#6: Sonic the Hedgehog (2020)

"Do ya'll criticize white people's movies as much as ya'll
criticize Tyler Perry's?"

- Individual who forgot about how the world over clowned the original appearance of movie! Sonic The Hedgehog. 

Just like "New Mutants", "Artemis Fowl", and "Chaos Walking", "Sonic the Hedgehog" was pushed from 2019 to 2020 (or, 2021, in the case of CW).

Why? Because his initial design looked ratlike and terrifying. Non-Sonic aficionados had no problem with it, and chastised the filmmakers for revisiting the drawing board.

Newsflash, guys - This movie was going to live or die by the reception by its fans. They didn't like it. It was terrifying. VFX artists told Paramount that it looked like shit, and they didn't listen until we ALL told them it looked like shit.

So, do you sink more money into it - Around 5$m, allegedly - and push it back, or do you push forward, and release something that was prepared to be a laughingstock?

Ask Universal and "Cats".

Anyway, did a redesigned Sonic save this movie?

#5: Birds of Prey

"Why didn't they just do Gotham City Sirens?"

Is something that was said a lot about this movie. Mainly so that people could have Barbara Gordon as Oracle, and less to push Harley onto another girl gang.

My knowledge of comics comes from a handful of Youtube channels, so I didn't know. After seeing this...I do wish we had seen that, simply because A) Catwoman and Poison Ivy are only two new characters.  "Birds" has about 4, and quite a few of them get shafted, partially ignored, and underused.

I had totally forgotten Huntress (Film wise, I have always enjoyed seeing Mary Elizabeth Winstead, and this is no exception) was even in this movie until she was officially name dropped.

One aspect I enjoyed was the score, especially whenever the diamond was mentioned. You hear it specifically when Cassandra (In name only, I'm told, but still, I enjoyed Ella Jay Basco) is in the cop car.

Black History Month : Animation (Semi-Recent)

I could go older, but the only one I cold think of is probably the "Fat Albert" Cartoon. So this is from about 2004 - Present.

Most of you are far too old to know that, for a hot moment, kids played with dolls as recently as 2019. Back in 2010, there was a very popular doll line called "Monster High", that had clearly black-coded character Clawdeen Wolf (and her family) in lead roles.

Though, with the reboot, they did give her a potential love interest to make up for the fact that, for about 7 years, the black-coded girl was the only one who had no boyfriend or romantic prospects because she just didn't care. Which is a fine quality, as I'm like that myself, but it still didn't look great.

This series went through like 800 art styles so this composite video is what you're getting.

There was also a character later, a girl called Honey Swamp, with a bonafied afro, and that was cool.

Doll lines still make little webisodes today. Well, at least DC Comics and DC Super-hero girls:

Selina Kyle is usually pale (Though in some comics I believe she may be Cuban, which is also neat), but the second iteration of DCSHGs (Because there is a Generation 1, with terribly unappealing art) made her black, akin to Eartha Kitt's Catwoman way back when.

And yep, that's Cree Summer. Isn't it always? Except with Bumblebee, where it's Kimberly Brooks!

What else is happening for black people in animation recently? Or, even as far as nearly 20 years ago?