A Sequel That Doesn’t Suck
SPOILERS AHEAD
Sonic the Hedgehog was released on Valentine’s Day 2020 and managed to rake in around $143 million USD before the COVID pandemic shut down society, becoming the highest grossing movie based on a video game. It was a surprise hit, and I was surprised that I enjoyed it as much as I did. I took my daughter to see it. She was a 6-year-old newbie fan then who was drawn in by the initial teaser trailer with the “funny, blue hedgehog.” She’d never played the Sonic video games before she saw the movie, but she liked the movie so much that she wanted to play them. So, she asked me — I mean, she really twisted my arm — to buy it, which I did.
Then the pandemic wave swept over the world, and she all of a sudden had to spend a lot more time at home, but she had Sonic and his friends as her companions to help keep her company. They went on many adventures over the course of a year, and she built a relationship with these new characters. When she saw the Sonic the Hedgehog 2 teaser trailer a couple months ago, she was hyped.
We ran it back this weekend with Sonic, his new friends, and a few million other people, and the results were about the same. Sonic the Hedgehog 2 is an entertaining flick for kiddos and adults, particularly adult fans of the Sonic franchise. I’m a casual fan, my daughter a bit more into it than me (even at her age), and we both had a great time watching this worthy sequel.
Sonic 2 picks up where the first adventure left off, revealing that Dr. Robotnik (aka Eggman, played with a vibrant flair that only Jim Carrey can manifest) has gone a little Colonel Kurtz in his isolation on the Mushroom Planet. Fortunately for the dastardly villain, he’s inadvertently rescued when Knuckles, a red echidna warrior with a long history of beef with Sonic’s adopted avian momma, Longclaw. Knuckles has been tracking Sonic for a minute, in search of the “master emerald”.
Meanwhile, Sonic has been shooting his shot at being a full-blown superhero, but he’s rough around the edges and tends to cause more destruction than prevent it. Of course, Sonic will have the chance to recognize when the moment for him to become a hero will arrive, but will he be able to meet that moment with heroic courage? Will he be able to make the type of selfless decisions that a true hero makes?
The answers to those questions unfold over the course of a fan-service heavy two hours that actually breezed by. My daughter liked Sonic 2 more than the first one, specifically because of the addition of the new anthropomorphic characters, Knuckles and Tails. These characters look great on screen, staying true to their popular video game avatar forms, and their voice actors (Idris Elba and Colleen O’Shaughnessey, respectively) inject them with a level of energy that’s appropriate for a franchise built on supersonic power. These characters’ presence in Sonic 2 expands the universe beyond the funny, blue hedgehog, giving long-time fans more incentive to check out this movie.
The physical actors, James Marsden, Tika Sumpter, Lee Madjoub, and Natasha Rothwell do a fine job of keeping the adult perspective grounded amidst the video game hero chaos that splashes and zips and slams and dashes across the screen. However, Jim Carrey steals the show in every scene he’s in, cranking up slapstick sadism and gonzo behavior in his portrayal of Eggman. He seems to be having a hell of a lot of fun, and, in addition to the stellar CGI, I’d argue that the success of this franchise leans on Carrey’s continued inclusion. It just wouldn’t be as much fun without him along for the ride.
Sonic movie series is all-but guaranteed to log in another sequel or two and should continue to draw in fans of the first two offerings, which have been surprisingly entertaining.
