Sonic the Hedgehog 2 is a extremely anticipated film for a lot of causes. This movie isn’t solely an enormous deal for online game followers of the fast-talking Sega mascot, but in addition for anybody wanting a sequel to 2020’s Sonic the Hedgehog, which is by far one of many higher online game films to return out within the final thirty years.
Within the mid-90s, nevertheless, Sonic was initially speculated to star in a very totally different live-action/animated hybrid movie that will tie right into a canceled entry in his long-running online game franchise. Whereas writer Luke Owen already wrote about this film in his 2017 historical past ebook , we’re right here to investigate the small print from the making of Sonic the Hedgehog: Wonders of the World and decide if the ultimate product would’ve even been good.
The place did all of it start?
Early growth for this Sonic film started in 1992 when Sega of America employed Marvel’s Michealene Risley as director of leisure and shopper merchandise. After placing a cope with ABC to supply two animated Sonic reveals, Risley thought the following step ahead was to deliver Sega’s flagship character to the massive display. Though this concept acquired pushback from Sega of America’s CEO Tom Kalinske, who believed that dangerous online game films like Tremendous Mario Bros. may trigger main injury to their respective manufacturers, the corporate nonetheless moved ahead with a feature-length Sonic movie and partnered with each MGM and Trilogy Leisure in August 1994 to make it occur.
Risley then requested screenwriter Richard Jefferies to pitch a Sonic film. Jefferies’ previous works embrace the 1992 horror-comedy The Vagrant and an unproduced Silver Surfer film. Risley had labored with Jefferies on the latter, so which will clarify why he was her first alternative to put in writing a Sonic film. What makes this mission much more fascinating is that Sega wished this film to tie into and launch alongside their upcoming online game, Sonic X-Treme. Whereas video video games that tie into films are nothing new, a film tying right into a online game is nearly remarkable–even to this present day. However, Jefferies consulted with a number of members from the Sega Technical Institute, together with lead programmer Yuji Naka, when writing the therapy for Sonic the Hedgehog: Wonders of the World.
What would the film have been about?
Most individuals would count on a Sonic film to revolve round Sonic, however that’s solely half the reality for Sonic the Hedgehog: Wonders of the World. As an alternative, Jefferies’ script largely issues a 12-year-old youngster of divorce named Josh Pinski, who wants to complete his faculty paper on a pace barrier-breaking check pilot named Sonic by the following morning or else “his mother and father shall be known as in.”
Josh’s dad is an excellent but unemployed laptop skilled named Hal who has invented an AI laptop able to projecting holograms known as the eXtremely Radical Intelligence or XRI (this film was written within the ’90s, in any case). Going in opposition to his father’s needs, Josh asks the XRI to complete his paper, however the XRI doesn’t acknowledge the identify Sonic. As an alternative of giving background information on the check pilot, Josh plugs in his Sega Saturn and begins enjoying Sonic X-Treme. This causes the XRI to move Sonic into the actual world alongside Dr. Robotnik and his goons.
Robotnik later recruits Hal to make use of the XRI for making a digital actuality theme park. The truth that every part within the park is free attracts the eye of many youngsters on the town, who’re changed with subservient Kinder-Bot replicas whereas the actual youngsters are pressured to dig underneath the town for “the one-in-a-million Chaos Emeralds,” which for some motive exist in the actual world. That is all a part of Robotnik’s plan to make use of the Chaos Emerald-powered XRI to holographically mission the Eight Wonders of the World and reap the earnings–therefore the film’s title.
The third act sees Josh and Sonic lure Robotnik again into the sport world the place he could be defeated. Josh returns to the actual world whereas Sonic stays behind, believing he’s the one one who can defend his world. Hal decides that the XRI is just too harmful to make use of once more however as a substitute of destroying it, Josh merely shops it away someplace, most likely to arrange sequels ought to the primary film show to be successful.
Why was the film canceled?
Jefferies submitted his Sonic script in Might 1995 to largely constructive suggestions from each MGM and Sega. Nonetheless, the latter’s COO Shinobu Toyoda thought that Jefferies ought to change Robotnik with a brand new villain that Sonic followers wouldn’t be acquainted with, whereas Risley fought to maintain Robotnik within the movie. Sadly, MGM broke ties with Sega earlier than the film may proceed growth.
Sega let Jefferies store the script round to different studios, so he introduced it to Dreamworks since he already had connections there. Sadly, the neophyte studio handed on the mission since they have been in search of “a low-priced mental property” and Sonic, who was nonetheless common within the mid-to-late ’90s, was too dear to tackle.
The ultimate nail within the coffin for Sonic the Hedgehog: Wonders of the World was when Sega officially canceled Sonic X-Treme in early 1997. Different causes have been attributed to this film’s implosion, together with artistic variations and cash disputes between MGM and Sega, however even fixing these issues most likely wouldn’t have saved the movie.
Would the film have succeeded?
Despite the fact that the plot particulars for Sonic the Hedgehog: Wonders of the World make it sound like a extra trendy Who Framed Roger Rabbit? (minus the creativity and originality), the film nonetheless could not have labored — not less than not financially. Whereas many concepts from Wonders of the World would carry over into the 2020 Sonic film, together with a totally CG-animated Sonic in the actual world, they might have been a bit too demanding to tug off within the mid-90s. For reference, the primary Toy Story was totally CG-animated and cost $30 million in 1995. Think about how a lot cash a live-action Sonic film with a CG-animated character, which additionally wanted to be launched alongside a Sonic online game, would have price round that point? Additionally, whereas Roger Rabbit was a monetary success in 1988, additional makes an attempt at an analogous live-action/animation hybrid have been met with vital derision and viewers indifference on the field workplace. Bear in mind Cool World?
Fortunately, Sega would have extra success with a Sonic film in 2020, which became the most profitable video game movie to date and spawned a sequel that appears to herald extra components from the sport. Furthermore, Paramount is so assured in 2022’s Sonic the Hedgehog 2 that they’ve already greenlit a 3rd movie in addition to a derivative sequence for his or her Paramount+ streaming service revolving round Idris Elba’s Knuckles the Echidna, who will make his cinematic debut in Sonic the Hedgehog 2. Whereas it’s price questioning what may have been, MGM’s Sonic film died within the Nineteen Nineties in order that Paramount’s Sonic film franchise may stay within the 2020s, when audiences’ tastes, and expertise, may totally understand the potential of a big-screen hedgehog saving the world from a man named Eggman.
Editors’ Selection
