polar the bear

infamously, Sonic games and etceteras have a very large cast of recurring characters. however, each set of characters sort of tend to stay in their lane - the colorful little sweetheart characters mostly show up for lighthearted stories, for example, while the edgier/more serious characters only really get a lot of character focus in the gritty sci-fi plotlines. team sportsboys only shows up for the racing game spinoffs. if Shadow the Hedgehog is a playable character, you know he's about to break the record for "worst day of his life" yet again, but it's really rare that anything all that bad happens to Amy Rose. and so on.

based on character theming and how they sort of attach to different vibes/genres, you'd think sweet baby Tails - 8 years old, very light on lore, looks like a long Care Bear, just a friendly little guy who likes to fly airplane and loves his pals - would be safe from the consequences of some of the more dramatic stories ... but for some reason, across 30+ years of franchise installments, like a dozen different writers have semi-independently decided to throw rocks and hammers at him every single time he's even mildly plot-relevant, even when the rest of the plot is super calm and low stakes ???

and like, It Makes Sense, obviously, usually you're playing as Sonic and Tails is your little buddy who helps you out. taking narrative potshots at your little buddy is an easy way to try to up the stakes and create emotional investment. also, a consistent complaint from fans is that Tails is frequently sidelined to make space for some other one-off plot relevant deuteragonist, so whenever he does show up, it makes sense that there would be some attempt to fully utilize his character.

but the thing I find so absurdly funny is the sheer level of consistency with which they heap random violence on that poor little boy. Tails cannot be in the spotlight for five minutes without some random chimp event happening to him, and once in a while it'll be well-written and properly built up etc etc, but a lot of the time it's just like a timer goes off like "you have been standing next to Sonic the Hedgehog for more than 25 minutes of screentime, prepare to die"

this started all the way back in Tails' debut game, where he was held hostage by Doctor Eggman for most of the game. the bad ending stresses just how dang sad it is that you failed to save him. restart game right now, you monster

which feels reasonable on its own, there's a new character and he's Sonic's friend and you have to save him, standard story structure, sure thing

but then you start looking ahead to newer games that generally focus on something else, but still can't help but torment Tails a little bit just to try to stir pathos. in Sonic Forces there's a random line that seems to imply Tails went mad with grief after Sonic was presumed dead for 6 months?? never brought up again. when we meet him later he's literally fine. I seem to remember that detail was dropped in there in the English script only, which would explain some things. but also why did they do that to him

even more recently, Sonic Frontiers opens with Sonic, Tails and Amy crashlanding on an island, and while you find Amy almost immediately, Tails goes missing for something like 75% of the game just for the narrative tension, and the characters keep stressing that You Have To Find Him Right Now, Every Minute You Spend Goofing Off In Our Open World Game Is Another Minute He's Trapped Alone In Sci Fi Silent Hill Cyberhell

Sonic Colors, released back in 2010, was trying so, so hard to escape the "too edgy" allegations the series was suffering at the time, but they still just couldn't help but pause the funnies to blast that little guy with a mind control ray for no real reason at all except to establish that Eggman now has a mind control ray and it's time to get scared. it's not even a boss fight, just a random 2 minutes of pushing Tails down the stairs again

not even 3 years later, Sonic Lost World recycled the mind control thing beat-for-beat, only with more hilariously out-of-nowhere melodrama that clashes completely with the rest of the script and never goes anywhere. this time the villains are explicitly trying to force Sonic to kill him just to be mean. once again no boss fight or anything

certain spin-off series do have some genuinely choice storylines for Tails, but I think some of them deserve a mention anyway just because of how much they twist the knife whenever there's an opportunity for it. like the time in the IDW comics where a mad scientist brainwashes some random kid into being Tails' evil doppelganger. Tails tries to help him, but that scientist was very literally gaslighting that poor kid so hard that a few misunderstandings later, he's decided Tails was trying to trick him too and now the only thing he wants for himself in this life is to kill him

and of course. probably the meanest "you want Tails to be plot relevant? okie :)" monkey's paw plot of all time. there was that one time in the 00's anime where he spent a whole season palling it up with new Plot Relevant Doomed Girl Character. and then in the series finale when she's fixing to sacrifice herself for the greater good, they MAKE HIM PULL THE TRIGGER ...

I don't have any real essay conclusion or anything here except I think if I were Tails, I think I'd start thinking about going missing in some deep dark forest, far away from narrative focus. it's right up there with "Sonic is injured or poisoned or contracts another deadly disease" as a go-to plot device to try to make things a little scarier, tonal whiplash be damned