The AVENGERS INITIATIVE

Mondo enlists Tyler Stout to assemble The Avengers in new print available Friday

Tyler Stout's Avengers - Regular, $60
Tyler Stout's Avengers - Variant, $110.

Earlier Thursday, Mondo revealed the final entry in their recent series of The Avengers posters. The series, which started with two prints forBlack Widow and Hawkeye, moved into posters for Thor, Iron Man, Captain America and The Incredible Hulk.

Now, a day before Joss Whedon's The Avengers releases, Mondo has announced the final print, and damn, is it spectacular.

Once again, Mondo has commissioned frequent collaborator Tyler Stout to apply his signature style in a way that ties the entire series together. And unsurprisingly, Stout's depiction of The Avengers assembled is stunning.

In a lot of ways, Stout's style is perfectly suited to wrap up a poster series such as this. The eye-popping use of color immediately grabs your attention in a way that sets it apart from the other prints — which were all very good — in the series. And perhaps an even greater testament to Stout's talent is how incredible the three-color variant looks.

Stout's busy, almost chaotic, frame paints a complete picture of The Avengers. The image is dominated by large portraits of the Earth's Mightiest Heroes, all assembled inside the Avengers logo, which smaller renditions of each character filling in the gaps.

Most notably, the all-encompassing nature of Stout's work (see: Akira, Kill Bill and Robocop) is able to provide satisfying closure to a poster series, much the same way he did for Mondo's Star Wars run in 2010.

His frenzied, crammed to the brim style brings everything together, all of the Avengers compiled into a collage that nearly overwhelms the eyes at first glance. A distinct finale to an equally dynamic and compelling poster series.

Both the prints are beautiful and will go on sale at a random time Friday, where they will both sell out within minutes. In an effort to prevent dirty scalpers from nabbing these for immediate eBaying, Mondo will implement a one-per-customer policy. That means, one print for each customer — not one regular and one variant. It's one or the other.

So, keep a careful eye on the @Mondonews twitter feed for the on sale announcement and good luck to you if you're keen on collecting these special Mondo prints. You'll need it.

unspecified

Movie Review

Sonic the Hedgehog 3 really knows its audience: fans of the game

Photo courtesy of Paramount Pictures

Sonic the Hedgehog (Ben Schwartz) in Sonic the Hedgehog 3

The first Sonic the Hedgehog movie in 2020 was one of the few video game adaptations that managed to appeal to both fans of the Sega game and those who just want to watch a fun movie. As the series moved into a second and now third film, though, it’s become increasingly reliant on giving the video game fans what they want, with not as much attention paid toward simply telling a good story.

In Sonic the Hedgehog 3, Sonic (voiced by Ben Schwartz) continues to live with human friends Tom (James Marsden) and Maddie (Tika Sumpter), as well as Tails (Colleen O’Shaughnessey) and Knuckles (Idris Elba), who stuck around after the events of the second film. Dispensing with any kind of narrative coherence, the trio is called away by an undefined military force to help with the escape of Shadow (Keanu Reeves), another alien hedgehog who has been locked away off the coast of Japan for many years.

Suffice it to say that the trio does not initially fare well against the powerful Shadow, forcing Sonic to do the unthinkable: Ask his nemesis, Dr. Ivo Robotnik (Jim Carrey), for help. What Sonic doesn’t anticipate is that Shadow has a history that left him with a grudge against most of human society, and he’s intent on using his powers — with a little help from his former mentor, Gerald Robotnik (also Carrey) — to exact his plans for revenge.

Made by the same team of director Jeff Fowler and writers Pat Casey, Josh Miller, and John Whittington from Sonic the Hedgehog 2, the film is a combination of manic action, jokey sequences, and a dash of heart. The addition of Shadow ups the mayhem considerably, and the filmmakers rarely slow things down (although, oddly, the super-speed of Sonic and company feels lessened this time around).

The initial casting of Carrey gave the comic actor permission to indulge in whatever wackiness he could imagine, and giving him two roles in this film means double the nonsense. Ivo and Gerald (who’s Ivo’s grandfather, for the record) face off in a number of silly scenes, none more absurd than a dance sequence aboard a space station threatening to explode Earth (yeah, this movie is a lot).

Does the plot make a lick of sense? Absolutely not, but the filmmakers seem to acknowledge that fact, throwing anything and everything at the screen to try to entertain kids and/or fans of the video game series. It should come as no surprise that the end credits tease yet more characters from the video games joining the franchise, making it abundantly clear who is expected to get the most enjoyment out of the series going forward.

In addition to Carrey, the voice actors continue to make the characters fun. Schwartz and O’Shaughnessey provide the cartoon-style acting, while Elba and now Reeves give a nice counterbalance with their deep and serious voices. Marsden and Sumpter aren’t given much to do this time around, and Krysten Ritter shows up as Director Rockwell, a character who’s mostly there to move what little plot there is further along.

A four-quadrant movie is one that appeals to all ages and genders; Sonic the Hedgehog 3 is a one or maybe two-quadrant movie at most. But it’s more fun than the other family-friendly offering this Christmas season, and fans of the video game will likely love the depiction of their favorite characters on screen, so it’s doing something right.

---

Sonic the Hedgehog 3 is now playing in theaters.

movies film