Sonic the Hedgehog sequel is officially happening
Sonic the Hedgehog is coming back for a sequel to the movie that came out earlier this year.
It's no major surprise, given that the original did so incredibly well at the box office. It made $306 million worldwide and became the second highest-grossing film of 2020 (after Bad Boys for Life).
The sequel from Paramount and Sega Sammy will also have the same filmmaking team behind it, with Jeff Fowler returning to the director's chair and Pat Casey and Josh Miller writing the script (via Variety).
There's no word on casting just yet, although Ben Schwartz, who voiced Sonic in the first film, is naturally expected to be back and responded to the sequel news with a peace sign emoji.
Related: Why Sonic the Hedgehog has been an unexpected box office hit
The live-action family comedy, released back in February, saw the world's speediest hedgehog Sonic team up with local town sheriff Tom Wachowski (voiced by James Marsden) to find his lost rings and escape the evil genius Dr. Robotnik (Jim Carrey).
Tika Sumpter, Natasha Rothwell, Adam Pally and Neal McDonough also voiced roles in the film.
Based on the popular video game franchise from Sega, Sonic the Hedgehog also achieved the biggest ever opening weekend for a video game adaptation.
It could have all been so different, though. After its first trailer was released in April 2019, there was a massively negative reaction to Sonic's appearance and this caused the movie to be delayed by three months so the character could be redesigned.
Related: How Sonic the Hedgehog sets up a sequel
Talking to Digital Spy earlier this year, director Fowler admitted that the redesign reveal was a nerve-wracking experience, even though he was pretty confident fans would like it.
"We had worked very hard on our updates to the character," he said. "It was definitely a little bit of like, 'Oh man, what happens if they don't like this?'
"But really, everyone that saw it internally as I was working on the film, just responded so positively. It really felt like, once we shared it with the fans, they would really embrace it and be excited about it.
"Fortunately, any anxiety I had the night before passed really quickly once it was released. Because, yeah, it was such an incredible feeling to see Sonic 2.0 get embraced the way it was."
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