I remember the first Sonic The Hedgehog trailer. It was terrifying.

Then the news came out that Sonic was getting a redesign after the internet went into flames over how he looked. Still, most of us thought, “Oh… ok. So the Sonic movie might still stink, but at least he won’t look like some nightmare creature.”

But then the movie came out and people started saying it was a good movie. That’s when I got excited.

You see, as a kid I was always a fan of Sonic. I’d would often play the first few levels of Sonic The Hedgehog 2 on the Sega Genesis over and over again (because, honestly, I could hardly make it past the Chemical Plant Zone)! Also, every Saturday morning I would sit in front of the TV to watch Sonic collect Chaos Emeralds and battle Dr. Eggman in the show Sonic X! So when I heard that the Sonic movie was actually good, I just had to go see it myself! And so, a group of friends and I got together, went to the theater, accidently chose a showing with closed captioning, aaaaannnnnnnnddddd…

WOW! I am going to be completely honest. That was a lot better than I expected!

Overall I think Sonic The Hedgehog was a really good, character focused movie that manages to tap into it’s video game nostalgia while being something completely new. I’m going to try to keep this post spoiler-free incase you haven’t seen it yet.

What is it about?

The movie follows Sonic The Hedgehog and a Sheriff named Tom Wachowski as they work together to leave the little town of Green Hills to find a new home. Sonic in particular must cope with whether he should run from danger or stay with the people he cares about. Tom goes through a similar arc, except instead of running from danger he wishes to prove himself as a police officer in San Francisco.

This all adds to the message of the movie, which I think is a good one: you should stay with the people you care about.

What were the highlights?

There are many things about this movie that makes it great and unique, especially considering its from the overwhelmingly underperforming genre of video game films.

The film, in no way was a nostalgia trip. The story took place in a modern day small town that featured not only Sonic (voiced by Ben Schwartz), but a human character named Tom (played by James Marsden). Despite the new plot, there were a lot of call backs to the original games, such as the small town’s name being “Green Hills,” after the Green Hill Zone, as well as another visual call back to the same stage. In addition to that, there was also a variety of other references to the games including the beloved ring sounds and a piano tune that I absolutely adored!

Another highlight was Jim Carry’s performance as Dr. Robotnik/Eggman. His version of Dr. Robotnik was very different from any other iteration I’ve seen but it worked very well in the movie. Jim Carry managed to portray the intelligently insane mad man in a humorous way… and lets be honest, no one was surprised. Ben Schwartz also did an amazing job at voicing Sonic in a way that made me laugh and really feel for our little blue Hedgehog.

Honestly, the fact that the Sonic movie was so differnt than the games and still managed to be an enjoyable movie despite it’s many creative liberties made this movie especially fun. Seeing Sonic interact with people you never imagined him interacting with added so much more charm to the movie in my opinion.

Oh yes, and if you go to see the movie, stay for the mid-credits scene! If you are a long time Sonic fan, you won’t regret it. I am being vague here but I literally freaked out. Which must have seem pretty funny since we were in a room full of children and none of the kids cheered. They must not be versed enough in the Sonic lore. Not yet.

Anything you didn’t like?

To my surprise, there were not to many cons to this movie. When you follow the format of having a talking animal and a human pair up in the movie, you typically are bound to run into a lot of unoriginal ideas. And even if there were some unoriginal ideas in the movie, the film still managed to be fun and worth the price of admission. Nevertheless there were two issues I had with the movie. One of them is minor and the other one is more important.

The first issue is extermly minor and has more to do with the advertising campaign. The military guy we see in the trailer is basically only in one scene. I personally did not mind that too much, but it was odd to introduce a character in the movie but never to reveal him ever again. The scene’s only purpose was to reveal Dr. Robotnik, and it worked well, but it could have been done another way. But this is extremely minor.

There was one big issue I had with this movie though: Lazy writing. Now, not all of the movie was written lazily, but there were a few of the more detailed aspects that bothered me. For instance, the movie takes a lot of time to establish Sonic’s speed and certain abilities he has (like where he can run) only for him to say he cannot do something we saw him do earlier. While this gives more action to his human friends and makes for a good scene, it was still sloppy planning and can take you out of the scene a bit. This issue could have been easily fixed by changing an earlier scene or by complicating the plot a bit. Again, this did not take the fun out of the movie, but it is an issue.

The Conclusion:

As said before, Sonic The Hedgehog was a really good, character focused movie that manages to tap into it’s video game nostalgia while being something completely new. While it drastically diverted from it’s video game roots by grounding the plot in a realistic environment it still kept much of it’s video game fun and nostalgia intact. While it does suffer from a few minor issues Sonic The Hedgehog is bound to please many film goers and offers some great family fun. I think children will especially love this movie… along with nostalgic fans like my self!

Sonic The Hedgehog is in theaters now! Get you tickets now!

Also… seriously, check out this piano version of Green Hill Zone! AMAZING!!!