I am professionally reviewing the Super Mario movie

2501

◉◉maru Yeah fully agree on the visual design being cool in a vacuum and the “2.5D Brooklyn” scene being far and away the best part of the film from any artistic standpoint - the whole Brooklyn segment is endearing enough that I think if the majority of the film followed it tonally and stylistically it’d be a lot less controversial! Alas, brand management and The Wizard of Oz have cast long long shadows over family filmmaking.

Anyway, the next and perhaps less comfortable level in Mario movie discourse will be contemplating why the Kongs are suddenly Jewish-coded. (Fred Armisen as Cranky is doing a weird Yiddish grandpa thing and Seth Rogen is, y’know, Seth Rogen.) I suspect part of the answer is Illumination leaping ahead of potential criticism that the clan of funky rapping simians might be racially coded in a different way.

treefroggy

Jack black performing Peaches

Kez

treefroggy I prefer Jet Black’s version

yeso

seems like people are saying the movie is ok because children like it. Guess what, children have terrible taste in movies

whatsarobot

yeso I guess it’s like “the movie is ok” as in “mission accomplished”

you know like how we don’t need Roger Ebert to weigh in on whether the bouncy ball you bought for a quarter from the machine outside the supermarket is fun to bounce around for one afternoon

2501

yeso I would call this less actively unbearable than a lot of kids’ movies I’ve seen that kids like and more liked by kids than some critically acclaimed “kids’ movies” that are actually for adults - for whatever that’s worth.

2501

tomjonjon

2501 this would be horrible. Dude huge has bad ideas.

Mnemogenic

2501 Marvel has completely broken people’s brains.

yeso

I’m going to see how long I can prevent my kid from knowing who mario is.

wickedcestus

my child’s first word will be “wahoo!”

2501

tomjonjon Look I gather Friend of the Podcast CliffyB is something of an innocent… the thought of Illumination doing Zelda and Metroid is blood-curdlingly awful though.

TheFragranceOfDarkCoffee

I liked the various background Nintendo-y bits in the New York scenes. Not just because it’s fun to point at a half-lit poster in the background for one second and think “Hey, that’s F-Zero!” but more because it felt like those set designers actually liked the source material. You don’t go throwing portraits of every Punch-Out! fighter on a restaurant wall unless you actually like Punch-Out!, you know?

Let’s be clear here, though: I did spend the entire credits rattling off references I spotted in the backgrounds to my girlfriend because nostalgia bait does work.

tomjonjon

2501 He should be using his reach and fame for good - not (mild) evil.

_{_{just having a bit of fun at Dude Huge’s expense}}

TheFragranceOfDarkCoffee

There’s not one studio I’d trust to make a good Metroid movie that would actually get the job.

2501

TheFragranceOfDarkCoffee tbh what would a good Metroid movie even look like? Without the ability to actually inhabit those retro comic book splash panel alien environments, to engage with them as architectural riddles and see narrative emerge gradually from your interactions, all you’ve got is a mockbuster Alien space opera pastiche with vaguely tokusatsu designs. It’s too goofy to be an arthouse thriller and too subdued to be an action film. At least Zelda has enough lore and actual characters that you could sort of imagine it working like the Castlevania cartoon. Metroid is like 90% an aesthetic.

TheFragranceOfDarkCoffee

2501 I think you hit the nail on the head here, it’d be a bit like Alien. When’s the last time we had a good Alien-like anyway? Gimmie some quiet, spooky ambiance full of dangerous critters who both must be eliminated and get in the way of sealing them away. Gimmie Die Hard but it’s a hostile alien planet instead of a skyscraper. It could work with the right people.

yeso

they should give Earthbound to the visionary minds behind the hit series stranger things

phylaxis

TheFragranceOfDarkCoffee
this plus as little dialog as possible, crank up the atmosphere because people aren’t talking all the time, make it a buster keaton horror flick by way of hong kong wire movies. i’d watch that

Tradeghouls 'n ghosts

TheFragranceOfDarkCoffee When’s the last time we had a good Alien-like anyway?

Annihilation maybe? I liked it, though I think that was another one critics loved but wide audiences didn’t understand.

I would see David Cronenberg’s Metroid Fusion

2501

Tradeghouls 'n ghosts Cronenberg and Sakamoto could at least find common ground in their interest in Samus’s sadomasochistic sex life

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