The first trailer for Paramount Picture's upcoming Sonic the Hedgehog movie dropped yesterday, and it's fair to say that the reaction online was pretty hostile, with many fans taking issue with how Sonic has been represented in this big-screen adaptation.
As is so often the case in these situations, the passionate Sonic fanbase quickly got to work, and we're already seeing some 'tweaked' versions of the character which are a lot closer to the original design – which is pretty amazing when you consider the amount money that must have been spent on the CGI work seen in said trailer.
https://twitter.com/repalec/status/1123443539013185536
What do you make of these tweaked versions? How did the creative team at Paramount get it so wrong? Let us know with a comment.
Meanwhile, whilst browsing Twitter for edited Sonic faces, we couldn't help but chuckle at this tweet. Poor old James Marsden.
Comments 87
Sonic fans know better than the maker of Sonic movie 2019. 🤣
Wow, the fixed ones are so much better
Wow, Sonic fans are amazing. Such a shame Sega let this happen.
They really forget that Sonic is a gem in pop culture.
Still plenty of time between now and November for Paramount to make some minor tweaks, though doubtful...either way, I still wanna see it regardless. It'll likely be the only movie I go to see potentially, as my theater experiences are few and between these says. I just prefer to wait 'til stuff hits blu-ray.
Colour me impressed with the alterations.
The movie however still looks complete rubbish...
Sonic needs to look like sonic
Think about the children
Too late to fix it. They may look better, but that's not what we're going to get now.
Really makes you think how many people producing the film actually thought his live-action design was a good idea.
With just few changes the Sonic from the fans look so so much better, hopefully, Paramount will take a look at those images and will change the looks of Sonic before it hits the cinemas.
Yeah that does make a difference. I was wondering why they gave him a more realistic look, then watching the trailer again confirmed an earlier suspicion. They wanted Sonic to essentially look like a superhero.
Dr. Robotnik is Lex Luthor and Sonic is the Flash. The missile scene and the lightning coming from Sonic’s shoes is taken wholesale from The Justice League movie.
Looking at that last picture of the human sized Sonic and the regular sized Sonic makes me realise how dumb this is. I wonder why they didn’t make Pikachu the same height as humans?🤔
They could make that film about 900% better with Bowser from the 1993 Super Mario Bros film teaming up with Robotnik and Mario doing some actual plumbing in the background. That would be the best crossover of all time.
These fan edits are a vast improvement
You do have to wonder if any of the people working on the film have even seen a picture of Sonic
Oh my god. The difference is crazy good
They need to do what they did with Sonic Mania and let a fan take the reins.
Funny...Sonic Team has difficulty making a hit, then Sonic fan devs swoop in and nail it with Mania. Then Paramount blows it with Sonic's design, and Sonic fans show them up with much improved aesthetics...
The pros just have no luck with Sonic, it seems.
Yeah, that does look a lot better
Lol looks 10x better wow!
No, no, no, NintendoLife. Please don't use opinionated titles when reporting on news. It's something PushSquare does which I find really annoying and unprofessional. I respected this site more for its objective reporting. Please don't become another opinionated, unprofessional news site!
@Octane ...........
I kinda love how awful it looks, admittedly. The movie will be terrible but at least it's good for a laugh or two. I'm about as interested in watching it as I am in playing most modern Sonic games.
@Anti-Matter I’ll be honest - I feel like I often see your comments get lots of downvotes... but in this case it doesn’t make sense as you’re totally correct!
@RainbowGazelle It’s completely reasonable... the character model for a gaming related movie is widely disliked, not just by a vocal few. These alternatives are both game related, entertaining and completely viable in a way that makes the readers of the article completely baffled by what the movie designers are thinking.
Keep these articles coming.
Doesn’t look bad to me.
Maybe it’s because sonic has always been stupid.
@RainbowGazelle
This isn't really a news article though.
It's a current events editorial piece.
The "original" seems made by amateurs. Way to go fans. Show them how it's really should've been done. This is the sonic we know
Sonic is so fast he won't be in Cinemas' for long and likely to be racing on to Netflix the following month.
A lot of people I think are confusing the design choices in the sonic movie for laziness. They’re intentional, and they’re not great. It’s like when the directors of the Mario movie decided to make the Mushroom Kingdom into a dark gritty dystopia. At least the rest of it looks like a banal kids movie, destined to be forgotten.
@RainbowGazelle I agree with your PushSquare criticism. Their reviews are usually better than NL, but the fanboys who write the articles lack professionalism. They also chatize anyone in the comments section who disagree with them. Comes off as elitist.
@Varkster Well in this case the anger is justified.
@FTL I was thinking the same thing: Why would anyone downvote that comment, let alone three people.
Those are pretty good; too good! Time to reverse that.. https://twitter.com/crowsx3/status/1123258198855647238?s=21
This will be the kind of movie you watch with friends while getting high.
So much better. Not that it would make the actual movie that much better but hey, at least you wouldn't have to cringe at Sonic's design anymore.
I was sympathetic to the movie design, but I was thinking Sonic might look more realistically integrated into the live action and they were going for a more plausible animal. But his movement and look doesn't seem plausible at all, anyway, so they really should have stuck closer to the game design and, really, exactly how these people show it. The altered image with the missiles is just about perfect.
The real problem they have is Sonic as a cultural touchstone is not that relate-able except to gamers. Mario is more so due to his wider acceptance by adults and children during a critical time in the video game industry. It would appear they knew this and tried to re-imagine Sonic as a less aggressive looking run of the mill CGI hero type instead of the slightly menacing, mischievous hedgehog he was originally.
It is sad they wasted an opportunity to appeal to gamers and non gamers alike by building on his real persona and writing a decent script. The trailer gives the movie away (what there is of it) and the casting of Jim Carrey was a huge mistake. He has not had a solid performance since the Grinch and the scenes in the trailer were a rehash of his usual shtick.
Sega is doing a terrible job managing Sonic.
I thought the design was pretty good. Well.. except for the teeth. Oh god not the teeth.
I like the first redesign. Just close the gap between the pupils. One huge eyed Sonic is a no-no for me.
@WomboCombo Went to a Combichrist / Silver Snakes / Ravel-Unravel concert in Atlanta a week and a half ago. Done.
The artist that is @virtanderson I happen to know him as a regular at a Twitch channel I frequent and is responsible for a good chunk of emotes that he made for it. Of course, he would make the best art from of this Sonic scene selection.
It's less "the eyes" and more "the lips".
@dkxcalibur
SEGA has been doing a very bad job at managing their whole IP. Not just Sonic. I mean, it seems that anybody willing to pay for a SEGA licence gets it, even if the planned product the licence was acquired for ends up to be total crap.
In one corner, you see Nintendo showing a decent amount of respect for their legacy (NES & SNES minis, Pokémon movie that actually look ok, etc...) and on the opposing corner, you have SEGA, licencing its name and image to cheap retro console makers who miss the mark far too often, and allowing a movie studio to turn Sonic into a cinematic turd that need to be killed with fire, etc....
Looks like SEGA just doesn't care about their brand and image, and just accept whoever's willing to put out money to buy rights to whatever they have without any right over the resulting product. There are clearly some people at SEGA that needs to be fired. No self-respecting company would tolerate such disrespect for their brand and image.
Looks worse to me. That design would work if it wasn’t cgi/intended to look realistic. As is it looks really creepy to give him the unieye (which looks poor in animation as well but that’s a whole other issue). The reactions are hilarious though.
Wow! These look SO much better!! Like...I really hope the producers take a look and do a redesign, at least with the eyes.
Well, I think it looks really good and I can't wait to see it. Sure, his arms and legs are too long, but I still think he looks really cute (especially when he says 'meow').
The writers need to fix the “jokes.”
How did Sonics "look" get signed off as acceptable?
When twitter can improve it so much and so easily.
@WomboCombo ^_^
This looks a whole lot better than what we’ve got.
@PBandSmelly I know, right.
If Paramount want to do it, it still possible, since Sonic probably CGI character, they doesn't need to reshoot everything. Schedule is pretty tight, but nothing that overtime and added resources couldn't overcome.
@Zidentia The Grinch and Cable Guy were outliers in his otherwise lackluster portfolio. He was always overrated, but he did have those two uncharacteristically quality performances. To be fair to him I have a feeling his presence works a lot better on stage than it does on film. He seems like the type of actor that's repetitive, bland, and obnoxious on recorded film, but on a live stage can fill the room with energy in a way few can.
As for poor Sonic, I think you got it right a lot about Sonic's personality. Honestly they should just get Jaleel White again. He actually had the Sonic personality nailed through a pseudo-Urkel-ish-ness.
They need to take example from Sonic Mania and let the fans show them how is really done right!
@NEStalgia
Jaleel is probably the best way to handle the voice. The one on the trailer is not even a match for the CGI character or distinctive at all. In all honesty they should have approached it like the recent Woody Woodpecker movie as more of a tounge in cheek humor based film. Embrace the oddness of a blue hedgehog in sneakers and not try to make him something he is not.
@NEStalgia I'd say 'The number 23 and Eternal sunshine of a spotless mind and True man show are also up that list.
Jim Carrey is a product of the late 80's early 90's tho
Every single one of those redesigns is better than what they went with. It’s hard to put into words just how wrong they’ve managed get this film.
I hope Nintendo won't let the next Mario movie get screwed up lol
The Sonic design in the film is giving me flashbacks to the Smurfs movie from 2011.
Again, I'm neutral regarding Sonic, but I can say that when my little sister saw the trailer, her response was that the eyes, the teeth, and the torso proportions were creepy. It's not surprising that fixing those things makes the model okay.
Im guessing this sonic is going to be classic sonic..
It's also just a terribly edited trailer. Bad pacing, cliche effect slams from Transformers trailers, and Gangsters Paradise set the downer tone throughout.
I'd like to see the internet recut this to fun soundtrack or original Sonic game music.
So Hollywood movie became fan made movie now?
I understand why their initial reaction was to "modernize" Sonic instead of just bathing him in 90's nostalgia. On paper, it makes sense, especially when trying to attract a market of younger audiences that don't have the same feels as the aging 90's kids do. But I think we can agree for the most part that the 90's vibes would have been a better fit, even for the youngins.
Just please don't let there be a movie tie-in game.
The title of this article is a bit confusing, somewhat misleading even. It essentially implies that the internet got the studio to reverse or otherwise change their direction. Which they haven't.
It's still not fixed, that realistic design is quite disturbing.
Everything about this movie has me completely thrown off. And I'm a huge fan of Sonic from back when it all started. I'm extremely disappointed. By far is this the most screwed up version of Sonic. And without even watching the actual movie. I can say far from the character as possible and possibly the worst live action recreation ever. The only character that remotely does the franchise Justice is Jim Carrey's Dr. Robotnik. Anyway. Apparently now Sonic is from space. His rings can warp people from one place to another. And when he runs or spins it's like he's Electro's (Spiderman Villain) beastiality forbidden lovechild with a mutated rat. Able to cause power outages. So simply speaking he has electric controlling capabilities 😂🤔 So....the writer of this movie. Seriously needs fact checks, because this movie literally is already a box office flop. Putting it a nice way. You literally could have made this movie so much simpler and got a much much more positive response.
That looks a lot better.
I want an invader Zim live action now. YAY IM A KNEE! WEEE!
I must admit Sonic looks better with his big eyes. Sega is surely taking notes.
They should totally fix this before the movie comes out, otherwise he goes from cute to just really weird and kinda disconcerting
@Octane Man, you made me laugh with your image!! 😂
I see nothing wrong with this trailer or the design, and I grew up playing the Sonic games. This looks fantastic! Sonic's design is obviously based on real life hedgehogs, which makes sense because it's a live action movie. But hey, I guess if it doesn't induce constant nostalgia-gasms then it sucks right?
The picture Guru Larry posted was plagiarized: the actual artist for that redrawing is @AimeeUeda. All Larry did was add a bit of white to join the eyes together, but the eyes themselves, the mouth, the lighter fur: it's all Aimee's work:
https://mobile.twitter.com/AimeeUeda/status/1123326781002481664/photo/1
Edit: Well, I'm glad he apologized, at any rate:
https://twitter.com/LarryBundyJr/status/1123688999430832128?s=19
@Octane Turns out the movie totally nailed the look. LOL
I cannot believe this is the look they all went with. It looks like some guy dressed up as part of a 90s stag do.
@Octane Wow that kid hates it. You gotta know when you look like garbage...
Literally every one of these looks better than the one in the movie.
@Anti-Matter Yeah, it really is so annoying that these people who are getting paid a lot of money to make big budget Hollywood movies can't even get some of the basics nailed yet a fan can come along and do a better job getting close to the correct design in literally a couple of hours. What are these movie directors and artists and the likes doing?
@impurekind "being creative"
Lol, yeah the fans did it better.
The redesign from Edward Pun looks great.
@Zach I agree. I’m sure they spent a lot of time looking at the best way to anthropomorphize Sonic - problem is, we humans usually think something that is close but a little bit off looks odd, but purposeful cartoon-style is completely fine.
Classic sonic has strike back again..
I'm convinced that sonic is indeed cursed... Until the fans take hold of him.
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