Here's a thing that bugs me re: the #SonicMovie, from a writing/adaptation perspective:

Why not have Robotnik be putting animals into the drones somehow?

It's his ONLY THING in the game and it solves a TON of the movie's problems.

In the movie, we're told Robotnik has "the best drones/robots" but the army doesn't actually like/trust him because Mad Scientist - okay, fine. But we never see what makes him "Mad" other than "he's a weirdo" OR what makes his drones so great other than "they just are."

We also never really know why he's initially/immediately obsessed with Sonic, other than "hey, an Alien" and 'weirdo.' So his MO, his background and his relationship to the hero until they start fighting are all "just because" and "Jim, do something funny." Empty. Dull.

QUICK REWRITE: The Army doesn't trust him because he won't *share* the secrets behind his "next level" drone A.I.

Sonic etc break open a robot and learn truth - the A.I. isn't "artificial," he's figured out how to "reformat" lab-animals' minds into "living data processors"...

...the limitations on which are, obviously, "people would notice if you did this with humans."

But now here's Sonic, who clearly has a human-level brain but looks to anyone who'd ask like an animal - and there's apparently a whole planet of these?

There you go. There's a movie.

Still probly not a GREAT one, but at least there's stakes, the bad guy is now MUCH more of scary/mean monster for the kids and there's an extra complication to the action scenes re: something for Sonic etc to rescue - plus, excuse for lots of "animal stuff"...

...and kids love "animal stuff!"

Seriously, my niece and nephew are 2 and 4 and they will be RIVETED during the *most* boring ass grownup thing on TV if there's a dog or a pig or a duck or whatever also in the scene for some reason.