Perhaps it’s no coincidence that Mario’s signature voice actor, Charles Martinet, didn’t return to lend his talents to the character or his supporting cast in all three main appearances, instead retiring to the role of Mario’s ambassador (whatever that means).
Nintendo seems to have treated 2023 as a very public rebirth of its mascot. The dizzying one-two punch of the Mario movie and the plumber’s return to 2D platforming, plus the Mario RPG finale, marked a clear departure from decades of meticulous visual design and characterization standards. Yes, Mario still says “Wow!” and wears his trademark overalls and gloves – that may never change. But Chris Pratt’s performance in the animated film gave Mario a more flattering, much less over-the-top voice, drawn from somewhere far removed from Martinet’s take on the character. And while Kevin Afghani does an admirable job as Wonder, the game itself imbues Mario and company with enough personality to make the New Super Mario Bros series look downright wooden.
[Nintendo] he’s willing to take a chance with perhaps the most recognizable video game character in the world, believing that audiences will still know who he is, regardless of his voice, height or attitude.
Wonder doesn’t even take place in the Mushroom Kingdom. Instead, it brings Mario’s merry band to the Kingdom of Flowers, where the aptly named Wonder Flowers appear in every stage. These items turn each level on its head, allowing characters to stretch to ridiculous heights, turn into a Goomba for stealth missions, or turn into slime to sneak into narrow passages. But some Wonder Flowers will transform the level itself, sometimes changing the perspective from side to top down, or turning the whole thing into a musical. You can even equip badges that further change the game, from allowing Mario to float through the air to turning him invisible.
And Wonder’s art style and animations perfectly reflect that “anything goes” vibe, with an almost clay-like aesthetic and designs much closer to Yōichi Kotabe’s original hand-drawn character art. Mario has a determined look on his face as he runs, changing stances with just the touch of a button on the control panel, while his feet squish like a comic strip. And for the first time in a 2D Mario game, characters lean nervously on ledges, waving their arms to keep from losing their balance.
Even the sound profile has been completely changed. Jumps and boosts are signaled by the warm and familiar sounds of instruments like guitar strings and vibraphones, as opposed to harsher sound effects like the chiptunes of the New Super Mario Bros. series.
It seems fresh now, but we’ve seen such wild creativity before. Mario may be a product of the 1980s, but even in the 90s, Nintendo was still playing with him. And he wasn’t afraid to let other teams deal with it. Super Mario Land for Game Boy was created under Metroid producer and Game Boy designer Gunpei Yokoi’s R&D1 rather than Mario mainstay Shigeru Miyamoto and R&D4, and took a funhouse mirror to what were then relatively new series conventions. In Mario Land, aptly named Bombshell Koopas explode when jumped on, shooting levels emphasize the action, and the final boss is an alien. That game appeared to be from ’89. set the precedent for Mario for the next decade, freeing him to go anywhere and do whatever he wanted. He soon became a doctor, go-kart driver and entertainment host.
But outside the office walls, things got even stranger. Nintendo was much more liberal with licensing during the Super Nintendo era, forming partnerships with educational and entertainment companies, Philips and their CD-i console, and allowing third-party developers like Rare and Square to complete Mario’s world. This was often a roll of the dice – 1994 alone featured the wildly successful Donkey Kong Country and the wet smash hit of the film Hotel Mario
Mario’s wobbly-wobbly depictions in games like Mario teaches typing they seem a little out of step with today’s standards, and sometimes the subject matter seemed to stray far into the macabre. In the case of Mario’s Time Machine, our brave hero travels through the ages to retrieve historical artifacts stolen by Bowser, leading to the amusing fact that both Abraham Lincoln and Mahatma Gandhi require full pages on the Super Mario Wiki.
Mariomania, of course, spread to the world of television and film, resulting in a trio of DIC Entertainment animated series and the infamous Super Mario Bros. film starring Bob Hoskins, John Leguizamo and Dennis Hopper. The movie, in which Yoshi gets stabbed in the throat, bears little resemblance to the games it’s based on. There’s a reason Nintendo waited 30 years to try to adapt Super Mario to the big screen again, and why it wanted so much creative control this time around.
But while Nintendo had its share of setbacks through its various partnerships and licensing deals, the company’s willingness to explore what Mario could be as a mascot character helped shape him into the lovable custom he is known for today.
Miyamoto referred to Mario and his friends as actors playing roles – much like Mickey Mouse. And Mickey, in a very similar way, was also a rougher character in his early days. He was more of a mischievous scoundrel in the 1920s and 30s, thrown into different costumes and roles as the story dictated. Disney soon corrected and cleaned it up to make the universally recognized mouse we all know, which is exactly what Nintendo did with Mario in the 2000s.
In the Super Mario Sunshine, Super Mario Galaxy, and New Super Mario Bros. series, Mario’s proportions, mannerisms, voice, and attitude were standardized in his games and promotional work (with some exceptions, such as the stylized Paper Mario and Mario & Luigi series). Gone are cartoons, film aspirations and educational computer games. Mario would appear exclusively on Nintendo hardware — a streak that was unbroken until 2016, when Super Mario Run launched on iOS. From there, the doors slowly started to open again, most notably when Nintendo teamed up with Ubisoft for Mario + Rabbids Kingdom Battle.
But even in Kingdom Battle, Mario’s image was carefully chosen to match Nintendo’s portrayal of the character (despite all the gunplay). The animated Mario and Wonder movie—probably somewhat influenced by the Illumination movie—plus the Mario RPG, represent Nintendo at its most confident and daring. He’s willing to take a chance on perhaps the most recognizable video game character in the world, believing that audiences will still know who he is, regardless of his voice, height or attitude.
2023 may change the way we see Mario for years to come. Much like Mickey — who had a similar overhaul and character design revival in the Emmy-winning series — the plumber still has a lot of life left in him. This is a weirder, wackier, wilder Mario in 2024.