I hope that this is the right place for this, please let me know if there's somewhere more appropriate because I'm not sure where it actually fits.
Let me just start this off by saying, I recognise that these are kids movies and I also thank these movies for bringing me back into the franchise and revisiting such a big part of my childhood. In fact what's great is that it's introducing a new generation of kids to it.
Just finished Sonic the Hedgehog 3 and after spending the last 6+ months (re)watching all the animated adaptations and (re)playing the games, I really don't think I enjoyed it as much as the first two movies. And I've realised that Sonic has actually been characterized pretty badly here and completely tamed and watered down. And even more so, I feel like this displays a larger problem in mainstream media right now.
Sonic in the '90s and 2000s:
Back in the '90s when I was a kid, we had two Sonic cartoons running at the same time. In both of them, Sonic was an anti-authoritarian "freedom fighter", trying to topple Robotnik's tyranny. One of them had little PSAs like calls to respect those who are different from you or warnings about scammers and false info. It was woke before woke was a thing. The other one involved Robotnik, the tyrant, stomping out free thinking by turning people into robot slaves. A not so subtle message.
In fact even without the cartoons, from the first game it's a pretty easy assumption to make that the little blue guy with the mohawk / spikes that runs around smashing machines and freeing the animals is supposed to be some sort of rebel. I promise that it wasn't too much for my little 7 or 8 year old brain to handle back then.
Then we get to the Modern era of Sonic, which gave us Sonic Adventure with wall to wall heavy metal and cool guitar solos. And little surprises like weed leaves placed in certain locations. And the defacto animated adaptation of this era was Sonic X, where Sonic blatantly shows no respect or even disrespect to authorities fairly regularly. But always with the message of doing the right thing. At one point, he inspires the 'freedom movement' which sees people quitting their jobs by the masses, dyeing and spiking their hair and just living their lives their way (I'd love to know where they got their income from though).
Sonic the Hedgehog movies:
Which brings me to these movies. I had fun watching all of them but now I am realising just how watered down and wrong a lot of the characterisation is. Instead of being about rebellion, it's about 'family'. Instead of heavy metal and weed leaves, it's top 40 pop and McDonald's references. Apart from an Easter egg thrown in here or there like a bone.
And I realised that the characterisation of Sonic, Knuckles and Robotnik are more like Sonic Boom than any game or other adaptation, except with all the adult references and humour removed. And Sonic Boom isn't known for its faithful representations either but still at least has some edge.
The Declawing of Media:
When I look around at the world today, I think that we need anti-authoritarian icons like Sonic the Hedgehog more than ever. But all of the movie studios and all of the artists are beholden to fucking suits that don't want to take any risks in case their precious money flow gets harmed.
And so we're left with a world where the art that used to inspire kids and teenagers to rage against the machine and keep it real has all become safe and boring and paint by the numbers. And so they're being attracted by douchebag podcasters that give them something to rebel against instead.
I feel like the Sonic the Hedgehog movies so far are a great representation of just how stale and corporate everything has become. I believe they call it enshittification. And I'm thinking that maybe Hollywood and the music industry are just as much to blame for the state of affairs today as social media. And not because of the wOkE agENdA but because no one has a fucking spine anymore and everything is trying to chase numbers on charts that go up and down. Enshittification is more than just social media design IMO.