The world’s speediest hedgehog is racing to the big screen. But fear no more, because he’s no longer the terrifying roadkill you’re fearing of. In this new trailer of the live-action Sonic the Hedgehog movie, the gaming icon has been fully redesigned, now looking better than ever before!
The film’s official synopsis is as follows:
Based on the global blockbuster videogame franchise from Sega, SONIC THE HEDGEHOG tells the story of the world’s speediest hedgehog as he embraces his new home on Earth. In this live-action adventure comedy, Sonic and his new best friend Tom (James Marsden) team up to defend the planet from the evil genius Dr. Robotnik (Jim Carrey) and his plans for world domination. The family-friendly film also stars Tika Sumpter and Ben Schwartz as the voice of Sonic.
Paramount Pictures
The live-action/CGI hybrid Sonic movie serves as the feature directing debut of Jeff Fowler, who gained an Oscar nomination for his 2004 animated short Gopher Broke. Comedy writers Patrick Casey, Josh Miller, and Oren Uziel scripted the film, while Deadpool director Tim Miller acts as executive producer in association with his company Blur Studio. Tom Holkenborg (a.k.a., Junkie XL) will compose the music.
Seven months prior, the first trailer was unleashed online to severely harsh backlash. Viewers were particularly horrified by Sonic’s uncanny humanoid design. The criticism led to Fowler announcing that Sonic would undergo a redesign, followed by a three-month delay (from November 2019 to February 2020) to allow time to “make Sonic just right”.
[Paramount Pictures / Image obtained from Cartoon Brew]
Tyson Hesse, an artist who recently worked on Sonic comic books and the Sonic Mania Adventures miniseries, was brought on board as the lead designer of Sonic’s overhaul, Hesse co-operated with Fowler and the VFX vendors of Los Angeles, London, and Vancouver to make the blue hedgehog look the best he can.
The end result is a surprisingly massive improvement over the monstrosity we got earlier. Sonic’s new design eliminates the unnatural humanoid attributes in favour of a simpler cartoony look comparable to Detective Pikachu. This allows him to resemble closer to his iconic look with his large gloves and shoes, pointy nose, and accurate skin/fur colour,
Sonic’s eyes appear to the biggest improvement, as they significantly enhance his appeal and allow him to showcase a highly expressive face. This is on top of the quick and smooth character animation, along with the dedicated vocal performance of Ben Schwartz (who you may know as Dewey of Disney’s DuckTales reboot).
In terms of the new trailer, this is something the Paramount’s marketing team have also considerably improved upon. The first trailer’s jarring song choice of Coolio’s “Gangsta’s Paradise” was one of the many problems, but the new trailer remedied this issue with more appropriate songs. J.J. Fad’s “Supersonic,” The Ramones’ “Blitzkrieg Bop,” and especially the classic Sonic theme do a much better job representing the movie’s goofy tone and assist the quirky jokes more effectively than an out-of-place gangsta rap.
Fowler, Hesse, the animators, and the VFX artists should definitely be commended for their big efforts in drastically improving Sonic’s design. Quoting Sonic himself in the trailer, they “nailed it”.
Sonic the Hedgehog will be speeding into cinemas via Paramount Pictures on February 14, 2020.
How do you feel about Sonic’s new design? Is it convincing you to check out the movie? Let us know in the comments!
Edited by: Kelly Conley
