Keanu Reeves has reportedly joined the cast of the Sonic the Hedgehog 3 movie, stepping into the slick sneakers of Shadow the Hedgehog. Sonic 3 is set to release in cinemas on 20th December 2024.
Reported by The Hollywood Reporter, the news has been confirmed by multiple sources. It also follows on from the first footage of the film that debuted at a CinemaCon presentation by Paramount last week. That saw Dr. Robotnik getting his groove back thanks to Shadow’s emergence.
Keanu Reeves has become one of the most popular and beloved actors in Hollywood in recent times, thanks in no small part to his action-packed John Wick series. In video games, he starred as Johnny Silverhands in Cyberpunk 2077. He will be joining Jim Carrey’s Dr. Robotnik, Idris Elba’s Knuckles, Ben Schwartz’s Sonic and Colleen O’Shaughnessey’s Tails.
Shadow’s appearance was teased at the end of Sonic the Hedgehog 2, adding another layer to the franchise which had just introduced Tails and Knuckles to the film’s universe. Shadow debuted in Sonic Adventure 2 in 2001 as a new arch nemesis to Sonic with many of the same abilities and powers, but a darker and edgier tone. Shadow has since become a mainstay of the video game franchise, though as more of an antihero as opposed to a villain, even using guns in the 2005 spin-off game Shadow the Hedgehog – this was not a series highlight.
Paramount certainly has high hopes for this film to capture the family friendly market at Christmas, and building on the successes of the first two films. The first Sonic the Hedgehog enjoyed a worldwide gross of $320 million, which was then topped by Sonic the Hedgehog 2 in April 2022 with a worldwide gross of $404 million. Neither was quite enough to surpass the $450 million of Detective Pikachu, but everything has now been dwarfed by The Super Mario Bros. Movie, which has a worldwide gross of $1.3 billion.
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We reviewed Sonic the Hedgehog 2 earlier this year, giving it a great 8/10 score and saying, ”
“Sonic the Hedgehog 2 kicks on from the 2020 origin story with a bigger and even more bombastic sequel, fleshing out the Sonic universe while riffing on superhero movies and globe-trotting adventures. With another film in the works (and a mid-credits scene to tease it), this blue blur is set to be a family-friendly staple for quite some time to come.”
