The Super Mario Galaxy Movie is bigger, brighter and bolder than its predecessor, making for one of the best video game to silver screen adaptations to date.
One of the pitfalls of the original Super Mario movie, something that many first-time adaptations suffer from, is having to go through the spiel of world-building and character origin stories, sometimes making for an end product that can feel too familiar or safe. Thankfully, The Super Mario Galaxy Movie ups the ante and doesn’t slow down at all during its 1h 38m runtime.
The Super Mario Galaxy Movie opens with a brief introduction scene that familiarises audiences with Rosalina and her extended family of Lumas and their fixation on bedtime stories about the Mario Brothers (and Peach, to a lesser extent), before swiftly moving to the brothers proper, who are seen riding bikes in the Sand Kingdom à la Super Mario Odyssey.
The brothers Mario are on another plumbing job, this time, investigating a clogged pipe in the Sand Kingdom, something that ends with the iconic duo befriending Yoshi (Donald Glover) before returning to the Mushroom Kingdom. On the topic of everyone’s favourite green lizard, Glover’s portrayal of Yoshi is excellent, partially due to the virtue of being a mostly mute character. Still, Glover has imbued a great deal of personality and charm into the character, which feels appropriate for Yoshi.
Similarly, other new characters, particularly Glen Powell’s portrayal of a certain guest character feels quite literally out of this world, giving audiences a much more fleshed-out take on a beloved Nintendo character that is full of personality. Anya Taylor-Joy’s Peach and Brie Larson’s Rosalina also play off each other rather well, with the two Princesses’ backstories being much more intrinsically linked within the canon of the film, making for changes that feel both meaningful and plausible to the legacy of the games.
“The Super Mario Galaxy Movie ups the ante and doesn’t slow down at all during its 1h 38m runtime.”
Story beats and world-building in The Super Mario Galaxy Movie are fast and well-paced, expanding on the rich lore of the games while feeling organic and respectful to the source material in a way that feels fresh and exciting. Visually, The Super Mario Galaxy Movie is absolutely stunning and a true feast for the eyes for longtime Nintendo fans. The returning cast sounds more natural (perhaps due to the passage of time), giving performances that do a good job of balancing between the affectation of their pixelated counterparts and their Power-Star-studded Hollywood equivalents.
Another trap that The Super Mario Galaxy Movie gracefully somersaults over is not having an over-reliance on nostalgia or Easter eggs that make up for the deficit of poor storytelling or padding. Instead, everything in the film feels deliberate and well-executed, lending itself to the overall runtime of the movie, while actual nods and Easter eggs all feel cherry-picked and curated. In fact, all the extraneous references in The Super Mario Galaxy Movie feel more like they’re potentially trying to build towards a broader cinematic universe than anything that truly feels like a throwaway gag or piece of nostalgia bait.
“The Super Mario Galaxy Movie feels like a truly powered-up sequel that is not only a wild ride for fans but a solid kids’ movie in its own right.”
The Super Mario Galaxy Movie‘s ensemble cast shines like a series of golden coins, playing off each other in a way that adds depth to the otherwise simplistic character relationships of the games. Like Peach and Rosalina, who have a much more dynamic relationship, Bowser (Jack Black) and Bowser Jr. (Benny Safdie) play off each other in a very cute and fun manner that sells the dynamic of father and son in a way that rivals the wonderful Nintendo Switch Parental Controls video (if you know, you know).
In other words, The Super Mario Galaxy Movie feels like a truly powered-up sequel that is not only a wild ride for fans but a solid kids’ movie in its own right. Like the sometimes bumpy transition into new hardware that marks the beginning of a new video game generation, it has taken Hollywood a few decades to nail the video game adaptation. But with features like The Super Mario Galaxy Movie, it’s safe to say anything Illumination and Nintendo have coming down the green pipeline will be in good hands.
The Super Mario Galaxy Movie is a stellar sequel worthy of the lofty stars it aims to reach, giving audiences both young and young at heart plenty of laughs and action sequences that feel true to the source material, making it a must-watch for the year.
