SPOILERS AHEAD for Sonic The Hedgehog, you’ve been warned, video game movie fans!
It’s no secret that video game movies haven’t exactly been great, or even managed to cross into “good” territory. Well I’m sorry to say Sonic The Hedgehog definitely won’t change that anytime soon, no matter how badly some fans want it to.
But while Sonic may be pretty meh on almost every count, it does have one surprising element that sets it apart from nearly every other video game movie that’s come before it: genuine, heart-tugging emotion.
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The opening 10 or so minutes of Sonic The Hedgehog feel like it was taken from a completely different movie. We’re introduced to the Blue Blur as an adorable little hedgehog living on a planet and being taken care of by a wise owl, Longclaw.
Since this is a new retelling of Sonic the Hedgehog, he is given the cliched “dark origin story” in which Longclaw dies trying to defend Sonic from kidnappers trying to capture him for his supersonic powers (which he was told to conceal by Longclaw, making Sonic somewhat responsible for her death) and the Blue Blur is sent to Earth all on his own.
For a kid’s film featuring a main character so adorable he can give Baby Yoda a run for its money, that is dark.
However, things get taken even further during Sonic’s time Earth. We see him getting up to shenanigans and doing random things to keep himself entertained, but it is quickly shown that despite his happy-go-lucky, living-his-best-life demeanour, the Blue Blur is quite lonely.
While he attempts to interact with James Marsden’s character, Sonic ends up just observing him from afar and forming some sort of weird, possessive relationship. In fact, it’s almost a retelling of Frankenstein’s Monster’s story after he was created; he secretly lives among a human family, forming a bond and learning from them, yet never actually making any contact due to fear of how they’ll react if he revealed himself.
After another night of observing Tom, Sonic ends up playing some baseball on his own and comes to the realisation that not only is he alone, but he’s the only one of his kind on Earth.
However, just as soon as we get this big character moment from Sonic, he ultimately sets off a chain of events that kickstarts the plot and brings him into contact with Tom and Jim Carrey’s Dr. Robotnik, and the movie quickly goes downhill from there.
But those initial 10 or so minutes of Sonic The Hedgehog though! It wasn’t the greatest portrayal of loneliness ever seen on film, but there was genuine emotion in those scenes. I actually felt for Sonic when he realised just how lonely he was on Earth and was surprised that a movie like this could pack such a punch from nowhere.
So when the movie quickly descends into a fustercluck of explosions, muddled character moments and just general meh-ness, it left me wondering one thing: why on earth was there actual emotion in a dumb movie like Sonic The Hedgehog?
It was weird and the tonal shift from initial emotional moments to the subsequent zany bits was like getting whiplash after Sonic had just run into you at top speed. It’s almost a damn shame that Sonic The Hedgehog couldn’t keep up with the momentum of those first 10 minutes because there was actually something there that could’ve broke the video game movie curse.
If you’re on the fence about seeing Sonic The Hedgehog, know that you’ll get at least one actual quality moment before it all quickly crumbles in a mess of blue fur.
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