Later this year, Keanu Reeves will voice Shadow for the upcoming movie, Sonic the Hedgehog 3. This isn’t Reeves’ first brush with gaming, as he previously lent his voice and likeness to Johnny Silverhand in Cyberpunk 2077. But before he took on Shadow, Reeves did his research about the role, according to Sonic 3 director Jeff Fowler.

“[Reeves] really wanted to create a very fan faithful version of the character,” said Fowler during his appearance on Sonic x Shadow Revolution’s Twitch stream. “He did research. In our first meeting, he very clearly had gone and done his homework, which was awesome. I can’t say enough wonderful things about Keanu and what he brought to the character and the experience of making this movie. I think people are going to really, really love his version of Shadow.”

“He thinks the character is awesome and he definitely understood what we were going for and he was very excited to do his version of it,” added Fowler. “Like all the cast, [he] really wants to get it right and really cares… He would give us so many different versions of line readings and just want to keep going. It was not sort of showing up and reading the script into a microphone.”

Sega must have enjoyed Reeves’ take on Shadow, since he’ll also be voicing the character in the Sonic the Hedgehog 3 Movie Pack DLC for Sonic x Shadow Generations. That DLC will arrive on December 12, with Sonic the Hedgehog 3 following on December 20. Additionally, Reeves’ voice and likeness will be in Prime Video’s Secret Level during the Armored Core episode. That animated anthology will premiere on Prime Video on December 10.