Sonic Live Action Movie Thread (Read OP for topic rules) "Trailer 2 on Page 482)

[NoKaine]

Just now, Tornado said:

Wow, that's a great defense of how Sonic isn't an incorruptibly purely pure archetype. You sure showed me.

The hell do I need to defend? Like who gives a damn, anyway? Who plays Sonic and thinks Sonic supposed to be some bad ass anti-hero who's supposed to do the somewhat-bad things sometimes? What gave you any indication that Sonic ISN'T super shonen?

1 minute ago, Knight56 said:

It makes sense from a marketing perspective for Sonic to have a rather bland personality. Look at Mario, or Mickey. They can fit any situation they need to for advertising and, in the video games' case, act as a stand-in for the player. Sonic has more personality than usual for this trope, but compared to everyone else in the series, he has one of the least defined for this reason.

Thank you.

[Tornado]

5 minutes ago, NoKaine said:

The hell do I need to defend? Like who gives a damn, anyway? Who plays Sonic and thinks Sonic supposed to be some bad ass anti-hero who's supposed to do the somewhat-bad things sometimes?

I think you should take a closer look at what my original post said before you throw your dick around explaining how much you figured this series out; because now you've made two posts arguing against the opposite of what I said in the first place.

 

 

 

 

Likewise:

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What gave you any indication that Sonic ISN'T super shonen?

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Just because it took you 30 years to notice that Sonic is a shonen game series doesn't mean anything changed. The second game had him turn yellow when he goes Super, but nah, Sonic totally isn't a shonen character...

I know this may be hard to grasp in the face of your 226 posts, but I've been on this forum before there were even three games in the series that were wholesale copies of whatever anime tropes had been popular when the team started development of the game.  I've been on this forum even before they made an entire atrocious shonen-ish anime ripping off previous crappy shonen anime. You're not teaching anyone anything here with this argument, and you'd look significantly less foolish if you stopped acting like you were.

[NoKaine]

6 minutes ago, Tornado said:

I think you should take a closer look at what my original post said before you throw your dick around explaining how much you figured this series out; because now you've made two posts arguing against the opposite of what I said in the first place.

 

 

 

 

Likewise:

I know this may be hard to grasp in the face of your 226 posts, but I've been on this forum before there were even three games in the series that were wholesale copies of whatever anime tropes had been popular when the team started development of the game.  I've been on this forum even before they made an entire atrocious shonen anime ripping off previous shonen anime. You're not teaching anyone anything here, and you'd look significantly less foolish if you stopped acting like you were.

First of all, are you seriously proud of the fact that you have 10k+ posts on the Sonic Stadium Board, presumably complaining that Sonic is "pure" and that's presumably a problem?

Second, Sonic was literally CREATED based on copying whatever was popular around the time. Literally throwing in Michael Jackson, fucking Bill Clinton, fucking Santa Claus; a group of Japanese people going "yeah, this is what Americans like". So nothing new there.

Third, are you really that bothered that Sonic is like anime? Like you have Black Lagoon in your signature (clearly you like both series because they're just so similar) and you're complaining that Sonic is anime?

My argument is 1) Sonic is no more "pure" than any other character who is good, which is most of the cast anyway and 2) what would it matter if he was anyway?

You can't honestly have sit here, on this board, for however long you've been here, with the idea that Sonic, the character in particular, was supposed to have some questionable morals or actions. Yeah, Sonic's fucking Goku. He literally goes Super Saiyan. Who actually cares?

Edited February 16, 2020 by NoKaine

[Diogenes]

I mean on the subject of "pureness"...

40 minutes ago, Indigo Rush said:

Hot take but everything I find wrong with Sonic's personality and writing can be summarized in Sonic Unleashed's later scene where Chip goes on about how Sonic is such a nice guy and that's why darkness doesn't affect him or some nonsense in that general area of flat character tropes.

Such a boring, boring character.

They literally had a game where Sonic got blasted by so much dark energy that he mutated every night, but there's no actual conflict that comes from it because he's just too pure and nice and strong to be affected otherwise.

Nobody's expecting award-winning drama and depth out of these characters but they should at least have enough of a personality that you can tell actual stories about them. Sonic was supposed to have at least a little bit of an edge to him; not "edgy", not morally gray, but not a boy scout either, but that's been sanded down over time and it's made him less interesting.

[Tornado]

1 hour ago, NoKaine said:

First of all, are you seriously proud of the fact that you have 10k+ posts on the Sonic Stadium Board,

Nope. I'm pointing out that your insight as if you discovered some interesting facet of Sonic's personality by pointing out that he is shonen is worthless to this thread and probably anyone in it; but especially to someone who has been on this forum all the way back when Sonic's personality could maybe be considered to not be "Goku with all of the personality flaws removed" and had to suffer through games that with a straight face used "Sonic can never do anything wrong" as the entire justification for the story.

 

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Second, Sonic was literally CREATED based on copying whatever was popular around the time. So nothing new there.

Wow, more never before seen insight.

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Third, are you really that bothered that Sonic is like anime?

Yes, I've never been a fan of shitty, lowest common denominator shonen anime and the tropes they rely on basically as a crutch. I'm certainly not a fan of the bad copies Sonic Team frequently employed for the stories of their games. Being "like anime" in general, however, is fine and almost certainly unavoidable regardless.

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Like you have Black Lagoon in your signature (clearly you like both series because they're just so similar) and you're complaining that Sonic is anime?

Yes, a sienen anime which is both incredibly cynical in a way that is about as far away from shitty, lowest denominator shonen as possible (though perhaps more broadly somewhat of a "generic sienen" tone), and also very stylized and violent.

My avatar is of Natsumi from You're Under Arrest, which is a slice of life , arguably shoujo series that is also a fair bit away from shitty, lowest denominator shonen.

My title refers to Asuka from Neon Genesis Evangelion, which doesn't need a description here to note how different it is from something like later season Bleach.

If you are familiar with the characters in question you might even see some common threads between them.

 

 

 

Any more psychoanalysis that you'd like to do? I had a High Elf Archer avatar before this one. What does that say?

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My argument is 1) Sonic is no more "pure" than any other character who is good, which is most of the cast anyway

And I've already noted that that's fucking absurd, since one of your examples of who he is only slight more pure than is someone who tried to kill everyone on the planet twice and another one whose entire point was "furry Fujiko."

 

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and 2) what would it matter if he was anyway?

Because it's boring to have a character who is so flawless that even his perfection is used as a plot point to prove he can win. It would be a bit boring even if the games were competent at storytelling otherwise; but since they almost never are it sticks out like mad even when they aren't outright telling us how amazing and great Sonic is like Unleashed did. It's a large reason why the first season of Star Trek TNG was so awful as a point of comparison; and Sonic has been written better than that several times (notably virtually every time someone other than Sonic Team has written him but also in some games too), hence me asking in a joking matter if that's how he acts in the movie.

 

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You can't honestly have sit here, on this board, for however long you've been here, with the idea that Sonic, the character in particular, was supposed to have some questionable morals or actions.

You should probably get a handle of what incorruptible pure pureness means before you preach about hypocrisy. I can happily sit here and talk about the lack of Sonic media actually showing Sonic to have character flaws (which used to mean his ego, and his impatience, and sometimes even arrogance occasionally getting the better of his judgement) without jumping to mean that he has to go around "snapping necks" or having his games end in allegories for the trolley problem.

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Yeah, Sonic's fucking Goku.

No, Goku actually does have questionable morals and actions. In-universe he was even called on them multiple times; and the basis of a multiple arcs have been about the fallout of his weird moral system (which favors getting in fights and being strong over actual justice and safety of others). He hasn't been incorruptibly purely pure since probably halfway through the Freiza saga, which was an arc that was effectively over before Sonic 1 even came out. Goku thinks he is and other characters tend to treat him like he is and he doesn't have any actual moral problems when it comes to general character interactions, but it's been clear for decades (possibly even "30 years") that that's not the actual driving factor behind his actions and the difference between the ideal and the real personality has been part of the narrative of the franchise.

 

 

Sonic rarely rises to that level in the games; just like the bad Vegeta clone Shadow is sometimes written as rarely rises to the level of the actual inspiration. And, at least the way he's typically used in the games if not in personality, he's more like "Fast Wesley Crusher" than "Hedgehog Goku"

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Who actually cares?

It certainly seems to have bothered you a bit.

[StaticMania]

12 minutes ago, Diogenes said:

They literally had a game where Sonic got blasted by so much dark energy that he mutated every night, but there's no actual conflict that comes from it because he's just too pure and nice and strong to be affected otherwise.

They could've probably done something interesting if they went the other direction and people were actually scared of him...

Nobody really seems to care when he's in Werehog form, they're mildly surprised at best...

2 basic story ideas wasted in favor of a story that was somehow even more basic.

[Wraith]

Pretty much nobody likes how Sonic Unleashed chose not to follow up on the Werehog narrative so I don't get why it's being treated as a hot take. That's been one of the most common criticisms of the game since 2008.

I'd honestly argue that Sonic has always been kind of a straight edge anyway though. If you think he'd be more interesting if he wasn't that then fair but he's always been a fairly upstanding dude that only ever fought people that were unambiguously evil. The pure chosen one status has been a thing since Sonic 3.

His status as a rebel was mostly fluff in promo material and not featured much at all in the games. 

[Ryannumber1gamer]

I still commit to how Archie handled Sonic transforming into the Werehog, which was based on Sonic’s flaws specifically. Sonic was corrupted by Dark Gaia like anyone else, but it personally messed with his character flaws by transforming his world view into a twisted mess, and making anyone around him look like monsters.

More than that, everything that a person said was a taunt, or insult towards Sonic, which thanks to Sonic’s ego, caused him to get pissed off and start attacking Mighty, Tails, Sally and Amy without stopping to think about the circumstances and why his friends would start suddenly insulting the hell out of him. 

[Solister]

This is something which is bugging me. Not actually a spoiler (If there's any in this movie aside you know what), but maybe people, like me, want every single detail as they watch the movie for the first time.

Spoiler

You know something which bugs me in the movie? The stop time control scene.

AFAIK, Sonic doesn't have any ability to control time (yet) so those scenes (On the bar is the first which comes in my mind, not sure if there was another) really left me with a question mark in my head. I even though on Chaos Control, but there were not even Chaos Emeralds in the movie (In fact, where the hell they went? Not in Forces and not in the movie?).

But yeah, I can't find a logic explanation for this. Except if it was in slow motion and Sonic was so fast which looked he was in normal speed and people's usual velocity was so slow which barely look they were millimeter moving

And if anyone's going to reply me, please use quote button because it's been really hard to keep up with this topic. (By this, I'll receive a notification direct to your reply).

[Ryannumber1gamer]

3 minutes ago, Solister said:

This is something which is bugging me. Not actually a spoiler (If there's any in this movie aside you know what), but maybe people, like me, want every single detail as they watch the movie for the first time.

  Hide contents

You know something which bugs me in the movie? The stop time control scene.

AFAIK, Sonic doesn't have any ability to control time (yet) so those scenes (On the bar is the first which comes in my mind, not sure if there was another) really left me with a question mark in my head. I even though on Chaos Control, but there were not even Chaos Emeralds in the movie (In fact, where the hell they went? Not in Forces and not in the movie?).

But yeah, I can't find a logic explanation for this. Except if it was in slow motion and Sonic was so fast which looked he was in normal speed and people's usual velocity was so slow which barely look they were millimeter moving

And if anyone's going to reply me, please use quote button because it's been really hard to keep up with this topic. (By this, I'll receive a notification direct to your reply).

Spoiler

He isn’t stopping time, he’s running so fast that time has slowed for him. It’s better to think of it as us seeing how Sonic perceives the world when he’s running in hyper-speed, while to everyone else, Sonic was just so insanely fast that everything that happened, happened within the blink of an eye.

 

[Indigo Rush]

10 minutes ago, Solister said:

This is something which is bugging me. Not actually a spoiler (If there's any in this movie aside you know what), but maybe people, like me, want every single detail as they watch the movie for the first time.

  Reveal hidden contents

You know something which bugs me in the movie? The stop time control scene.

AFAIK, Sonic doesn't have any ability to control time (yet) so those scenes (On the bar is the first which comes in my mind, not sure if there was another) really left me with a question mark in my head. I even though on Chaos Control, but there were not even Chaos Emeralds in the movie (In fact, where the hell they went? Not in Forces and not in the movie?).

But yeah, I can't find a logic explanation for this. Except if it was in slow motion and Sonic was so fast which looked he was in normal speed and people's usual velocity was so slow which barely look they were millimeter moving

And if anyone's going to reply me, please use quote button because it's been really hard to keep up with this topic. (By this, I'll receive a notification direct to your reply).

It's really just their way of showing how fast he is. It's one way other speed-centric heroes (Flash, Quicksilver) are portrayed in media.

[Kuzu]

Sonic, at least as far as Japan characterizes him, has always just been a laidback Adventurer. If that's "boring" to you, then fine, but that is his personality as far as the games are concerned. If you find it annoying that the series resembles common Shonen tropes, well hey guess what demographic Shonen is? Hint: Its not the age of most of the people complaining about it on this site.

Sonic's always been written differently on American soil, probably because the writers knew Japanese Shonen tropes probably wouldn't be interesting to American audiences. Sonic's "edge" is an entirely Western creation, and that's mostly why they've defaulted that characterization for the games as of late.

 

Even in this movie, Sonic resembles a typical animated character who just wants to be acknowledged and loved rather than the confident and selfassured hero he is in the games. And that's fine, I liked it even. But the fact remains, it's an entirely different take on the character from the norm.

[Wraith]

9 minutes ago, Kuzu said:

 

Sonic's always been written differently on American soil, probably because the writers knew Japanese Shonen tropes probably wouldn't be interesting to American audiences. .

They clearly are though, going by Shonen's continued popularity here. They're broadly appealing. 

[ShadowSJG]

I wonder how baby sonic looked predesign

[Kuzu]

11 minutes ago, Wraith said:

They clearly are though, going by Shonen's continued popularity here. They're broadly appealing. 

Nowadays sure, but that's because the cultural gap is smaller than in the 90's. Remember how "americanized" Anime had become when they were brought over to the US?

And even then, Shonen is primarily popular among the target demographic of teenagers as they're usually the ones raving about it on social media. 

Series like Dragon Ball have the benefit of newer fans coming with products like Super, and the older who are still around for the sake of nostalgia.

 

Sonic is kind of different though, as its Shonen anime elements are mainly popular among the crowd of fans who likely came in when Sonic Adventure 2 was ported to Gamecube (Like me :V) Given most people on site are pushing 30 and above, I'd imagine most people complaining about him being a "boring" Shonen hero are ones who grew up with his American personality and never cared for the Shonen influence at all. (Or more negatively, actively see it as a hinderance)

[Wraith]

Just now, Kuzu said:

Sonic is kind of different though, as its Shonen anime elements are mainly popular among the crowd of fans who likely came in when Sonic Adventure 2 was ported to Gamecube (Like me :V) Given most people on site are pushing 30 and above, I'd imagine most people complaining about him being a "boring" Shonen hero are ones who grew up with his American personality and never cared for the Shonen influence at all.

Gonna go out on a limb here and suggest that perhaps Sega shouldn't be concerned with what 30 year olds think of this franchise anyway. 

[Scritch the Cat]

19 minutes ago, Kuzu said:

Sonic, at least as far as Japan characterizes him, has always just been a laidback Adventurer. If that's "boring" to you, then fine, but that is his personality as far as the games are concerned. If you find it annoying that the series resembles common Shonen tropes, well hey guess what demographic Shonen is? Hint: Its not the age of most of the people complaining about it on this site.

Sonic's always been written differently on American soil, probably because the writers knew Japanese Shonen tropes probably wouldn't be interesting to American audiences. Sonic's "edge" is an entirely Western creation, and that's mostly why they've defaulted that characterization for the games as of late.

 

Even in this movie, Sonic resembles a typical animated character who just wants to be acknowledged and loved rather than the confident and selfassured hero he is in the games. And that's fine, I liked it even. But the fact remains, it's an entirely different take on the character from the norm.

There’s maybe some truth to that, but it also is missing some nuance.  Some early concept art by Naoto Oshima also gave Sonic a bit of an edge, with Shadow-like angular eyes, fangs, and of course, Madonna.  SEGA of America initially made Sonic LESS edgy when they got ahold of him; getting rid of all those things and only ever drawing him with one smiling expression.  It’s merely the marketing that played the idea of edgy Sonic back up.  Granted, Sonic’s Japanese portrayal didn’t retain those original ideas either, except that Sonic was still allowed to have multiple expressions.  But edginess isn’t alien to Japanese culture, and certainly not to Shonen literature.  There are heroic but still edgy examples of “Japanese delinquents”, Kunio Kun being the best known in video games.

[Kuzu]

3 minutes ago, Wraith said:

Gonna go out on a limb here and suggest that perhaps Sega shouldn't be concerned with what 30 year olds think of this franchise anyway. 

They probably shouldn't be concerned with us 20 something year olds either on the flipside. That said, I vastly prefer the Shonen influence cuz that's just the weaboo in me at work.

5 minutes ago, Scritch the Cat said:

There’s maybe some truth to that, but it also is missing some nuance.  Some early concept art by Naoto Oshima also gave Sonic a bit of an edge, with Shadow-like angular eyes, fangs, and of course, Madonna.  SEGA of America initially made Sonic LESS edgy when they got ahold of him; getting rid of all those things and only ever drawing him with one smiling expression.  It’s merely the marketing that played the idea of edgy Sonic back up.  Granted, Sonic’s Japanese portrayal didn’t retain those original ideas either, except that Sonic was still allowed to have multiple expressions.  But edginess isn’t alien to Japanese culture, and certainly not to Shonen literature.  There are heroic but still edgy examples of “Japanese delinquents”, Kunio Kun being the best known in video games.

Well even Japanese material refrain from calling Sonic traditionally heroic too. He's described as someone who doesn't go around for the sake of saving people. He's primarily an adventurer who just happens to save people along the way.

That's "edgy" by Eastern standards.

[Tornado]

That's so strange, because Adventure 2 (and to a lesser extent the original) were absolutely games that wore their anime influences proudly, but also absolutely were not games that had Sonic acting like a piece of wood with a moral compass. It's almost as if when I said

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which used to mean his ego, and his impatience, and sometimes even arrogance occasionally getting the better of his judgement

I wasn't referring to whatever the hell SoA was doing at any given time of the week before 1999, and was in fact referring to the very same game that brought so many people into the franchise with its jump to Gamecube; where Sonic absolutely had character flaws, and they caused him to act out in ways that weren't in everyone's best interests, and were even exploited against him in the game!

 

 

 

Sonic being a shonen-type hereo in a shonen-type franchise does not mean that the extent of the effort put into having a character driven narrative is having a collection of shonen bits thrown at a wall and picking and choosing from the ones that stick.

[Eskana]

Wow, I came on here to celebrate because I liked the movie, it didn't totally flop, and it's making box office records which hopefully means that they can have Tails and Knuckles in future movies....  (C'mon guys, the Sonic franchise sees little enough success!)

 

In response to some of the posts not liking Sonic's characterization, I think it just reflects the fact that this is just-starting-out Sonic. A "Sonic Begins," if you will. And I really loved the parts where that came out, like the "I'll do anything to protect my friends" bit. That's classic Sonic, because what does he do? He runs fast, collects rings, fights Robotnik... but at the end of the day, it's to protect his friends. So to me, that's what they got right. They can't have the 90s too-cool-for-school vibe as much any more because it's not the 90s. But the friendship thing? That's classic Sonic.

 

 

[Ryannumber1gamer]

I'll give the movie this in terms of humour

Spoiler

It's about the one and only time an official product used the Sanic meme that actually made me laugh for the fact I wasn't actually expecting it at all.

 

[Kuzu]

17 minutes ago, Tornado said:

That's so strange, because Adventure 2 (and to a lesser extent the original) were absolutely games that wore their anime influences proudly, but also absolutely were not games that had Sonic acting like a piece of wood with a moral compass. It's almost as if when I said

I wasn't referring to whatever the hell SoA was doing at any given time of the week before 1999, and was in fact referring to the very same game that brought so many people into the franchise with its jump to Gamecube; where Sonic absolutely had character flaws, and they caused him to act out in ways that weren't in everyone's best interests, and were even exploited against him in the game!

 

 

 

Sonic being a shonen-type hereo in a shonen-type franchise does not mean that the extent of the effort put into having a character driven narrative is having a collection of shonen bits thrown at a wall and picking and choosing from the ones that stick.

I just want to say that generally, when Sonic's character is flat or downplayed, its usually when he's not the focus of the story and someone else takes center stage, or generally when Sonic has to share the spotlight with other main players.

Since Unleashed was kind of the example we brought up; that game is more about Chip than it is about Sonic if we're being perfectly honest.

[DryLagoon]

1 hour ago, Ryannumber1gamer said:

I still commit to how Archie handled Sonic transforming into the Werehog, which was based on Sonic’s flaws specifically. Sonic was corrupted by Dark Gaia like anyone else, but it personally messed with his character flaws by transforming his world view into a twisted mess, and making anyone around him look like monsters.

I haven't read much of the comics, but this sounds interesting, do you know what issues that storyline is in?

[Ryannumber1gamer]

Just now, DryLagoon said:

I haven't read much of the comics, but this sounds interesting, do you know what issues that storyline is in?

Issue #264 to #267 - the Control and Ambushed arcs.

You can find it recollected in Graphic Novel form in Sonic The Hedgehog Vol 4 - Control.

[UpCDownCLeftCRightC]

I....loved Sonic's characterization in this movie? Still the same character, if only with a younger, inexperienced, more cutesy portrayal. Which worked great for this movie.