Sonic the Hedgehog was one of the last big releases to come to cinemas before COVID struck. I didn't catch it during its short yet successful theatrical run, but I did see it on Netflix a few months ago, and it wasn't too bad. I'm not a massive Sonic fan, the only game featuring him that I remember playing as a kid is Mario and Sonic at the Olympic Games on the Wii as well as maybe a few others, but the movie was still a perfectly servicable time. Quite generic and maybe a bit tiring, but still fun in parts. As it managed to perform pretty well, it was only a matter of time before we got more Sonic on the screen, and after hearing some good things about this sequel, I decided it might be worth a watch.
In the film, Dr Robotnik and his new ally, Knuckles, are on a journey to recover a powerful item known as the Master Emerald. So, Sonic, along with a new companion, Tails, must beat them to it to prevent them from causing chaos.
Sonic the Hedgehog 2 was a ton of fun, far more so than its predecessor, and I think this is due to a few things. The main thing is that the antics in this film are far more in line with what a Sonic film ought to entail. As I said, I'm not the biggest fan of this character, but even I could recognise that the first film was just your typical movie where a popular character is given the realistic CGI treatment and shoved into the real world, and the main character just happened to be Sonic. This feels much more like an adventure out of a Sonic the Hedgehog video game, and that instantly made this one more engaging. There were plenty of solid set pieces and the action was consistently exciting.
The new additions are also really enjoyable. Knuckles, voiced to perfection by Idris Elba, was really entertaining, and Tails was a really endearing sidekick too. Watching these two alongside Sonic had a certain charm to it, and I really liked that. The returning characters remained enjoyable as well, with Sonic still being a likeable protagonist, and Jim Carrey as Robotnik being extremely fun to watch, and even more so in this film than the first as his appearance is made more wacky and closer to the source material.
Some big issues I have with the film are the pace and the story structure. At one point, the plot kind of screeches to a hault as a sub-plot involving a wedding with the human characters is given far too much focus, with jokes that weren't even funny enough to make up for that fact. The film is also just too long in general; by the third act I felt I'd had enough even though what was going on was still fine, it just felt like it was meandering on at that point. But, to be honest, those are really my only problems with this film.
While nothing amazing, Sonic the Hedgehog 2 was just as fun as it needed to be. It may be a bit too long and a tad messy but it's a big step up from the original film by having a far more interesting series of events and well realised characters. I doubt I'll be watching it again any time soon, but I certainly wouldn't mind sitting down and having fun with it again, and I'll also happily watch any inevitable further sequels if they're on the same level of quality.
I'm going to give Sonic the Hedgehog 2 a 7.0/10
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