World 1-1 in Brooklyn
The first scene shows Mario and Luigi forced to run to a nearby apartment after their van breaks down in order to get to work on time. When you take a shortcut through a construction site, the camera angle changes to mimic the side-scrolling perspective of the games. That’s a nice touch.
It’s even nicer how the layout of certain objects (yellow paint cans, wooden crates, air conditioners, etc.) sit in the exact place of the corresponding objects (brick boxes and items) from the original world 1-1 in Super Mario Bros.
It’s even limited by sliding down a mast in front of a restaurant called Burger Castle.
Apartment of wealth
The New York apartment where Mario and Luigi attend their first plumbing job is home to several references of its own.
The galaxy book
Back in the owner’s living room, we can see one of them reading a book titled ‘Galaxy’ with a spherical planet reminiscent of the Super Mario Galaxy planet on the cover.
Pikmin statue
Look closely at this same scene and you’ll notice a glass Pikmin statue on the right side of the frame. We know Miyamoto really likes Pikmin, so we’re not surprised that they like him a bit in the movie.
Mario’s bedroom
Much like the Punch-Out Diner, Mario’s bedroom is full of references. Of course it is
NES
We can see Mario playing Kid Icarus on the NES, standing on a pedestal in front of his TV. This one is pretty easy to spot, of course, but it’s fun to see Mario playing a game on a console he has a game on…
Arrow
On top of the TV is a statue of Arrow from Star Fox.
Blue falcon
Mario has a bunch of posters in his room, all relating to Nintendo’s past. One of our favorites is the Blue Falcon poster, which apparently refers to Captain Falcon’s vehicle in F-Zero.
Duck hunting sign
As they set out to fix the leak that threatens Brooklyn, Mario and Luigi pass a sign for a French restaurant that uses an image from Duck Hunt on its sign. It’s called ‘Chasse au Canard’, which means duck hunting in French.
Underground Music
The musical references in this film almost deserve their own list, but the first one that really brought a smile to our faces was the presence of the “denum, denum, denum” underground theme when the Mario brothers first go, well, underground in Brooklyn. It is subtle and wonderful.
The underground sewers are also called 1-2, which is another reference to the first underground level in Super Mario Bros.
Luigi’s mansion motif
Another musical moment that can catch us off guard comes from the appearance of Luigi’s Mansion theme, which Brian Tyler uses as a small motif when Luigi is first thrown into the desert. You can catch him briefly as Luigi walks through the dark forest with his torch in hand.
Kingdom of mushrooms
Another crowded place — which makes sense because this is a world we associate with Mario video games! We got a pretty good look at the Mushroom Kingdom in the trailers, but a few moments really stood out to us when we saw the finished product.
The house of the toad
In the Coin Bank in the Mushroom Kingdom, if you listen carefully to the music, you can hear the Toad House music from Super Mario Bros. 3.
Toadette
Although the braided tail mushroom is not in the film, it does make a brief appearance on a small poster in the Mushroom Kingdom. Look closely as Mario wanders through the crowd of Toads and you’ll spot Toadette as the marching band’s drummer on the blue board.
Antique shop
Yes, the antique shop is full of little Mario Easter Eggs such as Hammers from Wrecking Crew, Dragon Coins from Super Mario World, and Super Bell from Super Mario 3D World. But one of our favorites sees an eager little Toad pick up what looks like an old game cartridge and ask if it works only for the salesperson to reply “yes, but you have to blow into it”. We’ve all been there Frog, we’ve all been there…
Crazy hat
In ano ther blink-and-you’ll-miss-it moment, we get a brief glimpse of Super Mario Odyssey’s Crazy Cap shop on the crowded streets of the Mushroom Kingdom. We wonder if they accept both types of currency…
Diddy Kong’s Bongos
Through the “computational enhancement” level of zooming in earlier trailers and posters, we had an inkling that Diddy Kong would appear in this one. Of course he does (at a big Donkey Kong fight, no less), but we didn’t expect him to play some bongos à la Donkey Kong!
Cranky Kong’s Super Mario World Map
While planning the best route to ambush Bowser and his army of Koopas, we took a peek inside Cranky Kong’s hut, and the design of his map particularly caught our eye. If you pay attention to its style and layout, you’ll notice a lot of transitions to the map from Super Mario World.
There seems to be only one cartographer in and around the Mushroom Kingdom…
Piano by Ludwig Von Koop
A small plaque on Bowser’s piano says that the instrument was made by one Ludwig Von Koopa. We’re guessing the oldest of the Koopalings is into carpentry too — hey, it’s good to have a hobby.
Drifting
While driving on Rainbow Road, Mario drifts from left to right to take sharp turns and avoid the oncoming attacks of the Blue Shell. Neatly, when doing these drifts, little blue, yellow and red sparks come out of the back of his tires just like you would see in the Mario Kart series.
Ice climber polar bear sign
Returning to Brooklyn for the final battle, we get another look at the references in the city itself. Among the stores we mentioned earlier, one store that we assume sells ice cream or maybe just ice advertises its product with an Ice Climber polar bear on its sign.
A polar bear can also be seen on a poster in Mario’s bedroom earlier in the film, but the sign was a fun moment that we easily missed and really loved spotting.
Store on disc only
Also in Brooklyn, we can check out the ‘Disk-Kun Store’ which has a little man up there as a logo. Diskun was the mascot for the Famicom Disk System in Japan, appearing in manuals and making cameos in several games.
Poster with lucky cards
Okay, the last one that made us smugly notice can also be found in the climactic battle in Brooklyn. After the fight is over and the team is working on cutting Bowser down to size, you can see a ‘Luck Cards’ poster in the background and we could swear we saw the word Hanafuda appear on it too. Either way, it’s a hidden little nod to Nintendo’s card-making history.
There are of course many, a lots of more references in this movie than the ones we listed above, but the ones that made the cut were some of our favorites. If you’ve spotted any others that you think deserve a spot on this list, be sure to mention them in the comments below.
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