Mario Bros. Animated Movie Coming from Illumination

[Rabbitearsblog]

Just saw the Mario movie and I really enjoyed it!  I loved how faithful this movie was to the games and the animation was very beautiful to look at.  Also, Bowser is easily the best character for me in this movie!  My issues with this movie though is that I think that the plot moved way too fast and I wish that we spent more time in the Mushroom Kingdom without going through the locations so fast.  Also, I wish that the characters were fully developed as I felt that the movie kind of rushed through their developments.  But overall, I had a lot of fun with this movie!

Now, do I think that this movie is better than the Sonic movies?  Honestly, I still think Sonic 2 was better than the Mario movie, but that's just my personal opinion.

[Ryannumber1gamer]

51 minutes ago, batson said:

I feel that Peach (and Luigi too for that matter) actually being better characters to play as in many of the games is one thing, while actually showing Mario as less competent than his supporting cast in a movie is another thing. The main playable character not actually being the best or easiest character to play as is a weird but common occurance in video games, one that us Sonic fans are all too familiar with. But we all acceppt that from an in-universe point of view Sonic and Mario are the respective champions/aces of their universes, regardless of the fact that Tails can fly and Peach can float. 

To have Mario be so trumped by Peach in terms of ability in a narrative movie like that however feels wrong to me. Again, it's Mario's very first adventure, I get it. But from what we saw of Peach and how she absolutely aced everything she did, and did it with as much heroic confidence and bravery as any person could possibly have, what could Mario possibly bring to the table even after he's reached his full potential as a hero?

This isn’t actually anything new, though. Peach is heavily based on her characterisation in Super Mario Adventures, and her being more experienced doesn’t invalid anything. Peach lets Mario tag along because he has a personal stake in all of this with Luigi captured. It’s not some scenario where she needs him, but she gives him the know how to journey through the Mushroom Kingdom without getting immediately killed.

Thats not even to say Mario doesn’t pull off skilled feats either, he defeats Donkey Kong despite DK being a far more experienced combatant, he is far quicker on his feet during the kart chase, jumping down and around karts, keeping one step ahead of the Koopa on him, and generally being extremely proficient while Peach only saves Toad, and Peach still ends up kidnapped and needing rescued towards the end, ice flower or not. Mario still ends up being the one to save the day with the Tanooki suit, and Bowser bodies Peach, DK, and Toad working together, while Mario and Luigi are the ones who demolish the army and kick Bowser’s ass together, particularly because they have the most skilled teamwork out of them all.

Disliking the movie is one thing, but this just isn’t a valid point to me, Peach is skilled, that didn’t make her any less incapable of being kidnapped, nor did it invalidate any of the numerous feats Mario does throughout the movie once Peach teaches him the ropes.

[Sonicka]

 

Ok, so I found the film to be a solid 6/10 overall.

Animation was pretty lovely, the music (that wasn't licensed) had loving rearrangements, and Chris and Charlie as Mario and Luigi were of course absolutely fine. Actually, almost everyone suited their VA's in light of the build up of discourse from the trailers (that used out of context voice clips). Jack Black stole it as Bowser for me with Toad as close second, even Seth Rogan as Donkey Kong nailed it. Kranky was certainly miscast, but he was relatively minor in proceedings overall. I did also enjoy that Charles Martinet got some appropriate voice work in here as well in various roles... although I'd argue that they should have stuck him with the main one that mattered and leant into this particular arc more as the payoff (and intentional meaningfulness here) was unearned by the movie's close.

...actually, a running theme of this film was a string of unearned moments, and that's mostly down to lack of character development and world-building in favour of pure fan-service.

Personally, I found that the references and easter eggs where all over the place... and that's both to the films credit and disservice for trying too hard. A lot of this fan-service benifited the 'players' for the "ooooh!" moments, but these usually came at the expense of narrative payoffs or story progression which was a shame. The world building and lore initially seemed very interesting to me as well, but it never got explained or made much sense in the end, so we just had to accept that there was "real world" and that there was a dimensional teleport system hidden under Brooklyn which lead to "video game world". Really, what we got for the opening act mirrored a lot of the Bob Hoskins 90's flick hilariously.

Preferably, I would have spent some more time on the world lore or other story beats, like the underachieving siblings arc, or Luigi breaking out from under his nerves (criminal that Luigi got sidelined for a good 70% of this film), or Peach's shoehorned in backstory (a literal reverse scenario of the live action film), or explaining why Bowser has such an obsession with Peach etc... Instead we are just whizzed from spontaneous set piece to action set piece, with non-senseical in game references thrown at the viewer like candy to help us forget that they don't have much else to say on these matters. So the payoffs never land when they come. 

My biggest bug bear though, was the use of the Superstar/Starman... but mainly because my brain kept going throughout the film... "No... that's a Power Star, how did you get this SO wrong?" - but of course, it is correct. It's just a shame Nintendo mismanaged these items use and look within their games as it totally threw me off.   

Anyway... overall, this is not a bad movie and in context of breaking the "video game adaption curse" - which I'd argue Sonic has already achieved twice prior - this film is neither here nor there. This iteration of the SMB Movie just exists in the great pipe space between realities. Hopefully, an inevitable sequel will simply benefit from the setup this one provided.

I'll say this though, Going into this 2023 I never expected to find myself citing the Puss in Boots sequel as a better film than the Mario Movie - who knew? XD

 

[Ryannumber1gamer]

33 minutes ago, Sonicka said:

Preferably, I would have spent some more time on the world lore or other story beats, like the underachieving siblings arc, or Luigi breaking out from under his nerves (criminal that Luigi got sidelined for a good 70% of this film), or Peach's shoehorned in backstory (a literal reverse scenario of the live action film), or explaining why Bowser has such an obsession with Peach etc... Instead we are just whizzed from spontaneous set piece to action set piece, with non-senseical in game references thrown at the viewer like candy to help us forget that they don't have much else to say on these matters. So the payoffs never land when they come. 

To be honest, I don't really get most of this. The sibling arc isn't really an arc, as much as it is a character dynamic that shows why Mario and Luigi are so supportive of each other, and isn't really meant to go much further than showing that Mario can do stuff on his own, but together with Luigi, they can pull off a lot more, and they always have each other's backs no matter what.

I don't fully disagree because I do think sidelining Luigi for a lot of the film was a bad call, especially because the sibling bond between them is easily the strongest character dynamic in the whole movie, but I'm not seeing where it's undercooked either. It's just it was one of the strongest points and would've been nicer to have more.

Peach's backstory, again I don't see how it's really shoehorned. She's a human princess in a world full of Toads, and they opted to address and explain it, rather than try to act like it was fully normal. They gave us enough to know she's probably from the human world and ended up accidentally in the Mushroom Kingdom like the Mario Bros, that she was taught everything she knew by the Toads, and that's how she eventually became the princess. Unless we're going to have a full movie about Peach looking for her lost parents or something, I don't really understand why this would be a necessary focus beyond establishing a backstory for her.

Bowser is the one I really don't get. Why do we need to see some huge backstory about why Bowser has a obsession with Peach? Not only has that never been a thing in the games (we're always just told Bowser loves her, not why), but the film literally has a full monologue of Bowser explaining exactly what he loves about Peach. There's an entire song sequence, as well as a massive laundry list of qualities he gives to Kamek about why he adores Peach. If anything, that's far more than the games, and even Mario Adventures gave us for that record.

I get that the pacing could be better and that the story is fairly simplistic, but I don't really see how any of these are worth focusing on. They're either enough for the purposes they serve, or are actually addressed in the movie. The only one I again agree on is having Luigi out of the action until the tail end was a bad call.

[StaticMania]

Bowser's original motivation for capturing Peach was that she could reverse the effects of his magic, I.E. turning the Toads into Item Blocks.

We don't know why that has shifted into Bowser being in love with Peach (it's probably because of the OVA or the Comic), but if they were gonna explain anything while ignoring the original concept...they might as well explain why Bowser loves Peach and wants her specifically.

[Sonicka]

41 minutes ago, Ryannumber1gamer said:

To be honest, I don't really get most of this. The sibling arc isn't really an arc, as much as it is a character dynamic that shows why Mario and Luigi are so supportive of each other, and isn't really meant to go much further than showing that Mario can do stuff on his own, but together with Luigi, they can pull off a lot more, and they always have each other's backs no matter what.

I don't fully disagree because I do think sidelining Luigi for a lot of the film was a bad call, especially because the sibling bond between them is easily the strongest character dynamic in the whole movie, but I'm not seeing where it's undercooked either. It's just it was one of the strongest points and would've been nicer to have more.

Peach's backstory, again I don't see how it's really shoehorned. She's a human princess in a world full of Toads, and they opted to address and explain it, rather than try to act like it was fully normal. They gave us enough to know she's probably from the human world and ended up accidentally in the Mushroom Kingdom like the Mario Bros, that she was taught everything she knew by the Toads, and that's how she eventually became the princess. Unless we're going to have a full movie about Peach looking for her lost parents or something, I don't really understand why this would be a necessary focus beyond establishing a backstory for her.

Bowser is the one I really don't get. Why do we need to see some huge backstory about why Bowser has a obsession with Peach? Not only has that never been a thing in the games (we're always just told Bowser loves her, not why), but the film literally has a full monologue of Bowser explaining exactly what he loves about Peach. There's an entire song sequence, as well as a massive laundry list of qualities he gives to Kamek about why he adores Peach. If anything, that's far more than the games, and even Mario Adventures gave us for that record.

I get that the pacing could be better and that the story is fairly simplistic, but I don't really see how any of these are worth focusing on. They're either enough for the purposes they serve, or are actually addressed in the movie. The only one I again agree on is having Luigi out of the action until the tail end was a bad call.

Honestly, for me it’s mostly that this IS is a film and not the game - so I always feel that more narrative tips and quirks are essential in this medium because then it can lend itself to more meaningful moments later on. This film didn’t really care about succeeding on any of that, and that would be ok if it didn’t try to set them up in the first place.

For myself it just felt that there seemed to be a lot of threads left dangling or were moments that felt completely unearned or that I just didn’t care.

So, at the end Mario finally earns the respect of his Father based on one defamation at the beginning and then him suddenly saving the world at the end… so what? Also, Did Mario actually self destruct the pipeline? Never followed up on. The Mario Bros now live in Video Game land at the end? Ok sure. But why? A Yoshi egg is teased / revealed in the end credits, but we saw a hoard of them earlier in the movie, so this isn’t really a surprise. And Bowser - he’s just obsessed or in love with peach because he’s crazy, that’s basically the premise. That might be ok for the games, but in this film we’re just told (or sung) that he’s crazy in love with her because the movie says he is. There’s either a lot of cut content here at best, or it’s just lazy writing at worst.

Ultimately, the movie is inoffensive and enjoyable - but I can’t turn off this part of my brain that found it mind numbing and overcooked with so much non-narrative referential clutter that didn’t need to be there.

There is Stuff like the recreation of level 1-1 in Brooklyn which was visually clever, but then you have Mario Kart shoved in here because… well… Mario Kart, so now all Kongs are mechanics because OK someone needs to make these things. Rainbow Road can also magically can get them and the Kong army to the next part of the story which is super convenient too. 

Theres just a lot of clutter in this film that is here purely because they existed in the videogames - but when this has no context or meaning within the movies narrative or visual language it just becomes a hollow reference.

It could be a me thing - but it’s one of those cases where I felt this movie had a solid foundation but was let down by the off pacing (and above).

The sidelining of Luigi (when this is CALLED The Mario Bros Movie) was also disappointing. I dunno, it actually felt like a good 30 minutes of content was cut out of this movie and a lot of that could have been at Luigi’s expense. 

Anyway, despite it all - a sequel and / or spin-offs can at least hope to build from this.

 

[StaticMania]

2 minutes ago, Sonicka said:

...so now all Kongs are mechanics because OK...

Funky Kong was already a mechanic, so they gave that trait to even more Original Kongs...

[Sonicka]

3 minutes ago, StaticMania said:

Funky Kong was already a mechanic, so they gave that trait to even more Original Kongs...

Actually that’s a good point! I just found it super weird to enter the land of Kongs only to find they are all just driving karts… well, everywhere. XD

I suppose in this world someone has to have the skills to make these things. It could have been any race. 

I will say though, that the use of the roads looking like the hub world level maps from the games was visually clever. I do like little touches like that. 

[Ryannumber1gamer]

1 hour ago, Sonicka said:

There is Stuff like the recreation of level 1-1 in Brooklyn which was visually clever, but then you have Mario Kart shoved in here because… well… Mario Kart, so now all Kongs are mechanics because OK someone needs to make these things. Rainbow Road can also magically can get them and the Kong army to the next part of the story which is super convenient too. 

Again though, it feels like you're splitting hairs. Like yeah, it's convenient that Rainbow Road would take them back to the Mushroom Kingdom (although it's explained narratively and used primarily for Bowser outsmarting them fairly naturally), but it doesn't actively change the fact that turning Rainbow Road into a set of interconnecting pathways to the Kingdoms is a valid idea to adapt it into a movie. It's taking parts of the games and turning it into world-building for the Kingdoms. At that point, we might as well start talking about how the Master Emerald shrine in Sonic 2 just so happened to be a couple miles out from where Rachel was holding her wedding, or how Sonic's rings can teleport him wherever the plot needs him to be if we're gonna start getting into plot contrivances

[Rabbitearsblog]

31 minutes ago, Sonicka said:

Honestly, for me it’s mostly that this IS is a film and not the game - so I always feel that more narrative tips and quirks are essential in this medium because then it can lend itself to more meaningful moments later on. This film didn’t really care about succeeding on any of that, and that would be ok if it didn’t try to set them up in the first place.

That's how I feel about films in general too. I also had an issue with the film's plot being too fast paced and not allowing any breathing space for us to see more of the Mushroom Kingdom.

[Sonicka]

7 hours ago, Ryannumber1gamer said:

Again though, it feels like you're splitting hairs. Like yeah, it's convenient that Rainbow Road would take them back to the Mushroom Kingdom (although it's explained narratively and used primarily for Bowser outsmarting them fairly naturally), but it doesn't actively change the fact that turning Rainbow Road into a set of interconnecting pathways to the Kingdoms is a valid idea to adapt it into a movie. It's taking parts of the games and turning it into world-building for the Kingdoms. At that point, we might as well start talking about how the Master Emerald shrine in Sonic 2 just so happened to be a couple miles out from where Rachel was holding her wedding, or how Sonic's rings can teleport him wherever the plot needs him to be if we're gonna start getting into plot contrivances

Splitting hairs? Probably.

Actually I missed the factoid of what Rainbow Road is in the context of the film - that clearly passed right over me. So fair if it’s the upper connectors between Kingdoms - I suppose it’s just lucky that they were in the mechanics kingdom and drove Karts I suppose. 

They tried to adapt a lot of Mario franchises in the best way they could - I just think it could have been an even better movie if the Illumination/ Nintendo cared embraced the movies world building rather than randomly throw constant references like a dart at a board that pertained to the games.

Sonic 1 & 2 balanced Easter Eggs a lot better, but this is because the narrative is mostly set within our world. All the stuff set in the “real” world in Mario was far more interesting and creatively fun to me, because the moment we went to the Mushroom Kingdom we were in Nintendo’s domain and it then became a showcase of just promoting their games within the film. The scenario suddenly became that this worked better as a game than a movie, and the creativity in the films landscape was lost. 

But that’s just my opinion. I don’t think that there is anything inherently wrong with any of this movie - it’s a fun time. It’s just not as amazing as it had the potential to be to really stand out as something unique rather than settle to be an OK family film starring a well known IP. But that’s alright - maybe that was their goal.

The film will certainly do well on a monetary level and this will certainly drive new consumers (or old time players) back to Mario I’m sure. 

[DaddlerTheDalek]

I saw it yesterday and I had a lot of fun.

[Dr. Mechano]

17 hours ago, batson said:

To have Mario be so trumped by Peach in terms of ability in a narrative movie like that however feels wrong to me. Again, it's Mario's very first adventure, I get it. But from what we saw of Peach and how she absolutely aced everything she did, and did it with as much heroic confidence and bravery as any person could possibly have, what could Mario possibly bring to the table even after he's reached his full potential as a hero?

He does a lot, actually. 

• Spoiler

  • He beats Donkey Kong in combat
  • He defeats the Koopa General and his troops on Rainbow Road
  • He stops the Banzai Bill from destroying the Mushroom Kingdom.
  • He and Luigi beat Bowser

  Mario is inexperienced, but he runs on pure determination and accomplishes a lot in this movie.

[batson]

Of course mario did things in the movie, but Peach came of as being miles better at the athlethic hero stuff than he was. And like I said, it seems difficult to imagine that he could ever surpass her and become the number one guy for the kindgom to rely on to stop Bowser (like he is seen as in-universe in the games) since Peach seemed to be as good as that stuff as any human could possibly get. I dont get why the hell this version of the Mushoom Kingdom ever need this version of Mario to be its foremost defender when they already got this version of Peach. Making Peach come of as the absolute master of the exact type of athlethics and fighting styles that Mario is supposed to be the ace at (again, that is, in the games, from an in-universe point of view) was a narrative misstep in the movie.

I'm not opposed to Marios supporting cast essentially being able to do what he does, as they absolutely should be. Like, everyone who is anything close to a fighter or hero in the series should be able to jump and wall-kick and throw stuff and all that jazz. But Mario should ultimately be the best at it, either because of ability, or at the very least he should be the best hero on account of his attitude, meaning on account of having that never-give up-spirit more than any other character. But that last aspect is another thing were it's difficult to imagine that the movie version of Mario could ever top the movie version of Peach, as she already has that never-give-up attitude as much as any person ever could. Sure, the movie spells out this personality trait as being characteristic of Mario, but from what we actually see, Peach seems to have it in an even greater dose. She litterally has no flaws in the movie, the very definition of a Mary Sue.

I just can't see how movie Mario could ever be a greater hero than movie Peach in either ability or personality. Which makes me once again ask myself why or how Mario would ever at any point within the context of that fictional universe become its best hero.

Unless "Mario needs to do the hero stuff simply because Peach is too busy being just as OP in politics as she is in heroics".

 

 

[Dr. Mechano]

1 hour ago, batson said:

She litterally has no flaws in the movie, the very definition of a Mary Sue.

• She's rash; She attacks Mario on sight when she bumps into him for the first time and quickly apologizes for it - which is like an in-universe acknowledgment that she did something wrong.
• She underestimates Mario and tries to talk him out of fighting Donkey Kong, and is proven wrong when Mario wins.
• Her whole "stand off against Bowser with nothing but a halberd" plan falls apart instantly, as Bowser and his troops quickly overwhelm her.

But even beyond that, I think it's fine for Peach to have fewer flaws than Mario because she's not the hero. She's the mentor-figure, the experienced character who acts as Mario's guide. Like, to use Star Wars as an example... What were Obi-Wan Kenobi's flaws in A New Hope? He retroactively got some flaws later, when he became more of a focal character, but I feel like in his debut appearance he lacks any clearly-defined faults. Which, for his role as Luke's mentor, is totally fine.

[StaticMania]

She's presumably with Mario a lot longer than Obi Wan is with Luke...

So while she doesn't really need well defined flaws per se, she probably shouldn't come off as infallible as people are saying.

Those 3 points you listed alone wouldn't make any character not a Mary-Sue.

[Dr. Mechano]

33 minutes ago, StaticMania said:

She's presumably with Mario a lot longer than Obi Wan is with Luke...

So while she doesn't really need well defined flaws per se, she probably shouldn't come off as infallible as people are saying.

Those 3 points you listed alone wouldn't make any character not a Mary-Sue.

I thought Mary-Sue meant "a perfect character with no flaws." Is that not what it means, then? That's how batson defined it, anyway, which is why I responded by pointing out that she does in fact have flaws.

But I mean, finding a truly "flawless" character is much more difficult than many people think. Most characters have at least something they're not absolutely perfect at, which is a good thing.

[Dr. Detective]

 

The Mario Movie was good and the crowd I saw it with was adorable. Baby dancing to the music on a mom's lap and a husband fist pumping to his wife down the aisle to the DK Rap playing was charming as hell, among other things.

That said, it does indeed have problems. The movie LOOKS phenomenal. I will always champion animation for these kinds of films above all else despite enjoying the Sonic films for what they are. The music, of course, blows those Sonic films and any other video game movie I've seen out of the water in that department too. 

I was also surprised by how well I liked the voices. Peach worried me a bit from the trailers but she has more color to her personality than they made it out to be and Mario's voice actually wasn't bad. I was surprised when I heard it. It still wasn't excellent or anything but it was better than I expected. Bowser, Luigi, Kamek, and Toad were great. They were by far the best at doing actual cartoon voices. DK was Seth Rogan but he does a good job at being Seth Rogan and Seth Rogan is charming so whatever. 

I did not really like Cranky Kong's voice. Not sure what it was they were going for but it did not work for me.

That said, uh, I DO actually get why critics and audiences are so split on this film. If you came to this film to see a love letter to Mario's franchise then yeah you'll love it. I, as a casual fan who's only really played Odyssey and learned the rest through cultural osmosis, Smash, and the tiny bit I played of Sunshine and 64, enjoyed it even. However, if you've come to watch an actual film... the beginning does a good job at setting things up and then it just jumps from scene to scene at a pace faster than Sonic the Hedgehog to outline an extremely threadbare plot.

Mario's "arc" in this film is so flimsy it might as well not even be there, honestly. Luigi, due to being the damsel, is sadly barely in the thing. Bowser is in it enough but he doesn't DO a whole lot aside from explain his plan and simp over Peach in an admittedly pretty humorous bout of scenes. He's in his castle through most of it though. The most action he gets is from the scene in the beginning that we saw in the trailer and the ending, which was AWESOME!

Also, loved the Rainbow Road segment too. I can't help but be a sucker for fast paced action scenes in the best of times and animated car chases seldom ever disappoint in that regard. 

There are things this movie does better than the Sonic ones but there are things the Sonic ones do better than this one which leaves them on fairly even footing to me. I can see myself being in the mood for either of them depending on what I want but on the whole I'm just glad it was good. I'm glad it was fun.

I'm happy video game movies can be good and fun now. It's a really nice feeling.

 

[StaticMania]

2 minutes ago, Dr. Mechano said:

I thought Mary-Sue meant "a perfect character with no flaws." Is that not what it means, then? That's how batson literally defined it, anyway, which is why I responded by pointing out that she does actually have flaws.

It means they're functionally "flawless" as in...good at everything they do pretty much.

The flaws they do have are superficial and/or just informed traits rather than apart of their actual characterization.

I'd like to believe she's not actually "all perfect" and the showing she has in the movie just overcompensates a bit, but it's no big deal.

---

I care more about characterization anyway and honestly it seems she's more lacking on that front.

[Ryannumber1gamer]

32 minutes ago, Dr. Mechano said:

I thought Mary-Sue meant "a perfect character with no flaws." Is that not what it means, then? That's how batson defined it, anyway, which is why I responded by pointing out that she does in fact have flaws.

But I mean, finding a truly "flawless" character is much more difficult than many people think. Most characters have at least something they're not absolutely perfect at, which is a good thing.

She isn't even really flawless though. As stated, she vastly underestimates Mario's abilities earlier in the movie, several of her plans go to shit, and the big one - her entire scheme to enlist the help of the Kongs was completely destroyed because she underestimated Bowser and believed it would be easy to get the drop on him, which leads to the full capture of the Kongs, the takeover of the Mushroom Kingdom, her Toads being imprisoned, and the kingdom being plundered.

I do not get this, honestly I do not. You can't even go with the 'peach was never a action girl, she should just be the damsel!" because - A. She's been a playable character numerous times within the series now, and B. A lot of her characterisation here is lifted point for point out from Super Mario Adventures, in which she's rash, headstrong, and determined to take matters into her own hands, even when ridiculously out numbered. She's capable, but she also has a flaw of overestimating her own ability.

It's not like she was a generic character here. If we had what's being suggested from the games, she would be a bubbly waste of a character crying out for Mario near constantly. Instead, Peach is capable as both a leader and a combatant, is incredibly curious and fascinated by the various worlds all around her, especially the Mushroom Kingdom, she shows far more disgust towards Bowser's advances than we've ever seen before, and she's far more cunning than we've ever got in the games. 

It's not even that they diminish Mario's ability to prop her up - she literally lived in the Mushroom Kingdom, the movie says this point blank numerous times, and she still makes mistakes, and Mario still has his own numerous numbers of feats that Peach can't claim, and in a far less amount of time to get used to the basics of the Mushroom Kingdom. 

[Dr. Mechano]

8 minutes ago, Ryannumber1gamer said:

It's not even that they diminish Mario's ability to prop her up

No, not at all; And Mario still does far more than Peach does in the overall scheme of things.

Peach does some cool things - the training course, rescuing Toad on Rainbow Road, the whole Ice Flower sequence at the wedding, etc. - but Mario just keeps accomplishing feat after feat in this film, and more screentime is devoted to him anyway; which makes sense, it's his movie, after all. He isn't remotely overshadowed by Peach as some fans feared he would be when those early trailers dropped.

[StaticMania]

21 minutes ago, Ryannumber1gamer said:

She isn't even really flawless though. As stated, she vastly underestimates Mario's abilities earlier in the movie, several of her plans go to shit, and the big one - her entire scheme to enlist the help of the Kongs was completely destroyed because she underestimated Bowser and believed it would be easy to get the drop on him, which leads to the full capture of the Kongs, the takeover of the Mushroom Kingdom, her Toads being imprisoned, and the kingdom being plundered.

This is a lot more definitive in showcasing how her flaw actually matters to the story, that's good.

[CrownSlayers Shadow]

So basically people are treating Princess Peach similar to Princess Sally.

Never thought I’d see the day these to get similar scorn like that.

[batson]

I wish we lived in an alternative universe were a studio with actual quality on the agenda would have gotten the job to do this movie instead of Illumination. Just imagine what Pixar, Disney or Dreamworks could have done with this material.

Granted, in Pixar's case I sorta suspect that they wouldn't want to do a movie based on a franchise with a look and feel that is already clearly established since this would limit their usual focus on creating a unique new setting for their movies. But the main Disney animation studio on the other hand is probably commercially focused enough not to be detered by that, so I can definitely see them being willing to take on Mario if they got the order from their parent company. Granted if there is any studio out there that is likely to have allowed Peach to out-badass Mario as much as Illumination did, it's Disney, but I think the difference is that Disney wouldn't have made her a straight up Mary Sue. Disney animation studios is too competent at storytelling to fall for such a basic narrative trap. Frozen, Moana, Zootopia ect all have capable female heroes but that still comes of as people with rounded personalities, people who could actually exist.

However, I think Dreamworks would have been the absolutely perfect studio to do the Mario movie. I mean look at Puss in Boots 2. God, what a great movie that was, and as it was within the action-adventure genre, we know that Dreamworks are apt at the exact genre that a Mario movie will obviously always have to be in. Also, I just know that Dreamworks is non-pretentious and just pandering enough that they have been perfectly willing to make a Mario movie with just as much fan-pandering as the Illumination movie did. And yes, I say this as a good thing. The only thing the Illumination film really has going for it is that it appeals so much to the Mario fan in us, with everything from visual to musical easter eggs, that we can't help but smile time and time again even though the narrative is crap. Just imagine a movie that could send out the same constant doses of good vibes to old-timey Mario fans by reminding us of the games, but which also had good writing. That would have been amazing.

But no, instead Nintendo squandred their opportunity for a good Hollywood Mario movie (again) by picking probably the single worst of Hollywoods mainstream animated studios. It reminds me of when Blue Sky was allowed to make a CGI Peanuts (aka Charlie Brown and Snoopy) movie (though to be fair that turned out better than I think anyone expected). Or as a swede, it reminds me of when the author of Pippi Longstocking refused to let Studio Ghibli make a Pippi movie but then about 10 years later allowed Nelvana, aka the creators of the friggin Care Bears, to take on the property.

[StaticMania]

Hopefully they can get another studio next time...