I watch a lot of movies that are so bad, they’re good. It’s rare that I see a movie so bad, it makes me question what a movie even is. For me, that was The Super Mario Galaxy Movie. As a big Mario fan, I was thoroughly Nintendo-rtained by the Mario gags and references, but I felt let down by the story. The story had fun ingredients, but didn’t cohere, like an underbaked Yoshi cookie. I was referring to Yoshi’s Cookie, exactly the kind of Nintendo B-Side you can give a thumbs up to the screen to during The Super Mario Galaxy Movie.
Mario has a bad reputation for story. Not just in movies (RIP Bob Hoskins, the most talented actor to agree to play Mario) or television shows (RIP Captain Lou Albano, the most wrestling actor to agree to play Mario), but even in video games. Ironically, Donkey Kong is considered the first game with a visual story, but the Mario series became known for threadbare plots revolving around a princess kidnapping. Also ironically, Super Mario Galaxy is one of the few mainline Mario games praised for its unique story. The movie uses almost none of the plot of the game it adapts.
The Super Mario Galaxy Movie left me wondering what went wrong. Other Mario stories felt broken beyond repair. This one felt to me like the pipes were in the right places, only leaking. Today, I’m the plumber here to diagnose the film’s story. Let me check my toolbox. Wrench, plunger, fire flower…
Here’s how I think of a movie from a story perspective. There are three key elements to a story:
Perspective: The vantage point. Whose POV are we following? Often, it’s the protagonist, but sometimes it’s another character observing the protagonist. The story’s perspective greatly affects the tone.
For example, imagine two Superman movies with identical plot points, but one tells the story from Superman’s heroic, optimistic perspective and the other tells the story from Lex Luthor’s cynical, calculating perspective. If I’m meant to empathize with Lex (because the movie was produced by Jeff Bezos?), the story will feel different.
Arc: The journey the lead characters go on. Our main character wants something, encounters obstacles in their attempt to achieve this goal, and ends up emotionally changed as a result of the journey. By extension, the viewer also feels emotionally changed, since they’re aligned with the protagonist’s perspective.
For example, imagine a romantic comedy. The leading lady goes through moments of hopelessness and cynicism when she has no partner at the beginning of the film, experiences joy and frustration as she navigates a new relationship, and ends the film with love and contentment in the arms of a special someone. Following her journey inspires our own emotional responses. (I’m not crying. I just squeezed a lemon onto my eyeballs.)
Metaphor: The message of the film. What is the story trying to say? What point is it making? Every plot in a movie should reflect the same core theme, or the film’s story will feel muddy and unfocused. We’ll come back to that in a bit.
For example, in Star Wars: Luke’s First Movie (1977), Luke Skywalker goes from the Empire destroying his family to joining a long shot resistance movement to blowing up the Empire’s super weapon. The story is a metaphor for how we should stand up to our oppressors, even against long odds, because oppression affects us all.
The first two elements, Perspective and Arc, work together to create the Metaphor. I think of Metaphor as the ultimate product of a film. Perspective and Arc are the components of a story machine, built to generate wisdom or opinion for the viewer to understand, whether the viewer realizes it or not. I have no definitive proof of this, but I suspect that 90% of the time, when people say a movie “doesn’t work,” it’s because the Metaphor failed. We might say the acting was hammy or the movie was poorly shot, but I believe viewers will forgive a lot of technical hiccups and poor artistic choices if the story feels complete and well-constructed.
This is what I realized about The Super Mario Galaxy Movie. The story of the movie is disjointed in such a way that you can clearly see how and why the Metaphor Machine breaks down. Let’s dive into this clogged warp pipe and see what happened to the story.
Warning, paisanos! Spoilers ahead!
Perspective: This should be Princess Peach’s movie. She’s the protagonist with the most clear arc. Her actions largely move the plot. I’m pretty sure the screenwriters intended the movie to be from her perspective, but let’s come back to this one.
Arc: There are quite a few main characters in The Super Mario Galaxy Movie, which I think was a major stumbling (Question Mark) block. Ensemble movies are tricky, because you have many plots to thread logically, but also metaphorically. The main story is about Princess Peach going on a quest to rescue princess Rosalina, a caretaker for child-like star creatures called Lumas.
At the beginning of the film, Peach feels alone in the world. She doesn’t know she has a family. Rosalina told bedtime stories to the Luma about Peach, so when Rosalina gets captured, the Lumas come to Peach for help. Peach finds herself compelled to rescue another princess who cared deeply about her. At the end of the film, after a long journey, Peach finds family by reuniting with Rosalina, who turns out to be her long lost sister. This parallels the story of the main antagonist, Bowser Jr, who rescues his long lost father Bowser and tries to build a perfect villainous family through a plot to enslave the universe as father and son (by kidnapping Rosalina).
If these were the only two plots in the movie, the Metaphor would be something like, “family is worth fighting for” or “not even a galaxy can keep a family apart.” The machine would be functional, at least on a broad level.
But, you guys, there are so many more Arcs in this thing! Mario and Luigi discover a new friend in Yoshi. Mario and Luigi fail to run the Mushroom Kingdom in Princess Peach’s absence. Yoshi and Luigi tease Mario about his “friendship” with Peach, sensing he’s got a crush. Mario, Luigi, and Yoshi attempt to reunite with the princess. Bowser is shrunk down and held captive by Mario. Bowser eventually earns Mario’s trust enough to get Mario to make him big again, then pays back the favor by saving them on the bee planet. Fox McCloud, a non-Mario character (?!), is stranded in the Mario universe and decides to give Peach and friends a ride to a dinosaur planet, where Mario and Luigi are turned into babies. Yoshi has to save baby Mario and Luigi, goddamn it!
None of these plot threads cleanly fit the Metaphor about family. So it all feels like just a bunch of stuff that happens and not a proper story. Granted, some of the things that happen are pretty funny! I liked tiny Bowser failing to regulate his emotions. Jack Black is a national treasure. But the story feels muddled, bloated, and confused. It’s not fully clear this is a Peach movie about family, in the same way if a kid’s bedroom is messy enough, it’s hard to distinguish it from a ravaged storage locker for Legos and Pokemon cards.
When the Metaphor fails, we grasp for other strong themes to make sense of what we just watched. That’s why a lot of critics called the film an advertisement for Nintendo. The most consistent theme of the film are frequent references to Nintendo’s various games and brands. Not just within the Mario franchise, but also Star Fox, Pikmin, R.O.B. the Robot, Metroid, Punch-Out, and even Mr. Game-and-Watch.
I think the criticism of The Super Mario Galaxy Movie as fan service is entirely fair. It’s not like we haven’t had feature length advertisements for Nintendo before, lol. Nintendo fan service was clearly a goal for the film’s creators. I imagine that was especially true for the literal Nintendo executives with credits on the movie. And look, I can get on-board with fan service. I’m a lifelong Mario fan! I know that if I do drugs, I’m going to hell before I die! But fan service without a well constructed Metaphor is like eating frosting with no cake. The cake balances out the frosting and gives the dessert stability. Fan service without a well-constructed Metaphor is a cinematic Pixie Stick that leaves viewers unsatisfied and jumping on the bed until dad comes home and puts an end to it.
So who is the Perspective for the Mario movie? Given the Metaphor, I would argue the movie is told from the POV of a Nintendo player. The most riveting scenes are the action sequences meant to bring the thrill of the Mario games to the big screen, like the scene where Bowser Jr. “plays” against the brothers in a deadly IRL side-scroller. Combine this with an endless stream of Nintendo references and I’m pretty certain the most coherent (intended?) emotional journey is one where the player/viewer goes from love for Nintendo to total awe and reverence for its long history of outstanding products!
Donkey Kong’s story became a misogynistic cliche, but it was incredibly simple. A giant ape kidnaps Pauline. Mario, her love interest, jumps over barrels to rescue her. “Love conquers all.” I wish Shigeru Miyamoto could have imparted his penchant for simplistic, solidly constructed stories into the bloated mess he executive produced. Imagine an animated Mario movie that felt less like Minions, using cultural references to make up for lack of a coherent story, and more like Flow, a simple tale with emotional depth about survival and bravery in a dangerous, awe-inspiring world. Keep it simple, paisanos.
🎲 Your Turn: What’s the metaphor in your favorite movie? Do you enjoy watching bad movies, too? What do you think of all the various Mario media out there? What did you think of The Super Mario Galaxy Movie? Was I too harsh in my assessment? Not harsh enough? I’d love to hear from you! Reply to this email or hit the orange ! Block comment button below.
Leave a Reply