Pearly the Manta Ray early concept

Lazy copy-paste time!

First off, sorry for the quality. I think I got it looking a bit cleaner than it was, but the thing is, I drew this... sometime last year? Anyway, the point is I don't have the original file around, so I had to cut this out from a copy elsewhere and blah blah blah, so apologies for it not being the prettiest thing in the world. Anyway, moving on...

With Waves of Change (starting in Sonic the Hedgehog #260) we reintroduced/revisited the concept of aquatic Mobians, since the past attempts way back in the day hadn't really been all that in theme with the aesthetics of a Sonic-based world. That in and of itself was kinda fun and exciting -- a new take on a theme, a new direction to explore, but it was also a little daunting at first because of pesky little things like biology. Obviously, a lot of aquatic animals don't exactly have limbs. There was a bit of initial back and forth regarding how to proceed (mermaid-esque bodies, etc..) but eventually it was settled upon that since a lot of Sonic characters tend to toss realism out the window and get liberal with the interpretations of various animal types, we might as well do the same. At first it bugged me a bit, but, well, when you get down to it, one way or another, things are never going to make perfect "sense" and you just have to pick a course and run with it. Along that line, it was pointed out that Rotor is technically based on an aquatic animal that doesn't really have full "legs" in reality (they're kind of like fins with digits). In a world where birds don't have wings (??) but bats do (and on their backs, independent of their arms...), fish can have arms and legs. Part of the deciding factor there was also that this way, the characters would have more flexibility in terms of setting should the need arise (which isn't to say they can stay comfortably on land forever...). There was some consideration of webbed or partially-webbed fingers, and I was at least thinking we'd go with more flipper-like feet than the "blob" style, but ultimately I like what we've been coming up with for this story.

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I've just gotta say that made Pearly here SO. FLIPPIN'. CUTE. I cannot stress this enough. The cuteness. THE CUTENESS.

Now, to disappoint some people: while there are a lot of thematic similarities, Pearly is NOT actually based on/inspired by Pearl Fey from the Ace Attorney series. Sorry! While I have played one game in the series (Trials and Tribulations) the similarities (the names and being sort of apprentice priestesses) were not intended at all, which makes me feel kind of silly in retrospect. In fact, Pearly started off with a couple of different names early on (one put forward was Raya, but I thought it would sound too similar to Razor or Ray the Flying Squirrel). It kinda makes me want to draw Pearly dressed up as Pearl Fey sometime, though. That might be fun.

With Pearly I sorta wanted to do "cute little girl" without going for a species that would immediately seem fitted for typical "cutesy/girly" visuals and the manta ray theme gives her a bit of a unique head shape. I was kinda thinking "wetsuit" with the leggings, though I suppose that also just looks like... leggings. I think the details around her neck changed a bit in the final. She's a bit shy and reserved at first but warms up to people eventually, maybe earnest to the point of being a little pushy. She absolutely adores and looks up to Coral, but she's wary when it comes to chao (personally, it makes me think of how some little kids are scared of adorable puppies and kittens... I don't get it myself but it happens, so why not with chao?). I'd love it if we could have her and Cream interact someday.