sonic runs and rests; the sun rises and sets

You can absolutely relate to Sonic and I didn't mean to imply you couldn't.

If you're referring to my essay about the topic I wrote a couple years back, it was essentially a response to the common phenomenon of dismissing Sonic's character due to being "unrelatable," and since the term "relatable" is subjective to each and every individual, it's not very useful as a character descriptor by itself. When people say Sonic should be relatable they usually mean this in a specific way, such as wanting his emotional vulnerability emphasized. You can certainly relate to Sonic due to his introverted traits, but the relatability that fan discussion always comes back around to is specifically about Sonic displaying severe negative emotions to situations (usually crying) and having flaws. The nuanced (and frustrating) element of this discussion is that Sonic is emotionally reactive to situations, both negatively and positively, and he does have character flaws, but not with the specific writerly presentation that detractors want for him, and in discussion this is oftentimes boiled down to just calling Sonic not relatable enough, which may cause vagueness and confusion surrounding the term "relatable." This is why I described a clearer definition for "relatable" in my essay by relating it to the target audience. I hope that clears things up.

This is not to say you can't or shouldn't relate to Sonic. My point was that he was not made explicitly to be relatable in an emotionally vulnerable aspect, and judging how good of a character he is based on a scale of not just relatability (because nearly every character is relatable to someone in some way), but rather a specific kind of relatability that emphasizes his vulnerability is missing the point of what role he fulfills in narratives. Also, if we don't operate on a clear definition for relatability, then it comes across as a rather arbitrary line to draw since this boundary for relatability seems based in one's individual preference, and others can still find him relatable based on their own boundaries.

Game sonic being functionally perfect works because his character arc, if you could call it that, is applying his skills to be the kind of person the rest of his cast and the plot need. Frontiers was the closest we've gotten to an "arc" from him in some time, and that was again being the person his friends need as *they* grow and change, to become "game sonics" on their own. IDK, I just think it's neat. Sorry this is a bit disorganised I just really liked your post.

Hey, thanks for sharing your thoughts! I appreciate that you liked my post enough to think more deeply about it and consider it in the context of the writing and handling of movie Sonic, because how these characters compare and contrast is an interesting discussion, albeit one that is hard for me to have specifically due to the wide celebration of the Sonic movies being seen as amazing video game adaptations by the general populace.

At this point in time, I don't agree with the notion that movie Sonic is becoming game Sonic. Honestly, it stopped being Sonic the second he was given a dead owl mom and a traumatic backstory to encourage the viewer to feel bad for him, so whatever they do now is for naught unless they just completely ignore that backstory they already established and make it ineffectual to all of his motivations and decisions, which would just create a new problem of being, generally, pretty bad writing. If it is a goal to get new fans to play the games, then it is rather questionable to present a completely different Sonic as encouragement when there's no guarantee they will even enjoy game Sonic if they enjoy movie Sonic.

Even if this was what they were going for, the concept of forcing myself to suffer through years of sequels to see the main character be like what they were in the source material is a practice in "cinematic universes" that shouldn't be normalized as much as it is. If I end up enjoying the sixth movie because they finally made Sonic act like Sonic that still leaves five movies over the span of >10 wasted years that I dislike (because, among other reasons I do not enjoy these movies, Sonic's character is perhaps the biggest.) Quite frankly, they already made their message loud and clear by throwing out game Sonic right away and just doing what they want in accordance with current consumer trends, so for my own sanity, I'm going to assume that they are never going to make movie Sonic faithful for the sake of capital returns instead of convincing myself of the false hope that it might happen someday in the next decade.

I feel I must emphasize, with the point you brought up about how movie Sonic is different because of a younger audience: Sonic was always for a younger audience. Sonic games are already for children. He didn't need to become Sonic, he just was already Sonic. I see what you're saying with Frontiers and how it can mirror movie Sonic growing into his own like Amy/Knuckles/Tails grow into their own. The thing is, characters besides Sonic serve a different role than Sonic himself, which is why they even exist in the first place. Switching the roles here is missing the point, because these are not interchangeable aspects of the characters. They achieve opposite effects. The reason Sonic doesn't tend to have a full-on narratively-focused arc where he changes fundamentally is not because Sonic has no weaknesses, or because he's literally perfect. It's because none of his weaknesses are treated, by the narrative, as things to be fixed. When this is flipped on its head, he is being presented as the antithesis of this concept, which therefore removes the feeling that this character is Sonic the Hedgehog.

This idea that movies about preexisting franchises need to ease in slowly into things by writing the characters as different characters in a banal real life world to appeal to the new generation/people new to the franchise may be a popular trend these days, but it's ultimately not true. Movies can be anything, and with the right execution, can communicate anything. They can be faithful and appeal to new audiences, these are not mutually exclusive at all like so many people argue them to be. The key difference between games and movies is that games have additional gameplay elements that add to the storytelling that movies do not, so movie writers should consider how to supplement this. It's actually an interesting topic that is outside of the scope of this ask right now.