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Sonic the Hedgehog 3 (film)

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Sonic the Hedgehog 3
Theatrical release poster
Directed byJeff Fowler
Screenplay by
Story by
  • Pat Casey
  • Josh Miller
Based onSonic the Hedgehog
by Sega[a]
Produced by
Starring
CinematographyBrandon Trost
Edited byAl LeVine
Music byTom Holkenborg
Production
companies
Distributed byParamount Pictures
Release date
  • December 20, 2024 (2024-12-20)
Countries
  • United States
  • Japan
LanguageEnglish

Sonic the Hedgehog 3[b] is an upcoming action-adventure comedy film based on the video game series published by Sega. The sequel to Sonic the Hedgehog (2020) and Sonic the Hedgehog 2 (2022), It is directed by Jeff Fowler and written by Pat Casey, Josh Miller, and John Whittington, based on a story by Casey and Miller. Jim Carrey, Ben Schwartz, Natasha Rothwell, Shemar Moore, James Marsden, Tika Sumpter, and Idris Elba reprise their roles with Krysten Ritter and Keanu Reeves joining the cast. In the film, Sonic, Tails, and Knuckles ally with Dr. Robotnik to defeat a new enemy, Shadow the Hedgehog.

Plans for a third Sonic the Hedgehog film were announced in February 2022 during ViacomCBS's investor event before the release of the second film. Due to the 2023 SAG-AFTRA strike, filming for animated characters began in July 2023 in Surrey, England, while filming with physical actors began in November of that year in London, with production concluding by March 2024. The film draws inspiration from the video game Sonic Adventure 2 (2001).

Sonic the Hedgehog 3 is scheduled to be theatrically released by Paramount Pictures in the United States on December 20, 2024.

Premise

Sonic, Tails and Knuckles face a powerful and mysterious new adversary, Shadow the Hedgehog. The trio forms an unlikely alliance with Dr. Robotnik in hopes of stopping Shadow and protecting the planet.[4]

Cast

Main article: List of Sonic the Hedgehog characters

Voice cast

Live-action cast

Additionally, Sofia Pernas, Cristo Fernández, James Wolk, and Jorma Taccone were cast in undisclosed roles.[5]

Production

Development

In March 2020, James Marsden confirmed that he had signed on for multiple sequels to Sonic the Hedgehog (2020).[17] In February 2022, Sega Sammy Group and Paramount Pictures had been developing a third film after Sonic the Hedgehog 2 (2022). It was formally announced during ViacomCBS's investor event.[18] Jeff Fowler returned as director, and Neal H. Moritz, Toby Ascher, Toru Nakahara, and Hitoshi Okuno returned as producers.[19] Haruki Satomi, Shuji Utsumi, Yukio Sugino, Fowler, Tommy Gormley, and Tim Miller served as executive producers.[20] Pat Casey, Josh Miller, and John Whittington returned to write the screenplay, with the former two also being credited for the story.[20] Paul Greenberg and Oren Uziel received off-screen additional literary material credit.[21] In addition, a spin-off television series for Paramount+, Knuckles, was developed simultaneously with the film.[18] The film will draw inspiration from the video games Sonic Adventure 2 (2001) and Shadow the Hedgehog (2005).[22][23]

In April 2022, Jim Carrey–who portrays Dr. Robotnik in the films–announced that he was considering retiring from acting.[24] With his possible retirement, Moritz and Ascher confirmed that his role as Robotnik would not be recast in any sequels if he followed through with his retirement plans. However, they remained hopeful that they could develop scripts good enough for him to continue the role.[25] Carrey conceded, requiring that "the angels bring some sort of script that's written in gold ink that says to me that it's going to be really important for people to see" if he were to continue.[26]

Filming and casting

Prior to his casting as the voice of Shadow, Keanu Reeves was a popular fancast for the role after the character's cameo in the preceding film.[27][28]

Second-unit filming began in late July 2023 for animated characters only without physical actors (due to the 2023 SAG-AFTRA strike) in Farnham, Surrey, England.[29] Principal photography was originally scheduled to begin on August 31, 2023, in London, England,[30][31] but was delayed to September.[32] Production with physical actors started on November 29, 2023, and was announced with a teaser image of Shadow the Hedgehog's stand-in statue used in filming.[33] Brandon Trost returns as cinematographer.[12] Luke Freeborn was production designer.[12]

In February 2024, Carrey was confirmed to be reprising his role,[19] along with Marsden, Ben Schwartz, Tika Sumpter, Colleen O'Shaughnessey, Idris Elba, Lee Majdoub, and Tom Butler.[5] Krysten Ritter, Alyla Browne, James Wolk, Sofia Pernas, Cristo Fernández, and Jorma Taccone were cast in undisclosed roles;[5] Taccone was previously hired as an episode director for the Knuckles series.[34] On February 16, Browne's role was revealed as Maria.[15] Schwartz began recording for the film by the week after.[35]

Marsden said that filming had been completed by March 14, 2024,[36] while Fowler officially revealed that the film had wrapped production on March 29.[37] On April 15, 2024, it was reported that Keanu Reeves had joined the cast as the voice of Shadow.[6] Fowler said that Reeves "would just give us so many different versions of line readings and just want to keep going" during voice recording and said he put more into his performance than "just sort of showing up and reading the script into a microphone", both understanding their vision for the film and realizing his interpretation of Shadow.[10]

Post-production

As a cost-cutting measure, the producers had an in-house animation team at Paramount work on both Sonic the Hedgehog 3 and the Knuckles series.[38] Al LeVine serves as editor.[12] According to Ascher, the team "made an investment in the Sonic assets and [...] built them in-house," then distributed them to the several different vendors, which he noted was comparatively different from previous installments where "usually the vendor controls the assets that they rig." Owning the assets also allowed for their in-house team to work exclusively on Sonic the Hedgehog 3 and Knuckles, and helped the production "keep costs down and move faster."[38] Fowler emphasized the need for visual continuity between the projects and cited good communication as being key to achieving this.[38]

Music

Tom Holkenborg, who composed the score for the first two Sonic films, returned to score Sonic the Hedgehog 3[39] and had finished work by July 2024.[40] In December 2023, Crush 40 vocalist Johnny Gioeli said there had been talks of including "Live & Learn", the theme song from Sonic Adventure 2.[41] In February 2024, Gioeli confirmed "Live & Learn" would be included in the film.[42]

Release

Sonic the Hedgehog 3 is scheduled to be released theatrically in the United States by Paramount Pictures on December 20, 2024, taking over the original release date of The Smurfs Movie (2025).[43] It will release in the United Kingdom a day later on December 21.[44]

Marketing

In April 2024 at CinemaCon, Paramount showcased first-look footage of the film, which featured a heavier Robotnik bemoaning his current state before his assistant Agent Stone informs that "they found him", and Sonic, Tails, and Knuckles fighting a silent Shadow.[45] In July, a popcorn bucket and action figures produced by Jakks Pacific were leaked online.[46] On August 25, the first official tease of Keanu Reeves's involvement as Shadow was posted to the film's TikTok account, which referenced the actor's mention in the first film, captioned "foreSHADOWing".[47] Beginning at that time, images of the film's characters were projected on buildings in locations globally in promotion of the film's first trailer,[48] which released on August 27 alongside a teaser poster.[49] Reeves's role was considered the most prominent feature in the trailer.[7][50][51] IGN observed that "Keanu Reeves is very much in Keanu Reeves mode here",[4] and Vulture likened the actor's moody and vengeful portrayal of Shadow to a John Wick performance.[52] Both Ash Parrish of The Verge and Paul Tassi of Forbes agreed that Reeves's voice was satisfactory, and Parrish also noted Maria's reveal, anticipating how the film would adapt her fate.[16][7]

On the opening weekend of Paramount's Transformers One, posters of Shadow were raffled to the first 300 attendees at select theaters, with Reeves signing a limited quantity of them.[53] The video game Shadow Generations, set to be released in October 2024, will receive additional downloadable content based on the film on December 12. The "Sonic the Hedgehog 3 Movie Pack" DLC will include an additional level set in Tokyo, as it appears in the film, along with a cosmetic skin for Shadow based on his movie appearance. Reeves reprises his voice role for the downloadable content.[54][55] By October, the Jakks Pacific toy merchandise was released.[56] In commemoration of Halloween, a 10-second clip from the film of Shadow saying "boo" was posted on social media.[57] On November 4, a promotional still image of Shadow was released by Fandango.[58]

Future

In September 2024, producer Toby Ascher stated intent for additional installments in the franchise following the release of Sonic the Hedgehog 3.[59]

See also

Notes

  1. ^ Sonic the Hedgehog was developed by Sonic Team, published by Sega, directed and programmed by Yuji Naka, designed by Hirokazu Yasuhara, and illustrated by Naoto Ohshima.[1][2]
  2. ^ Known in Japan as Sonic x Shadow TOKYO MISSION (Japanese: ソニック × シャドウ TOKYO MISSION（トーキョー・ミッション）, Hepburn: Sonikku x Shadō TOKYO MISSION)[3]

References

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