Poor start, but it got better.
Yeah, Sonic's dream was corny and went on for far longer than a dream sequence should. During it I think you forgot that Mecha Sonic is a robot and portrayed him instead as a cliche supervillain. (eg."That can be arranged", "Master Mecha Sonic's Evil Empire") Cool evil robots do not talk like that. Ever. Still, it was just the dream. Not a problem for future episodes.
Pressing space for speech was annoying, but I suppose you have to relent for the tide of both the slow five year olds and the impatient teenagers. The jokes in the first half did not appeal. I hope they were appreciated by younger viewers. It definitely picked up once they left for Yoshi's Island, so good going there. Graphics and Violence were good as ever, but sound was pulled down by not changing the music from the cheerful jungle beat at the "Freeing the slaves" scene, but sound was otherwise pretty good.
It would be nice if Sonic and the team got back the radar and at least one emerald. The new lot can have the other. You can lose the radar radar to the Koopas if you like. Not that I'd boss you around or anything. Haha. Congratulations on running such a grade A series by yourself and sorry the standard is so high for you now.