Service today [Aug. 29, 2025] posted notice of its intention to roll back significant protections on some 45 million acres of mid-elevation forestland, and will accept public comments through Sept. 19 to gauge Americans’ appetite for the change.
Specifically, the Trump administration plans to rescind the 2001 Roadless Area Conservation Rule, proposed by the Clinton administration and enacted under the George Bush administration, that generally prohibits new road construction on millions of acres of U.S. Forest Service land. The rule was adopted after hundreds of public meetings and 1.6 million public comments, 95 percent of which supported the roadless protections as a tool to conserve wildlife habitat, improve watershed health, and importantly, reduce the risk of catastrophic wildfires on America’s public timberlands."
Later edit: As a rural resident of Appalachia who lives just outside a national forest, please know a few things:
The USFS has a long history being in bed with the logging industry. This logging has NOT benefited local people or the environment, especially not long term. All that money leaves the area, and the environment is left degraded. Appalachians are very well acquainted with exploitative industries.
In the "fine print" on the main page in the link, you'll see that the President wants to increase deforestation and mining in publicly held lands in the USA. Again this is PUBLIC property used for PRIVATE gain. This whole thing is a test to see how the public will react, what they can get away with. There's no reason we can't keep importing wood from Canada.
You know what does use public lands that generates money without destroying everything? Tourism. Where we live is heavily economically dependent on the remaining forests being as healthy and beautiful as possible. It's also why so many people move here. We are struggling to recover from Hurricane Helene since FEMA denied us most of the recovery money we need so... yeah.
This will NOT help rural economies. What would help rural economies is actually the stuff the Biden admin had planned and was canceled by Trump, like cheaper greener electricity generation and better internet and better access to higher education and funding rural hospitals.
I always make economic arguments. These #*($&ers have proven time and time again they don't actually care about anything else. They don't care that the forests we have now are severely degraded remnants of what used to be, especially on the east coast. They don't give a shit about habitat fragmentation or things going extinct due to roads, which is happening right now.
Oh yes and Right Wing Tumblr has discovered this post and is leaving comments in support of it. They're not the ones that will have to share the roads with giant logging trucks! (I have and it's not safe)
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God idr the last time i posted art on this blog. Do I even post art here. I should probably start again. But I so rarely use this site lol
ANYWAY life is a circle I made a fantroll. Yes she is a clown. Yes he is a beautiful butch creature who will crush your skull. Any questions?
Hello, my name is Bee, and I have recently been battered by a string of unfortunate events. This most recent one has pushed me past the brin
Hi everyone, my name is Bee, and I am imminently losing my job. My only source of income is going to vanish in 2 months or less, which is the estimate provided by my work. I had been planning on moving prior to this, but my timeline has been significantly sped up, and I cannot afford this on my own.
I have no home to return to with regard to my parents, nor is any family able to house me and allow me to exist as a trans nonbinary individual. To most of my family, I am still closeted, and attempts before this to move in with them have ended in disaster.
I am lucky enough to have friends willing to house me, the main issue is simply the cost of getting there and having enough to survive on while I find a new job.
My budget breakdown is as follows:
- $750 USD for the cost of renting a UHaul truck.
- $150 USD for the cost of gas to get from NC to KY.
- $100 USD for obtaining minor essentials, such as packing supplies.
- $1000 USD for food, expenditures, and overall living expenses while I uproot. This includes plate registry at the DMV, a new in-state license for job application purposes, medicine while I work on obtaining in-state insurance, and other such costs.
I have a deadline of October 3rd, and I will be working up to the day I leave to make sure that I can accrue more funds. Regardless of how much is raised, I will be in a much better place at the end of this, where I can then focus on rebuilding my life.
Anything you can spare will help so, so much. Thank you for reading if you've gotten this far.
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The sponsor, Earl Carter, is doing this to distract from the bill he sponsored immediately before this, H.R. 1160, which appears to classify all traveling doctors and "advanced care practitioners" as independent contractors (can't be 100% sure as the text hasn't been released yet, but it sounds like it's gonna be exactly what it says on the tin).
If you've ever seen a post about doordash or lyft drivers being overworked and underpaid, this is basically the same thing but for doctors. Here's an article about why independent contractors are bad for the worker, but here's the cliff notes:
shit pay
no benefits
social isolation (coworkers changing frequently, so you don't have time to make friends or even proper acquaintances)
not actually independent workers/still tied to a company
They dressed it up by adding this reasoning to the end of the title "to help alleviate physician shortages, including in underserved areas," but it's just political theater. Any physician would still need proper licensing, and there are already systems and travelling doctor companies in place designed to address underserved areas. The only difference is that the companies would be "required" (i.e. CEOs have been chomping at the bit to do this) to make all these doctors ICs instead of salaried employees.
All this to say, when you see some outrageous shit like this, look for the stuff that's been released at the same time. That's what they're actually trying to get passed.
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