Sonic, Knuckles, and Tails reunite against a powerful new adversary, Shadow, a mysterious villain with powers unlike anything they have faced before. With their abilities outmatched in every way, T...
To say Sonic fans have been eating good this year (mostly) is probably the understatement of Sonic’s entire existence maybe; after the rut Sonic ‘06 permanently dug him in, his recovery has never looked better and we now look to go three for three with “Sonic The Hedgehog 3”.
Peeps, the holy trinity has been completed!
Jeff Fowler, if there’s one thing I can say about him, gives hyperactivity a competent name. Like a chameleon, he places his focus accordingly and spreads his wings far enough to accommodate for a nuanced family festivity and a rabid fan’s wet dream. For three straight movies, this method has proven fruitful and his direction here is perhaps his most mirthful of the series.
These Sonic movies continue to make building a believable world around those characters look easy and I’m not talking about the pleasing CGI looking more polished and enticing than before; despite the by-the-numbers production design not offering much visually, there’s enough variety and personality in each location to where every scene justifies the placement its settled in and the scope and scale shifts to where the structure is simple and streamlined enough to warp into a comfortable stronghold. Every time the worldbuilding and setting feigns veering off course, it quickly course corrects.
Brandon Toast’s cinematography coats the frames with a colorful sheen and is very deliberate in being as anime-coated as possible even if the editing feels weightless as a result. I love the costumes they used in this, Tom Holeknberg’s score is a vast improvement over previously, and after two straight movies, we finally have pacing that isn’t mired or bogged down by its momentum or excessive comedy; the vast majority of which is still a mixed bag. At least it’s far less juvenile and has seemingly matured with its audience.
Oh, and the action sequences are probably the best in the series yet: very anime-coded like the camerawork and they all have something memorable about them to help stand out from the other.
As expected, the cast bounce off each other really damn well despite, again, really basic dialogue dumbing it down. Lots of chemistry is shared separately between them and everyone is having a ton of fun but of course, Jim Carrey remains the standout with his overly expressive comic-book haughtiness; he keeps giving off that Grinichian lunacy vibes and he owns it even when playing two roles. Keanu Reeves comes the closest to matching his effort though, embodying Shadow with quiet condescension.
Largely inspired from Sonic Adventure 2, I must admit I wasn’t entirely sold on that games story: it’s built around a lot contrivances, awkward pacing and a severe lack of attention to detail in a bid to complicate itself to feel darker and the more I think on it, the quicker it falls apart for me. Here though, this rendition is much more fulfilling: while also parodying the mindless, unserious grandiosity of what superhero movies have become these past decades. Treating both Sonic and Shadow’s arcs and personalities as direct Yin and Yang mirrors to each other and blurring the lines between good and bad into uneven shades of gray, it barely supercharges the original story with the emotional heft it was missing while maintaining the basic beats of that narrative and keeping it concise and refined too. All things considered, there’s no avoiding how basic it is as far as kids films go; there’s nothing high-brow, deep or intellectual about it and if anything, the whiplashing between cliches can wear on you if you’re as overly analytical like me.
But these films prioritize heart, warmth and focus over its drying well of pop-culture references and this one has just enough substance to narrowly outweigh the paper-thin utter drosses it consumes along the way.
Again, I have to express how impressed I was with the characterizations. You get clear crisis of conflicts wrestling within not just Sonic and Shadow but also Eggman and Stone in regards to their striking contrasts of found families and how they handle the weight of what choices they make, tying in well with the film’s recurring themes. Nothing too mind-bending and a tiny bit derivative but it didn’t need to be hold your attention.
But….again, the foray of issues that stalled the previous two films from becoming great have to charge in and remind us this is still part of a kid-courting blockbuster franchise. There are a few instances of subpar CGI or, at the very least, awkward green-screen effects, Krysten Ritter’s character was very underutilized as a missed opportunity hidden in plain sight (although they could still utilize her more in the next film) and it’s messages are heavy-handed to the point of saccharine; then again, you probably already knew that.
Three for three on chaotic, heartwarming, nostalgia tugging clownery, the blue blurs third outing still has some legs to stand on, skillfully catering to both younger audiences and the extensive and passionate fanbase Sonic has garnered; definitely my favorite of the trilogy.
