Sonic 2 - Movie Review

Critics Score - 6 of 10

General Audience Score - 7 of 10

Kids Score - 8 of 10

Anybody remember what the second highest grossing film of the 2020 year was? It was actually 1917 but third place went to Sonic The Hedgehog as it made it's bankroll before COVID-19 took a wrecking ball to the box office. Kids were delighted to watch a fast-talking Sonic throw out goofy one liners and parents were taken back to the 1990’s with the wildly outrageous version of Jim Carrey they grew up loving. Sonic 2 spins into theatres and takes the top off the box office it’s first weekend, with kids of all ages ready for another go round of blue mischief. Although the sequel isn’t nearly as inspired, especially in its humor, as the original film, there’s still a good time to be had, especially for the younger audiences. While parents will forget all about the film upon exiting the theater, kids will be bouncing off the walls, partially from all the bagged sugar they sell in theaters, but also because Sonic 2 is a bouncing blue ball of fun.

SYNOPSIS - We start off this retro video game sequel as we catch back up with Dr. Robotnik (Jim Carrey), dropping probably his best one-liner of the whole movie right out of the gate, as he makes his escape from the mushroom kingdom. Before he can leave, though, a lumbering reddish-orange echidna named Knuckles (voiced by Idris Elba) arrives and asks the good doctor where he got one of Sonic’s blue spines from. It’s clear these two have some catching up to do as they depart together, but we skip to a high speed chase at night in Seattle. A group of masked robbers are being chased by a bunch of cops when Run DMC’s It’s Tricky starts playing. This is thankfully just the first of many sweet throwback tunes designed to keep all millennials and older generations slightly more entertained. We see Sonic stretching, cracking his knuckles and eating a chili dog before he irresponsibly saves the day and we witness possibly the worst example of a kid’s ice cream falling off the cone ever put on film. Gravity was a non-factor. Frozen dessert complaints aside, Sonic heads back to the sleepy town of Green Hills and crawls into bed right before he’s supposed to go fishing with Tom (James Marsden). While they're on the boat, a snoozing Sonic falls overboard and Tom reveals that he knows what Sonic has been up to at night, sneaking out and trying to be a hero. 

Aside from a parental pep talk, when Sonic gets soaked we see one of the first signs that this animation is subpar, not that anyone was writing home about the animation from the first. Later in the story Sonic covers Tails with a blanket and there's digital blobs of unfinished cgi work leftover. There’s also a whole sequence with Sonic and Tails are skiing, pieces of snow stuck in their hair looked like white splotches on blue and yellow matted fur. There's no detail or texture, it's like the animators knew most kids wouldn't care about many of those details and decided most of the cgi budget should be saved for the big finale. I could go on explaining the plot about Tom and his wife going to Hawaii for a weekend and Sonic partying with the dog, but you couldn’t care less. The plot was generally overstuffed anyway, with the runtime pushing just past the two hour mark when it really could’ve easily been been right around a hour-forty. The pacing suffered as a result with a lengthy second act adventure subplot of Sonic searching for a lost emerald that soaked up way too much time.

This sequel was as fun as the first film, but not as funny. The one liners are nice and add some amusement, as they did in the original, but it was the few bits of Jim Carrey and James Marsden banter from the first film that was really lacking in the sequel. They were hilarious together in the original’s scenes and the sequel definitely missed their witty and constantly insulting interactions. Idris Alba as Knuckles was also quite amusing as a gruff intergalactic being not familiar with earthly customs, not laugh out loud funny, but a chuckle here and there. As was mentioned, the use of classic hip-hop and rock songs made a few sequences more entertaining, I particularly enjoyed Barracuda playing while a bride goes on a revenge fueled bender. Nobody is going to watch Sonic The Hedgehog 2 for any great cinematography or production design elements, which of course the movie doesn’t have any to offer. But even any lessons that Sonic or the youthful audience was supposedly going to take home are lost in the minutia of the storytelling and ultimately a lack of solid direction. After the success of the first film, it’s almost like the entire crew gave 85% effort. They knew whatever they put on screen, Jim Carrey and a a blue spinning Sonic would sell all the tickets they needed to get by. Low and behold.

SUMMARY - Sonic 2 is a pretty forgettable adventure that kids will love, but they may not be quite as tempted to revisit it as frequently at they did the first installment. For those that are looking for more quality in their filmmaking, there’s a lot left to be desired after Jim Carrey’s numerous but fleeting one liners are forgotten.