Sonic the Hedgehog movie topped the box office on its opening weekend with $57 million in takings over its first three days, and an estimated $70 million for the long holiday weekend in the US. That’s a new record for a video game adaptated movie, breezing past the $54.3 million three day record set by Detective Pikachu last year.
After Sonic the Hedgehog movie and Birds of Prey came in second at the box-office over the weekend, but between Sonic and another gaming franchise, Detective Pikachu, the Pokémon movie held the record for the best opening weekend for a video-game movie adaptation.
A few months ago, fans of the Blue Blur were worried the movie would flop thanks to its frankly unsettling original design. After a first trailer was released in May, there was a huge fan backlash against the original design of Sonic, which was meant to be “realistic”. Thankfully for the film, it was delayed so that Sonic could be redesigned, this being revealed in November. Alongside the VFX team Sonic Mania Adventures director Tyson Hesse was brought in to bring the character’s design closer to the games.
The film was originally going to be produced by Sony, they sold the rights to Paramount. It stars James Marsden as Tom Wachowski, a former SFPD officer who has moved to Green Hills, Motana, who encounters the blue speedster, who is voiced by Ben Schwartz.
The Ryan Reynolds voiced Pikachu has made $433 million worldwide (£332 million), and Sonic has so-far made $100 million globally, so there’s still some way to go.
