Marvel’s Cinematic Winning Streak Ruined By Sonic The Hedgehog Movie

Marvel’s series of wins over nearly the last decade has come to an end thanks to 2020’s Sonic the Hedgehog movie.

For the last decade, the Marvel Cinematic Universe has absolutely dominated the superhero box office – right up until its biggest threat arrived in the form of a certain blue speedy hedgehog by the name of Sonic.

Sonic from the movie looking to the side
Credit: Paramount

As noted by ComicBook, in terms of worldwide gross, the top five grossing superhero movies of all time are all from the MCU. Meanwhile, 12 MCU movies are also places within the top 20 grossing superhero movies list.  For any superhero movie to even come close to knocking Marvel off its cinematic perch, it’s going to take something big. Turns out that “something big” is 2020.

Between 2010 and 2019, each year the highest grossing superhero movies all came from the MCU.  However, in 2020 the biggest threat to the MCU was not Thanos: it was beloved SEGA mascot, Sonic the Hedgehog, and the coronavirus pandemic. 

Black Widow with fist extended
Credit: Disney/Marvel

Thanks to the pandemic, if 2020 couldn’t get any worse, this is the first time since 2009 that Marvel studios have not released a movie at the cinema.  We were supposed to get the release of Black Widow this year, that was until the pandemic put a stop to those plans and even Disney+ couldn’t save the day, because the one movie where Natasha Romanova would be taking centre stage had been put back to May 2021 (at the time of writing).

This is where the unexpected blue superhero comes in to save the day in the form of Sonic the Hedgehog. The Sonic movie released earlier this year and has officially ended Marvel’s reign of top-grossing superhero movies by scoring big at the box office. 

captain america running
Credit: Disney

This is quite crazy when you think back to that abomination of a first trailer from 2019. The reveal caused such a fan-crazed backlash that Paramount and SEGA delayed the movie to redesign Sonic, pushing the movie back to a 2020 release.

It’s fair to say that video game-to-movie adaptations haven’t got the best of track records at the cinema, so when you consider that factor, plus the delay to redesign the beloved mascot, the odds were not in Sonic’s favour. 

Thankfully however, what we got was a really fun family movie, which surpassed most people’s expectations.  So much so, that it not only became the highest grossing superhero movie of 2020, but it is also the fourth highest grossing movie of the year, grossing over $308 million.

Harley Quinn laughing
Credit: Warner Bros. Pictures

To compare figures, while of course not a superhero, the Harley Quinn movie Birds of Prey grossed over $201 million, while The New Mutants grossed a lowly $43.7 million. In fairness it would have been interesting to see how much Black Widow would have grossed at the cinema if it wasn’t for the pandemic and – assuming it won’t get delayed again – we still have Wonder Woman 1984 to release this year.

However, I believe even if Black Widow and Wonder Woman had released on schedule, it would have still been a close battle with the blue hedgehog.  So with its success, it should come as no surprise that we’re also getting a Sonic the Hedgehog movie sequel in 2022

How do you think the Sonic the Hedgehog movie would have fared against the likes of Black Widow and Wonder Woman 1984, if 2020 wasn’t such a turbulent year? 

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Featured Image Credit: Paramount/Marvel