We’ve known about the Super Mario Movie for quite some time, now. A long time, in fact. The September 2021 Nintendo Direct announced the voice cast for the movie, which included talent such as Jack Black, Charlie Day, Seth Rogen, Anya-Taylor Joy, and Chris Pratt (with Miyamoto’s “He’s so cool” comment becoming a new meme). Well, a year later, and we’ve now got a trailer to show off just what this movie is bringing.
In said trailer, we see Bowser’s island fortress coming in to land, creating a great contrast between fire and ice visuals. The penguins who call the ice castle their home come out to meet the forces of the great Koopa, though prove ineffective at even putting a smile on Bowser’s face. Until he commands the Magikoopa to deal with them. Now free to do as he wishes, Bowser flames the ice castle’s defences and claims the power star within.
Having seen the main villain, it’s only right to also see the main hero. In comes Mario, thrown from a pipe into a world that’s strange to him. Meeting a Toad, he joins with the Toad to explore the Mushroom Kingdom. The end shows a confrontation between Luigi and some of the Koopa forces, possibly on the island fortress considering the volcanic setting he’s exploring.
The visuals are fantastic. I’ve already mentioned about the contrast between fire and ice, but even within the Mushroom Kingdom there’s a lot of detail to the environments. The voice talent that we heard throughout does a great job in putting a voice to these characters. Pratt’s Mario feels a bit generic, but… is that really a bad thing?
The memes of it just being Chris Pratt’s regular voice are everywhere, and I admit to joining in on that. Does that not work, though? For someone who is meant to be ordinary? Don’t forget, this interpretation is the same as the cartoons of the 90s, where Mario and Luigi were just Brooklyn-based plumbers thrust into a fantastical world. I don’t blame Illumination for taking the same premise and putting it into the movie to start the Nintendo Cinematic Universe (come on, you know it’s going to happen).
What I do love is that Illumination are taking this seriously. Koji Kondo – artist behind many of the great Mario soundtracks – is here and collaborating with Brian Tyler to bring that Mario feel to the soundtrack. Everything looks as you would expect for the Mario world, even if the Mushroom Kingdom is a very different interpretation to what we’ve previously seen. Bowser’s island fortress looks every bit as intimidating as you’d imagine.
I am certainly interested in seeing more about this movie when it comes, but I’m sure there won’t be anything else released about it until the new year begins. 2023 will be where we see the marketing for it start fully, ready for its release to theatres on 7/April in the US. And maybe the UK as well. Which for some reason doesn’t have a date set.
