‘Sonic the Hedgehog 3’ Trailer: Shadow Finally Arrives

Aug 28

From Ryan Cordaro

While I haven’t been too invested in the games recently, the Sonic the Hedgehog movies have always been a lot of fun to watch. I’m on the side of Twitter that’s obsessed with Sonic, and just because of that, it feels like this trailer was supposed to drop in May. Then June, July, and so on. Not even a lot of leaks happened with the movie, so that’s always a good thing to keep the fans in suspense of what they’re going to do with it. Now, though, at the very end of August, we finally have our first trailer for Sonic the Hedgehog 3, a potential trilogy ender.

Not too many plot details are out there for the movie yet, but Sonic 3 will close out this little trilogy that’s been forming since the first movie back in 2020. The big reveal is that Shadow the Hedgehog will be the main villain of the movie after being introduced in a post-credits scene for the last movie. Director Jeff Fowler already has a history with the character outside of the three Sonic movies he’s directed. One of his first animation credits was working on the CGI cinematics and cutscenes for the Shadow the Hedgehog video game from 2005, so it feels like, along with the rest of the trilogy, Shadow will be in good hands. As I mentioned earlier, these Sonic movies have been a lot of fun, and the stakes do look properly raised for this one, so this could be a wonderful holiday break movie for me.

The big new addition to the cast is Keanu Reeves (the John Wick franchise, the upcoming The Entertainment System is Down), who will be voicing Shadow. Ben Schwartz (Parks and Recreation, Invincible), Colleen O'Shaughnessey (the Sonic franchise, The Imaginary), and Idris Elba (Hijack, Extraction 2) reprise their voice roles as Sonic, Tails, and Knuckles respectively, with Jim Carrey (The Mask, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind), James Marsden (X-Men, Knox Goes Away), Tika Sumpter (The Old Man & The Gun, The Underdoggs), Lee Majdoub (The 100, Star Wars Outlaws), Natasha Rothwell (Sausage Party: Foodtopia, Insecure), Adam Pally (Iron Man 3, Dirty Grandpa), Tom Butler (Loudermilk, Tomorrowland), and Shemar Moore (Criminal Minds, S.W.A.T.) returning from earlier entries. New cast members also include Krysten Ritter (Orphan Black: Echoes, Jessica Jones), Alyla Browne (Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga, Sting), James Wolk (The Boys in the Boat, Mad Men), Cristo Fernández (Ted Lasso, the upcoming Venom: The Last Dance), and Jorma Taccone (Popstar: Never Stop Never Stopping, Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse).