![]() Maybe the 1992 campaign is an error on the part of the translator, but the inspiration tracks in this route. This is easily the best argument to make sense of this inspiration. An interview where Clinton is a presidential candidate that doesn't act like a presidential candidate, joking with Carson and playing the saxophone, does make sense for Sonic's personality of a cartoon mascot who's too cool for other cartoon mascots. It does actually make sense that the Carson interview is more influencial than I'm giving it credit for.ĮDIT: Sitting down and considering this further, this actually does make a lot more sense. It's wrong of me to disregard the Carson show interview as it was a massive exposure back then, to even the point it was reference in cinema's most famous scenes in The Shining. You’re right that it’s not totally clear from Ohshima’s quote though, and I haven’t seen any direct confirmation of whether the influence was before or after. It had a strong appeal to younger people though, so it wouldn’t be a stretch for him to come up when SEGA was looking for cool influences. While it’s true a single late show appearance doesn’t have much of an effect today, back in 1988 Johnny Carson was “viral before there was viral” to the point where apparently, “If something happened on Carson’s show, it permeated American culture.” and might’ve had a bigger audience then the convention itself Īmerican presidential politics would be a hot topic of conversation around much of the world, especially since the advent of television, and Clinton’s appearance on Carson’s show was considered controversial at the time (seen as beneath the dignity of candidates). Though it could’ve been the contrast between a young dynamic 41 year old Governor and President Reagan, who was the oldest president at the time. I doubt the “can do”/“get it done” attitude would’ve come across at the convention, so that might’ve been an after the fact thing. Was Clinton enough of a known name to people in Japan to be an influence even before the 1992 election? Is there some link with Ohshima/Sega and Arkansas that I'm missing? Did Ohshima mean it became an influence for Sonic after his initial release for one of the later projects like the cartoons, OVA, or Adventure games?Īdmittedly I've already recorded the episode and I'm just in the editing stage, this is just me wanting to try and understand this inspiration more.Īnything you can tell me to help out would be greatly appreciated. So, I need to ask am I missing something huge here? I'm admittedly not American nor old enough to remember early 1990s politics. Assuming the creation of his attitude was finialised during the final push of design, this is the latest date the design of the character could have been finalised.Įven digging into Clinton's time as the governor of Arkansas which he would have still been back when Sonic 1 was released, his IMDB doesn't suggest he had a huge number of public exposure to justify him going along side Michael Jackson and Santa Claus for influences to Sonic's design. However, isn't this putting it a year after Sonic was created? Sonic 1 released in 1991. ![]() A lot of websites and videos cite Bill Clinton's 1992 presidential election campaign for this inspiration, where Clinton shows a "can do"/"get it done" attitude. I have found an interview with Naoto Oshima saying his influences for Sonic, and one of the names he mentions is Bill Clinton. ![]() I've tried a good hard googling for an answer to this but can't seem to find an explanation. ![]() I'm a podcast host doing an episode about Sonic the Hedgehog 2 (the game not the movie), and was looking to try and make sense of my research. ![]()
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