Sonic 2, le film

The first film was a solid, if slightly safe film introducing Sonic to the live action movie world. Sonic 2 takes the live action universe of Sonic and adds not only familar faces in Tails and Knuckles, but adds its own spin of the Sonic franchise's lore from the original 3 Sonic games. Whenever Sonic, Knuckles, Tails and Eggman are on the screen this film, its a fun spectacle and a fun time for Sonic fans.

If however you are not a Sonic fan, and/or don't have children, this movie will probably not do much for you. References from the original games (and beyond) will be totally lost on you and the film is definitely a kids film. Also as a Sonic fan, this film isn't perfect. There is a small subplot involving some of the human side characters halfway in the film sends this film on a weird, confusing detour that adds barely anything to the overall experience. The Movie does recover from this bizarre sidetrack to a fan's dream of a final fight.

I cannot wait for Sonic the Hedgehog 3 and I do hope this film and franchise succeeds so we may see more of the franchises fan-favourite characters on the big screen!

I wonder what Tails and Knuckles would've looked like had we not have a redesign...

As a fan of the games, I had an idea of where the story was going within the first 15 minutes of the film. With that being said, the execution of the plot and writing with both new and returning characters, made the build up to the finale very entertaining and worth my time. It's a little slow at the beginning but once Tails and Knuckles join the cast, it's a thrilling race to the finish; and what a finish it is! There are some twists I didn't see coming and I won't spoil the 3rd act which is the peak of the film. Think Spider-Man No Way Home: Sega version! Yes, the 3rd act is that good and it gave me goosebumps. Very enjoyable film for fans and newcomers alike and definitely STAY for the mid-credits scene.

It's a blast filled with cringe jokes and some actually funny ones. Maybe just a bit too long but I didn't mind too much. The additional new characters in the movie were great too. What I love most is that there seems to be a lot of love and fun put in when making these films and you can see that when watching it.

Many sequels go bigger but end up being worse than the original. They lose the essence of what made the original good. That's definitely not the case here. It's much bigger but feels just like the first movie. It's on par with the original in every way, just bigger.

I said this in my review of the first movie, every moment Jim Carrey is on screen is pure gold. I wanted him to be in every scene. His facial expressions are hilarious. Whoever cast him as Robotnik is a genius. It's so perfect. I can't imagine it being anyone else.

My only downsides are a few gaps in logic and parts that don't really make sense. I chalked it up to being a kids movie but that's not really an excuse. And was I the only one who thought Idris Elba was doing something weird with Knuckles' accent? It sounded like it was switching between an English accent and a heavy New York accent, and sometimes a combination of both. I couldn't stop hearing it.

I had a great time with this movie. Two out of two in the videogame genre??? That's unheard of. Keep up the good work. Maybe this is the tide turning on video game movies like it did with superhero movies in the early 2000's. I can only hope.

(3 viewings, opening night 4/8/2022, 4/27/2024, 12/19/2024)

Sonic the Hedgehog 2 is basically everything the first Sonic movie should have been. While the first film wasn't bad per se and perfectly watchable, it was very basic and clearly limited in scope and budget. Still alright overall.

Thankfully, with a sequel greenlit it feels like this time the writers and director could do much more. The CGI game characters get more of the spotlight than the Human characters, the jokes land better and there's just much more going on here that fans will recognise from the games. With Tails and Knuckles added into the roster, it adds more character dynamic and banter that fleshes them out more in the story.

Robotnik also gets to shine more too thanks to Jim Carrey's performance and having more gadgets and locations to juggle with. The weakest parts of the movie are when Sonic, Tails, Knuckles, and Robotnik aren't on screen, but the scenes are still perfectly watchable and better than almost everything in the first film. There's more locations too and gimmicks to play around with in the movie as well.

Without spoilers, fans will be most happy with Sonic 2 and even people who aren't a fan of Sonic will still get a kick out of it. Although this ain't saying much, I can confidently say this is the best Video Game Movie I've seen easily. It really felt like they put their soul and effort into it and kids will have a blast with this. Don't forget to stay to the end for a surprise. There will definitely be a third film coming.

7.5/10.