The Sonic the Hedgehog Show (TSTHS)

== Introduction ==
The Sonic the Hedgehog Show or ソニックザヘッジホッグショー (Sonikkuzahejjihoggushō) in Japanese, is a mix of action, slice of life and comedy show directed by Takashi Iizuka and produced by Tokyo Movie Shinsha (TMS), Studio Osaka and SEGA that aired from August 9th, 2023 to January 8th, 2028. This is the first Sonic show to feature a new episode format featuring two 11 minute segment. In seasons 1 and 2, 26 episodes were produced in two 11 minute segments, with season 3 and season 4 having 20 episodes with two 11 minute segments (discounting the specials). The show was rated TV-Y7-FV for all 4 Seasons, occasionally containing a few TV-PG episodes.
==Development==
=== Early Development (Season 1) ===
The show was first conceptualized by Eitaro Toyoda, who saw a lot of positive feedback from Sonic fans outside of Japan for the Sonic Isekai stories he wrote for the Sonic Channel service in Japan. He thought about a way to bring those stories to the West, by pitching an animated series with episodes that have similar plots to the stories, whilst toning down some of the action. So he got together with Yui Karasuno to pitch the series to SEGA. SEGA showed interest with the project but suggested finding a way of incorporating action elements in that new show. The Original Dragon Ball series was a major source of inspiration for the series, as it also stroke a balance between action and slice of life comedy. They also insisted on making the show storyboard driven to allow more creativity and have 11 minute episodes, which is quite rare for Japanese anime. The show's production was picked up by TMS Entertainment who was the main publishing helm for the series, and for the animation, they picked up a new Osaka-based animation studio, Studio Osaka for their work on a Detective Conan test animation, which would be the main animation studio that would animate and color and clean up the storyboards for the show, while the rough storyboards and writing would be handled in-house by SEGA and the Sonic writing team. And the series would be trying to replicate the Sonic Channel PICT artstyle of Yui Karasuno, to give off a cozy vibe of what was at it's core a slice of life comedy mixed with some occasional action.
After a couple episodes being produced, it seemed that TMS and Studio Osaka ran out of budget for the series and needed more, or the series would've been cancelled and shelved completely. Around the same time, SEGA asked numerous Western cartoon channels to host the show, most of them rejecting it, but Nickelodeon was hesitant to air the series and signed a contract with SEGA and TMS which included Nickelodeon being involved and funding the first season of the show and bringing in crew members of various Nicktoons to help on the project, which finally led to the full production of the first season.
The series would then air on August 9th, 2023 in Japan on Fuji TV, and it would finally come over to Nickelodeon and Paramount+ 4 months later.
=== Seasons 2-3 ===
When it came time for Season 2, and as the series proved itself hugely popular Studio Osaka and TMS had enough money to supply the series by themselves and didn't need Nickelodeon's help anymore. Nickelodeon stopped their direct involvement in the project, but staying as a distributor within the US, but some crew members brought over from select Nicktoons still remained, namely crew members from SpongeBob SquarePants. 
Because of the stopping of Nickelodeon's involvement with the series, Seasons 1 and 2 would be released on Netflix.
=== Season 4 ===
Due to the popularity of the series, TMS and Sega wanted to keep it for one more final season, but however, Studio Osaka didn't want to continue with the project, as they were working on their own solo anime work at the time, while also being the main overseas animation studio for many new western cartoons, so they quit the animation department. TMS instead put their own animation team to work on the 4th season, demanding SEGA to make the series script driven instead of storyboard driven. The fourth season ended with it's last episode premiere on January 8th, 2028, marking the end of the entire series' 5 year run.
== Reception ==
When the show first aired in Japan on Fuji TV and was soon subbed into English, the initial response was extremely positive, some citing it as the best Sonic show to be ever produced. This hugely positive reception continued when the series got it's first episode dubbed in English, where people expressed more satisfaction with some of the current cast reprising their roles and some newcomers into voice acting the series, praising the voice director for his work. As more episodes of the first season aired, the positive reception of the series calmed down, and while it was still positively received, it wasn't on the same level as when it aired before.
Although, the second and third seasons proved to be huge critical successes, as the series seemed to have found it's own identity and magic, according to critics, but there came worry for the fourth season, which upon release had a drastically less positive reception, as it's reception was extremely mixed, bordering on mostly negative, and many expressed their desire for the series to end as they found it to have gone on for too long at that point.
==Merchandising==
==References (Sonic/Other Media)== 
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== Episodes ==
Go to The Sonic the Hedgehog Show (TSTHS)/Episodes for the episodes
==Trivia==
*This is one of the few storyboard driven anime that's not based off a manga
*This series is the first physical appearance of Tangle, Whisper, Starline and Surge outside the IDW Comics and Mobile games. The series also has the return of Ella and Topaz from Sonic X and Sticks from Sonic Boom, the ladder only appearing in Season 4.
*Instead of dubbing the series in English in studipolis, they dubbed it at Bang Zoom! instead for Studiopolis for unclear reasons. Which meant a lot of the voice actors from the modern cast do not reprise their roles and are replaced. However, aside from Eggman, this is not the case for the main cast.
*The series was nominated for multiple award shows for it's animation and comedy, one of them includes winning 2025's Nickelodeon Kids Choice Awards, beating out the likes of SpongeBob SquarePants, which has consistently won the awards beforehand.
*The series features one opening with two different variations. The first one is used in seasons 1 and 2 and includes a scene with already existing Sonic characters such as Shadow, Cream, Big, Blaze, Silver and the Chaotix. The second variation however, used in seasons 3 and 4 replaces that scene with a scene in the same vein of that one including the series' original characters alongside Tangle and Whisper.
*The series features two completely different ending themes with different animation playing over it compared to the intro, but just like the intro, the first one is used in seasons 1 and 2 and uses the pre-existing Sonic cast, while the second ending theme is used in seasons 3 and 4 and uses both the pre-existing cast and the new cast of characters the series introduces
*While 70% of the series' first three seasons was storyboard driven, there's quite a lot of episodes that were script driven instead. These are the equivalents to filler episodes in the series, as SEGA is not involved in conceptualizing the plots, but rather TMS. The fourth season however would be completely script driven, switching between inside of SEGA's walls or in TMS.
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Category:TV Series
Category:TSTHS
Category:Anime
Category:Nickelodeon