Film Review - Sonic the Hedgehog 3 (2024)

Sonic the Hedgehog 3 is the third film series and once again directed by Jeff Fowler who directed the first two films and Ben Schwartz, Collenn O’Shaughnessy and Idris Elba voice Sonic, Tails and Knuckles as they head to Tokyo to confront the recently escaped Shadow (Keanu Reeves) and not one but TWO Dr Robotniks both played by Jim Carrey and when its double your villains it can be double trouble.

Sonic 3 was the movie I was keen to go and see the most in a cinema since Dune Part Two back at the end of February as I am a big fan of the first two films which like the Paddington and Despicable Me films are the top film franchises for families right now, they both have heart, good natured humour, exciting action and fun villains, the kind of family entertainment that Disney has seriously dropped the ball in delivering recently but the third film in a series is more often than not the worst and even having the same creative team involved doesn’t guarantee a bucking of that trend (see X-Men Apocalypse, Spider-Man 3 and the Dark Knight Rises.)

But Sonic 3 avoids this and does indeed buck that trend as I was very impressed with this movie and a lot of that credit has to go to Fowler and his writing team in Pat Casey, Josh Miller and John Wittington who also wrote the second film in 2022 and this time it feels like they are working together better as a team as this film avoids the exposition dumps that bogged down Sonic 2 at times as well as balancing the heart, humour, action and emotion and third time around this movie feels like a great amalgamation of the best elements of the first 2 films:

- The tight storytelling and Jim Carrey flailing his limbs around of the first film
- The character/story/world expansion and high-speed action of the second film

And that really shines here as it clips along at a good pace while keeping the exposition dumps to a minimum and this creative team is now a much more well honed machine that it can do this without having the storytelling feel like a bunch of stuff strung together by action scenes and the action here is very good as it was in the last film and in a very very refreshing way the action here is properly lit and edited and doesn’t feel like it was all done on a green screen stage or shot through a fog filter on the camera as that has gotten so so so tiresome to see over and over and over again.

Also shining is the cast, the Team Sonic trio play off each other very well be it Schwartz’s humour, Elba’s straight man or O’Shaughnessy’s lovable tech nerd and at times this trinity is tested but you are invested in them same with James Marsden (and watching him here will make you resent all the more how dirty he was done as Cyclops in the X-Men films) and Tika Sumpter as Team Sonic’s parents who are as good as they were in the first 2 films and still have good chemistry together, I also enjoyed seeing Kristen Ritter in a small role as well.

But this movie belongs to two people and the first of those is Reeves as Shadow, this character is a big fan favourite and Reeves delivers very good voice work as a character who’s life mirrors Sonic’s and takes the film into some darker directions which could’ve bogged the film down but thankfully doesn’t.

Then there’s Jim Carrey who plays Dr Robotnik and his grandfather Gerald and he is simply glorious here, one scene in particular was very very funny and like the first two films this team understands the magic of Jim Carrey and how he can make you laugh with nothing more than the frantic flailing of his limbs.

However the more I have thought about this movie since seeing the more I find myself wishing that this was the last Sonic film mainly because this team pulled off the impossible, a trilogy of films where each film built on the last and didn’t drop the ball in terms of the quality as well as taking the story to the highest heights you can go to without it feeling like where Dragon Ball went where the power scaling got so far over the top it made it boring to watch and the only way to go after here is down and I’ve seen that happen too often with many franchises nowadays that I want some to just end and be gone and this is now one of them.

Guys you made a great trilogy of films, why not quit now while your ahead and go out on top, there’s nothing wrong with that.

And so that was Sonic 3 and this trilogy of films has been terrific with great action, villains, characters, humour and emotional moments, I wish all involved had made this the finale and left it at here because it won’t get this good again, 4 and a half out of 5.