Why Doing a Direct Movie Adaptation of a Sonic Game Won’t Work

[Blueknight V2.0]

9 hours ago, Tarnish said:

Tell that to the Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter movie adaptations that made bucketloads of money.

Also Jurassic Park and The Lost World Jurassic Park.

11 hours ago, Drifting Jack said:

I just think adaptations are boring, if you want the story to be 1:1, it doesn't work, we already know the whole thing, where's the surprise?

Well that's where Ratchet & Clank kind of went as it was an origin story but changed up a few things. Like Dr. Nefarious and Qwarks betrayal.

[Wraith]

7 minutes ago, Skull Leader said:

 

These are things that could be explored using long established character that are already part of Sonic's life and without the need of having to introduce an audience surrogate.

Even if you do want to use an audience surrogate, there are ways to do that more fitting to the series. 

 

Tangle is pretty deliberately introduced as someone who doesn't know any of the other characters but could reasonably keep up with them and fit in with them conceputally and aesthetically. If you really want to do this, actually think about it and do something that makes sense for the franchise. Some of you guys are giving the usual hollywood rules and assumptions that have pretty much only ever put out garbage adaptations way too much credit here and I can't for the life of me figure out why aside from playing devil's advocate.

 

[Diogenes]

17 minutes ago, Josh said:

Even if you go with the assumption that Sonic as a character hasn't changed from the 90s to now,

Less that he hasn't changed at all, more that any changes are arbitrary and directionless. They're not the result of actual character development, they're just differences in writers' interpretations or in the direction of the series.

17 minutes ago, Josh said:

there are entire franchises based around simple, even borderline one note characters and how the tension comes from how they refuse to change even when the world around them is changing. Superhero movies don't really have complex characters and haven't had them for a long time. 

They're not exceptionally complex, but they've still got some kind of arc, some kind of flaw to confront. I don't see how you could do that with a game-accurate Sonic. He's never really been written to have actual flaws or to be challenged in that kind of way.

17 minutes ago, Josh said:

 If you decide to push the character further regardless, you could take the fact that the guy built up a stable set of friends over time and make something out of the idea that it takes a while for him to realize he needs the help of others.

I'm not sure how viable that is for a movie because they can't assume the audience already knows and cares about all those friends. It's like if the MCU had tried to start with The Avengers, it sounds like too much too fast.

17 minutes ago, Josh said:

This has been done countless other times in the franchise, but for a big budget adaptation it's okay to start from square one and go over new ideas for the new audience.

I mean, that's kinda my point, Sonic as-is doesn't have anywhere to go, you've gotta roll back something so he can develop into the Sonic we know and love.

2 minutes ago, Skull Leader said:

What if some of them like Tails and/or Amy feel that Sonic doesn't trust them to be capable to help him during the more dangerous/critical moments? 

That just gets you 5+ years of fans complaining about what a horrible asshole they are.

[Wraith]

5 minutes ago, Diogenes said:

Less that he hasn't changed at all, more that any changes are arbitrary and directionless. They're not the result of actual character development, they're just differences in writers' interpretations or in the direction of the series.

They're not exceptionally complex, but they've still got some kind of arc, some kind of flaw to confront. I don't see how you could do that with a game-accurate Sonic. He's never really been written to have actual flaws or to be challenged in that kind of way.

I'm not sure how viable that is for a movie because they can't assume the audience already knows and cares about all those friends. It's like if the MCU had tried to start with The Avengers, it sounds like too much too fast.

A consistent movie franchise means you can do consistent changes to the character. You're not talking about writers getting the series handed to them years apart from other writers over the long term. You're talking say 3 movies that release a couple of years apart from eachother with generally the same people working on them. 

As for the superhero movie thing, you're kind of giving the writers of those too much credit. Iron Man has gone through the same arc of creating his own nemesis through his hubris and just powering through it without really learning anything like 3 times and Captain America's whole thing is that he wont change even if the world around him does. You could do something like this with Sonic if you're dead set on him being a static character. 

Also, I didn't say that every friend would be in the movie. This is a simple arc you could do with a small group of characters. 

[SenEDDtor Missile]

Couldn’t there be a story where Sonic is faced with a challenge to his ideology or something?  He believes firmly in the idea of freedom, but maybe have groups (GUN?) who believe that control must be absolute because people have shown themselves to not only be hapless without clear rules and order in life, but that if given freedom will abuse it to benefit themselves or disregard the betterment of society. Their prime example is Eggman, who would represent the dark side of freedom, a person who wants to control others and make them bow to him because he hates being subservient to others who he sees as worthless, and wants to create his utopia where he can do whatever he wants with no consequences for his behavior and be praised.

Then major theme questions can be asked: Does anyone deserve freedom? Should people get it even if they don’t? Is controlling everything and everyone else in the name of a better world a good idea? If so, who gets to decide what is right and wrong? What keeps those in control from simply abusing their power?

These are the kinds of things you could get from the series’ theme of freedom vs order, while still providing a challenge to Sonic’s ideals without needing to drastically change him as a character. And maybe in the end Sonic doesn’t really change his stance, but he does gain a Better appreciation for beliefs that drastically differ from his own, while also being more aware of how easy it is for his ideals to be corrupted. Granted this would probably be better for a later story than a starting one, but eh.

[Almar]

3 hours ago, Diogenes said:

Sonic as an actual character, with an arc to go through and some sort of character development, like a protagonist in an actual story.

First off, plenty of successful works that chances are will be better accepted than Sanic Movie have protagonists who don't "develop" and instead are rather static since the story doesn't revolve around them so much as following how they act in their world with its situations. James Bond is one. The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly among other Clint Eastwood cowboy films are others. 

Secondly, your so-called arc so far can be summed up as "Sonic learns how to have empathy by some random OC." That's not Sonic, that's Tony Stark.

3 hours ago, Diogenes said:

Like, by the time Sonic 1 starts, Sonic's basically already completed his growth as a person. He's a cool, confident, and caring dude who's ready, able, and willing to fight the bad guys to protect the innocents. Where does he go from there? What is the internal conflict? How is Sonic going to be different at the end of the movie than he was at the start? Sonic's not exactly a complex or nuanced character, nor is the world around him, and Sega's probably not going to want movie-Sonic to develop in a direction that puts him at odds with their vision for the character, so I really don't see where you could take a Sonic that's ripped straight from the games. 

You seem invested in the notion that Sonic has to revolve around Sonic as some odd melodrama as opposed to his world and its situations. That's the same mindset that got the rest of the core cast turned into cheerleaders depspite some of them being established as about on his level in skill at one point or another.

 

[Diogenes]

4 minutes ago, Almar said:

First off, plenty of successful works that chances are will be better accepted than Sanic Movie have protagonists who don't "develop" and instead are rather static since the story doesn't revolve around them so much as following how they act in their world with its situations. James Bond is one. The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly and Clint Eastwood's cowboy films are another.

I don't actually know those movies well enough to compare, but a movie that's just 90 minutes of a hedgehog fighting a mad scientist with nothing changing and nothing meaningful said doesn't sound like a movie worth making.

4 minutes ago, Almar said:

Secondly, your so-called arc so far can be summed up as "Sonic learns how to have empathy by some random OC." That's not Sonic, that's Tony Stark.

Maybe Sonic Team/Sega could learn a thing or two, then, since the MCU is wildly popular and the Sonic series is dying.

4 minutes ago, Almar said:

You seem invested in the notion that Sonic has to revolve around Sonic as some odd melodrama as opposed to his world and its situations. That's the same mindset that got the rest of the core cast turned into cheerleaders depspite some of them being established as about on his level in skill at one point or another.

Yeah actually wanting to explore Sonic as a character literally ever means I want "odd melodrama" rather than, y'know, actually giving a shit about him as a character. And this has absolutely nothing to do with how the other characters are handled; actually writing an interesting main character doesn't mean all the others have to be trash.

[Skull Leader]

50 minutes ago, Almar said:

First off, plenty of successful works that chances are will be better accepted than Sanic Movie have protagonists who don't "develop" and instead are rather static since the story doesn't revolve around them so much as following how they act in their world with its situations. James Bond is one. The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly among other Clint Eastwood cowboy films are others. 

Another example is the Dredd movie (not the one with Stallone, lol), where the main character remains the same for the most part, having only one little bit of a subtle change by the end after spending the entire film next to a character that believed more in doing the right thing than in just following the law by the book.

Sometimes there are main characters than move at the speed of an iceberg when it comes to development, and Sonic happens to be one of them, which is ironic considering that his thing is speed.

I personally find it much more interesting for Sonic to realize that forming bonds doesn't mean that he has to sacrifice nor compromise his freedom, or how he can count with his friends, even if he is capable of doings things by himself, since they bring things that make his journey much better and memorable than an origin story, especially one detached from the source material since that risks changing how people see a character... For examplem how many would had imagined that Darth Vader was a much more angsty and whiny teen than farmboy Luke?

[Tornado]

On 6/22/2018 at 7:09 AM, Skull Leader said:

I disagree, and think this has more to do with Hollywood's misguided belief that things need to be grounded to our reality or that there has to be some kind of human character as co-protagonist for the audience to relate because apparently, the personalities of the Sonic characters are just not enough to do that.

Isn't it funny how in contrast, the Japanese are much more capable of producing animated feature films based on game properties that actually achieve what the americans just never could: being faithful to the source material.

The Japanese who were in charge of The Chris Show Starring Chris from inception to completion?

 

Let's pump the brakes here asserting that hack writing is any more in tune with source material just because of the country to person who is a hack happens to live in.

[Skull Leader]

1 hour ago, Tornado said:

The Japanese who were in charge of The Chris Show Starring Chris from inception to completion?

 

Let's pump the brakes here asserting that hack writing is any more in tune with source material just because of the country to person who is a hack happens to live in.

You still have the OVA, and outside of the Sonic franchise, they also have much more credit than the western side with how other game franchises have been represented more faithfully than anything Hollywood has ever put out. Heck, they even make animated adaptations of shoot'em up like the Gradius spinoff Salamander.

I also think that there is definitively a different mindset between the Japanese and Hollywood, since the first actually have faith in the source material and know that animation (traditional or CGI) will always work better than Hollywoods stubborn belief of putting things in the real world that results in all kind of questionable decisions, characters not really looking like their game counterparts, etc.

With a Sonic movie adaptation, they had the chance to do what the games cannot because of how those primarily focus on gameplay: tell a story.

Sonic and company might not have that much deep like someone said, but they have clearly defined and distinct personalities, dynamics and goals. Just put them in a situation that affects their world and let them take charge of the story by making it character driven. This is also why I think there is no need for an origin story since people liked Sonic when he was already a character that was introduced having fully grown into the cool, confident, coocky but also kind guy that we know since day 1. Why does Hollywood suddenly develop this paranoia that a much wider audience would not come to like him or his world  (the very things that hooked people in the first place) and replace it with something else of their making? Too me, that's just silly, and might come off as hubris from people that are more concerned in leaving their "legacy" rather than working on giving fans what they want (at least something that keeps the majority happy), which shouldn't be that hard to figure out. 

[Almar]

13 hours ago, Diogenes said:

I don't actually know those movies well enough to compare, but a movie that's just 90 minutes of a hedgehog fighting a mad scientist with nothing changing and nothing meaningful said doesn't sound like a movie worth making.

Hey,  if you don't find "respect your environment and your animal friends" meaningful then that's on you.

14 hours ago, Diogenes said:

Maybe Sonic Team/Sega could learn a thing or two, then, since the MCU is wildly popular and the Sonic series is dying.

It's not dying. It's just out of shape.

14 hours ago, Diogenes said:

Yeah actually wanting to explore Sonic as a character literally ever means I want "odd melodrama" rather than, y'know, actually giving a shit about him as a character. And this has absolutely nothing to do with how the other characters are handled; actually writing an interesting main character doesn't mean all the others have to be trash.

What does Sonic need to be "explored" for? And the insistence that the series revolve and revolve around Sonic (or in the case of Forces, Sonic and OC) has impacted the rest of the core cast. Care to tell me what stopped Knuckles and Shadow from running around the levels instead of Knuckles playing leader and Shadow going on break?

[Diogenes]

7 minutes ago, Almar said:

And the insistence that the series revolve and revolve around Sonic (or in the case of Forces, Sonic and OC) has impacted the rest of the core cast.

Forces isn't about Sonic. Basically no Sonic game has ever actually been about Sonic.

[Marco9966]

4 minutes ago, Diogenes said:

Forces isn't about Sonic. Basically no Sonic game has ever actually been about Sonic.

True for most cases, it's either about Knuckles, Shadow, Blaze, Silver, Elise, Chip... but perhaps Lost World, as bad as it is has some development for Sonic realizing his mistake.

[MetalSkulkBane]

Here's a simplest 'arc' for Sonic: learning about teamwork.

Start with him being cocky one-hog-army that keeps kicking Eggman but, who doesn't want any helpers "slowing him down", introduce Tails and maybe  Amy, make it about learning taking help is okay, etc.

And if "hedgehog fighting a mad scientist " isn't enough to fill out 90 minutes, then take a page from Moana and make it abut the journey to the bad guy. Sonic has some sweet locals and smaller baddies (badniks, Metal, Chooligans, Knuckles) he could fight before meeting with Doctor himself.

[Tornado]

4 hours ago, Skull Leader said:

You still have the OVA,

No I don't. The Sonic OVA has a decent amount of aesthetic trappings that directly relate it to Sonic CD in particular and the Genesis games as a whole in broad strokes, but that's about the extent of it. The characters don't act the same, the setting is blatantly and bizarrely not the same, the overall plot is nothing like the Sonic series ever did either before or after, the tone and the characters that aren't from the games could be plopped directly into a contemporary anime and no one would notice. And, even when the series proper got peak "rip off shonen anime that was popular five years ago" it still never had the amount of generic anime sexual humor that the OVA has in half the scenes Sara is in.

 

 

The reports of the OVA's faithfulness to the source material have always been dramatically overstated. It's not SatAM levels of "slap Sonic characters in what might as well be a different show", but it's also not anywhere near approaching something like Street Fighter II: The Movie. Nothing in it has ever suggested it couldn't have been made by someone with only a cursory knowledge of the (Japanese portion of) the franchise at the time.

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and outside of the Sonic franchise, they also have much more credit than the western side with how other game franchises have been represented more faithfully than anything Hollywood has ever put out. Heck, they even make animated adaptations of shoot'em up like the Gradius spinoff Salamander.

We're not talking about outside of the Sonic franchise, though. For a Hollywood movie about Sonic to be so quickly written off because it is being made by people in Hollywood instead of under the eyes of the ones who made, the implication that the Japanese people more in tune with the franchise would automatically do it better needs some sort of backing.

 

Not only is that company in question Sega, but the last media push they were directly involved with literally was the exact thing you were talking about. Front and center. Perhaps even the best example ever of such a thing in an adaptation.

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I also think that there is definitively a different mindset between the Japanese and Hollywood, since the first actually have faith in the source material and know that animation (traditional or CGI) will always work better than Hollywoods stubborn belief of putting things in the real world that results in all kind of questionable decisions, characters not really looking like their game counterparts, etc.

Not every game is based on a platform series with anthropomorphic animals. Some movie adaptations absolutely would work better as a "real world" one; since they already have a real world aesthetic. Shitty movies like Max Payne and Cradle of Life weren't bad because they took something that already had a realistic aesthetic and went the full distance with it; and most of the Hollywood adaptations of videogames have been based on properties that did. The concept of a videogame film did not start and end with Super Mario Bros.' and Double Dragon's insane Hollywood adaptations.

 

 

Also, while something like Ratchet and Clank would have been quite an abortion had they tried to adapt that into live action (not that it is really much better than, say, Doom), following a series' aesthetic so closely or having such involvement of the people who should seemingly know better doesn't automatically make something good. SNK had a large backlog of dogshit adaptations they helped with of their series long before Hollywood got their hands of The King of Fighters. Street Fighter II V is easily worse than the Van Damme movie. The Resident Evil movies are pretty bad on critical levels, but let's not pretend any attempt by circa-last decade Capcom to instead make their own following games more closely would have been better or been as successful.

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With a Sonic movie adaptation, they had the chance to do what the games cannot because of how those primarily focus on gameplay: tell a story.

This could not be less true. Sonic Team and Sega doing a shit job of it for the past 15 years does not preclude the idea that a Sonic game could be used to tell a story on a conceptual level; and even if it was a zero sum game the gameplay hasn't been anything spectacular in that period of time either.

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1. Why does Hollywood suddenly develop this paranoia that a much wider audience would not come to like him or his world  (the very things that hooked people in the first place) and replace it with something else of their making?

Why would a wider audience automatically accept Sonic in 2018? The old SoA canon is dead and buried and hopelessly dated besides, and the things the series has had since that change over have generally just been a running joke. They presumably want people to go see this, and aren't an Uwe Boll tax scheme.

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Too me, that's just silly, and might come off as hubris from people that are more concerned in leaving their "legacy" rather than working on giving fans what they want (at least something that keeps the majority happy), which shouldn't be that hard to figure out. 

Hi. Welcome to the Sonic franchise. I see you're new here.

[Almar]

1 hour ago, Diogenes said:

Forces isn't about Sonic. Basically no Sonic game has ever actually been about Sonic.

He and OC are more or less the only ones who are actually proactive and effective against Eggman's empire. Sonic gets plenty of spotlight, the games not being a Hamlet doesn't change that.

[Diogenes]

26 minutes ago, Almar said:

He and OC are more or less the only ones who are actually proactive and effective against Eggman's empire.

That doesn't make the story about him. The story's about Infinite and his power, it's about the Avatar character becoming a hero, it's about the other characters coping with Sonic being gone...but it's not actually about Sonic himself. In fact the only character that the story is less about than Modern Sonic is Classic Sonic.