Writen by Manic Man
Around the end of January/ Start of Febuary 2010, I finally recieved the new Classic Amy Rose Plushie by GE. I was very impressed with it but something bothered me.. Amy Rose's Classic Hair Band wasn't quite there, it was replace by a full ribbon that tied under her spikes in a little mini-bow like shape. This looks great, but it was a change.. so i started to think.. was it a change from the oringal design, or was it just a case of graphics not quite showing the details...Well, alot of work when into checking this out and some information was a bit confusing at time until i REALLY looked into it and walked about it with some people and the answer was then very clear. Lets look at some picture sources
The first two images come from Amy's first animation appearance with her very oringal release design, Sonic CD's Ending Video. Now, we could comment about the colours but that isn't the point here. In the first video, we see Amy's band only covering the top part of her head, where as in the second one, we see it down the side and 'under' her spikes. Now, the third image is from the final version of the Amy Press/picture shot for Sonic CD (very simpler to the un-cleaned image i got someplace). The Band seams to move down the head but come to a point as if it's the edge of the band, but look closely.. is this just the angle? Now, the fourth image isn't really the best thing to go with.. it's from a short time later, in the game Sonic Drift. It looks like it's clearly a plastic band at this point, due to hitlighting, and this is what is used most of the time after wards.
There are two kinds of band for the hair like this. One is called an 'Alice Band'. This is often a ribbon that ties around the hair and half of it, or so, is hidden under the hair. The other kind is a plastic band that mostly 'sits' on top of the hair. Alot of sources and many fans (I Must admit, I was included) have always pictured that the band WAS the plastic head band, but some people, seam to have seen the truth.. It was an Alice Band all along, it's just Amy's fur hiding bits of it, as normal with that kind of band. A few sources showed this. Now, current Amy design art (used for Plushies, statues etc) show the band as an Alice Band that ties under the hair. I'm not saying this is the 'always true' design because of that.. In fact, when i started researching this, while i like the idea, I was more trying to prove it was wrong and it should be a plastic handband, but it seams it is the right way all along. This is a very intresting point really. Later sonic games seam to show it as more of a band, but i believe that is pretty much due to design errors, small changes and even down to the fact that half of it is mostly hidden.
Soo.. Case Closed.. It was a Ribbon and always has been.