Director: Jeff Fowler
Distributor: Universal Pictures Home Entertainment
Duration: 99 minutes
Sonic the Hedgehog (Blu-ray) – Movie Review
Sonic, SEGA’s mascot who was created in 1991, made his way into the hearts of many 80s and 90s kids. The blue hedgehog was meant to compete against Nintendo’s loveable plumber, Mario. SEGA had a fairly good run on the console market, but they pretty much destroyed themselves by adding add-on after add-on to their Mega Drive/Genesis consoles and the early critiques on their Dreamcast console didn’t help the company either. SEGA finally decided to focus solely on software, making Sonic step somewhat into the background of the gaming world. While many games still appeared with the blue hedgehog in the lead, he never reached the fame he did back in the 90s. Now, a movie has been released on DVD and Blu-ray, based on the renown character. The movie initially received a lot of backlash because of how Sonic was designed, but the moviemakers then opted for a more traditional design of the speedster.
The movie starts off by showing us Sonic (Ben Schwartz), who is using his powers on his homeworld. Sadly, it did not go unnoticed and a bunch of echidnas from Sonic’s home track him down and try to attack him. Sonic gets to flee towards another world thanks to the usage of special rings handed to him by his guardian-figure Longclaw (Donna Jay Fulks). He ends up in Green Hill, being surrounded by nice people, but he can never make himself visible, as the same thing would probably happen again. He grows up studying certain key figures in the city such as Tom (James Marsden) and Maddie (Tika Sumpter). He is trying his luck though by using his powers secretly, until one day he actually goes too far and shuts down the electrical grid of the entire city.
The flow is quite predictable for a movie such as this. We first get to meet the unsung hero when he flees away from his home, ending up in our dimension. He grows into a teenager/adult and learns the ins and outs of Green Hill, where he currently lives in hiding. Nonetheless, things happen, he gets exposed and bonds with the people he has been following for years. Of course, the villain enters the stage and everything starts unraveling quite quickly, to add a proper amount of excitement and tension to this kid-friendly superhero-esque movie.
Sonic the Hedgehog has a very decent cast. The hedgehog himself is voiced by Ben Schwartz, who does so quite vividly and gives him the proper ‘cartoon’ vibe of the 90s. His compatriot throughout the movie, played by James Marsden, feels like a very believable companion and ally throughout the adventure. While Jim Carrey does not completely fill the original picture of the somewhat rounded Dr. Robotnik, he performs his role splendidly and has a proper mad-scientist vibe from start to finish.
The Blu-ray edition of Sonic the Hedgehog comes with a fair amount of special features, which is always very nice when purchasing a physical copy of a movie. You’ll get to see different deleted scenes, bloopers, or hear commentaries. Other than that, the movie has a few short featurettes and a fair amount of making-of content. While many of the features are all fairly short, some things are quite interesting to view, to learn more about the origins of the blue speedster, or how they created him in the movie, etc.
Conclusion
Movies that are based on gaming series often bomb in the ratings, and the initial backlash of Sonic’s early design made it feel like this movie would follow in the footsteps of many failed products. Nonetheless, the creative team behind the movie was able to turn things around and create a fairly enjoyable experience for fans from Sonic’s early beginnings, to younger children now experiencing the adventures of this blue marvel for the first time. While this movie will undoubtedly not win any big awards, this is a very enjoyable family movie for a fun casual movie night.
Sonic the Hedgehog (Blu-ray) - Movie Review,
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