‘Sonic the Hedgehog 2’ Already Sounds Like It Will Be Interesting
By George Robbins
This year has been one with a lot of ups and downs which has caused many things to happen that no one would have ever expected to happen and the year isn’t over yet. While most industries are currently suffering due to the pandemic at the moment, we have all been made aware by now that it is the film industry which is having perhaps the hardest time. Most of that, of course, stems from the fact that movie theaters aren’t really functioning at max capacity right now due to the fact that they have their own new rules they must follow. Health guidelines aside, people just haven’t been comfortable with going out to the movies again because it is considered by the vast public to be way too risky. Therefore, theaters have been losing business hand-over-fist and they can’t help but be worried about their future which is definitely within the realm of reason.
When theaters reopened, they were excited and nervous to have new movies to show because it would provide a perfect opportunity to test the market. Testing the market is not easy and usually requires a sacrificial lamb and in this case that lamb just so happened to be the movie ‘Tenet. ‘ ‘Tenet’ was expected to be the Christopher Nolan blockbuster which would be able to bring people back to theaters and it was on track to be a massive release, but it was easy to see just after launch that the movie was definitely suffering from the current climate. The movie released to a strong degree, though nowhere near as strong as it was originally going to be before the pandemic hit. Therefore, it was expected that this trend would continue as the weeks went on, but this would turn out to not be the case as the movie would go on to make much less in the next few weeks.
When other studios saw what would happen if they tried to release their biggest films this year, they immediately pushed all of their films into either the end of the year or some time next year. Those that decided to keep a date for this year will either be releasing straight to digital, releasing to theaters for 17 days before releasing on digital, or releasing on both platforms at once. These are the current options for dealing with these sorts of things at the moment and there is no telling if things will even work out for those that are doing this. Those that have released in theaters before releasing on digital managed to bring in a few million to help theaters, but everyone knows it is not enough to help theaters stay afloat during this period of time. Therefore, most aren’t even bothering with releasing their films and will instead be waiting until a better timeframe to release their films.
While many new movies will not be able to show properly, this year has still been a big year for certain movies which has led to a lot of different discussion. Of course, the pandemic is the reason why so much is different this year as opposed to previous years, owing to the fact no movies can really release in theaters at the moment which has led to major things happening. Before the pandemic began, any movies that were out beforehand managed to have decent theatrical runs, especially those released in early February or earlier. Among those movies to have luckily released before the pandemic began was the ‘Sonic the Hedgehog‘ movie which easily managed to break a couple of records. This movie was one that no one expected to be good and that worked in its favor.
When everyone heard that there was going to be a movie based on the video game character Sonic the Hedgehog, they immediately thought that the movie wasn’t going to be good in any way. When the first trailer for the movie released, even those who were still holding out hope that the movie could be decent gave up due to the character design. After enough people complained, they delayed the release of the film in order to completely redesign the character before the movie’s actually had a release. What they came back with was a version of the character which was much more grounded by the original character design and people decided they would go see the movie upon release. The end result of the whole movie’s campaign was the fact that the movie ended up doing really well at the box office.
No one would have expected, based upon the trailers of the film, that the movie would actually end up doing as well as it did at the box office. Being a video game movie, and one that no one was expecting anything from, the movie already had a strong bias against it from the start which made it difficult for the movie to begin with. Luckily, the movie’s release of the original trailer and its rework led to people becoming curious about the film which plays into the phrase, “Any publicity is good publicity.” Having grossed just over $300 million, this movie has become the most successful video game movie to date which led to there being talks of a sequel. Not only is it the highest grossing domestic video game film, but it is also going to be taking another record away this year.
Marvel Studios’ MCU films usually take home the title of not only the highest grossing superhero films, but also the highest grossing films of the year sometimes. They have been keeping up that tradition for awhile now and they didn’t plan on stopping. Unfortunately, the pandemic prevented this from happening and now the title of highest grossing superhero movie for the year will go to ‘Sonic the Hedgehog.’ Now, moving forward with the unexpected popularity of the first film, they will be starting production on ‘Sonic the Hedgehog 2’ in March 2021 for a probable 2022 release date. The unexpected popularity of the movie was not only based upon its references to the video games themselves, but also the new-to-universe feel the movie had. There was something for every crowd to see in the movie and that definitely helped the movie along in the end.
Now, going along with the theme of playing along with references from the video games, the current name of the sequel’s production is ‘Emerald Hill.’ For those unaware, this is an area in the original Sonic 2 video game which is something fans of the character will most definitely enjoy. As of now, this is just a working title, but based upon what happened at the end of the first film, we have no idea what will happen in the upcoming sequel. While we may have to guess what will be happening in the upcoming film and what its title will be, there is no doubt that it will definitely end up catching people’s attentions. Whether this ends up being a good thing or a bad thing is also unknown, but we will definitely have to keep our eyes open for the upcoming sequel.