I finally caught Sonic the Hedgehog 2 over the weekend, and it seems like Sega may be following the pattern of the games in the blue hedgehog’s big screen series. The first movie was just Sonic himself, the second adds both Tails and Knuckles, and a third film — if it transpires — is set to feature another character shown in the final moments of Sonic the Hedgehog 2. But why stop there? The games certainly didn’t, with each release in the late 1990s and 2000s adding more and more characters, to the point that the low ratio of actual Sonic in Sonic games became a running joke among fans. Here are nine characters who should appear in future Sonic the Hedgehog movies. I’m limiting myself to characters who have actually appeared in Sonic games here, because if we get into comics and cartoons then this list would just be nine different Ken Penders echidnas.
1. Rouge the Bat
Let’s start with the obvious — Rouge the Bat first appeared in Sonic Adventure 2, which is a pretty obvious choice of source material for the next movie. But is now the time for a cartoon bat with huge gazongas that bounce wildly when she walks around? Witness the de-yassification of Lola Bunny in Space Jam 2 and tell me that any studio would be willing to put this thing onscreen in a movie for children.
2. Eggman Nega
Is he a future descendant of Eggman or simply an alternate universe version of it? It depends on what game he’s in, though the latter doesn’t require Eggman to have canonically had sex. Word of god says he’s from the future and hates Eggman for ruining his family’s reputation, which is sort of a fun idea. Really, though, he’s kind of just a palette-swapped Eggman. One time he found a magic camera that let him turn people into cards? His equivalent of Sonic is a cat that can set herself on fire.
3. Infinite
A Jackal who was previously head of the creatively-named Jackal Squad mercenary group, Infinite appears in the much-reviled Sonic Forces as the big bad. He was once just a normal anthropomorphic jackal, but was beaten up by Shadow the Hedgehog, lost his self-esteem, and then used a magic gem (no, not the Chaos Emeralds, a different one) to turn himself into a godlike being who can generate realistic illusions. He sucks. He’s the inevitable result of Sega’s edge lord arms race — Sonic was trumped by Knuckles, then Knuckles by Shadow, and finally Shadow by Infinite. It seems like we’re moving through that cycle even faster with the movies, so Infinite might show up sooner rather than later. But hey he could do like WandaVision stuff or something? I don’t know. This guy sucks on ice.
4. Big the Cat
He’s a cat whose deal is that he loves fishing and his best friend is a frog. He can barely even talk. Make a two hour movie with no dialogue about him trying to find the frog friend.
5. The President
He’s the President of the United States, and he has a photo of Sonic and Shadow posing on his desk that could not have been taken at any conceivable point in time in the series.
6. Vector the Crocodile
Best known for his catchphrase, “Find the computer room!” Vector the Crocodile was introduced as one of Knuckles’ buddies in Knuckles’ Chaotix. He later became the leader of the Chaotix Detective Agency, which also employs an irritating bee and a ninja chameleon. His thing is that he always has headphones on and has a gold chain. He is an ok detective but a terrible businessman. Sometimes he can also breathe fire. I don’t think he’s likely to show up unless the Sonic cinematic universe gets so big that we get a noir spinoff about the world’s worst animal detective agency.
7. Vanilla the Rabbit
She’s attractive and is the size of an average human mother.
