Carrey’s Dr Robotnik is the best thing in elaborate third-instalment shenanigans that are pretty good fan-service fun

A third Sonic film rolls off the production line with remorseless inevitability, and no little excitement among its core early-teen fanbase; the Marvel Cinematic Universe could take a lesson or two in how to keep the audience onside. The kerfuffle over Sonic’s weirdly designed teeth seems a long time ago and if Jim Carrey is really only in it for the money, he certainly gives his double role here some major welly. And while no one could deny the cash-grab fan-service underpinning to the entire project … well, it’s actually a not unenjoyable experience, even if you are someone on whom the intricacies of early-00s game narrative are lost.

So this Sonic reboot takes the time-hallowed third-instalment approach by foregrounding a “dark” version of Sonic – in fact near-identical hedgehog Shadow, distinguished from our hero by his black and red colouring. At the start of proceedings, Shadow escapes from a containment unit where he is being held for various convoluted reasons, and Sonic (along with his echidna and fox sidekicks) is called in to deal with him. Pretty soon, for further convoluted reasons, they briefly find themselves fighting alongside Ivo Robotnik before – and I don’t think this is a major spoiler – unearthing Robotnik grand-père in an abandoned military base. Then … it starts getting complicated.