Sonic the Hedgehog Is Fast, Frenetic, and Forgettable

Growing up in the Sega sect of the 1990s console wars, I suppose I should have a twinge of nostalgia for a Sonic the Hedgehog movie. There’s even a certain throwback embrace of the era’s too-cool-for-school attitude that fits the character well—while watching, my thoughts drifted back to the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movies of that decade.

I tried to place myself in the smaller shoes of the younger crowd that’ll gobble up this film with as much gusto as Sonic munches chili dogs. Though the result is better than one might expect for a story nestling the character in the simplistic formula of the lost-creature adventure format, this movie spends so much time zipping and quipping that it zooms right past anything more than a mindless motion blur.

He’s here. Courtesy Paramount Pictures and Sega of America

Consider how Sonic the Hedgehog introduces us to the cocky and chipper title character (voiced by Ben Schwartz). We first seem him on a forest planet, where he resides with an owl matriarch and is under attack by some mysterious faction. The scene is pointless to drink in because after the owl chucks a young Sonic through a portal to the safety of Earth, we never address his planet or its inhabitants ever again. I suppose we should be thankful that Sonic describes his owl mother figure as Obi-Wan Kenobi because nothing else in the film makes this clear.

With that bit of pointless pathos out the window, we follow Sonic hiding out in the wilderness of the small town of Green Hills, secretly spying on the residents and taking an interest in many of them from afar. He considers the plucky sheriff Tom (James Marsden) to be his best friend, given that Tom protects a town with little going on and seems to favor junk food just as much as Sonic does. Sonic will soon come to rely on him once an accident makes the blue alien known to the government and he needs to find a new home, leading to the inevitable road trip.

James Marsden as Sheriff Tom. Courtesy Paramount Pictures and Sega of America

Venturing after them is the sinister scientist Doctor Robotnik, played by Jim Carrey turning up his goofiness to the maximum setting. Carrey seems to mostly be just playing himself, but you can’t blame him. He doesn’t have much to work with, as Robotnik is a standard villain: he loves his machines, hates human beings, and only wants to capture Sonic to harness his power for more machines. There are a few brief mentions that he grew up as a child prodigy without his parents, but this never comes into play past some jokes in passing. Without much character, Carrey can only cackle, smirk, and dance his way through this picture.

Jim Carrey as Dr. Robotnik. Doane Gregory/Courtesy Paramount Pictures and Sega of America

It’s the same for everyone else in the movie. Tom doesn’t have much character as the everyman caught in the background concern of deciding to move. His wife, Maddie (Tika Sumpter), offers little more than unquestioning support, even when meeting his new hedgehog friend. Maddie’s sister, Rachel (Natasha Rothwell), apparently thinks Maddie should divorce Tom for reasons that are never once made clear.

I didn’t expect much from Sonic as a character, given that he’s more or less a wise-cracking blue blur. But there’s rarely a moment to feel much for him, and his few somber moments of appreciating friendship and being alone on Earth come more by design than organically. That said, I can safely say that of all the CGI creatures to stumble into our plane of reality, Sonic is by far the most bearable. There’s never a moment where he annoys too much with a never-ending joke or a tiresome lowbrow gag. There’s still a fart joke in there because, look, we knew this was coming from a movie with a character who gobbles chili dogs, but it’s a thankfully brief moment that doesn’t linger.

Maddie, Tom, and Sonic. Courtesy Paramount Pictures and Sega of America

But this is the biggest problem with the movie: it aims to be being more safely pleasing than all that engaging. All of the characters go through the expected motions, including a bar brawl and car chase that arrive right on schedule. The action, while visually well assembled, never quite impresses, especially with the lack of explaining Sonic’s hidden power of generating unlimited electricity that seems to only come about when the plot requires him to go super. The comedy never entirely bores, but it also never quite cracks that barrier of lukewarm banter between the superspeed and explosions.

Sonic’s zippy nature is enough to be a breezy bit of mindless matinee entertainment. For the video-game crowd just hoping the film won’t fall flat on its face, that may be positive praise enough. But much like Sonic’s classic Sega Genesis games, the film remains locked on a forward track, forced to go through the familiar loops of a CGI creature on a road trip with no major kinks but no surprises either. There’s just not a lot here to come racing out for.

Courtesy Paramount Pictures and Sega of America