Tags
Archie Comics, character reviews, Draconic Dominium, Dulcinea, Dulcy, Dulcy the Dragon, Sonic SatAM, Sonic the Hedgehog, Sonic the Hedgehog (Archie)
DULCY
Full Name: Dulcinea
Realm: Mobius
Featured in: Sonic SatAM/Archie Comics (Pre-Super Genesis Wave)
Voiced By: Cree Summer
As before with Zeromaru of Digimon renown, a bit of backstory is necessary here for the dragoness known as Dulcy. To start with, as I’m sure a few fans of the franchise can already guess, she hails from the world of Mobius that is, in turn, the home planet of one Sonic the Hedgehog. Though she originally premiered in the Saturday morning cartoon, rumored only because ABC wanted more female characters, she has a far more pivotal role in the comic continuation/alteration that is Archie Comics take on the franchise of Sonic the Hedgehog.
While I shan’t go too much into the history of the show/comics itself, something, which can easily be rectified by watching the introductory theme in all honesty, I shall speak a bit of the planet Mobius. Contrary to popular assumption, Mobius is not an entirely different planet from our own. In point of fact, Mobius IS Earth, several millennia and one massively one-sided war later. The basics of what occurred is that an alien ambassador happened upon our world and humans, naturally freaking out, proceeded to do what many a science fiction film depicts and in retribution, the ambassador’s people proceeded to bomb the planet with weapons that were specified to humanity’s genetic code. The result… was not what was to be expected by them or even by us.
The once thriving human population had all but been wiped out into two distinctive variations. The normal humans who were smart enough to shelter themselves from the oncoming invasion and remained secreted in their hideaway throughout the centuries and those who would grow to be known as Overlanders. The Overlanders resembled humans save for missing a fifth finger on their hands and are distinctly known for their almost animalistic savagery and brutality. Not surprising given the more adverse side effects on the local wildlife…
To put it short, everything and anything that was remotely an animal in our present age had been mixed into the same primordial soup that the human race had been devolved into. In essence, they became grafted with enough human DNA to eventually evolve their own distinctive species: Mobians whilst many others were twisted and turned into creatures long thought to be myth and legend.
Dulcy’s kind is one such race and whether by genetic happenstance or some form of metaphysical guidance, dragons now flew the skies of Mobius. However, much like the Overlanders and humans, the dragons were an endangered species long before Julian Kintobor, more commonly known as Doctor Ivo Robotnik or, more derisively, Doctor Eggman, took most of the planet over.
Dulcy’s species is rather unique as far as most dragons in comics go really. While she can breathe fire, she can only do so thanks to the black nose-ring she wears, otherwise she stuck strictly to her icy exhaust via her nose. She is more commonly depicted wearing a golden nose-ring as a physical brand of her banishment from her people when she involved herself with the war against Doctor Robotnik. She only recently made amends and was restored to her full potential as a dragon via saving their collective behinds despite the limitations they set upon her. Frankly, I would think that, given the size of the nose-ring itself, she’d be incapable of either but whatever.
Another interesting trait to Dulcy’s species of dragon is their ability both to sense the truth in others and to be completely incapable of lying. In other words, they are, for a more science fictional comparison, the “Vulcans” of Mobius.
Dulcy herself is quite young, fourteen in her premiere, but she would eventually grow and mature over the years. While she was a background character for most of her time in the comics, she played two pivotal roles in the series as a whole. The first being the de-facto lie detector that revealed that Sonic did not in fact kill Princess Sally Acorn despite what everyone else believed. While the “End Game” event was certainly a page-turner and one of the most pivotal events in the comic’s continuity despite recent events, there was one other instance that really struck me deep with Dulcy as a character.
For a time, Dulcy was absent in the comics to such a degree that she wasn’t even a background character. She had disappeared and it wasn’t until some time later the source of her disappearance was revealed in the form of her “mate” Zan. I say “mate” insomuch that Zan was both verbally and physically abusive to Dulcy, who denied these traits in Zan for he was, quite literally, the only dragon who would associate with her despite her banishment.
I shan’t spoil the events that transpired but I will say that it was a startling mature turn for the comics to take, one that I’ve yet to see in a series that once was geared entirely towards children and was, quite literally, rather cartoony in its interpretations in its early days.