Sonic the Hedgehog Review (2/14/2020)

I didn’t have high expectations for this film, and I was mostly going to see a movie with friends and to reward the animators working on it for painstakingly improving the design of the titular character at the last minute based on audience feedback. While I still find that to be an admirable thing, unfortunately it doesn’t save this movie from being the boring, aggravating mess that it is. There’s just nothing really interesting about this movie at all. It’s a strung-together chain of pop culture references, memes and bad jokes, filled in with a weak plot and underdeveloped characters with nonsensical motivations. None of this would matter too much if the movie was fun, but it’s not. There are a few funny moments – 90% of them coming from Jim Carrey’s performance – but the film just spends so much time mugging the audience for laughs that I just got tired of it.

The biggest flaw with the movie is Sonic’s character himself. As good as he looks, he’s obnoxious and irritating and never stops throwing bad one liners around. I couldn’t even think about anything that was happening without my brain being assaulted by a bad joke. His relationship with the human lead played by James Marsden is underdeveloped and forced and doesn’t make any sense. On that note, nothing in this movie really makes sense. Things just kind of happened for the sake of humor and flashy sequences.

Jim Carrey’s performance as Dr. Robotnik is probably the best thing about this movie. He’s over the top and obnoxious but in the best possible way, and whenever he was on screen things were generally tolerable. He actually has some genuinely decent lines in this, and though there are a few lines from him that just kind of go on for too long, for the most part his scenes at least got some kind of emotional reaction out of me. Without any spoilers, there’s a scene with him at the very end of the film that hints at future character development for him in a sequel that I’m sure is coming, and while I don’t think I’ll go see the sequel to this, I would probably pay to see a short film that’s just him alone dealing with that situation.

I know a lot of people enjoyed this because they thought it was fun, and more power to them. Die hard fans of Sonic might enjoy this, and Jim Carrey’s performance is just bonkers enough to work. There are some interesting visuals and a few legitimately funny scenes. I just have a huge problem with the approach to filmmaking that this film represents. There are actual story and character arcs set up here (not good ones, but they’re still there), and lots of scenes are dedicated to growing certain character relationships and what not, but it’s all just so forced and half-assed. If you want to make a movie that’s just dumb fun without a care for story or character development, do it. If you want to tell a good story, do it. Don’t make me sit through a badly told story to have fun; it’s tiresome and annoying and it gives me a headache.

There’s also a beautifully animated owl character that I really loved but she was only in it for less than a minute and it’s implied that she died. Thanks guys.