'Sonic the Hedgehog' on Track for a $40 Million Opening Over Presidents Day Weekend

Paramount Pictures had to deal with a bit of a nightmare scenario when the reveal of their Sonic the Hedgehog movie was downright laughable. The reaction was so unfavorable that the studio chose to overhaul the design of the SEGA video game character and push the movie back from a November release last year to a February release this year. Thankfully, the new character design has been approved by fans, and it looks like the movie is tracking to have a solid opening for the Presidents Day weekend in February, which also happens to be Valentine’s Day weekend.

Deadline has the Sonic the Hedgehog box office landing somewhere between $41 million and $47 million for the four-day holiday weekend. That’s a solid start for the movie, which should be enough to help it earn back the reported $95 million budget of the movie, though that certainly doesn’t include the marketing costs.

Considering Sonic the Hedgehog was so reviled after that first trailer, it’s impressive to see the tracking for the movie is so good with another three weeks before the movie hits theaters. Unless bad reviews keep some audiences away, tracking might even rise between now and then. In fact, the dreaded initial design of Sonic may have actually worked in the studio’s favor, giving the movie infinitely more attention than it otherwise might have received. That second trailer with the character redesign now has 28 million trailer views, and 18.6 million of them were within the first two days of the trailer’s release.

Deadline points out that the two-day figures for the Sonic the Hedgehog trailer were on par with Detective Pikachu trailer views. That video game adaptation went on to have an opening of $54.3 million. But Pokemon is also a much more successful video game franchise at this point, so it makes sense that Sonic is tracking under Detective Pikachu by roughly $10 million.

When Sonic the Hedgehog opens, it won’t have much competition. The only other major releases that weekend are the R-rated thrilled Fantasy Island, a twisted take on the classic TV series that is currently tracking between $12-$16 million, and The Photograph, a romance starring Issa Rae and LaKeith Stanfield that is looking to pull in between $10-$14 million and is being pushed to the African-America demographic out there.

Sonic the Hedgehog should have no problem topping the weekend, but will it have legs outside of that? Stay tuned.

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