The Sonic the Hedgehog movie smashed box office expectations, going on to be the highest-grossing video game movie in North America despite its rocky development. Fans expressed their displeasure for the original Sonic design, and the voice of Sonic in the film, Ben Schwartz, has some thoughts on the whole debacle as well.
Sonic seemed destined to suffer further damage to his already diminished reputation when the first trailer for the movie dropped and was universally panned. Listening to that feedback and redesigning the character helped turn around the fortunes of the oft-maligned blue hedgehog, who has been beset with a patchy catalogue of work in recent years.
Ben Schwartz, the voice of Sonic, was one of those fans who were less than impressed with the design. Schwartz is no stranger to the video game world, having appeared on YouTube channel GameGrumps and advocating for Nintendo to include more NES and SNES games on the Switch, and in a recent interview admits the original design didn't mesh with the image in his head. Careful to not completely trash the original design, Schwartz says "when I saw the first one I was like ok, but when I saw the second one I was like this is, in my head, what the little guy looks like."
According to Schwartz, the production team didn't know if the first trailer would really matter, but as word spread, and the dislikes poured in they realized "oh, people care a lot. Let's look at this and figure it out." Schwartz saw the backlash ultimately as a positive, showing fans passion for the character and the movie.
With theaters closed due to the ongoing pandemic, Paramount announced it would move up the home release of the film. Fans that missed a chance to check out the redesign, and listen to Schwartz' voice work, are able to do so, and finally wipe that original design from their minds forever.
Sonic the Hedgehog is now available for digital download.
Source: Cinemablend