When early Marvel Studios movies planted their seeds that implied a possible crossover of their films, they came off as fun little easter eggs for the hardcore fans at first. Then, when The Avengers came out in 2012 with its game-changing crossover, the film world saw what they were capable of and studios rushed behind them in line to try to get some of that shared universe glory. A producer on the successful Sonic the Hedgehog movies thinks the video game-inspired franchise has the characters and the lore to build what he hopes will be “Avengers-level” event films.

According to IGN, franchise and series executive producer Toby Ascher recently gave an interview with Paste Magazine where he spoke about Paramount’s plan to build upon the Sonic the Hedgehog movies into a mega event. The studio already has the Knuckles spin-off coming out as a way to look at “supporting characters in depth and really build them out in cool ways.” The sequel feature films are aiming to feature a wide array of characters and sport an epic story of sorts. Ascher states, “We got really excited about the idea of expanding our characters in our world into television, specifically, because it gives us a platform to really do character studies. We knew that, with Shadow coming into Sonic 3 and some of the bigger things that we want to do, the Sonic franchise on the movie side is going to be these Avengers-level events. They’re going to be these big, exciting stories that have a lot of different characters.”

Sonic the Hedgehog 2 inevitably featured Sonic’s partner, Tails, in a major role and also introduced Knuckles. With the third movie, another big character from the Sega games is making his way onto the big screen — Shadow the Hedgehog. According to IGN, “One character fans have begged for since the live-action movies began is Metal Sonic, and with dozens of other games, shows, and even comics to pull from, there’s no telling how Paramount will proceed.” However, the real litmus test before Sonic 3 will be how the Knuckles spin-off captures audiences. When the character entered the film world, Ascher says, “We thought we could translate that into a full series. I think it’s by far the funniest version we’ve had in any of the Sonic movies so far. It leans into weird comedy partially because of Adam Pally and because of what Idris brings in a really great way.”

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