Sonicomics: Is IDW Ruining Shadow?

Shadow is one of my favorite characters, and one of the most popular in the entire series. But in IDW...like the turtles say, what the shell?

Summary/notes

Shadow first made an appearance at the end of issue 5 with Rouge. He immediately got into a fight with Sonic over morals. This was a little annoying (sometimes it seems like head-writer Ian Flynn has picked up a habit of throwing characters together for a brawl like every-other issue). Still, it's not too out of character. He wanted to neutralize the Eggman threat, though Sonic had a point--Shadow was kind of hypocritical.

The next time we see Shadow he bails on a team-plan to take on Neo Metal Sonic. At first this is cool--he actually almost saves the day. But than Sonic points out that Neo can just copy the "ultimate lifeform's" data, making Neo's following transformation Shadow's fault. After they beat the Metal monster, Shadow walks off.

In the more recent, Metal-virus saga, Shadow made an awesome entrance that was swamped by yet another argument between Sonic and Shadow. Arguing about the SAME problem as in issue 6. That Sonic let Eggman (as "Tinker") go. Shadow then decides he can handle the hoard of Zombots himself (and shortly becomes one). The two then fight it out AGAIN until Sonic & co decide to retreat.

He also appeared in a TSR adaptation where he (no, really?!) raced with Sonic.

So my point?   

Shadow's been acting off. He's overconfident, yeah, but not stupid. He learned to work as a team in Heroes--even if he prefers solo work, he wouldn't have dived into the Zombots like that. The same could be said for the Metal Sonic thing.

It's clear Flynn just made Shadow a zombot so he and Sonic would fight again. Fighting is fine, but it's OFF. Like bringing the ethical problem back. I don't mind morals--it adds depths, themes...but Shadow made it clear after Shadow the Hedgehog that he was leaving the past behind him. It seems doubtful that he'd nag on Sonic for a past mistake. And sure, let's fight over it in the middle of the zombie-robot apocalypse.

Shadow's been portrayed in different ways. I complained in my post about Archie-Blaze that Flynn didn't write her right. I felt Archie-Shadow was a little off, too. When Flynn took over, Shadow did act more like himself, but he was definitely too friendly with Sonic and other characters (even if he didn't admit to it).

("after reboot")

The best "Comic Shadow" was probably after the reboot. Considering Sonic Universe immediately jumped into what was basically a Shth sequel, his personality was much closer to the games. Still found ways to get into (mostly pointless but also amusing) fights, though. Maybe that's the difference with IDW--the fights are just pointless. I'll give IDW the 1st one. Need to show Shadow as an anti-hero and all that. But what's the real point of Zombot Shadow?   

To *TRY* to make the comic look cool?

I don't know, I just see this as a bad beginning to the character. I don't hate Ian Flynn, but they should let more writers contribute to balance it out better.

...hmm, maybe I should review the main cause for this article, "Crisis City Parts 1/2" (which is not bad...for the other members of Team Dark, heh).