The Super Mario Bros. Movie continues to break records and perform unbelievably well, as the film just crossed the massive $500 million mark at the North American box office.
While that amount is nothing to scoff at any time, The Mario Movie is only the fourth film to cross that amount since the start of the COVID-19 Pandemic in December 2019. The other three are Avatar: The Way of Water ($683.9 million), Top Gun: Maverick ($718.7 million), and Spider-Man: No Way Home ($814.1 million). Of course, an important distinction is that Mario is the only animated movie of the group, which lines up with some of the other big records that the film has shattered.
Super Mario had the biggest animated debut since the Pandemic, jumping past Frozen 2’s $358 million. It’s also become the second-biggest domestic opening of an animated movie ever, ranking only behind the Incredibles 2($183) million. As of April 390, the film passed the $1 billion global box office mark, a staggering mark that doesn’t show signs of stopping yet.
The Mario Movie has proven to be a huge hit with audiences, even after a mostly middling reception from critics. The film currently sits at 59 percent on Rotten Tomatoes, with an audience score of 96 percent.
Our own review gave the film a 7.5/10, saying, “The Super Mario Bros. Movie continues the trend of well-adapted videogame properties while delivering a film that will please both fans of the source material and children alike.”
With such overwhelming success, more Nintendo movie adaptions are a matter of when not if. Speaking to Japanese outlet Nikkei (translated by My Nintendo News), Mario creator Shigeru Miyamoto said there’s “no doubt” we’ll get more movies from Nintendo.
Of course, the post-credits scenes for The Mario Movie indicate one of those will be a sequel, but it also wouldn’t be surprising to see Nintendo tackle some of its other big series like The Legend of Zelda or Splatoon, the latter of which continues to be a monumental success in Japan.
