Rulepost from Reddit: I made a tier list of Sonic characters based on how surprised I'd be if they came out as gay.

I wouldn't be surprised if Shadow came out as gay.

Unless it was aimed at anyone outside of Sonic.

And Big is an Aroace in a platonic life partnership with Froggy, and I refuse to believe otherwise.

why tf would sonic surprise you more than charmy

charmy is like the straightest male ever, like in 10 years you know he is going to become a frat boy, and as for sonic... even putting fanfic aside, I don't know if you've seen how sonic has looked at Amy in any of the games where she has a crush on him...

Sega has a bunch of mandates regarding how Sonic is allowed to behave, so there's meta reason for his placement. They don't even let him cry, so coming out of the closet would be enormous.

TBH, I didn't know what to do with Charmy, since Team Chaotix doesn't really get that much development. I stuck him in the middle just to be safe.
- sonic canonically coming out as gay? sure, that would surprise me a ton.
  
  any of the sonic cast canonically coming out as gay would surprise me a ton. sega's not really that sort of company. but if we're within the realm of headcanoning characters as gay based on how they act...

Wtf is that thing next to Shadow

The character is Infinite from Sonic Forces
Think it's an echidna.

Where’s Antoine the escargot aficionado? He’d be in not surprised.

Edit wow apparently Bunnie is his wife. I’ve been living a lie this whole time

I only included characters from the games because if I hadn't I'd be here all day.
- GIVE ROTOR

The bat obv goes with girls as well, at least for attention

For the last time, girls don't do this stuff for attention. People keep saying that because they don't take sapphic relationships seriously.
- are you in every bar? have you ever heard the phrase "gay for pay"?
- I agree with you in real life, but I do think rogue would play up her bi-ness in a public setting cuz she knows she's hot & is a bit of an exhibitionist. She's also probably had a group break up session where she dumps all 6 of her partners at once in a hipster coffee shop then asks for the batistas phone number.
I didn't say that it was a tier list based on how surprised I'd be if they came out as Bisexual, now did I? Strictly gay.
- Several bisexual people I know call themselves gay. I also assumed bisexual was included. I think it's a more general term these days
Having gex for attention? I guess if she says no homo...

Shadow is canonically engaged to a man

Does it say anywhere it's a guy? But also him not caring either way is enough to prove your point.

I... Need to watch more of this because what is this video. I guess a promo event for that game? I don't know why it feels so out of place to me for a Sonic game.
- The twitter takeovers are game promo events where the voice actors answer twitter questions in character; realshadowfan01 is an actual guy on twitter. Sega's recently been having fun with sonic 'canon' outside of serious game plots (eg one of the gags in the takeovers about Shadow eating coffee beans with a spoon was referenced in the Murder of Sonic the Hedgehog)
Here is an alternative Piped link(s):

Shadow is canonically engaged to a man

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My personal tier list: a tier list with everyone in the obviously or not suprised rows