Sonic Movie 3: Pre-Release Thoughts & Speculations

[@KidEDarus]

They really are playing their cards right with the marketing. The trailers, the toys, the sneak peeks, the Movie Shadow DLC coming, everything to get people to watch this movie is working.

[@ryananthony2869]

The movies inch closer and closer to what the games are,and one thing I really like about them is how they use the elements of Sonic and make it their own,having a new spin on these things we've seen like nothing before. My biggest hopes for future movies are 1:They finally start incorporating more of the game music and 2:They keep expanding on those Sonic elements with more game characters,game locations,I want to see what they can do without shoving a bajillion human characters taking up the spotlight. I genuinely believe that the Sonic movies could be the next MCU as there's just so many cool stories and characters that deserve to be seen by more people in a much wider scale,even if it's not the exact same which might actually be a blessing,what happens in the movies doesn't affect the games and multimedia franchises thrive on different interpretations,many of which don't or won't appeal to everyone.

[@cobalt_effect]

As far as Shadow's backstory goes, I don't believe this film could do much less or worse in portraying it as the source material has. Sure, the games have told us the necessary info, but the medium of film is a prime opportunity to really SHOW how Shadow connects with Maria and why it hurt him so much to lose her. I hope they go this far and redeem themselves after what little they did with Tails and Knuckles' backstories.

[@furdman02]

I really wish I could be excited, I'm interested in seeing how they handle shadow's story but there are so many choices made here that detract from why I like sonic. I dont think its a very hot take to say Sonic himself is my least favorite part of these films. I don't mind him having a maturity arc but I wish they would tone down the quips and references he makes, This specific trend in making sonic a spider-man like jokester has been a common problem in recent sonic media as a whole unfortunately.

[@kaobunn]

i think the hate for this sonic is overblown imo, he isnt like game sonic sure but he doesn't need to be, if this is considered a different interpretation of the character, and at least it isnt canon like prime is also im not sure what you mean by that being a recent trend in sonic media? this ONLY happens in the movies and prime, not the games

[@jarkspore]

I suppose Movie Sonic vaguely resembles Pontaff Sonic, though he was less a Spider Man jokester and more a tired old man trying to stay cool. Personally, I’d rather American Sonic still act like American Sonic. I’m a bigger fan of Movie Sonic than current game Sonic, which feels odd as basically Japanese Sonic from an American perspective.

[@kevin_kevinson]

​@@kaobunnhe needs to be sonic not ben Schwartz. This is Ben Schwartz the hedgehog not sonic

[@kaobunn]

@@kevin_kevinson this isn't how ben schwartz acts though so you can't really say the character is defined by ben just because he's voiced by him

[@_adrill]

ooooh i love the setup

[@FastTheSonic]

Up until that clip released, I was pretty indifferent to the movie coming out, but now I'm actually excited despite disliking these movies, so whatever the marketing is doing is definitely working

[@partyjams]

You did great this episode getting your all your thoughts within the time. Normally it feels like there's too much left unsaid or not elaborated enough on, but not this time. Anyway I think these concerns are particularly magnified by Sonic X Shadow Generations refining Shadow's backstory & the current era of Sonic writing. Had we continued in the 2010's era of writing, we wouldn't have such expectation of Shadow's story in movie form. But especially with the director having worked on Shadow before (& the previous movies besting initial expectations), makes sense we'd be worried about being let down. Because this time we have high enough standards to be letdown. Based on early impressions it seems the action and acting of the main cast is well done. There were mentions of a few bad jokes in the movie, but that's about it. So I'm reasonably optimistic. If anything, what I really wonder is how the general public will react. During the "Dark Era", Sonic stories were criticized for being too serious. Really hoping that won't be the reception this time

[@jarkspore]

I don’t have much to say for movie 3 so far. What we’ve seen so far looks par the course, and I’m expecting 3 to be better than 2, like how 2 was better than 1. What I find more interesting is, where will they go from here? Shadow was an obvious choice for a stinger as far as “meat in the seats” goes, but they’ve kinda already played their best cards. Any other characters they could tease are effectively obscure in the public conscious, so I’m kinda expecting a drop off in performance going into movie 4 and beyond. Sure, we’d love an adaptation of the Rush Adventure story, but would the average John Jacob Jingleheimer Schmidt feel the same?

[@kevin_kevinson]

Adventure 1s story with Tikal and Chaos would sell seats. They could focus on knuckles and the master emerald. Or a sonic heroes movie could work too with metal sonic. They'd have to have massive balls tho and commit to the source material

[@jarkspore]

@@kevin_kevinson Yeah, I don’t think they **couldn’t** still be big, but they’ll have to lean more into actual content than just dangling a new character, at least with stingers. Don’t just tease us with Tikal spawning in and saying something vaguely pacifist, tease us with the bigger story that implies, with ancient gods and vengeance. Though I guess they already did that with the Shadow stinger. That’s why it’s so much more memorable than the Tails stinger, and Shadow didn’t even say anything!

[@kevin_kevinson]

@@jarkspore haha for sure they don't have many choices. I don't think seeing silver would be exciting to anybody outside of the fanbase

[@Egood_ty]

I’m fine with lighting being in the game but that’s as far as I want it to go, and maybe movie skins. dlc. because it would feel so forced ngl.. but if they want to lean on the movie like take a few small small things , I don’t mind myself personally but the big differences I don’t want .

[@Egood_ty]

by small , let’s say they decided to make game shadow’s shoes detailed more like the movies. i’m fine with that.

[@kaobunn]

i absolutely believe they'll handle shadow's backstory with sincerity, if you've seen early reactions from the premiere it was said it was handled with a lot of care, sure the movies are lighthearted and joke-y but they can absolutely take themselves seriously, they've done so before

[@Nolan1333]

Im gonna lose my mind if they gonna say these movies are canon lmao

[@DarkBloodAssa]

How could they even fit anyway? IDW made sense as it was written as a direct sequel to Forces from the very beginning, and Prime was ambiguous enough for such a claim (although nothing fit with the canon). However the movies are more in a Sonic X situation, close enough to the games but still a retelling of its stories within a different world. So no matter what they say, it can't be canon (I don't care about multiverse stuff used to justify such things).

[@callibor3119]

I think we are seeing trailers from other regions, too. I came across UK and few other trailers for other countries and one trailer had a release date on January 2025 that I thought was our’s.

[@jaysolaris06]

I haven't gone out of my way to watch the Team Sonic vs. Shadow clip but based on what you said about the dialogue it sounds on par with what the movies usual do. I accept the movies as their own thing. If it's more comedic than that's okay. However, I really do believe that any high stakes or emotional scenes should be handled with sincerity and not followed up with a joke. Let it sit with the audience. Admittedly the heart-to-heart scenes with Sonic and Knuckles or Sonic, Tom, and Maddie in movie 2 did a good job with this from what I remember. So, I'm not TOO concerned with Shadow's backstory. I'm more so just curious to see how Shadow is portrayed from start to finish. I really don't want to see a lot of these characters being comical for most of their screen time whether it's their actions or dialogue. Having that variety would spice things up since Sonic, Knuckles, and Eggman already fall under that category.

[@petergriffinsbrother2499]

I'm confused why they would say these movies are canon?

[@Mardiculous]

@petergriffinsbrother2499 I’m confused why they said prime was.. It’s mostly an example as to why I tolerate the movies being different

[@petergriffinsbrother2499]

@Mardiculous oh ok, yeah prime is pretty confusing on it being canon to the games.

[@jarkspore]

I don’t think nebulous claims of “canon” have much bearing one way or the other. Hell, the games are barely canon to themselves! I guess I just expect alternate media, true spinoff content, to always be detached. Even Sonic Boom, a multimedia series made from the ground up, constantly tripped over itself in its different forms.

[@OrangeToadGamer]

I actually avoided the 2nd trailer cause I'm not trying to see too much regarding this movie. The 1st trailer convinced me right off the bat, so I'm good 😭🙏

[@liamphibia]

Kraven and Mufasa do NOT have top-tier marketing & hype like Sonic 3

[@windy3935]

The _"it's its only thing and has it's own style"_ argument is shallow and a copout. I'm moreso generally speaking, so the argument hits harder. That alone is not enough to justify things like this and give them a pass. It's based on the source material, was selected, and is being represented, so a high level.. at least.. of integrity needs/has to be maintained. You can't just rationalize the execution behind "these movies are more comedic" or whatever. The far better parallel argument is "a different but sensibly and comparably great take" from its source rather than accepting the new direction under the superficial premise of "it's fine because kids movie/demographic" (even though SA2 was also still a kid's game) or the like. And yeah imma have to add they are releasing too many trailers, at least too many that are spoiling the movie.

[@Mardiculous]

@@windy3935 so, your quote of me is true, but I’m using it to say something else. When comparing how I critique Prime and IDW, it’s worth pointing out, as that’s why I’m going to be less harsh on the movies. That does not mean I’m not willing to criticize the movies for exploiting hype from game fans, if they deliver us a generic movie story, with Sonic elements slapped on. We shall have to wait and see!

[@Acesuper811]

Wait how would that work? What being "Canon" have to affect the opinion here? Like it's clear that this is not game Canon by just how everything look and introduced into these films. I am sorry, but the Canon talk is really silly here 😅

[@Mardiculous]

Its more so explaining why I am more forgiving towards the movies, compared to Prime and IDW. It's less about the movies, than it is about those

[@kevin_kevinson]

As a Sa2 enthusiast. This movie aint for me. The movie Franchise is overly goofy, sonic is too dependent on others, he isnt cocky or cool enough...but ill take having all that money sega is going to make from this so we can get better games. All that matters 😂

[@JakeTylenol]

As someone who wanted to give him a chance since day 1 am I the only one who felt Keanu’s acting was just bad in that scene?

[@Axxidous]

I never thought he sounded like him. People kept posting examples of Keanu Reeves over Shadow that sounded nothing like Shadow and more like Espio. People only want Keanu as Shadow because John Wick and Neo wear black and shoot guns. But the voice isn’t it. But using his natural voice more surprisingly sounds better as Shadow to me. But some lines sound off to me still. Also it’s funny fans even embrace this when the edgy aggressive gun-wielding Shadow is by consensus the “ruined” version of the character. lol

[@jarkspore]

I still would rather Hayden Christensen voice Shadow. I knew the second I heard that rumor that it was a complete fantasy (I don’t think he’s ever even done voice work), but I also knew nothing could ever beat that in my heart.