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

[CaptainRobo]

Not the first time that they listen.:

 

What if they working on improving the model, a while ago, before they released the trailer a few days ago.  I doubt that.

[KHCast]

43 minutes ago, Meta77 said:

Why do so many fans in this fandom do this. What's horeshit to one may not be to another. I have coworkers kids in my office that are talking about this. Some seemed interested but noting concrete.  but for them they could very much like it and want to see more. Just like many enjoy ttg. There is no need to sit and say they wanting to see this is just accepting any crap given to them if it's what THEY like.

Okay but then what’s the point of arguing for one’s view on something if you’re just gonna throw back “well someone else likes it probably, everything is subjective!” Sure some may like, for example, Sonic Forces, but if it were to become the standard because it financially pleased Sega, I don’t have to be happy or find that a good thing, just cause somebody else personally loves that formula and wants more. “It’s subjective” is not a platform to build an argument on in this situation.

[Failinhearts]

I at least feel somewhat reassured by the mature, professional response from Jeff Fowler so good on him. This isn't the first time Paramount did this, as I pointed out a while back that Megatron got redesigned after fan backlash for the first Bayformers. So if it worked with ol' Megs, maybe Sonic stands a chance to at least look as well as he does in those posters.

[Marco9966]

It's PR move, probably only gonna fix the eyes, make them a little bigger.

All the animation and rigging is already done, the model can only slightly be changed

[Tara]

I'd be more impressed if they could at least name something some of the more specific complaints that fans have about the designs.  "[We recognize that] you don't like the design" is a pretty broad statement.

[PeterPancake]

7 minutes ago, Failinhearts said:

I at least feel somewhat reassured by the mature, professional response from Jeff Fowler so good on him. This isn't the first time Paramount did this, as I pointed out a while back that Megatron got redesigned after fan backlash for the first Bayformers. So if it worked with ol' Megs, maybe Sonic stands a chance to at least look as well as he does in those posters.

Which ones? He looks the same 

[Detective Kaito]

This is not the first time they've said that.

I don't think they'll make any changes.

[UpCDownCLeftCRightC]

1 hour ago, MadmanRB said:

Well yes because most of us realize this is a mere cash grab movie and nothing more, you are apparently fine with any old horseshit given to you.

If this movie had a walking pile of cow dung in it I guess that would be okay with you.

Face it this is just shit faced Hollywood at it again, another shitty live action video game adaptation along the lines of Double Dragon or the Mario brothers movie but the added crap tastic live action cartoon aspect like the Live action Garfield or live action Alvin and the chipmunks.

 

 

 

I mean, it could be that I dont think this is horseshit too..... shocking, i know.

I definitely have my preferences and standards and wish for sonic to be a particular way, and constantly talk about in this forum and other places. But this doesnt get in the way of that at all, which is why I'm not reacting strongly to it. Most of why I'm a fan of sonic has to do with the videogames, particularly the classic SEGA console era games. But the standards I use to judge videogames are not the same standards i use to judge the movies, particularly when one does not affect the outcome of the other. This movie existing has no effect on whether I get the games I want and why I primarily  patron the franchise. So if it's bad, so what? If it's good, cool, I had a fun time. Again, this is different than a disaster like sonic 06 which threatened the direction of the franchise and the very reason I support it.

In general I'm much more critical of sonic's main series video game outings, because they're the primary representation of the character and direction of the series. Spinoffs are much less important, and movies have almost zero importance. So they can be what they want and I dont care unless it's actually good. Then, great, it worked out.

All the rest of this, in my opinion, is most people not really considering that. Its only important for sonic to fit the mold of what you or I expect, when our idea is threatened by a permanent shift in direction. Most of us diehard fans should be quite familiar with this concept already....classic fans when Sonic Adventure 2 released and it showed a clear divide from the previous era.....Adventure fans when unleashed/colors released....etc. when your franchise's creative direction sharply changes, that's THE reason to raise a stink, because the thing you patron with loyalty is "abandoning" you. But this is disconnected from that entirely, it's a one off thing.

[Pawn]

1 hour ago, PeterPancake said:

Yea, I can't make the edgy PG-13 blockbuster justification anymore because this movie is clearly aimed at small children. And that weakens Tim Miller's excuse for Sonic looking realistic. If your audience is children who don't care about aesthetics and realism, why are you trying to make the character realistic? A cartoony design would have worked a lot better with the type of movie they're trying to make

Because many kids in their target demographic are more likely to think something being realistic makes it cooler. Shadow the Hedgehog was probably enjoyed more by pre-teens than teens, for example, despite the alleged intended audience.

Unfortunately, at the end of the day, it's more of a risk financially to make an effort and produce a good (and faithful) film. It's a shame, because I think Sonic has more going for it than most video game series do. It has a wide appeal among children and adults, well-designed characters, obvious links to the popular superhero genre and lends itself well to comic moments. Perfect ingredients for a fully CGI movie and of course, merchandise. There are enough characters and lore for a talented writer to work with, but nothing so important that couldn't be altered to serve a more story-driven format. We've also seen how incredible Sonic and his world can look, thanks to the pre-rendered animation in Unleashed and beyond. But big budget animated films are relatively rare for a reason and taking any kind of chance on a video game property is not all that attractive to studios after so many failures. Then there's SEGA, who would actually have to take an active role without interfering too much (a balance they rarely seem to get right). Let's not forget how Ubisoft managed to end up with the horrendously boring Assassin's Creed of 2016 despite the talent involved.

While I think Pikachu looks a lot better, I don't think it's a fair comparison when the success of Go likely proved to Hollywood that the franchise could attract as many as adults as children. Pokemon's also proven a multimedia success with anime, movies, trading cards and merchandise in a way that no other video game series has been able to match. It's literally the most successful franchise in the world. Adapting Ash and chums or a more traditional Pokemon story in general might have been a challenge, but they didn't need to, since Detective Pikachu had come along and given them a solid narrative to work with. Sonic was never going to get the same treatment. Very few IPs would.

It fucking sucks, but it's why I'm not too surprised by the result.

EDIT: Went on a slight tangent there, but I wanted to get my thoughts out at some point and this is as good a time as any.

[Eurisko]

Jeff Fowler has confirmed they are changing the design of Sonic , at least they have listened. I’m guessing this is why Aaron missed the livestream 

[Fire-N-Space]

They should call this movie Eggman the Human he's funnier and better looking then Sonic.    

[Pawn]

So it will look slightly less bad. I wouldn't even be surprised if they always intended to reveal an inferior version to make the final look "good" by comparison.

[Ruomarta]

42 minutes ago, FFWF said:

The trailer is far from perfect, but nearly 400k dislikes? I mean, it's not THAT bad people.

But it is nice to see that 48 hours later, the trailer is still #1 trending on YouTube, even above Detective Pikachu!

Also the amount of likes, while overshadowed by dislikes, are still pretty impressive. 248K likes is no small number. And that's not counting the amount of likes on other channels lik

 

You do realize that it was trending for all the wrong freaking reasons, right @Myst?

[CaptainRobo]

The best case scenario is that if they make him look like this.:

 

12 minutes ago, Detective Kaito said:

This is not the first time they've said that.

I don't think they'll make any changes.

BTW, I already make an post about that, before you did. Anyway, yea you probably right, they probably won't make any major changes.

[UpCDownCLeftCRightC]

13 minutes ago, Eurisko said:

Jeff Fowler has confirmed they are changing the design of Sonic , at least they have listened. I’m guessing this is why Aaron missed the livestream 

Wow they're actually.going to do this? Pretty late in the game. 

Who are they going to receive feedback from? 

(Somebody contact naoto please)

The design looked weird to me for sure but I'm struggling to see how they can improve it to meet fan demand in this short of time. Theyve already marketed the movie and character in this way, they cant just swap in a fuzzy modern sonic model now. I dont know how much fixing Sonic's eyes and legs are going to make a difference for people that are already this appalled by it.

I just hope the movie turns out okay. I never want to see a disaster, even when I'm not happy about what I see.

 

 

....Except 06...I was happy that game failed spectacularly. It would've killed sonic for me.

 

[Razule]

9 minutes ago, Pawn said:

So it will look slightly less bad. I wouldn't even be surprised if they always intended to reveal an inferior version to make the final look "good" by comparison.

Maybe the one thing that will change is giving him the white fur patch for the mono-eye illusion.

[Sonic Warrior]

I love Jeff's answer to criticism and this is how professionals should act. I'm glad he's not Josh trank, lol.

 

That being said, it seems he has had feedback for a long time. So, I'm sure this first trailer is showing a old version / draft. The next trailer might show a better design and everyone will say he fixed it after this trailer. Nope, he probably fixed way before the first trailer. 

[Nestor]

To be honest, I'd prioritise altering Sonic's bizarrely proportioned body to something less fugly over altering his face; not sure how much they could do now though.

[Wraith]

Sonic not looking like an undead possum is good, but I hope they don't crack the whip on their vfx team to duct tape this turd in time for November. This movie probably won't be good anyway. It's not worth the effort. 

 

[Failinhearts]

25 minutes ago, PeterPancake said:

Which ones? He looks the same 

It's somewhat minor, but apparent.

The original Megatron was very animalistic and alien, not unlike the Xenomorphs from Alien. This design got quite a lot of backlash.

So they went back to the drawing board and fixed the design to appear more humanoid than alien. And the old design did make it through some promotional material, so it isn't too late for Paramount to change Sonic considering what happened to Megatron.

The only difference here that could cause a problem is that Megatron only appears for the final act of the film compared to Sonic who is there for the whole runtime. So we'll see if they have the time to tweak all the shots necessary.

Graaaanted Megatron is a far more complex model, so I guess it evens out.

[CaptainRobo]

I'm not sure how they can fixed this up, since the damage had been done. They already released 4 posters in one day.

[PeterPancake]

30 minutes ago, Pawn said:

Because many kids in their target demographic are more likely to think something being realistic makes it cooler. Shadow the Hedgehog was probably enjoyed more by pre-teens than teens, for example, despite the alleged intended audience.

Unfortunately, at the end of the day, it's more of a risk financially to make an effort and produce a good (and faithful) film. It's a shame, because I think Sonic has more going for it than most video game series do. It has a wide appeal among children and adults, well-designed characters, obvious links to the popular superhero genre and lends itself well to comic moments. Perfect ingredients for a fully CGI movie and of course, merchandise. There are enough characters and lore for a talented writer to work with, but nothing so important that couldn't be altered to serve a more story-driven format. We've also seen how incredible Sonic and his world can look, thanks to the pre-rendered animation in Unleashed and beyond. But big budget animated films are relatively rare for a reason and taking any kind of chance on a video game property is not all that attractive to studios after so many failures. Then there's SEGA, who would actually have to take an active role without interfering too much (a balance they rarely seem to get right). Let's not forget how Ubisoft managed to end up with the horrendously boring Assassin's Creed of 2016 despite the talent involved.

While I think Pikachu looks a lot better, I don't think it's a fair comparison when the success of Go likely proved to Hollywood that the franchise could attract as many as adults as children. Pokemon's also proven a multimedia success with anime, movies, trading cards and merchandise in a way that no other video game series has been able to match. It's literally the most successful franchise in the world. Adapting Ash and chums or a more traditional Pokemon story in general might have been a challenge, but they didn't need to, since Detective Pikachu had come along and given them a solid narrative to work with. Sonic was never going to get the same treatment. Very few IPs would.

It fucking sucks, but it's why I'm not too surprised by the result.

EDIT: Went on a slight tangent there, but I wanted to get my thoughts out at some point and this is as good a time as any.

Well, hopefully they listen to the complaints and give us something closer to the traditional design. 

 

I hope they get rid of the blue arms 

[Radiant Hero Ike]

This is gonna be horrible for the animators working on this. If it is a big change they'll probably be in crunch time, and I doubt they'd be paid any more than they already are.

If it's a minor change, I'm not sure, as I'm not an animator myself. Maybe it wouldn't take much work to slightly tweak the model. But we've only got 6 months to the release date either way. I'd rather have this design than force animators to try and fix this in such a short amount of time.

On the subject of the movie itself, I enjoyed the trailer and I don't mind the design very much. That's pretty much it. Looking forward to watching it, honestly.

[PaddyFancy]

4 hours ago, Tarnish said:

Being the first ever real Sonic movie, I'm pretty sure most of them would exist purely for that fact either way. Reaction vidoes are all the craze these days.

You’re right but, would the one dominating aspect of all the thumbnails be that same gaping mouth shot if that didn’t stand out from the trailer the way it did?

[Sega DogTagz]

I guess I should do a small victory dance. The collective and pure vitriol for the design en masse has forced a change. However with the good comes the bad - as we are now trusting these revisions to the same people who thought this current model was a good idea in the first place (Marza seems to be less and less involved with this) and without a delay this could turn half the movie into a rush job, which would also not be ideal.

I'm sure Fowler consulted with his CGI people as to what could be changed in what time period. I think he is a co-owner of Blur after all (or something to that effect). He should be pretty plugged into what can be done at this stage of the game.

 

Side note: I saw some of Naka's posts earlier where he expressed disappointment in not being remembered to be included in the film. If thats true, then that is the single biggest, easiest Easter egg opportunity you could whiff on. I hope they get that rectified while they go back to the drawing board on Sonic.