Sonic The Hedgehog

[Colly]

In which case it's doomed.

[stokeriño]

The new trailer appears to have upgraded the film from "Unmitigated Disaster That Needs To Be Wiped From The Face of This Earth" to simply "Meh, Don't Care".

So kudos, I guess.

[Benji]

59 minutes ago, Skummy said:

and who do we decide "the audience that they're for"? Do Disney start listening to the fanboys crying about women ruining Star Wars?

Who was complaining about the character design in the Sonic movie - the children it's aimed at, or adults making fun of a trailer?

Who says it's just aimed at kids? Surely it's aimed at both? I'd argue if anything, with their use of "Gangstas Paradise" in the original trailer, they were probably aiming *more* at the adults.

As a lifelong Sonic fan I wasn't going to bother with it before, let alone enjoy it, now the change gets me in the cinema door and the rest is down to how good the material is.

 

[Bobfoc]

It's clearly a silly children's film, and I don't know why anyone would expect anything else from a live action Sonic the Hedgehog. The trailer shows him hitting himself in the face, falling over, playing table tennis with himself, making noises with his armpits and screaming in a very child-friendly way. Then you've got Jim Carrey making wacky faces.

As far as source material is concerned, what exactly is there to work with? The best and most popular games were bright, virtually plotless sidescrollers that involved running quickly and jumping on things. Storylines from the 3D games were laughably stupid and were soon swept under the carpet in future releases because Sonic fans hated them. The only Sonic property I can think of with a reasonably decent story was Sonic SatAM, and predictably, the Sonic fans hated that too because it introduced characters that weren't in the games.

So, really, if you want a film that sticks to the core of the franchise and satisfies the Sonic community, you'd be looking at a back-to-back Let's Play of the Mega Drive games.

[Benji]

1 hour ago, Bobfoc said:

It's clearly a silly children's film, and I don't know why anyone would expect anything else from a live action Sonic the Hedgehog.

Of course it is, but kids films also appeal to adults, Pixar and DreamWorks basically created an industry around that fact. I think it's daft to completely ignore the fact this is based on a 90s franchise and parents and non-parents alike from that era are interested in seeing it.

Theoriginal look was horrifying and was justifiably shit on and would have made the film DOA, they changed it to look more faithful and people like it, giving it a fighting chance of at least just being a generic shitty video game adaption. I honestly don't see what people's problem is with changing it, it feels a little like people just looking for a moan.

[Skummy]

2 minutes ago, Benji said:

I honestly don't see what people's problem is with changing it

Precedent.

Most of the people who complain and petition for films to get changed aren't doing so because of a disagreement over character design, but for far more insidious reasons. But every single one of them is well aware of this decision, and that it's sending a signal that if you make enough fuss, the studio will listen to you. 

[Benji]

I think it's setting less of a prescedent than you think it is. This was a business based decision far more than it was a creative one.

[Bobfoc]

I can see where you're coming from in the sense that the new design looks more like the sort of thing that would sell children's toys.

[Skummy]

It's twofold - the issue isn't solely that studios will start listening to the cranks, but that the cranks will start feeling more emboldened. All the Gamergate, Comicsgate, Star Wars whatevers and every other person making thinly veiled arguments to complain about women, gays and minorities in their entertainment, barely needs more license to think that they're the be-all and end-all of fandom, or to get louder and more aggressive, but I guarantee they'll claim this (especially the gamer types) as a success for them, and cite it as a reason why their complaining and harassment works.

[Benji]

I get where you're coming from with that, but I think this was also the right move from the creators. Fans exist for a reason, they know what they want, and whilst I agree a lot of the time they come with a lot of self entitlement, I think that is also not a reason to ignore them out of hand. Final Fantasy XIV was an absolute garbage fire when released because they ignored playtesters, but they rebuilt it from the ground up and now it's one of the most successful and popular MMORPGs around. AEW is arguably a result of a lot of anti-WWE sentiment from them not listening to fans for the most part, and WWE itself listened to fans for Mania 30 after a lot of fallback and created arguably one of the most memorable moments in company history.

TL;Dr - fan criticism ≠ entitlement and vice versa, and it's important to listen to the people who spend their lives and money supporting your franchise.

 

[Ruki]

I think it looks fun.

[IDOL]

Don't get the people complaining that they caved in to fan pressure to change that ridiculous looking original design. This just went from "No thanks," to taking my family to see it in theaters because I grew up with Sonic and my kid loves it as well.

[Hobo]

Movie producer hubris is probably more to blame here than fan entitlement. The roasting the design got could've easily been avoided. What I totally think sucks is that the animators had to go back in and fix everything. If anything, fixing it makes the movie less interesting.

The Mario Brothers movie only really survives in memory because it was a weird dystopian sci-fi that was completely at odds with what the games were. 
 

Although, this movie is totally aimed at adults who grew up with Sonic who will then bring their kids to see the movie. Which happens. It's been a marketing strategy for films for at least 20 years or more. People sure weren't screaming for a Rocky and Bullwinkle movie the year 2000.

 

[Bobfoc]

I think people underestimate Sonic's appeal among children. It's not as big as it was among young people during the 1990s, but it's not as if children aren't familiar with it. I've seen a few primary school children with Sonic bags and it was mainly children who were interested in the Sonic games when I worked at GAME a few years ago. Sonic toys are also still widely available in shops.

[Benjamin]

For sure the Sonic movie will appeal to children. It's a brightly colored character that does whacky shit, that's about all you need nowadays. 

However, it certainly seems that the redesign of the character will appeal to adults who were less inclined to bring their kids because they didn't want to see that weird first design (ie. Idol) or people without kids (like Benji).

Also, there's a stark difference between a character redesign and wanting to appease assholes who only want straight white dudes in their entertainment. Movie studios know that listening to dipshits could cause them to lose support from other more diverse and more profitable demographics. 

[Skummy]

1 hour ago, Hobo said:

Although, this movie is totally aimed at adults who grew up with Sonic who will then bring their kids to see the movie. Which happens. It's been a marketing strategy for films for at least 20 years or more. People sure weren't screaming for a Rocky and Bullwinkle movie the year 2000.

I have a broader point around remakes here - remaking kids' entertainment properties goes back forever, but I don't think it always means "it's for the adults who grew up watching it". Usually, historically, it's because the adults who grew up watching it want to have a stab at making it. That's why you have The Jetsons, Flintstones and Scooby-Doo making a comeback in the '80s and early '90s, when the kids who watched in the '60s became animators and studio staff. 

What's changed in recent times is that we're more likely to see those old series remade, not for a new generation of kids, but for the same generation as adults, like the last Power Rangers movie. I honestly believe this Sonic movie is far more aimed at kids, but they'll be banking on easy nostalgia too.

47 minutes ago, Benjamin said:

Also, there's a stark difference between a character redesign and wanting to appease assholes who only want straight white dudes in their entertainment. Movie studios know that listening to dipshits could cause them to lose support from other more diverse and more profitable demographics. 

My worry is less about whether studios listen, and more about the license it gives the assholes. Assholes will now point to this movie as "they listened to us once, they'll do it again!" and use it to justify being louder and more obnoxious assholes than they already were.

[=BK=]

 

[Rocky]

Just finished watching this. It was definitely better than I thought it would be. It’s about Detective Pikachu good. I think I liked it more though. I’ll probably put that down to Jim Carrey. The man is a gem.

[RPS]

On 13/02/2020 at 04:20, Rocky said:

Just finished watching this. It was definitely better than I thought it would be. It’s about Detective Pikachu good. I think I liked it more though. I’ll probably put that down to Jim Carrey. The man is a gem.

Who is hotter - Pikachu or Sonic? 

[GoGo Yubari]

I saw it. It's fine! It's a kids movie, as it should be, so most of the stuff that I didn't like about it probably doesn't even register with them. I'd put it below Detective Pikachu but they're in the same ballpark.

Seeing it honestly makes the original decision they made on the character design even more bizarre to me, because the Sonic the Hedgehog in this movie is meant to be, like... ten or eleven or so. Why would you do that weird, hyper-realistic design when the movie doesn't work at all if you don't find him endearing?