Sonic the Hedgehog Sonic Fans: Your Hero Has Arrived! Grade: B-

Sonic the Hedgehog is from the acclaimed Sega Video Game Legend Sonic the Hedgehog. The film takes place in fabulous Green Hills, where Sonic (Ben Schwartz) currently lives alone in a small cave. Sonic was having a fun time at night, playing baseball by himself. Suddenly Sonic feels depressed, due to the fact he has no family, friends, or anyone to play with. So Sonic runs around and around and around, until Green Hills loses power. Now Sonic is under attack by a mad evil genius named Dr. Robotnik (Jim Carrey), whom wants to destroy the super powered lightening speed hedgehog. As one whom grew up playing Sonic Heroes, Sonic the Hedgehog, Sonic DX, and Sonic Adventure 2 Battle which was my personal favorite... Of course I have familiarity with the character and this world. I'm honestly surprised this exists, given the fact video game adaptions in film don't always work out well, as one would be concern how to create a quality film out of this acclaimed video game icon. It's 2020 so anything goes I suppose. The Cinematography was just fine, it looked like a basic studio looking film, nothing really to praise about it from a visual standpoint. The Score was forgettable, the only thing I truly liked about it was near the end, when they did a piano version of the Green Hills theme song from the original game. So the visual effects looked like they were going to be a complete disaster from the first trailer... I mean who in the right mind approve of that going out in public?! Complete trash if I do say so myself. A big thank you to all the animators whom worked effortlessly to make the design for Sonic, the way it should be. Solid visual effects as far as character design goes whether it be Sonic the Hedgehog, the mother Owl, the rings, the mushroom planet. The cast of this film all in all was a surprise, I found the cast quite enjoyable in this film. It's reminiscing to the laid back style of the 90's early 2000's kids movies, may not be Oscar worthy performances, but good enough to keep you satisfied. Ben Schwartz voicing Sonic did a pretty good job, captured his personality as it should be from the games. The character Sonic itself thankfully was entertaining to watch, whether it be his corny jokes, his high energy, rare moments of somber and rage... It was an enjoyable experience. Tom played by James Marsden t'was a solid performance, unfortunately I found this character extremely uninteresting. For kids this will be fine, due to the fact they'll relate to Tom moving away from his friends and family to a new place, where he'll have to make new friends so at least it's fine for them. But as an adult watching this character I honestly couldn't care less about the character, as it provided barely anything to the table, other than a human companion for Sonic. Jim Carrey playing the villain was extremely goofy, yet I found it surprisingly enjoyable. I've had doubts about Carrey playing this role, due to the fact he just doesn't resemble Dr. Robotnik/Eggman at all. I think Carrey was playing more himself than the character itself, but given the fact this character is a mad evil genius... I think Carrey did just fine and hopefully he'll improve if given a sequel. One may argue about the supporting cast and characters, but in order for a Sonic movie to work, you have to push the human characters away and let Sonic do his thing. So the supporting cast were just fine for their purpose in the film, nothing really to complain about. Just bout have one flaw to mention. Product placement isn't a bad thing in cinema, sometimes films need money in order to create their art, so subtle product placement is fine. But when the film places product placement in a form of a commercial ad... We got a problem. This film has a distracted product placement involving Olive Garden, which both scenes felt like a 15 second commercial ad, in order to get to your YouTube video or the next song on Soundcloud/Pandora. I didn't need an Olive Garden ad shove in my face nor did anyone ask for one, please be subtle next time around... Who am I kidding, they're probably going to create a joke about it in the sequel. So did Sonic delivered?! In my own opinion: It kind of does, this is quite an enjoyable kids movie. Like I said earlier it feels like an early 2000's kids movie, where it's trying to make kids have a fun time at the movies and have the parents just satisfy enough to where they are not annoyed to death, like an illumination film would normally do. The story itself may feel cheesy or feel formulated, but it has a simple narrative and it gets the job done just fine. There are moments of action, car chase sequences, Sonic unleashing his powers... I mean what kid wouldn't have a ball watching that?! The comedy material is hit or miss, sometimes you genuinely laugh at the jokes they offer, sometimes you laugh when you're not suppose to, and sometimes you don't laugh at all. As far as entertainment it's solid in that standpoint, I didn't feel much boredom at all watching this film unlike some other kids films in the past. A good question to ask will this work for those not familiar with this character?! I'm going to say maybe, depends what kind of person they are. I'm just happy this film didn't butcher my past enjoyment with the Sonic games, as well as it wasn't obnoxious, stupid, annoying... It honestly was just a nice time at the movies. I hope if given a sequel Knuckles, Tails, Shadow make an appearance... One can only dream. Overall, Sonic the Hedgehog was an enjoyably decent film. I recommend this film to kids, families, and Sonic fans especially, it's a good time at the movies. -Mitch Smietana