I feel that the more prominent Sally become, the more she actually seemed simplified to the traits of a periphery character, perhaps more so than a standard actual one. The other periphery Freedom Fighters got worse, losing any personality to foil Sonic whatsoever. I do agree that when you put all of Sally's traits together, she has all the potential to be the arguably the most complex character in maybe the whole series, but we so rarely see it (in fact I feel even putting all her moments together we haven't seen a full display of her personality yet) because writers are so used to just playing the 'love interest' and 'straight man' aspects of her personality, sometimes to the point even when they actually TRY to expand her into a complex flawed character they're oblivious to how to do it (Ian's flawed Sally borders more as just breaking her character, and I don't think he would have even bothered with that if not for the constant Mary Sue complaints).
I think that's also where some of the controversy comes in, since many fans don't think those are specific elements that Sonic's character needs, and yet they often develop Sally directly for that purpose. Many feel Sonic doesn't need a perpetual romantic interest, hence the controversy of Archie storylines, while many resent Sonic having to be the 'wrong' to someone's 'right' so often.
