Sonic The Hedgehog 2

“Being a hero isn’t about taking care of yourself. It’s about taking responsibility for other people.”

I think it’s safe to say that people were pleasantly surprised at the beginning of 2020 when Sonic The Hedgehog, the first attempt at bringing the blue blur to the big screen, turned out to be pretty fun. It may not have been the “best” film released in the year 2020, but given what happened in the weeks immediately following its release, it ended up being the year’s highest grossing film. The announcement of a sequel set the internet on fire, particularly with the reveal that not only would Miles “Tails” Prower be featured, and voiced by long-time Tails voice actor Colleen O’Shaughnessey; but that it would also feature the debut of Sonic’s O.G. frenemy Knuckles… voiced by Idris Elba.

Sonic The Hedgehog 2 returns us to the small town of Green Hills, Montana, where Sonic (Ben Schwartz) is trying to figure out his place in the world. Desperate to use his abilities to help people, he struggles to balance that with his need to stay hidden from the wider world; but when an old enemy makes a surprising return with a powerful new ally on a quest for power, staying hidden is no longer a priority for Sonic.

The good news about Sonic The Hedgehog 2 is that, if you enjoyed the first movie, then this is more of what made that movie fun with some of the rougher edges shaved off. Ben Schwartz’s vocal performance in the first film was the stand-out factor that gave real life to the project; and he maintains that balance of earnest do-goodery and bratty irreverence in the sequel. Sonic is in a more comfortable place living with the Wachowskis as this film begins, though he is still trying to figure out where he fits in as part of the wider world; and Schwartz does great work in navigating the hero hedgehog through these trials and tribulations; through personal revelations and personal growth. The comedy is light and fun but doesn’t overshadow the darker, more serious and more action-filled moments, and Schwartz is clearly comfortable demonstrating the balance within Sonic’s personality on his second outing as the character.

Schwartz is not alone in his stellar performance; Carey returns with the same chaotic energy he brought to the first entry, enhanced after Robotnik’s isolation on a distant planet. He once again manages to find the balance between goofy and threatening, reminiscent of his classic performances from films like The Mask and Ace Ventura: Pet Detective; bringing comic relief without it feeling cringey, and still maintaining his standing as the central villain amongst the laughs. Support from the returning Lee Madjoub (The 100) as Robotnik’s assistant Agent Stone is welcome, but they also have Knuckles to play straight-man to Robotnik’s chaotic energy as well; and Elba finds an excellent balance between the “noble warrior” and “meathead” characterisations that Knuckles has long found himself ping ponging between in recent depictions. In Sonic The Hedgehog 2, Knuckles is driven by his desire to fulfill the responsibilities of his people and return honour to his tribe by restoring the Master Emerald to its rightful place, but Elba weaves subtlety into the performance and helps demonstrate that Knuckles is also thoughtful and cunning beneath his strength and drive for honour. Elba’s announcement as the voice of Knuckles caught many people off guard, but he has more than proven that he was the right choice for the role in this initial outing.

The other side of that coin is Colleen O’Shaunessey, who makes her film debut as Tails but is no stranger to the character, having voiced him in video games and TV shows since the Sonic Boom video games in 2014, and has been involved in Sonic properties since before then as the voice of Charmee Bee. Colleen’s performance represents a familiar grounding for the character and helps iron out some of the creases from Sonic The Hedgehog; as Tails is a much better buddy comedy/road trip/great adventure companion for Sonic than Tom Wazowski was. The relationship between the two characters seems much more natural, and they almost immediately fall into a brotherly dynamic that allows some of the clunkier exposition to feel more forgivable. They also benefit from both filling that “fish out of water” role in scenes where it’s required, where Tom’s position as the road trip buddy in Sonic 1 made Sonic’s differences feel much more aggressively stark – and while that was appropriate for the first entry, easing it off for the second helps keep the story flowing.

That is not to say that the supporting human performances are not unwelcome, despite their reduced presence. As mentioned previously, Marsden and Sumpter are deployed well as Sonic’s parental guardians, with Marsden and Schwartz effectively demonstrating a deeper father & son dynamic between Tom and Sonic that plays well, builds on the first entry and adds real heart to the film. Natasha Rothwell also returns as Maddie’s sister Rachel, and as with the first film in this series, she provides the same excellent standard of comic relief in this outing as she did in the first, and as I hoped for in my review of that first film, is given a bigger piece of scenery to chew here and does it to great effect, really making the most of her minutes on screen. Sadly, my hope that Tika Sumpter would get more to do was not realised, but it was only on a second watch that I was struck with that realisation as the film does manage to succeed in spite of that. However, her time on screen is better used here, as she joins Marsden in that parental role and helps to further build up the sense of family that the Wachowskis have generated with their adopted alien son and keep the heart of the film beating fast.

Earlier mention of the Master Emerald’s importance to the plot leads to Sonic 2’s secondary strength, which is a greater nod to aspects of the videogame series lore, both big and small. The Master Emerald has been at the centre of the Sonic game series since the third game way back in 1994, so its inclusion in this film makes a lot of sense. There are other nods, both large and small, which will catch the eyes of multiple generations as they watch this film; longtime Sonic fans of my generation will note the updated Robotnik drone designs reflecting the classic Badnik robots of the early series games, or the snowboarding scene aping the beginning of the Ice Cap Zone from Sonic 3; younger fans will clock Tails’ array of gadgets as a nod to his technical skill from later series entries, and the revelation that the human world has established a global military taskforce called G.U.N. (a name justifiably mocked in this film) is straight out of the Sonic Adventure series.

I have a lot of good things to say about Sonic The Hedgehog 2, but it certainly isn’t perfect. Earlier mention of clunky exposition is rare but still noticeable when it happens; and Sonic 2 makes the classic sequel mistake of unnecessarily retreading elements from the original, most notably the “alien discovered in a packed bar” scene. While the two scenes play out somewhat differently in each film, it’s still a return to a setting which worked in the first film but didn’t warrant a return in the second, and I found it jarring on both my first and most recent watch, which is unfortunate. This is a series that relies on CGI quite heavily, and for the most part that CGI is well executed; but it is at its worst when the central CGI characters are using their powers. We can thank modern superhero movies for the use of lightning effects to signify the use of super speed and other abilities, and when all 3 anthropomorphic characters have inner power they can access, filling the screen with lightning effects of different colours is a visual spectacle which I found quite distracting, especially during key fight scenes between Sonic and Knuckles. Hopefully as the series progresses, the animation designers will walk those effects back a little, as unless they’re being used to hide rough edges in the animation, I feel like they’re not entirely necessary and cleaner action scenes would play better. This is something I noted in my review of the original as well, so at the very least the usage is consistent; but I’m also consistent in my distaste of it.

Sonic The Hedgehog 2 takes the aspects of the original which really worked and builds on them successfully. This is a fun, exciting family film; with a great balance of action to comedy, of tension to cheese, and has an emotional core that keeps the action grounded and leaves space for the central characters to grow. In the best possible way, this film is more of the same, and there’s only room for the fun to keep growing as this series progresses. Had I finished this review in 2022 when I started it, I likely would’ve made a jokey comment about casting for Sonic 3 struggling to outdo the choice of Idris Elba as Knuckles – but we already know what happened there…

Watch this film, especially if you’re a lifelong Sonic fan, or if you have kids of an appropriate age – and then get ready to watch Sonic The Hedgehog 3, ‘cause that review is up soon!