By Pierson Luscy | LTVN Reporter
“The Super Mario Bros. Movie” is full of callbacks and references from Nintendo’s past, making it a must-watch for fans of the charismatic plumber from Brooklyn. With the help of Illumination Entertainment, Nintendo was able to successfully put Mario on film.
Fair warning — there are spoilers ahead.
Nintendo first announced that Mario was going back to the big screen in September 2021, immediately followed by the cast of characters and who would voice them. Chris Pratt as Mario and Jack Black as Bowser were two of the big names that would be in this movie.
My biggest concern was that this movie was going to be a letdown after seeing the cast and trailers by not meeting expectations of what it should look like to put the face of Nintendo on the big screen.
Those concerns were put to rest, and the film was fantastic.
Illumination and Nintendo did not hesitate on filling the movie in with cameos of every character they could that has been in a Mario game. From Super Smash Bros., to the Captain Toad games, to Mario Kart, this movie had everything thing that you could think of, making it the ultimate love letter to the character that made Nintendo a household name.
Even though the Mario franchise started in 1983 and has been going ever since, Nintendo did not heavily lean on one generation of the game over another. If you have ever played a single game of Mario, you would understand at least a few references in the movie.
It did not stop at just mentioning the Mario games. “The Super Mario Super Show” also made a cameo early on in the movie, closely followed by the voice actor Charles Martinet, the original voice actor of Mario, getting a one-liner that is easily recognizable.
My only complaint about the movie is that they did not reference a few of the games that I wished to see. Fortunately, I highly doubt that we will have to wait very long for Nintendo and Illumination’s next installment, based on the great reviews it is getting and breaking the box office record for an animated movie opening weekend revenue and surpassing “Sonic the Hedgehog 2” for total revenue from a video game movie adaptation.
This movie was exactly what I was hoping for, and when the next Nintendo Direct rolls around, I would keep an eye out for an announcement of a possible sequel.
