When you think about it, animation studio Illumination has got it made landing a partnership with Nintendo when making animated movies on their properties. With the former’s talent for making its storylines stock and more on commercial value, matching with Nintendo’s current resolve to reliving the glory console-selling days of the 90s, it’s a match made in heaven

For us audiences, we will be watching the same template of video game character films that cater more to fans than actual filmgoers. But at the very least, it’s going to keep both companies alive, art in storytelling be damned. Thus our focus for this review: The Super Mario Galaxy Movie.

Star Lit

The Super Mario Galaxy Movie has red plumber-turned-world-savior Mario (Chris Pratt), cowardly-but-still-competant brother Luigi (Charlie Day), ass-kicking matriarch Princess Peach (Anya Taylor-Joy), and Toad (Keegan-Michael Key) teaming up again to protect the Mushroom Kingdom from the invading Koopa army led by Bowser Koopa’s son Bowser Jr. (Benny Safdie). The latter also kidnapped a literal star-powered moon princess named Rosalina (Brie Larson) to fuel his ambitions for world destruction and making daddy dearest Bowser (Jack Black) proud, who last we saw was shrinked by the Blue Mushroom.

Amidst all this, we have a bunch of planets our heroes split up and do adventuring in, one of which hosts a number of Super Mario Bros. 2 characters like Wart (Luis Guzman), Mouser, and Birdo. And we have Yoshi (Donald Glover) joining Mario and Luigi early on just because. And Princess Peach gets help from a pilot named Fox McCloud (Glen Powell), which is Nintendo’s way of bringing its classic rail shooter Star Fox back to the limelight as a future marketing ploy and because having furries get stuck in Mario’s world is quite plausible given their similar art styles that can translate well within one another.

Compared to the previous entry, the film is a bit more blatant in shoving in characters to join the core Mario team, and less organic about weaving them in. There’s supposed to be an emotional resonance between Princess Peach and Rosalina’s history (hinted at in the first movie), but it plays out with the impact of a golf clap. Bowser rehabilitating and turning to a good guy for a bit before going back to the dark side thanks to his eager son is also a stock recourse that just plays out for the sake of moving the story along. At the very least, having Fox McCloud in the show for a reasonable and decent bit helps add more levity and open-endedness to the movie versions of Nintendo’s money-maker. Honestly, I wouldn’t mind if both companies went the eventual Smash Bros. route, bringing their characters into royal rumbles left and right. We’re already seeing a preview of it here in this hodge-podge of a film.

Playing With Power

An Illumination-made pretty-as-heck animated film meant to be the equivalent of jangling keys in front of its all-ages audience who love video games and all things Big N? It’s hardly a surprising level of effort here from them and Nintendo. But I will say this: they do listen where it matters.

The film axed its pop culture-laden soundtrack of the last entry in favour of a Brian Tyler-led orchestra that plays all the recognizable themes & leit motifs from the classic titles to the 3D Mario recent fares to even Star Fox. The latter somehow making sense, as Nintendo character Fox McCloud (Glenn Powell) who serves as a guest character who pilots the heroes, ends up in the Mario Galaxy universe.

While arguably a bit faster-paced to its detriment -some visual jokes could have used an extra minute to set in and land- this animated film based on all-ages video game products that itself has a LARGE history of being commercials and ads is serviceable and on par with the last film. Lore changes are expected in adaptation, and I do feel that it does forward the momentum and drive of already-established characters and backstories from the first film.

Is this a great film? Not really, but it is an entertaining one that will have its audience wrapped around its figurative finger with many callbacks, references, and odes just to keep your attention. Will it touch your heart? Of course not, but its aesthetic and compositions does prove that this collaborative effort does as intended: get you to care more for Nintendo’s upcoming gaming nonsense.

Final Score: 60/100