Gotta fix fast, but not that fast. Director Jeff Fowler has announced that Paramount had delayed the release of Sonic the Hedgehog by three months, to allow the visual effects team some more time to work on a character redesign.
Earlier this month, following criticism of Sonic’s design in the first Sonic the Hedgehog trailer, Fowler promised they would work on a new design for the character. This prompted some criticism about whether this would put undue pressure on the visual effects artists, giving them less time to finish the movie.
Now, the director has announced on Twitter that the movie will be released in the US on 14 February 2020 instead.
Taking a little more time to make Sonic just right.#novfxartistswereharmedinthemakingofthismovie pic.twitter.com/gxhu9lhU76
— Jeff Fowler (@fowltown) May 24, 2019
The whole situation has prompted a larger conversation about fandom, criticism, and the way visual effects artists are treated in the industry.
We recently talked with some VFX artists about what it would take to do a resign of the Sonic the Hedgehog character. Based on suggested changes that have been supported by fans, they said it could take somewhere up to three months to get the character ready to put back into the movie.
Delaying the movie four months might still make things tight, but it seems as though it would give the artists more room to work with. Although I feel Fowler’s joking hashtag about his VFX artists was a little, well, gauche.
Sonic the Hedgehog is now coming out in the US on 14 February 2020. No better way to celebrate true love than by watching a running hedgehog, right?