It's rare that two movies would both release a trailer in the same year that simultaneously are in the running for🍃 the most mind-melting, eye numbing, soul-crushing visual exper൩ience a human being can witness. But it's 2019, and apparently, this must be the year where all happiness must be wiped from the face of the Earth.
In one corner, you have a movie that's basically spat upon a beloved video game character, and managed to anger an entire fanbase so bad they had to overhaul the whole project. In the other corner, you have an adaptation of an already insane broadway musical that's managed to use millions of dollars of high-end CGI technology and expert costuming to turn popular aꦍctors into horrible cat-like hellspawn.
Both are insane, both are potential trainwrecks, but only one can be the absolute worst trailer of 2019 (...so far). So it's time to answer the ultimate question: Which trailer is worse, Sonic The Hedgehog, or Cats?
Least Faithful Adaptation Of A Known Design
In order to determ💯ine 🐓which of these properties have the most horrifying cinematic adaptation, we first need to look at the original source material.
The creatures of Cats are horrifying. Cat-like humanoids who prance around like overacting actors who have no idea how terrifying they look - it's more like something out of H.P. Lovecraft than T.S. Eliot. Even worse is the fact that the trailer implies that the characters are actually cat-sized (sometimes), which might have always been the intention of the play, but seeing tiny litܫtle humans dressed in fursuits performing ballet is like soꦜmething out of a coma induced fever dream.
However, when you compare the film's cat people to the cat peo🐠ple that Andrew Lloyd Weber originally envisioned, it's shockingly not too far off.
From the stage production:
The upcoming film:
Even in its original incarnation, Cats was always full of people dressed up as c🌟at demons. So in reality, even if the trailer is enough to make you want to throw your computer into the nearest dumpster fire, it's technically very faithful to what people loved about the play (do people love that play? Is that still true?).
Meanwhile, Sonic The Hedgehog has always either been a short, chubby litꦇtle guy with a tendency to wag his finger, or a tall, lanky dude with attitude that was still recognizably Sonic. His design is one so good that even though roughly 65% of his games are awful, his franchise will never die.
So, of course, Hollywood had to royally ꦅmess that up and give the world this:
Instead of this:
Or this:
Human teeth, weirdly muscular legs, realistic blue fur (that's also magically electric?), beady little eyes, the list goes on and on. All they had to do is give us Sonic, and they screwed up so badly they had to go back to the drawing board. Needless to say, Sonic takes this category.
Winner: Sonic The Hedgehog
Most Disturbing Human Characteristics
We've already harped on Sonic's design to death, because it's bad, shamefully bad. However, it's important to keep in mind that while movie Sonic's teeth, and legs, and fur, and just overall existence are just terrible and creepy, it's not any creepier than any of the fan art that Sonic fans have posted over the years.
Seriously, if you search Sonic The Hedgehog you're fairly likely to find pictures that are far worse than anything the Sonic movie could possibly throw at us. Deviantart was practically built off the backbone of people showing off their Sonic OC's.
Cats, on the other hand, h𝓰as given the world something so fundamentally icky that it's almost impossible to ever feel clean again. It's like watching a bunch of hairy naked aliens jump around. Seeing actors like Judy Dench or ༺Idris Elba essentially completely nude except for a weird human-sized set of cat fur (and maybe a cowboy hat) is something that no one asked for, aside from the furry community who are likely happy about having this cultural moment.
The characters of this movie are no doubt going to inspire a whole new fetish in a lot of people, and that's enough to make the Cats movie a crime against humanity.
Also, why do the cats have human noses?! Cats don'💝t have human noses! Imagine𝓰 if cats actually looked like this? There'd be a lot less litterboxes in the world.
Winner: Cats
Most Likely To Actually Be A Good Movie
Cats looks scary, and corny, and weirdly sexualized, and everything about it makes us want to go live in a cave in the Tibetian mountai🥃ns. However, it is based on an inconceivably popular musical that's been around for decades. Plus the talent involved is staggering, and even if every moment of the trailer is visual water torture, there likely won't be a dry♏ eye in the house when the movie gets to the part where Jennifer Hudson scream sings "Memory".
Sonic The Hedgehog looks like a video game movie. A bad video game movie. Don't get us wrong, it looks like the cast is trying. Jim Carrey is doing his best job to ham it up as Robotnik, Ben Schwartz is trying to work his magic to make movie Sonic sound likable, and James Marsden has experience from working with fake furry comedic relief from his time on Hop, so he's a pro at this.
But it just looks like it's going to be so awful. A few of the jokes land, but th🌳ose are probably the best jokes in the whole movie. Even with a dramatic redesign, it's pretty likely that Sonic and Mario will be somewhere together, drowning their sorrows, and telling horror stories about their cinematic disasters.
At least John Leguizamo didn't play Tails.
Winner: Cats
Best Memes
Finally, we get the real category, the one that matters the absolu🎶te most: Which trailer has generated the best memes?
Cats has a lot of pre💃tty str⛦ong entries for this category. From comparisons to Blanche Devereaux:
To conversations we wilꦉl likely hav🔯e with medical professionals:
To epic crossovers:
To studies in cause and effect:
To the possible end of a national crisis:
There are some pretty strong contenders here, and it would be pretty easy to just hand this thing over to Cats in a landslide. However, this is Sonic The Hedgehog here, and they ain't going down without a fight.
T🤪here's an example of the movie being even more realistic:
Or how about a peek at the sequel?
There's questions about the creative process:
Then there's a bit of soundtrack criticism:
And then there's this one which is just the beꦏst thing ever:
Clearly it's a very close race between the two, but where Sonic takes it is that noꦚt only was the movie ridiculed thoroughly on the internet, but it also inspired a bunch of amazing artists to step up and do a better job of designing a Sonic movie than💛 the people who were actually paid to do so:
So while both trailers have inspired the internet to collectively go mad, at least the Sonic movie also allowed some artists the chance to show of their ability to overshadow the incompetence of the Sonic The Hedgehog movie's art team. So for being able to shove it to a major Hollywood studio on two different levels, Sonic wins the internet.
Winner: Sonic The Hedgehog
With it being a tie, there'🥂s only one way to figure which trailer wins this truly idiotic contest:
Most Shots Of Creepy Jim Carrey In A Weird Mushroom Dimension
Winner: Sonic The Hedgehog
Conclusion
So there you have it, an epic battle of terrible trailers. But even though we have a cle♍ar victor, it's important to know who the true winners are:
No one.
We all lose because ꩵboth of these trailers exist, meaning both of these movies exist, meaning that this is the darkest reality that can possibly exist. Chaos reigns, and now humanity must be punished, and that punishment comes in the form of naked cat James Corden, and strangely buff Sonic. Repent now, welcome your furry overlords, and weep for what our world once was.