When Shadow The Hedgehog Met Minoru Suzuki And Showed Up At A Pancrase MMA Show
The 2000s were a real blur of Pop Culture. The first time in modern history where access to high speed internet truly broke the dam of old guard taste-makers. No longer were there as many big collective water cooler moments. Those were slowly replaced by lore accumulated over time, until enough of that lore was strong enough to grow into the long term collective zeitgeist.
Some pieces of lore made it to the mainstream. But many more stories of weird pop ephemera remained relegated to their small corners of the world. All this to say that it doesn’t get more esoteric than SEGA using a Japanese shoot-fighting league to promote their new, gun-toting bastard hedgehog video game.
In 2005, SEGA was looking for ways to promote Shadow The Hedgehog. A direct spin-off of their Sonic The Hedgehog series, Shadow differs from Sonic in a few key ways. While Sonic runs fast, makes sarcastic quips, and jumps on his enemies; Shadow can teleport, use mild curse words, and shoot actual realistic handguns.
So the traditional kid-forward video game marketing was off the table.
But what about a little out of the box thinking for this out of the box character? Around this time, SEGA had recently merged with pachinko & arcade amusements company Sammy Corporation to become SEGA Sammy Holdings and decided to look at the partners Sammy had in their portfolio to see if they could find some prime promotional opportunities.
Enter Pancrase. A Japanese shoot fighting MMA promotion started in 1993, which Sammy had been a key sponsor of their more recent tours & events.
The wheels were beginning to turn. The bad boy of hedgehogs pairing up with the cutting edge of fighting leagues. It was kismet.
Although apparently I’m giving SEGA far too much credit. According to research done by Youtuber Dave Luty, Sonic creator Yuji Naka was asked about the promotion and basically told reporters that, while he was hesitant at first about teaming with Pancrase, he realized that Shadow’s red & black color profile matched the red & black Pancrase logo and that this could be a chance for Shadow to become a mascot for the fighting league.
As of 2024, Yuji Naka is currently serving four years probation for insider trading.
So the powers that be at SEGA thought that teaming up their fake tough guy, Shadow, with some real tough guys like Bas Rutten & Minoru Suzuki was a good idea. But how did it actually go?
Let’s start with the ring.
Wow! That’s certainly a giant hedgehog holding a gun. Why is he bigger than the entire Pancrase logo? I get promoting the sponsor, but shouldn’t the brand always have the biggest real estate on the ring?
In any case, this is how SEGA SAMMY Presents ‘PANCRASE 2005 SPIRAL TOUR 10’ kicked off. But, it’s at this point that it should be noted that actual footage of this event is hard to come by. Even the footage on the official UFC paid archive (which owns the Pancrase library) has just a small segment of Shadow in the ring.
Here’s what we do know.
In a leadup to the event, Shadow did promos with legendary shoot fighter Minoru Suzuki, where the hedgehog almost immediately showed that he was a pushover by allowing himself to get caught up in an abdominal stretch.
During the show proper, Shadow was due to come out right before the sixth bout. Unfortunately for him, during the fifth bout, one of the fighters suffered a very serious, very bloody head injury which caused the ringside doctor to call off the match.
With serious blood spewing onto the mat and a very hostile crowd booing at the decision to call off the match, Shadow made his entrance… to this ridiculous song from his game soundtrack:
So there goes Shadow; hotdogging & grandstanding to “Tripod Baby“ as he runs the ring, gets onto the second rope, and tries his best to hype up this bloodthirsty crowd.
Sadly, this is where I need to let you know that Shadow isn’t actually going to have a match. He’s just here to do commentary for the sixth bout and attempt to act like he belongs in this very serious world.
Shadow left the event after his commentating duties were over with. But he did return at the end of the show to hand off a trophy and pose with his creators, in a weird moment of meta-reality that we shouldn’t think too deeply about.
Once the event was over, Shadow was never seen in a fighting ring ever again. Probably for the best.
What exactly was this? Who was this even for? Were hardcore MMA fans that up to get hyped for Shadow The Hedgehog?
These are questions we’ll never get answers to. After all, this entire promo was greenlit, in large part, because Yuji Naka thought, “You guys got a red & black thing? We got a red & black thing too!”
While this stunt ultimately became fast fodder for the dustbin of history. It’s also a great reminder to never underestimate the weird drawing boards of powerful men with bad ideas.
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Incredible work lolol