You’d need to go through the Chip ‘n Dale: Rescue Rangers movie frame by frame to see all the Easter eggs and references to the wide world of entertainment. Everything from deep cut Marvel properties to Hasbro toys are on display, but there’s one cameo that eclipsed all others.The plot of Rescue Rangers is much akin to Who Framed Roger Rabbit?, where your favorite animated characters are in fact Hollywood actors. Several scenes of the film take place at a convention where some of pop culture’s lesser stars are sitting at booths and selling 8×10 signatures of themselves. Lead character Dale tries to psych himself up that he won’t be on the convention circuit forever and he gets support from the most surprising of characters. Across the aisle is none other than, as the movie refers to him, Ugly Sonic. Oh yes, that’s right: the original Sonic the Hedgehog movie design that was revealed in the very first trailer for that picture in 2019. The one that was so universally reviled that the film was delayed so the filmmakers could redesign the title character. The odd proportions. The needless detail. The scarily realistic teeth, hence some calling him Teeth Sonic and cries for Paramount to “release the Teeth Cut.” (Okay, maybe that was just me.) In the film Ugly Sonic is portrayed by Tim Robinson, best known for I Think You Should Leave with Tim Robinson, and he plays him with a smokers voice and a constant cough.In the universe of the Rescue Rangers movie, Ugly Sonic (which apparently is his real name) lives in the fallout of being fired from the Sonic movie. When he tries to make Dale feel better he claims that soon everyone will like him for who he is. “Not like last time when the internet got a hold of one look at my human teeth and burned the place down.” Ugly Sonic’s appearance isn’t a one-off gag either. He shows up several times in the movie, at one point quipping to Chip and Dale, “You want me to go fast? That’s Sonic’s thing. Ugly Sonic’s thing is going SLOW.”This appearance of Sonic’s first movie design is completely baffling and delightful. I have no idea why Paramount agreed to it, and Sonic the Hedgehog movie director Jeff Fowler says he had no idea it was happening. We spoke to Fowler before Rescue Rangers was publicly released (more on that discussion next week), and he chuckled when told about it.“I can’t wait to see it,” he said, “I did not know about it but it sounds really fun and hilarious.”
