It’s the 23rd September 2021, we are all eagerly watching the latest Nintendo Direct when all of a sudden Shigeru Miyamoto comes out to talk about the upcoming Mario movie being handled by Illumination. No one is quite sure how this whole thing is going to go down, will this simply be another mediocre Illumination movie or could this be the best video game movie ever made? Then Mario is announced to be voiced by Chris Pratt… and the internet erupted into laughter. Yet, within my soul remained a glimmer of hope, a certain sense of optimism that whispered, “everything will be alright.”

Fast forward to 6th October 2022, there is a Nintendo Direct with the sole purpose of unveiling the first look of this movie. We as a species are probably not ready to witness whatever Nintendo has in store, yet hesitantly, we proceed. The movie looks… GREAT much to everyone’s surprise… except mine. My optimism was rewarded, and now I’ll explain to you why I remained optimistic even after the ridiculous cast list and why I believe the Mario movie is in good hands.

Nintendo really cares about its IPs, especially Mario. After the failure of the Super Mario Bros movie from 1993 (which Nintendo had virtually no involvement in) we’ve had very little official representation from Mario or any Nintendo characters in film, tv or anything similar, despite the fact that so many of Nintendo’s franchises would be ideal candidates for such media (this is of course excluding Pokemon of which Nintendo only has partial ownership).

I believe Nintendo has avoided these other forms of media because they want as much control over their brands as possible, and to be fair, this has worked. Many of their IPs are incredibly successful because they are of such high quality, including Mario. Seeing as how they have avoided doing anything for the last 30 years, it is incredibly unlikely that Nintendo would green light any sort of movie if they were not confident that it would not tarnish Mario’s reputation in any way.

Furthermore, Nintendo is clearly very involved with this movie. They have chosen to promote it almost exclusively through their Nintendo Directs, which are again known for showcasing their high quality products. On the poster, it reads “Nintendo + Illumination” Nintendo clearly wanted their name first, they want to be associated with this product, and that is a good sign.

When Bowser was featured in the Disney movie, Wreck-It Ralph, Nintendo specifically asked them to make Bowser bigger when they were shown what he looked like in the movie to which Disney complied as was their agreement with Nintendo. This was a small cameo, Bowser had no lines and to most people, even fans of Bowser, the size of him within this movie would have made 0 difference to their enjoyment of this cameo, but Nintendo cares about their characters and how they are portrayed in ALL media to the most minute details.

Now I’m not going to pretend that Nintendo cares only out of the goodness of their hearts or because they are just filled with so much passion for all their IPs (although I’m sure many at the company do feel this way) but they’re a business, a very successful business. They’re a business associated with, above all, high quality entertainment. Now they are looking to expand to other outlets, like their recently opened Super Nintendo World which most visitors seem to really enjoy. This is a theme park experience, something completely foreign to Nintendo, and yet it has been successful likely due to their partnership with Universal (who is also handling the movie) and because they took the calculated risks necessary to ensure that their business, even whilst expanding to new territories, continues to remain known for high quality entertainment.

In conclusion, I’m not saying that this movie is going to win any Oscars, but I do believe at the very least, it will be good. Nintendo will have brought out the best of Illumination (which can be seen though their animation efforts alone) and Universal is going to want to continue this relationship they have with Nintendo because it is good for their business too. This is an important movie, and as such I believe that even the most out of touch executive heads will not mess it up… but I have been wrong before.

What do you think about the upcoming Mario movie? Just… please be good, I’m going to look like a fool now if it’s not.