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<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\nThe \u201cSonic the Hedgehog\u201d movie franchise has had quite the history. In 2019, jokes about the poorly-received first trailer were everywhere in pop culture. Paramount, to its credit, took the vitriol as constructive criticism and spent months redesigning the main character to have a more palatable appearance. When the upgraded movie was released in 2020, all was forgiven and the movie was a hit. The 2022 sequel was also a bigger hit than expected, with \u201cMorbius\u201d bombing the week before and audiences hungry for a blockbuster. And with the third film already earning over $60 million at the domestic box office in its first weekend, it\u2019s a safe bet that it will be the biggest hit of Christmas 2024. The journey from Internet punching bag to must-see holiday destination is indeed an inspiring one, much more than anything that happens onscreen in the mess that is \u201cSonic the Hedgehog 3.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
As we check in with Sonic (Ben Schwartz), he\u2019s enjoying domestic life on Earth with his adoptive human parents Tom (James Marsden) and Maddie (Tika Sumpter) and his home-planet sorta-siblings, fox Tails (Colleen O\u2019Shaughnessey) and echidna Knuckles (Idris Elba). But the good times can\u2019t last, as the government needs Team Sonic to fight off a threat from another superpowered space hedgehog. Shadow (Keanu Reeves) has escaped from a secret government facility and is up to no good. Even with a 3-on-1 advantage, the heroes are easily bested and Shadow gets away. If they want to defeat Shadow, they\u2019re going to have to align with hedgehog expert and dormant supervillain Dr. Ivo Robotnik (Jim Carrey).<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Robotnik and his long-suffering assistant Stone (Lee Majdoub) help Team Sonic track Shadow to an abandoned facility where they learn that the heelish hedgehog isn\u2019t working alone. Dr. Gerald Robotnik (also Carrey), Ivo\u2019s grandfather, has been helping the former science specimen for decades. Together they\u2019re working on an evil scheme to control a doomsday device. Ivo immediately turns on the others once he discovers that family is involved, so the next battle in London is essentially a 3-on-3 with Team Sonic vs. Shadow and the Robotniks. Then, of course, the final showdown is at the weapon itself with only seconds to spare, most of those seconds used by the heroes to try to convince the villains not to blow up the world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Action and story-wise, this movie is a yawn. I can\u2019t imagine anybody coming out of this movie saying that it was really cool when a character did this or it was a surprise when the movie took that turn. That leaves humor as the movie\u2019s distinguishing characteristic, which is a shame because a lot of it missed for me. The heroes\u2019 jokes could be found in any number of similar family action movies, including but not limited to the MCU. The returning character that probably got the most laughs out of me was Knuckles, thanks to Elba\u2019s gravitas-filled delivery, but even his lines feel like Drax the Destroyer leftovers. As for comedy legend Carrey, I assure you that playing two characters doesn\u2019t make him twice as funny. Twice as annoying, maybe, but he\u2019s doing all of his infamous mugging without much of his famous passion. I say \u201cmuch\u201d because, like Elba, he did get a few laughs out of me, but not enough to come close to saving the day.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
As far as I\u2019m concerned, the only thing that \u201cSonic the Hedgehog 3\u201d has going for it is that it could be worse. We could be three movies deep into this franchise with the way Sonic originally looked, with the lanky body and humanoid teeth. Yes, I know that releasing the first movie like that might have killed the sequels, but it also could have brought about two even uglier sequels. At least this way it\u2019s a marginally better-looking character getting shoved down our throats.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Grade: C-<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cSonic the Hedgehog 3\u201d is rated PG for action, some violence, rude humor, thematic elements and mild language. Its running time is 109 minutes.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
By Bob Garver The \u201cSonic the Hedgehog\u201d movie franchise has had quite the history. In 2019, jokes about the poorly-received first trailer were everywhere in pop culture. Paramount, to… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":60312,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[108],"tags":[2895],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/60311"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=60311"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/60311\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":60313,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/60311\/revisions\/60313"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/60312"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=60311"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=60311"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=60311"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}