The Super Mario Galaxy Movie: An Uneven Continuation

After decades of bad video game adaptations, it’s hard to oversell just how vital the one-two punch of ‘The Last of Us’ and ‘The Super Mario Bros. Movie‘ was to the industry in 2023, proving that these properties could be translated successfully without losing their identity. While neither was a direct adaptation, and both took their own deviations, a common sentiment online was to label them “love letters to the fans,” even if that framing feels a bit generous. By that measure, The Super Mario Galaxy Movie is an improvement over the original, paying homage to the series’ history, expanding its cast with faces both familiar and obscure from across Nintendo, and favouring the series’ iconic score over licensed music. For the most part, the film is just as much of a sugar rush as its predecessor—complete with a formulaic story, one-note characters, and a lack of thematic depth—but it’s an inch closer to the series’ potential, even when it should really be taking a full Mario “wahooooo!!” leap.

The film begins aboard the Comet Observatory, a space station that doubles as a ship ripped straight out of the ‘Super Mario Galaxy’ games. This ship serves as a sanctuary, propelling Princess Rosalina (Brie Larson) and her pack of adorable, star-shaped creatures known as Lumas through the cosmos. How did Rosalina get here? What are the Lumas? It doesn’t matter. Their peaceful existence is abruptly halted when Bowser Jr. (Benny Safdie) intercepts the ship and kidnaps a Luma and the Princess in an attempt to use her magical powers to restore the reputation of the Bowser name. Meanwhile, Bowser (Jack Black), after being imprisoned in a shrunken state, has undergone somewhat of a personality change after spending so much time with Mario (Pratt) and Luigi (Day). Despite a couple of fire-breathing temper tantrums, he’s done with his evil ways, spending most of his day painting and even attending an occasional book club with Luigi. The brothers have settled comfortably into the Mushroom Kingdom, acting as crime fighters with royal connections. Mario has even developed feelings for Princess Peach (Taylor-Joy), although he fears she could never love a plumber. Eventually, Peach learns that Rosalina is in danger and embarks on her own journey to save her with Toad (Keegan-Michael Key). Mario and Luigi would soon follow, setting off on a sort of planet-hopping journey alongside Bowser and their new companion, Yoshi (Donald Glover).

Like the first film, the story is paper-thin and serves more as an excuse to showcase this frequently gorgeous, beautifully animated world and the colourful characters that inhabit it, albeit this time around the characters are given a dash of internal conflict. Princess Peach confronts her mysterious past as an orphan who grew up around Toads, while Mario, despite his confident heroism, proves insecure—struggling with feelings of inadequacy over the Princess and refusing to believe Bowser can truly change. Bowser’s own arc is conflicted, as his son’s memory and appreciation for him are rooted in the brutality of the Old Bowser’s teachings—all before these threads are mostly dropped. Perhaps the issue lies in Nintendo wanting these films to operate as an extension of the games (or at the very least, a parallel), where only so much growth can occur before the characters have to fit back into their video game counterparts. But is it so much of a stretch to say Mario and Bowser wouldn’t be able to get along eventually? After all, they play tennis and party together. Peach is the only one to reach an emotional conclusion, but her journey is so disjointed and rushed that there’s no emotional weight to it.

There’s an argument to be made that these films function more as brand extensions than proper films, forgoing simple narrative arcs in favour of flashy action sequences, references, and Easter eggs. As a result, some older audiences may find themselves asking, “Were children’s movies always like this? Is this what kids’ movies are now?”, although mileage will depend on how willing audiences are to turn their brains off for a bit. For a franchise directed by ‘Teen Titans! Go’ creators Aaron Horvath and Michael Jelenic, one could hope for the Mario films to be more clever in their execution and humour, but there are at least some simple pleasures to be found: Peach fighting a thousand Ninji as if it were Neo vs. Smiths from The Matrix, the continued mixture of ingenious and baffling casting, with Glover never breaking from his best Yoshi impression, and Safdie and Key’s standout performances, the inclusion of a couple faces from Super Smash Bros., and a late dungeon sequence that’s genuinely electric in the gorgeously detailed animation and art direction, to name a few.

And yet, The Super Mario Galaxy Movie remains an entertaining, if uneven, continuation of Nintendo’s cinematic ambitions—one that understands the appeal of its world even if it struggles to justify itself narratively. There’s a clear affection for the material in its visuals, music, and expanding cast, but that affection rarely deepens into something more meaningful. For all its flashes of creativity and spectacle, it still feels like a film caught between being a product and a story. There’s enough charm, visual inventiveness, and fan service to keep things moving, but it ultimately feels like a film more interested in reminding audiences why they love Mario than giving them a new reason to.

still courtesy of Nintendo and Universal Studios

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J.A. Birney

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