One of the last movies I saw in theaters before the pandemic hit was, of all things, Sonic the Hedgehog. And, surprisingly, I liked it. Oh, it wasn’t the greatest movie of all time or anything, but it was awfully entertaining with a great Jim Carrey comedic performance as the villainous Dr. Robotnik and some downright creative ways to display superspeed. It was probably easily the best movie I have ever seen based on an actual video game, especially since my knowledge of Sonic lore is basically nonexistent once you get away from the whole “he’s a blue hedgehog that runs fast”.
Anyway, a sequel came out, as they tend to do. I may not have gotten out to see it right away, but I was more interested in it than the Firestarter remake.
Dr. Robotnik (Carrey) is still stuck on the mushroom planet when he manages to get a signal out somewhere. That attracts the attention of a red echidna named Knuckles (voice of Idris Elba). Knuckles just so happens to have it in for Sonic because of a longstanding conflict between his people and those of Longclaw, the owl who initially raised Sonic. Since Knuckles has the means to leave the planet and Robotnik knows where Sonic is, the two strike a deal to work together to retrieve a magical emerald that will grant the holder unlimited power.
Meanwhile, back on Earth, Sonic (voice of Ben Schwartz) is trying to be a hero, much against the advise of Tom (James Marsden) and Maddie Wachowski (Tika Sumpter). However, those two have a destination wedding to attend for Maddie’s sister Rachel (Natasha Rothwell) in Hawaii, so Sonic is left alone, just in time for an attack by Robotnik and Knuckles. Sonic’s speed seems to be evenly matched by Knuckles’s strength, but Sonic escapes thanks to the intervention of an alien fox named Tails (voice of Colleen O’Shaughnessey). Tails knows about the emerald, and soon he and Sonic are off to retrieve it before Knuckles can get it. Then again, Knuckles is a noble warrior with an honor code. Robotnik, well, not so much…
That shading of Knuckles actually made the character a lot more interesting than I might have otherwise thought. He’s not so much a bad guy as he is misguided and mistaken, and as the movie progresses, the Knuckles character changes and grows in a manner arguably similar to what Sonic went through in the first. Likewise, Carrey seems to be having fun again as Robotnik. However, this movie didn’t seem to quite match the fun of the first. There were less speed tricks, and the plot felt more like a video game’s this time around. Sure, the first one was about finding the gold rings, but looking for a magic emerald that somehow turns into a globetrotting adventure for Sonic and Tails is not as much fun for me as a buddy road trip between Sonic and Tom from the first movie.
In many ways, Sonic the Hedgehog 2 is like a lot of sequels to successful comedies: it took the parts that, for the most part, worked in the first one and just repeated them louder and probably with a bigger budget. The first one was mostly set in a small town in Montana and San Francisco. This one includes the Montana town, Seattle, Hawaii, Siberia, and an underground temple. I also felt like there were more video game references I wasn’t catching in this one. There’s a lot of mythology being tossed into a movie about a blue alien hedgehog that runs fast. I did have some fun here since Carrey is still a bit of a hoot, and the other characters all had their moments, but it wasn’t quite as satisfying as the first one.
Grade: C+
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