Jeff Fowler
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Filmography
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Connections, in both directions
Sonic the Hedgehog is The screenplay by Patrick Casey and Josh Miller has a few funny lines and references for adults, i.e. when Sonic spies on Tom and his wife while they watch Speed.
He learns human behavior by watching action movies, so his idea of life on earth is informed by "Speed" and the "Fast and the Furious" saga.
Sonic hides out near the local sheriff, Tom Wachowski (James Marsden), and his wife (Tika Sumpter), essentially acting like their invisible child as they relax at home and have movie nights where they watch films like Speed and The Naked Gun.
Gamely voiced by comedian Ben Schwartz (perhaps best known for playing Jean-Ralphio in TV's Parks and Recreation ), Sonic makes a cutely cartoonish hero as we find him alone on Earth, forced to watch his favourite movie ( Speed – what else?) through other folks' windows.
When the couple sit down to watch Speed —subtle!—there’s Sonic watching from the outside of their living room window.
He observes them from a distance, becoming an invisible part of their routines, such as watching TV reruns of Keanu Reeves in Speed – natch.
Uwe Boll’s filmography notwithstanding, you might have to go all the way back to 1993’s “Super Mario Bros.” to find such a striking disconnect between the experience of playing something at home and watching it in a theater.
Likewise, I reckon, the utterly deranged – and now very cult 1993 movie – Super Mario Brothers , with Bob Hoskins and John Leguizamo tearing it up as the plumbers who just want to save the world, while the batrachoid Dennis Hopper tries to destroy time and space itself.
E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial (1982)
Directed by Steven Spielberg
influenced Sonic the Hedgehog (2020)
Plot
Really, though, a Lovecraftian monster might have made this movie more interesting, because the adaptation of the long-running Sega video game series is a dull, predictable family movie that borrows heavily from E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial and ALF , turning Sonic into an alien who’s taken refuge on Earth.
He’s certainly the best thing in the movie, which is otherwise pretty standard “family” fare in the low-rent “E.T.” mode.
Think "E.T." in running shoes.
Jeff Fowler and Paramount build a very serviceable amalgam of entertainment and action that invokes a lot of the classics like “ET” in interesting albeit vague shades here and there.
The plot isn’t too far from the classic “ET” or the more modern “Bumblebee” — an alien lands on Earth to hide and soon must team up with a kindly human (James Marsden, in a very Marsden groove) to escape the clutches of evil government scientists who want to dissect it.
The characters mostly work, the jokes come fast and they mostly land – there's a gag about chilli which includes multiple uses of the word “fart” that even had me laughing out loud – and enough movie references – Avengers , Transformers , Pacific Rim and the Indiana Jones series are only the most obvious ones – to keep the grownups chuckling and appreciating just how hard Fowler and Co. are working.
Aggressively referencing everything from Ghostbusters to Transformers , Sonic The Hedgehog 2 is a mishmash of other event pictures, with Fowler trying to make a joke of the story’s obvious cinematic benchmarks.
These high jinks more closely resemble Michael Bay’s Transformers, the live-action Alvin and the Chipmunks, or live-action Scooby-Doo films.
Suffering from Masters of the Universe syndrome, the writers Pat Casey and Josh Miller downshift from the opening sequence, set in the familiar loop-de-loop world of the Genesis game, to a mundane buddy-comedy routine set on Earth.
Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981)
Directed by Steven Spielberg
influenced Sonic the Hedgehog 2 (2022)
Visuals
(During one action sequence that heavily borrows from Raiders Of The Lost Ark , Sonic coyly declares that he does not want to die in such a derivate way.)
There’s a lovely moment during the enjoyably dizzying swirl of Sonic 2 where one has pause to wonder whether Steven Spielberg and George Lucas had any idea when they were making Raiders of the Lost Ark just how iconic an image that giant ball chasing after Indiana Jones would turn out to be.
(“I don’t want to die like this,” Carrey exclaims, while outrunning a boulder straight out of “Raiders of the Lost Ark.” “It’s derivative!”)
El trabajo de Schwartz cumple, aunque en ocasiones se siente un poco como la versión PG de Deadpool , y sus referencias a la cultura pop del momento no ayudarán a que la película envejezca con gracia.
Fowler, along with co-writers Patrick Casey and Josh Miller, is working off the Deadpool and Detective Pikachu template, which is really just the Ryan Reynolds template.
It’s like watching a family-friendly version of Deadpool but with a hyperactive hedgehog that never stops irritating viewers and dropping second-rate jokes.
Friends, this is a record-scratch, freeze-frame, “I bet you’re wondering how I got here” sort of movie, with a voiceover (by Ben Schwartz, as Sonic) that indicates above all how much movie executives have learned from Deadpool ’s box office returns.
What is the target audience for a film that wants to take its cues from Deadpool but also family films about the Easter Bunny?
Sonic is produced by Neal H. Moritz, whose Original Film banner helped create Fast & Furious , 21 Jump Street , xXx and the TV series Prison Break.
More like sequences where Sonic shellshocks a turtle by letting him “burn rubber” for once, or pop culture references to Fast & Furious movies, or the film’s bountiful Olive Garden references (seriously, that product placement probably paid for Sonic 2.0).
The George Lucas-produced, Willard Huyck-directed Howard the Duck from 1986, that’s what, and it feels like more people are realizing this with each passing day.
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Out of the Shadows (2016)
Directed by Dave Green
influenced Sonic the Hedgehog 2 (2022)
Director Jeff Fowler and company take a page from the stuffed, fan-service heavy vibes of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Out of the Shadows .
In my review of the first film, I hoped that a Sonic sequel needed to meet the “apologetically dumb fun” levels of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Out of the Shadows and the 2017 Power Rangers movie; two other retro franchise adaptations that knew what they were and revelled in their goofiness.
The Olive Garden product placement is far from subtle and reminiscent of the product placement of McDonald's in the dreadful and cringe-inducing Mac and Me.
Alvin and the Chipmunks (2007)
Directed by Tim Hill
influenced Sonic the Hedgehog (2020), Sonic the Hedgehog 2 (2022)
Plot
And although the final product was essentially just a riff on the live-action Alvin and the Chipmunks , it appealed enough to audiences (or, more likely, children in the audience) that it made more than $300m (£228m) at the global box office.
These high jinks more closely resemble Michael Bay’s Transformers, the live-action Alvin and the Chipmunks, or live-action Scooby-Doo films.
Because while Sonic the Hedgehog is cut from the same bland mold as Garfield (2004), Alvin and the Chipmunks (2007), and The Smurfs (2011), the one thing besides the little blue fur ball that feels most like a relic of the Clinton years is Jim Carrey.
Scriptwriters Patrick Casey and Josh Miller breezily steer Sonic down well-mapped odd-couple and chase-movie highways, with Alvin and the Chipmunks and Easter comedy Hop (also starring Marsden) as signposts.
Live-action comedies which rely overtly on pint-sized CGI mascots don’t exactly have a great standing among audiences or critics – just look at Alvin and the Chipmunks or The Smurfs – but Sonic the Hedgehog is aided enormously by the charmingly daft personality of Sonic himself.
Director Jeff Fowler is making his directorial debut here after having worked on the visual effects for films like “Where the Wild Things Are.” His best moments are when he breaks free from the film’s plot and has fun with the idea of Sonic.
But Jeff Fowler had an animation research job on “Where the Wild Things Are,” so he’s just happy to be here.
Sonic the Hedgehog features the directorial debut of Jeff Fowler, an animator whose credits include Where the Wild Things Are and a number of other projects as part of his company, Blur Studios, which he co-owns with Tim Miller, who recently directed Terminator: Dark Fate .
Newbie director Jeff Fowler (he was a visual effects artist and developer on Spike Jonze’s Where the Wild Things Are ) orchestrates the action rather well, a mid-movie set piece involving an escaping Sonic and Wachowski being chased by one of Dr. Robotnik’s massive robotic machines both imaginative and thrilling at the same time.
Because while Sonic the Hedgehog is cut from the same bland mold as Garfield (2004), Alvin and the Chipmunks (2007), and The Smurfs (2011), the one thing besides the little blue fur ball that feels most like a relic of the Clinton years is Jim Carrey.
Live-action comedies which rely overtly on pint-sized CGI mascots don’t exactly have a great standing among audiences or critics – just look at Alvin and the Chipmunks or The Smurfs – but Sonic the Hedgehog is aided enormously by the charmingly daft personality of Sonic himself.
The Smurfs , Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Road Chip , Hop , it’s been done before.
Instead, the screenwriters Pat Casey and Josh Miller lean on the simple fish-out-of-water setup that drives other recent brand-based kids’ films, such as The Smurfs.
Sonic’s face got sorted out in post-production; after an understandably traumatized reaction to the film’s trailer, Paramount delayed the movie by several months and redesigned the title character so he didn’t look like something that just crawled out James Woods’ TV in Videodrome .
Who Framed Roger Rabbit (1988)
Directed by Robert Zemeckis
influenced Sonic the Hedgehog 2 (2022), Sonic the Hedgehog (2020)
Visuals
From a technical standpoint, Sonic The Hedgehog 2 is fairly impressive in its merging of live-action and animation, a reminder of the technological advancements since the days of Who Framed Roger Rabbit .
Perhaps if the film was completely an animated affair it could have had a loony quality to it, one that isn’t bogged down in this live action/animation hybrid that only makes you realize just how great Who Framed Roger Rabbit really was, or even Pokemon: Detective Pikachu, which shares similarities to Sonic and also had its origins in Japan.
“You’re probably wondering how I got here,” Sonic says, in a nod to Thor: Ragnarok or maybe the 2016 meme or possibly the ancient narrative cliché, but most definitely something the movie’s core audience does not understand.
X-Men: Days of Future Past (2014)
Directed by Bryan Singer
influenced Sonic the Hedgehog (2020)
Visuals
This is especially the case in two notable set pieces that have a very similar hook to ones in X-Men: Days of Future Past and Justice League .
During one pit stop, Sonic embroils himself into a biker bar brawl and Fowler lifts a move from X-Men: Days of Future Past .
There’s more than enough cute here to sell the handful of X-Men: Days of Future Past-influenced chase scenes peppered through the movie.
A fur-based sight gag is pinched from Paddington and a time-lapsing brawl from X-Men: Days of Future Past , but both land with disarming charm and cheek.
Still, it’s not enough to distract from the fact that much of it feels derivative of Quicksilver’s big moment in X-Men: Days Of Future Past .
Guardians of the Galaxy (2014)
Directed by James Gunn
influenced Sonic the Hedgehog 2 (2022)
Characters Themes
Elba truly throws himself into the role of Knuckles, playing the Echidna as a powerful warrior with a mindset similar to Dave Bautista’s take on Drax in the Guardians of the Galaxy films.
Tails hops into the cockpit of a biplane, the Chaos Emeralds shine bright as power-ups and camaraderie between Sonic’s chums quickly binds with a Guardians of the Galaxy-esque charm.
It’s a joy hearing Elba flaunt his underused comedy chops by playing Knuckles as a simple-minded warrior, lacking in wit and self-awareness, even if the shtick is a shade too close to Drax from the “Guardians of the Galaxy” movies.
He’s basically a more kid-friendly version of Drax from Guardians of the Galaxy : a hulking brute driven by revenge but who doesn’t understand sarcasm and empathy.
His Dr. Robotnik is reminiscent of the over-the-top silly characters he famously created in movies like The Mask, Dumb and Dumber , and Ace Ventura: Pet Detective .
When the government becomes alerted to his presence, they set Robotnik on his tail, giving Carrey license to slip into his "The Mask" mode, twirling moustache and all.
And the endlessly game Jim Carrey brings his wacky physical comedy to life here, bringing to mind his work in “The Mask,” “Liar Liar,” and “Ace Ventura: Pet Detective”–more throwbacks.
Carrey’s performance is both entertaining in the style of some of his past roles like “The Mask,” but it’s also another example of the film’s weird disjointed tone.
Jim Carrey gives a campy, goofy performance that channels his characters from The Mask and Ace Ventura with just the same level of energy onscreen.
Marsden’s hapless small-town sheriff with the heart of gold is the laziest of archetypes, and Carrey spends the entire film basically recycling outtakes from the Ace Ventura films, The Mask and Batman Forever .