Sonic The Hedgehog 2 ($289 Million Worldwide Box Office)

After settling in Green Hills, Sonic is eager to prove that he has what it takes to be a true hero. His test comes when Dr. Robotnik returns with a new partner, Knuckles, in search of a mystical emerald that has the power to destroy civilizations. Sonic teams up with his own sidekick, Tails, and together they embark on a globe-trotting journey to find the emerald before it falls into the wrong hands.

UltimateMarvel wrote:I enjoyed the first one, it really wasn't bad at all. I don't think they could have done better to bring this to live action and changing Sonic after the criticism they received on how he looked, kudos to them on that. I might be the only one but I'll be watching the second one too. It's a good family movie.

Tyger wrote:Similarly, I could see Jean Ralphio calling Rob Swanson Donut Lord

Sonic the Hedgehog 2 is outstripping the 3-day opening results of its first 2020 movie, which keep in mind was over a holiday weekend, with $71M. For Jim Carrey, on a 3-day basis, Sonic the Hedgehog 2 is his biggest domestic opener, beating the $68M start of Bruce Almighty in 2003. Sonic‘s updated gross is after an estimated $26M Saturday which is up 1% against Friday+previews of $26.8M. Technically speaking the Jeff Fowler directed sequel was up 30% on Saturday over Friday if you back out previews.

Paramount Theatrical Distribution Boss Chris Aronson beamed, “Sonic 2‘s record opening is a victory for Paramount and for the industry at large. The filmmakers did an amazing job of crafting a film that is both in service of Sonic’s legions of fans as well as the general and family audience. Growing a franchise is no small feat and having an opening +22% over the first film is a remarkable achievement. Kudos to the filmmakers and to the marketing and distributions teams at Paramount for doing a fantastic job in bringing the film into the global marketplace!”

Knock on wood, it’s going to be fun to see the legs on this one and how vibrant a Sonic movie can truly be in the market, especially for a sector that has been starving for movies. The first movie’s momentum was stalled by Covid and the closing of movie theaters, the pic making close to 50% of its $148.9M final domestic in its first four days.

Critics at 68% Rotten didn’t curtail business for the Hedgehog as he received an A CinemaScore, the same grade as the first film, with an 87% positive and 74% recommend on Comscore/Screen Engine’s PostTrak with kids under 12 jumping up and down at 95% positive and a 79% definite recommend.

Demos were 61% guys, 39% women with 32% under 17, and 46% between 18-34 years old. Diversity demos showed a strong turnout among Latino and Hispanic audiences of 38%, Caucasian at 29%, 20% Black and 13% Asian/other. Sonic was great everywhere, but showed power on the coasts and in the South. PLFs by Saturday AM drove 22% of ticket sales.

The audience was made up of 27% parents, 31% kids and 42% general.

EntTelligence says 6M admissions were closed for Sonic 2. Matinee attendance was strong on Saturday with almost 56% of the audience attending before 5PM.  Thirty-one percent came between 5PM to 8PM, and 13% after 8PM. On Friday, approximately 31% of the audience came before 5PM, 46% came during the 5PM to 8PM dayparts, and 23% of patrons showed up after 8PM.  By comparison, Encanto had over 83% of their audience see the film before 8PM on opening day. Average ticket price for Sonic 2 was $11.69.

iSpot monitored that Paramount spent just under $18M on U.S. TV spots that yielded 717M impressions with the campaign running on NBC, Nick, CBS, USA and Univision on such shows as the Winter Olympics, SpongeBob, men’s college basketball, and of course the Super Bowl LVI pregame and NBA games.

Social awareness for Sonic 2 per RelishMix before the weekend stood at 468.6M and 29% above the social media universe of family-live-action movies across Facebook, Twitter, YouTube Instagram and TikTok. And, it also runs in-line with the first installment of Sonic which opened two years ago, just before the pandemic, and exceeded predictions for that opening weekend at $58M. Included, is the 11.7M social/digital kick from the Super Bowl pre-game spot and social pages for the movie at 568K which is strong. The franchise based on the 31 year old video game, has social cross-promotional integration from the Sega game platform (4.3M) and the Sonic The Hedgehog social media (13.1M). RelishMix noticed that the word of mouth was positive for Sonic 2 and that “expectations and love for Jim Carrey as Dr. Eggman, and concerns as to whether this this will be his ‘last film’ are building interest even more.”

It’s official — Sonic the Hedgehog 2 is the highest-grossing movie based on a video game of all time. The genre has traditionally been viewed as cursed, given its various infamous flops over the years, but the Sonic franchise has well and truly trounced that belief thanks to the runaway success of 2020’s first film and its new sequel, which has managed to outpace its predecessor at the box office.

And Sonic himself — Ben Schwartz, specifically — is overjoyed by the news. The actor and comedian, who voices the Blue Streak in the movies, shared the exciting update on Twitter this Tuesday that Sonic 2 has outdone Sonic‘s total domestic gross. That means it can now be crowned the biggest video game flick ever.

“[Sonic 2] has officially passed the domestic box office total of the first [Sonic] film, officially making the sequel the highest domestic grossing movie based on a video game of all time,” Schwartz said. “AND THIS LITTLE BLUE GUY IS STILL GOING!!! AHHHH!!!!”Sonic 2, which opened internationally on April 1 before hitting U.S. theaters the week after, started strong out the gate and has continued on a sprint ever since. This past weekend saw it hold on to a top three place despite now being in its third week, with its latest earnings pushing it to a domestic cume of $146.2 million (via Box Office Mojo). Globally, it’s currently sitting at $288.3 million, which means its close to outranking Sonic‘s international total of $319.7 million to boot.

In the light of Sonic 2‘s big earnings, it’s funny to think back to how the first movie almost got it totally wrong with that infamous original Sonic design. Luckily, the franchise’s good fortunes mean that producer Neal Mortiz can look back on the intense backlash and laugh. As for looking to the future, Paramount is known to be moving forward with Sonic 3 and a spinoff for Idris Elba’s Knuckles.

If you haven’t done so already — and, if that’s the case, know that you’re in the minority — catch Sonic the Hedgehog 2 on the big screen now.