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Dan Drazen

From Sonic Retro

Revision as of 02:53, 26 October 2008 by Tweaker (talk | contribs) (External Links: bullets)

Dan Drazen is one of the oldest, and perhaps respected members of the Sonic Internet community. Joining the community back in the mid-90's, he first became interested in Sonic from watching episodes of the Saturday morning series, intrigued by the characters and writing not always found in a licensed program. A member of the now-legendary Rat.org and related mailing list, he first became noticed with his fanfiction serial "Bloodlines," dealing with the Knothole gang in a fashion that had yet to be attempted. Met with near-universal praise from its original audience, Dan Drazen went on to write more stories, dealing with the Sonic cast in ways that the writers at Archie wouldn't dare, due to the limitations of working with a licensed character. His style has been emulated many times, but those who still pay attention to fanfiction often point to his works as being the standard.

While he still writes fanfiction from time to time, Mr. Drazen has kept a steady presence in the community by actively reviewing the Archie comic series for over a decade. Beginning as summaries for a general FAQ, he started to add his own personal opinions, expanding them over time and adding a unique rating system. His reviews have become so well known that there are those who claim that they are actually more entertaining than the comic he reviews. Others have criticized the reviews, confused as to why he cares so much about the content of what is targeted at a much younger demographic. Regardless, the notoriety of his reviews sparked Archie to make him an official reviewer of the series on their website, though the arrangement only lasted three months.

There have been at least two instances where Dan Drazen has made the resolve to stop reviewing the comics entirely, citing the sharp decline the series has dealt with during its run. Right before he was to give up the fandom entirely, an editorial shakedown occurred at Archie, resulting in long time writer Ken Penders being relieved of his duties, replaced with long time fan Ian Flynn. Curious to see what would become of this, Dan Drazen remained the dedicated reviewer, still releasing them to this day.

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