Awkward Forced Olympic Tie-In Special, Part 1: Super Mario Bros.!

This month, ath-a-letes from all relevant parts of the globe will once again come together to celebrate the spirit of the eternal burning flame of competition, and more importantly, to celebrate the spirit of bringing tourism revenue to a specially selected selfish major city. This year, it's London! And, once again, Nintendo and Sega (well, okay, mostly Sega) have decided that the most effective representation of the diversity of this gathering, bringing together nations from all over the world, is to replace that diverse array of nations from all over the world entirely, and replace them with a broad-but-cuddly Italian stereotype and a woefully inaccurate drawing of a hedgehog. And, while you could easily give in and shell out money for the catchily titled Mario and Sonic at the London 2012 Olympic Games if you wanted to see who would win at, um, hurdling, and pot-addled swimming, and whatever else it is they do at the Summer Olympics.....wouldn't it be more fun to find out who would win in a duel of movies, for free? Here, in the first of a two-part series, I take a look back to the year 1993, when Bob Hoskins and John Leguizamo were chosen, against all logic, to play the Super Mario Bros.!

Of course, to any not-overly-young fan of the Mario games, this film lives on in infamy. Everyone knows that it's a completely inaccurate representation of the games and therefore worthy of scorn! Well, except for Shigeru Miyamoto, of all people, who thinks if anything it tried to get too close to the games, but he was probably high, on drugs, at that time, so let's disregard him. Even the stars of the film hated it, you know! Bob Hoskins regards the film as the single worst thing he's ever done, and please bear in mind that he was also in Son of the Mask. Dennis Hopper, despite getting the theoretically awesome role of King Koopa, also looked back on his experience with the film with disappointment, anger, and terror, directing special ire at husband-and-wife directorial team Rocky Morton and Annabel Jankel. But maybe Denny was just jealous, for his relationships inevitably ended in despair. Maybe EVERYBODY is being unnecessarily bitter here, like a shoddily concocted marmalade, perhaps. Isn't it only fair that, like anything else in the world, this film deserves a second chance? An "extra life", if you will? (Please do.)

Our tale begins in the distant past, as tales often do, with the apparent end of the dinosaurs' tale. You remember that whole thing about how they were all wiped out by a meteorite, maybe? Well, that happens in this movie, too! Dan Castellaneta, donning the most stereotypical Brooklynese accent he could possibly muster, walks us through it. You see, life was great for them. In case you had any doubt about that, Dan even helpfully narrates their dialogue for us. Apparently, prehistoric dinosaur conversation consisted of deep, thoughtful utterances like, "Lou, it just don't get no beddah den dis!" See? They had it good!

They were as happy as you could possibly be while apparently being characters in a Phillips CD-i game, anyway.

Then, of course, things immediately proceeded to get no beddah den dat. Y'know, the whole meteorite thing. Dan Castellanarrator classily summarizes their extinction in two words: "Goodbye, dinosaurs!" Because he's, like, five fucking years old or something.

But, deep fellow that he is, he has an interesting hypothesis for you, that will totally blow your mind, maaaaaan! What if the dinosaurs weren't actually all destroyed? What if the impact of that meteorite simply created a parallel dimension, where they continued to exist and evolve into "intelligent, vicious bein's, just like us"? I'm not sure if he's implying that regular, unevolved dinosaurs were NOT vicious, because by all accounts......they were. The word "dinosaur" literally means "terrible lizard" in Greek, Danny Boy. But, whatever. Let's run with your hypothesis anyway. What if they continued to exist, and became, um, even viciouser?

The answer, of course, is that if they continued to exist in a parallel dimension, we would flash forward to the Brooklyn of twenty years ago, of twenty years ago, where some chick in spiky shoulder pads sprints through the rain, looking pretty much like someone who's about to get whacked in the cold open of any crime drama ever. So, she drops her mysterious futuristic crystal-activated techno-egg on the doorstep of a nunnery before fleeing into Brooklyn's sewer system. (If this film is to be believed, Brooklyn has the driest, un-pooiest sewers in the world, and I'm surprised you don't see that listed as a selling point in more of their tourism brochures!)

Unfortunately, she can run, but she can't hide, and she can't really run, either, as an older spiky-shouldered dude by the name of "Koopa" catches up to her. Surprisingly, he's not a nice guy, and he presumably does her in, offscreen, of course. Meanwhile, the nuns witness the techno-egg hatch into a naked baby. Perhaps Taylor could refresh my memory on which season of Law & Order this was from? This feels like the sort of stunt Dick Wolf wouldn't have pulled until recently, in his more desperate years.

You don't need to explain how big it is. You know they're staring at it too, right?

Twenty years later, in the modern-day Brooklyn of 1993, the not-yet-super Mario Bros. are moderately successful plumbers! Mario seems to handle most of the basic business aspects, though, because Luigi is just a no-good peanut-eating slacker. And also Latino, apparently. Mario's fed up with the way his brother believes in the sensational paranormal nonsense he sees on Our Miraculous World - which seems to be primarily about parallel dimensions, i.e. miraculous worlds that are NOT ours, but I digress - but Luigi the Parappa the Rapper insists that "you just gotta believe". Following a jump cut to the brothers in their van en route to a "dishwasher emergency", which is presumably at least two or three minutes later, if I'm being generous, Mario finally unleashes his witty comeback. "I do believe! I believe the rent is three months overdue! That's what I believe!" Oh, Mario, you slow-witted scamp!

Movie Mario Bros. (left), vs. Video Game Mario Bros. (right). In both cases, that's Mario on the right and Luigi on the left. Notice the painstaking attention to detail, down to the colours of their outfits!

It's all very urgent, of course. A broken dishwasher means those poor, poor people would.....have to wash dishes by hand in the sink, maybe, and their fingers would get all pruney, which would mean they might have to use some sort of hand lotion. Hand lotion! A fate worse than death!!! So, yes. Time is very much of the essence, and Luigi realises this, speeding all the way there and even taking a detour through a garbage-strewn alleyway to avoid traffic. He could've also avoiding traffic by just driving on actual streets, though, because this film's version of busy midday Brooklyn only has, like, two or three cars driving about, spaced waaaaay far apart. And none of those cars are even explosive Bob-Ombsmobiles or Wiggler Buses or anything! But I guess it IS cooler to drive though garbage, you peanut-munching badass, you.

Alas, even his trashy shortcut isn't enough, and the Marios are beaten to the job by their eternal rivals at Scapelli Construction. Wait, do you mean to tell me that these potential clients view having to go an hour or two without having every dish they own meticulously machine-cleaned as being SO OBJECTIONABLE that have to hire a bunch of different plumbers, just to see who can come fix it first? Is that really something that people somewhere might do? Maybe it's just a Brooklyn thing, which would mean that Brooklyn people are just terrible.

Of course Scapelli Construction beat them there, though. They're clearly a well-oiled machine with, according to the side of their considerably nicer van, locations in London, Paris, Palermo, Beverly Hills, and, um.....Brooklyn. Beautiful, glamorous Brooklyn. But OF COURSE Scapelli Construction works in Brooklyn, too, being a thinly veiled stand-in for the Mafia and all.

In fact, Scapelli's so successful that even his signage is starting to get sick of it. "Sigh.....it's yet ANOTHER project by Scapelli Construction...."

Being a thinly veiled stand-in for the Mafia and all, Anthony Scapelli and his men make a hobby of openly threatening people who stand in their way, in broad daylight, in front of cops, even. Savvy fellow that he is, I suppose he realises that they couldn't possibly do anything even if they wanted to, being nothing more than mere motionless extras and all. They probably don't even get paid. Ah, good old reliable law enforcement.

Today, the target of his legitimate businessman threats is a fine young lady named Daisy, who is leading a group of NYU students in digging for "dinosaur bones", which the film adamantly refuses to simply call "fossils", for some reason. Unfortunately, the dig site happens to also be the site of a proposed building-to-be, of some sort, and that's not-so-swelly, sez Scapelli. If she doesn't get those damn kids off his metaphorical lawn, she might find herself "disappearing", he explains, like the other girls who have "disappeared" lately. What a helpful gent he is!

Movie Daisy (left) vs. Video Game Daisy (right). Who'd you rather?

Scapelli isn't Daisy's only problem, sadly. She's also being pursued by two dorky twits named Iggy and Spike, who have seemingly been tasked with kidnapping her. But not by Scapelli. By someone else. She's just that covetable! Anyway, when they spot her on the street, they're sure it's her. "Two arms, one head, two legs", they shout, going over their mental Daisy checklist, and she matches all three criteria! Of course, by the same criteria, they are also Daisies. That's a lot of Daisies. Something something Daisy chain.

Movie Iggy and Spike (left) vs. Video Game Iggy and spike (right).

Perhaps her biggest problem, though, is that Luigi, of all people, has fallen madly in love with her. You see, when the Mario Bros. Plumbing van breaks down, Luigi bumps into her by chance, and is immediately enraptured by her, um....unflattering paleontologist costume, I guess. He's so eager to please that he abandons potential customers - victims of ACTUAL FLOODING, no less - on the payphone, just so she can use it. After all, how could he resist her? She even has a beautiful name. "Like the flower", he cleverly notes, not that he's "the type who hangs around flower shops or nothin' like that". She finds his lack of security in his own sexuality so charming, apparently, that she accepts his offer of a dinner date, for some reason. Don't fall for his whims, lady! He's just a peanut-eating underachiever!

Actually, it's a double date, because Mario is also there. He's brought his "girlfriend", "Daniella", who claims to be a "tanning salon employee". I'm gonna run with the assumption that she's actually just some sort of escort, though. I mean, he's Bob Hoskins! Bob Hoskins, with his gross, Wariolike physique, isn't hot, at all, to anybody, anywhere in the omniverse. (Except temperature-wise, of course, he looks like he probably sweats a lot.)

I mean, it's not like she's super-hot or anything, but..........y'know, again, Bob Hoskins. (Also, I'm convinced that Italian restaurants in the movies are incapable of serving dishes that aren't spaghetti and meatballs.)

Like all truly romantic candlelit dinners, the topic quickly veers away from romance, and into the realm of exposition! Daisy explains that Scapelli's construction site contains more than just "dinosaur bones" (aka "fossils"). There's iridium in them there hills, too! And there's only one possible thing that iridium could possibly mean, of course: IT'S THE METEORITE THAT WIPED OUT ALL THE DINOSAURS!

Unshaken by this, um, exciting (?) revelation, "Daniella" keeps the Exposition Express chugging along by asking about Daisy's tacky-ass crystal pendant necklace. (It looks an awful lot like the crystal that open up the cybernetic techno-egg in the prologue, but shhhhhhh, we're probably not supposed to be privy to that yet.) "It's the only thing I have from when I was found", Daisy adds, revealing to all that she was abandoned as a baby. (Like the techno-egg-baby, though shhhhhhhh, that's also a well-kept secret.) Luigi takes this as his cue to reveal that he was also orphaned, also, and that his big bro Mario raised him like his father. Wait, so they've BOTH been orphaned? Well, that settles it! Mutual dead parentage equals truly true love, after all, and so Daisy invites him to accompany her to her "bone pit". IF YOU KNOW WHAT I MEAN.

Crafty devils that they are, Iggy and Spike have been staking out the restaurant, eagerly awaiting their foolproof opportunity to finally capture a Daisy once and for all. However, un-crafty devils that they also are, they manage to completely bungle this foolproof opportunity by choosing "Daniella" as their Daisy to kidnap, instead of Daisy herself. (Poor "Daniella" must find this so very stressful; perhaps she should charge Mario extra next time.) This gives Luigi and Real Daisy ample time to reach that "bone pit", which sadly is an actual bone pit, down in the unnaturally dry sewer from the prologue. As they gaze upon the remains of undiscovered species of dinosaurs (and probably a couple drifters), they begin to feel romance in the air, because the violent deaths of animals millions of years ago is the biggest turn-on in the world, y'know.

Sadly, the romantic, ancient, deathy mood is totally ruined by the appearance of some of Scapelli's men, who have apparently fiddled with some pipes such that the place is now starting to flood. Now, to the lovebirds' horror, this sewer is becoming wet, like most sewers in the world, and that's just unacceptable! Thinking quickly, Luigi realises there's only one man who can save the day:

It's-a Mario, who I should point out could very well be wearing nothing from the waist down in this shot. There's no evidence that he isn't!

Okay, yeah, Luigi's supposed to be a plumber too, but I guess he's not as good at plumbing as Mario? Well, he IS the plumber so nice they named him twice, after all. All the plumbing skills in the world can't save him (and Luigi) from getting clubbed in the back of the head by Iggy and Spike and their shiny flashlights, though. (They sure realised "Daniella" wasn't Daisy relatively quickly, by their standards, anyway, so I can only presume she had an extra limb or a second head somewhere we couldn't see.) And, thus, inevitable kidnapping victim Daisy is inevitably kidnapped, inevitably.

The brothers shake off their concussions as quickly as possible, and give chase after the sound of her voice, eventually tracking her to a particularly cavelike part of the sewers, with breathtaking whitewater rapids and everything! From the flooding, I guess. It seems as though they've reached a dead end, but Luigi's Peanut Sense is tingling, and he's right - Daisy reaches out from inside a freakin' WALL to impart him with a deeply significant message from the beyond.

That message being "LUIGI! HELP ME!"

Unfazed by this early 90s special effectastic display, Luigi manages to snag her crystal pendant before she's pulled back into the wall from whence she came. The brothers incredulously ask each other whether they actually saw what they think they just saw, seemingly ignoring the very physical evidence of it right there in Luigi's nutty little hands! But, really, a decent chunk of their dialogue in this film is like that - slightly nonsensical small talk that certainly sounds like something that people might say, but that is actually bizarrely disconnected from what's actually going on around them, if you actually think about it for even a second. It's rather off-putting, really. (This technique would later be reused for the cutscenes in Super Mario Sunshine.)

Luigi, who as we all know is BY FAR the braver of the Mario Bros., takes a leap of faith and hurls himself towards the rock wall, as though it were some sort of portal to a secret slide on a redundantly named mountain floating in the sky, though not before planting a farewell smooch on Mario's gross, bald head first. This is enough motivation for Mario to conquer his notorious cowardice and hurl himself through the magickal wall as well, sending him flying unconvincingly through a trippy void.....

And that's an occasion for which jazz hands are ALWAYS appropriate!

On the other side of the void, our heroes land in more underground tunnelage, because the scenery in this film is just that diverse. Immediately, they give chase after Iggy and Spike, and though Luigi tries his best to threaten them, it's Mario who comes out on top, telling his brother, "No, YOU'RE not gonna kill ‘em, not if I get there first! I'm gonna break every bone in their bodies, and THEN I'm gonna kill ‘em!"

Now, stop for a second, and imagine that line delivered by Charles Martinet instead. Go on, I'll wait.

They quickly lose track of the Daisy's kidnappers, alas, when they emerge from the tunnels, and are shocked to discover that the magickal liquid rock portal led them to a place that's somewhat strange! What are the odds? It's a city, dark and grungy, with sparks flying everywhere for no discernible reason, everything covered in slimy cobwebs that we're told is supposed to be fungus, and worst of all, citizens dressed in - gasp - early 90s punk stylings! It truly is the sort of horrific dystopian society that one might expect, say, dinosaurs that didn't die but instead continued to evolve into human-like beings to live in, if such a thing were even possible, theoretically. Dinosaurs LOVED punk rock, after all. But, again, shhhhhh for now.

Sadly, Iggy and Spike escape with Daisy by hailing an electric taxi. Can you believe the nerve of these twisted dino-freaks, driving around in electric cars everywhere??? It should come as no surprise that they're so very depraved, though, for they also enjoy pornographing.

Since this is a parallel dimension where the dominant species are reptiles, this would be classified as bestiality, right? God, this movie is unexpectedly foul!

"I got a feelin' we're not in Brooklyn no more," Luigi helpfully offers, presumably whilst stroking his adorable Cairn Terrier just out of frame.

Elsewhere, we are introduced to a fellow named Koopa, who is either the President or the King, depending on how the screenwriters were feeling on a particular day. At any rate, he's feeling really pissy, because the "mammals" have everything and they have nothing, apparently! His plan, it seems, involves "merging the worlds", which is....supposed to be a good thing, I guess? I'd think it would result in a world that was still half-crapsacky, but whatever. He's thoroughly pissed to discover that his comic relief minions Iggy and Spike managed to recover Daisy, but not her tacky-ass crystal necklace, which apparently was the most important part. ("Without that, the meteorite lies dormant", Koopa complains, as Dennis Hopper's integrity slashes its wrists and bleeds out in the bathtub of Dennis Hopper's mind.) They explain that "the plumbers" took it, and thus Mario and Luigi are officially wanted men, because I guess there are no other plumbers in the entire dimension? God, this place SUUUUUCKS!

President Koopa (left) vs. King Bowser (right), referring to their positions in the picture, and certainly NOT to their respective political leanings.

Oh yeah, also, King President Koopa has a mistress. Her name is Lena, in a sly reference to the old Scandinavian "Koopa and Lena" jokes.

Oh man, you do NOT want to know what she's gonna do to that shoulder later tonight.

Anyway, even without the newly added risk of being found out as "the plumbers", the Marios are having a rough time in Dinohattan. (Oh, yeah, that's the name of the city. How special is that??) First, a little old lady with a Wilma Flintstone necklace tries, unsuccessfully, to hold them up with her massive sparking vibrator thingy. Then, a fat black woman in a tacky orange traffic cone getup and rocket boots has a more successful attempt at thievery, grabbing their crystal pendant and bounding away. Just when it seems like they don't have a friend in the world anymore, they meet a punk rock folk singer named Toad, who provides a brief sliver of brightness in their presently bleak lives, by letting them hear his anti-Koopa protest song, maaaaan.

Movie Toad (left) vs. Video Game Toad (right). Now they're just messing with us...

As you can imagine, King President Koopa's police state doesn't take kindly to that sort of thing, and they stop to arrest Toad. They end up getting a three-for-one deal, after noticing that the Mario Bros. are, indeed, the famous "the plumbers" they've heard so much about! They could tell, you see, because Mario was still wearing his tool belt, with all his plumbing tools, even after hearing it loudly announced that Koopa was on the lookout for plumbers. Oh, Mario, you slow-witted scamp!

Being thrown in jail is, of course, a humiliating process. First, they have to reveal the embarrassing fact that, yes, Mario is seriously their surname, for realsies, and Mario's name is Mario Mario, and that's dumb as fuck. And then the three Marios (Mario is worth two, naturally) have to undergo a "de-fungusing" procedure, before being......chained up and prepared for execution by firing squad? Jesus, that's a bit steep, isn't it? Even if it is just a firing squad consisting of only two dudes, which isn't much of a squad at all, and is actually kind of pathetic. But, pathetic or not, it seems that doom is imminent, as the laser sights take aim, right between the brothers' eyes....

Oh, wait, they're not guns, they're actually just cameras for mugshots, I guess! With....laser sights. Ho ho ho. Good one, Annabel and Rocky. I hope you're proud of yourselves.

They're not the only ones being thrown in jail, of course. Pretty much every important non-villainous character is imprisoned right now, in fact, as Daisy has just been thrown into one of Koopa's luxurious women's prisons, where she reunites with "Daniella", and meets a bunch of other women with only two visible arms, one visible head, two visible legs, and no audible lines, at least not yet. We're supposed to feel sorry for these ladies, maybe? But, to be perfectly honest, it seems pretty stress-free, as prisons go.

Backgroundina the Background Girl is even treating herself to some nice, relaxing yoga. And "Daniella" is, I dunno, enacting her evil scheme to recolour Daisy's hair with nail polish?

The Marios have it far worse, by which I mean they've been thrown in a cell directly beneath radical free-thinker Toad, who also enjoys sharing completely insane conspiracy theories. Like the one about how all that fungus outside is actually the dino-people's old king, who has been de-evolved! Into fungus! And now he's wreaking his revenge on the city, I suppose, in the only possible way that useless immobile fungus really can: eliciting disgust in the average person by being present on the surface of things that, ewwwww, you'd kind of rather it wasn't, honestly. REVENGE!

You can see why they the Marios want out of this awkward situation ASAP, so they request a lawyer. And, by gosh gollies, they're gonna get one, because Presikingident Koopa's as big a believer in fairness as anyone! Unfortunately, he's also as big a believer in unfairness as anyone, because the lawyer is Koopa himself, in the guise of "Larry Lazard, of Lazard Lazard....Conga......Dactyl?" How you manage to get yourself elected to the highest office in the entire dino-nation without even knowing that you ALWAYS come up with your fake law firm name ahead of time is anyone's guess, but considering how poorly the façade goes from the start, it's not at all surprising that he maintains it for less than a minute before he snaps and asks about Daisy's meteorite shard, and tries to claw Luigi's eyes out. Jesus, there's more catfighting in Koopa's regular prison than there is in his women's prison!

But, in all seriousness, if the next Paper Mario game involved, in any way, Bowser trying to pass himself off as a germophobic defense attorney, it would be an INSTANT BUY for me.

Of course, Luigi the Brave refuses to break, and so the monarch-in-chief sentences the Mario Bros. to the De-Evolution Chamber! What will it do to them, you wonder? Why, just to demonstrate, Koopa submits Toad to de-evolution first, because Toad is an irascible little scamp who tells him - to his FACE mind you - "You're a lousy leader!" Ooooh, BURN. And so, the "EVOLVE/DE-EVOLVE" switch is flipped and the time dial adjusted - yes, these are the sole two controls on this complicated machine - and Koopa bids the radical free-thinker a hearty farewell. "See you later, alligator!" OH SNAP, TOAD, HE BURNED YOU RIGHT BACK! It's like fucking 8 Mile all up in here!

Toad emerges from the De-Evolution Chamber a changed man. A de-evolved man, you could say, if you wanted to be obvious. Koopa, wanting to be less obvious and more batshit insane, gives a little monologue about how people are stupid and wrong for thinking of evolution as a forward-moving process. You see, by reversing that process, "even our musical friend Toad can become a loyal child of the royal family". A Goomba! It still beats being a brick block, maybe?

I'll grant them that they got the vacuously stupid facial expression right, but the head-to-body ratio couldn't be more off! (It's impossible to tell whether or not the movie Goomba's feet are vibrating like that.)

Holding his brother back from attempting to slug Koopa in the face, Mario tauntingly asks Mr. President, "What single-celled organism did YOU evolve from?" Koopa smugly replies, "A Tyrannosaurus Rex, thank you very much!" Unicellular T-Rexes were the most terrifying T-Rexes of all, you know!

But that's not important. Toad was just Goombafied, after all! And the same fate could befall the Mario Bros., too, if they don't cooperate. Wait, would it? They're apes. They're an entirely different species from the dino-folk! They'd probably become some sort of ape, right? Either way, it's still some seriously bad juju. So, of course, they decide to not cooperate, at all. They force Koopa into the chair and "de-evolve" him, though it appears to have no effect aside from making his eyes momentarily more lizardy. He's certainly no Unicellular T-Rex, that's for sure! Oh, and also, they've triggered a guard-summoning alarm. It's time to skedaddle, guys!

Fortunately, the guards are really slow and it's not much of a chase scene at all. The Marios have so much spare time that they're able to stop and admire some pretty mushrooms growing out of the otherwise amorphous spider-webby fungus. And the fungus responds by dropping a Bob-Omb down, right in front of their faces.

The Bob-Omb is kind of accurate, actually, so let's even things out by pretending that the strands of fungus holding it are the movie's version of an Albatoss. There, now the cosmic balance of sheer inaccuracy is restored!

Is it a threat, or a gift? Luigi thinks it's the latter, but then some non-Toad Goombas show up to remind them that this is still technically a chase scene by, as Goombas are wont to do, blindly running in a straight line. And then, um, stopping and firing their FLAMETHROWERS. (Admit it, it would be oddly cute to see one of the Video Game Goombas carrying around a flamethrower in his overgrown mouth! Like a puppy! Of doom!)

How do Mario and Luigi get out of this jam? Well, it's really quite simple. Luigi hotwires a police car, though I'm using the term "hotwire" loosely, because Dinohattan police cars are started not with keys, but rather, by playing a shooting minigame on a little video screen. So, instead of using something one would necessarily have to have on their personage to start the car, they've created an even more advanced system, that will allow any peanut-eating slacker with Duck Hunt experience to go for a ride. Brilliant idea, Dinohattan PD!

So, now it's electric car chase time! And.....yawn. I suppose it's all supposed to be very tense, what with the dino-cops being told that "USE OF UNNECESSARY FORCE IS AUTHORIZED" and all (though authorization would imply that someone somewhere DID think it might be necessary, but whatever), but.....well, it's underscored by the same wacky musical cue this movie uses for everything, and that kills the tension. Also killing the tension, you have things like this happening:

Just so we're clear, these two cars drove straight into each other, and somehow, Mr. Civilian's vehicle went under the cop car, despite the presence of Koopa's Patented Police Plow. And now it's just precariously balanced up there! This would be entirely too silly to involve the MythBusters with, right?

And then they trick two of the cops pursuing them into blowing each other up with their flamethrowers, because Dinohattan Police Academy apparently doesn't teach that you should, perhaps, periodically check to see if the thing you're shooting at repeatedly is actually still the thing you intended to shoot at in the first place. Nonetheless, this is still undoubtedly streets ahead of the Brooklyn cops' handling of the Scapelli situation...

In the end, the Mario Bros. make their escape by driving through a tunnel and careening out the side of a cliff, killing them both.

By "killing them both", of course, I mean "not killing them both after all because the gross fungus from the tunnel functions as a bungee cord OH COME ON ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING ME?"

Naturally, Iggy and Spike are the ones who have to break the bad news to King President Koopa, and naturally, he's frustrated. Both by their incompetence, and also, at having his sexxy mud bath with Lena interrupted. "You know what I love about mud? It's clean and it's DIRTY at the same time", says Dennis Hopper, with low-grade orgasmic intensity that kind of implies that maybe he's whacking it down there a little bit maybe, underneath the mud covering his body up to his neck. So.....enjoy that thought. (He certainly was!)

Despite the mud all up in his junk, Koopa realises it's time to step up his game, so he straps a terrified Iggy and Spike into the De-Evolution Chamber. Not to de-evolve them, though. Quite the contrary! He's evolving them into far smarter Iggies and Spikeses, whose newfound intelligence will surely be used to capture Mario and Luigi, and not rebel against their intellectually inferior master or anything, right?

Secondly, he asks Lena to let Daisy in on the fact that - gasp - she's a princess! Can you believe it? The film character Daisy, based on the video game character Princess Daisy, turned out to be a princess! What a shocker! Anyway, the princessifying process apparently involves forcing Daisy to wear a fancy and important Princess Dress, which somehow looks even cheaper than her silly little paleontologist costume!

Strangely, the princess outfit doesn't involve a crown. Still, you can tell she's a princess. She'll turn the world around.

Lena's jealousy is palpable when she shows off the newly princessed princess to King President Koopa, and her jealousy is completely justified. In his second consecutive skeevy monologue, Dennis Hopper unleashes this gem on Daisy: "You know what they say about little girls, don't you? They say....they never forget the first time they're kissed by a lizard." And, to prove his point, he shows off his lizard-like tongue. Jesus, guys. If I were Dennis Hopper, I would've had to take a scalding hot shower to cleanse my soul after filming some of this stuff - and, again, yes I'm aware of his actual personal life!

Oh, and also, the royal family has a pet dinosaur and his name is Yoshi and Daisy totally likes him and stuff!!!

While the movie version of Yoshi is mostly innocent, the game version is deeply involved in illegal racketeering.

While Daisy comes to the realization that she is a princess, Mario and Luigi come to the realization that they are hopelessly lost in the Koopahari Desert, which is apparently responsible for 99% of Dino-Earth's surface area. As if that isn't bad enough, newly superintelligent Iggy and Spike are hot on their trail, if by "hot on their trail" you mean "still driving like morons, such that they fly off a cliff and land in a giant mudhole". You see, their newfound "intelligence" only exists in the sense that they now pepper their dialogue with the longest words the writers knew, words like "corpulent", "bulbous", and "scallywag".

Which is to say, our heroes are easily able to apprehend them, tie them up with Luigi's gay pride belt, and grill ‘em. (Interrogation, not semi-cannibalism.)

Just imagine the stench of Bob Hoskins sweat that everyone else is being subjected to here!

It doesn't take much prodding for Iggy and Spike to spill the beans. (Information, not legumes.) The "rock" Koopa's looking for, the crystal, is actually part of the meteorite that TV's Dan Castellaneta talked about in the prologue, and once it is "re-inserted", the two dimensions will "merge", and somehow Koopa thinks this means he will be allowed to rule both, somehow. I doubt the ape-people would be down with that, but whatever.

An agreement is struck - the Mario Brothers hand over the "rock", and the Koopa Cousins hand over the "princess". But, if you recall, the crystal was stolen by that fat black lady, whom Iggy and Spike are, at least, helpfully able to identify as the famous Big Bertha.

...wait. Really?? Big Bertha??? Seriously???

Iggy and Spike say she likes hanging around clubs. I imagine she prefers songs with boss bass.

With the assistance of Iggy and Spike's theoretical superbrains, a plan is devised: "We'll hijack a Sludge Gulper and drive into the city!" (Apparently, "Sludge Gulper" is what the dino-people call their electric garbage trucks, and it's quite an accomplishment that they found a term for them that actually sounds less pleasant than "garbage truck"!) But who, you might (but, in all honesty, probably don't) wonder, would serve as garbagemen in Koopa's domain? Why, Chainmail BDSM Snifits, of course!

The S also stands for "Snifit", if you were curious.

Surprisingly, the plan goes off without a hitch. The brothers and cousins knock out the driver and don Snifit masks (why does the driver carry around three spares??), allowing them to pass through a security checkpoint undetected. You'd think that, in any profession where wearing a face-obscuring mask was a necessity, there would actually be more to the typical security procedure than just a quick half-glance to confirm that someone's wearing a mask, right? But, noooooo! Not even when the city is in lockdown with two extremely wanted criminals on the run! Seriously, people?? Fixing this problem would be so simple! Perhaps I should run for dino-politics! Anyway, I got off track. The point is, yes, it worked. The brothers successfully Sludge-Gulped their way back into Dinohattan, and arrived at Big Bertha's hangout: Water Land the Boom Boom Bar!

First, Mario tries to work his magic on her, laying out his very best pickup line: "It's your main man, Mario!" Naturally, she responds to this by vomiting a baby fish in his general direction, before swallowing it again punching him, in his fat face. It seems hopeless, but then he has an epiphany! He approaches her again, but this time, he begs her to hit him, again, because she's just SO VERY GOOD at punching, what with "the way your knuckles crunched....when you hit my face" and all. And thus, bafflingly successful ladies' man Bob Hoskins has stolen another heart. "Dance with me," she says. "I'll hit you all you like..."

...whereas in this case, the M stands for "Mario".

During their disappointingly non-punchy dance, Mario manages to slip the crystal pendant thingy off her neck, and escape before she realises just what happened, exactly. It's so clever and smooth that OF COURSE it had to be offset by another case of supreme Marioesque stupidity to even things out. Like, let's say, having left his plumber's tool belt with the coat check lady, who managed to connect the dots and realise, hey, plumbing tools are often used by plumbers, like the plumbers on that Wanted poster right over there! Seriously, I don't know what the fuck Mario's problem is. Just throw the belt out, dude! Having to buy a replacement monkey wrench is an entirely reasonable price to pay in exchange for NOT BEING EXECUTED. Right?? Or do I just not have MY priorities in order?

So, of course coat check lady calls the police, and Lena and the Goombas arrive on the scene to arrest Mario and Luigi, triggering - *siiiiiiiiigh* another chase scene. This one's set to then-current President George Clinton's cover of "Walk the Dinosaur". (Fun Fact: Ice Age 3 also included a cover of this song, and also starred John Leguizamo, who is seemingly fated to have it follow him around until, finally, he is freed from his cosmic burden of perpetually walking the dinosaur, by the sweet release of death.)

Just when it looks like they're cornered, Big Bertha reappears, willing to help them escape! Why, that's not fishy at all! *rimshot*

...but, no, apparently she's legit. Apparently, blatantly conning cruel and vicious sadists is the best way to win the way to their face-punching knuckle-crunching hearts! She holds off the Goombas and even allows them to borrow a couple pairs of those rocket boots - apparently they're called Thwomp Stompers - to make their escape, through a window in the ceiling. Responsible adults that they are, Mario and Luigi make sure to strap on makeshift milk crate helmets beforehand. And to think, the Milk Crate Mario transformation still hasn't popped up in one of the games yet. For shame, Nintendo!

Anyway, they've made their escape, and all is well, right? Except, no, they lost the crystal again in all the commotion, and now Lena has it. Well, gee, that entire scene was a perfectly valid use of screentime, now wasn't it?

On the bright side, once again the Marios have found themselves in a chase scene so slow-paced that they're able to stop and admire the fungus. And, once again, it decides to offer Luigi a Bob-Omb, and this time, he takes it. It might come in handy, after all. Not as handy as, say, the crystal pendant, but idiot beggars can't be idiot choosers, I suppose. Honestly, I doubt Iggy and Spike even have the authority to dictate what can and cannot be exchanged for Daisies anyway.

Mario and Luigi make the fateful decision that they should go to Koopa's Towers nonetheless, and see how that goes. Once again, they hitch a ride in a "Sludge Gulper", though this time, they don't disguise themselves a Snifits. Oh no, this time, the Mario Bros. are REFUSE.

While our heroes are out and about being ineptly heroic, President King Koopa is passing his time by chatting up inanimate masses of fungus and ordering pizzas. (It's the Koopa Special: "Dino, lizard, hold the mammal, no worms, and, uhhhhh.....spicy.) It's a wonderfully relevant pair of scenes; from this information, we can gleam that he's less the sort of guy who's bent on world domination at all costs, and more the sort of guy who just wants to get this world domination business over with so he can fully devote all his time to sitting around and smoking weed in his sparkly sequin-y suit, all day long.

"I like you, Fungy. You're my best fwiend!"

He's (presumably) so high, on drugs, that he doesn't notice the Mario Bros. getting dumped outside his towers along with the other trash. Why are they dumping trash here, anyway, instead of the landfill out in the desert? It sure is mysterious, isn't it? Perhaps Koopa's using all this trash for some other NEFARIOUS scheme we haven't been let in on yet, right? NOPE. There's no reason. They're just dumping waste here, in a residential neighbourhood, for no real reason whatsoever. Okaaaaaay.....

Sneaking into one of the towers - it's a 50/50 shot that they chose the right one, I guess - Mario and Luigi immediately notice that the plumbing hasn't been serviced in YEARS! This is unsurprising when you consider the fact that Dinohattan lacked plumbers altogether until they showed up. It's a wonder the place still has working plumbing at all!

They start fiddling with pipes to mess with the tower's heating, which triggers an alarm. Sure, there's no border patrol in Dinohattan and cop cars can be stolen by any gamer anywhere but, by gosh gollies, Koopa's made sure that nobody will make his home slightly too cold or anything! PRIORITIES!

So, of course, the Goombas come running again, but it's okay. Mario and Luigi have a cunning plan. They've stumbled upon a pair of old mechanics' uniforms, and now they are completely inconspicuous.

Why, plumbers and "mechanics" look completely, unrecognizably different!

Yes, it's a stupid plan, but it works, because Goombas are simpletons. Luigi even manages to hypnotize the entire group, by tricking them into dancing along with some elevator muzak, because why not? It's hard to understand what President King Koopa intends to achieve by actively ensuring that all his top guards are under-evolved beasts with tiny, tiny brains, but then again, it's hard to understand why he does anything, as you've seen. What you do during your private time is your own business, dude, but at the very least, you should NOT be making security-related decisions when you're clearly so totally blitzed...

I suppose he has to cope with the mounting stress somehow, though. His cousins Iggy and Spike are, shockingly, using their newfound intelligence to rebel against their intellectually inferior master! Gaspies! They call him an "oppressor of the proletariat" right to his face, so he proves them right by ordering their death. And then that pesky Lena is trying to win back his affections, which he angrily rebuffs, ultimately making an enemy of his longtime partner. In summary, things are not so good in the House of Koopa. Because he's just awful, you see.

By comparison, things have been downright boring for Daisy. Until this point, the most exciting thing she's done is refuse Goomba-Toad's attempt to placate her with a delicious uncooked steak. So, for the sake of making things interesting, Lena visits her and pulls a knife, for interestingness. Yoshi tackles Lena to protect Daisy, and ends up getting stabbed him(?)self while the Princess flees down a corridor. Poor, poor Yoshi. It would be very, very sad, if not for the fact that Movie Yoshi is clearly nothing more than a soulless hunk of plastic with no capacity for emotions of any sort. :(

And poor, poor Goomtoad, too! Not only does Daisy turn down his new offer of a steamed vegetable platter as well, on account of being in the middle of, like, the millionth escape sequence in this blasted movie, but also, he ends up getting caught in the crossfire of the non-Toad Goombas' flamethrowers.

And who can blame them for taking him out? His platter-handling skills under pressure leave a lot to be desired.

Fortunately, Daisy quickly locates the only fire extinguisher in the entire tower and sprays her down. Still, the incident causes enough of a commotion for Iggy and Spike to escape the Goomba guards leading them to their death. They're so grateful, or bored, or something, that they decide it's time to reveal a startling truth to her: Daisy's father, the King, is still alive, and also, he's a giant mass of fungus now! What a truly shocking revelation, for everyone who was in the john when Toad explained this half an hour ago!

While Daisy deals with the shock of this news, the Marios deal with the shock of encountering another fearsome foe you might remember from the games: Bottomless Pit.

Seriously, he has no ass, and that tunic thingy isn't doing anything to hide that fact. Dude has no idea how to show off his assets...

Luigi decides that maybe he could clear the Pit by jumping, an insane decision that I, personally, would attribute to probably peanut withdrawal. It seems successful, in the sense that his gay pride belt just happened to catch on a floating hook in a billion-to-one freak accident of physics. Mario takes a leap, and has less luck, plummeting to his death.

Yes, OF COURSE there's a last-second deus ex fungo again. This time, King MacFungus manifests in the form of a gross rubbery trampoline that bounces him back up, where Fishin' Luigi manages to catch him, and all is well, in the lamest possible sense.

Did you know that the towers' intercoms are also controlled by a lasergun minigame? Urged on by Unlikeable Mechanical Abomination Yoshi's incessant whimpering, Daisy uses it to tell the Mario Bros. that they can find her in a room called "Devo 4". President King Koopa, elsewhere, is displeased that she's sharing this nugget of info, but really, he should be proud! It's a sign that the dino-people are more persistent than we apefolk ever were! We gave up after Devo 2.0!

So, the brothers proceed into the heating ducts, which aren't doing much ducty heating now thanks to their earlier alterations, in the hopes that it'll take them there. Luigi once again notices some mushrooms growing out of the amorphous fungal slime covering anything, and he has the same goddamned conversation with Mario about how he believes it's trying to tell them something, and Mario doubts Luigi's sanity, yet again. Is making scenes that are virtual carbon copies of earlier scenes unforgiveable laziness from the writers.....or a sly and clever and sly allusion to the levels in Super Mario Bros.: The Game that shared the same level layouts, just with added Bullet Bills? You decide!

This time, though, Luigi plucks the mushroom, and tucks it away with the Bob-Omb for later on. It's true what they say. Peanuts really ARE the gateway drug.

Conveniently, yes, Devo 4 IS right there on the other side of the un-heating duct! Awesome! And convenient! Not only are Mario and Luigi reunited with Princess Daisy, but also, they're introduced to her dad, King Doesn't-Seem-To-Actually-Have-A-Name-Or-Anything.

It's like Meet the Parents, with the giant mass of fungus in the Robert DeNiro role - a striking resemblance, you must admit.

Daisy asks Mario how "Daniella" is doing now, and he slaps his forehead in embarrassment, only just now remembering, "I promised to take her to WrestleMania!" And Daisy realises, also with embarrassment, that Mario hadn't yet been aware of the kidnapping of his beloved lady of the evening, at all, until this very moment! What a guy! And so, Mario sets out to find her, in the "Goomba Barracks" on the 51st floor. Luigi and Daisy stay behind because, um, I guess they wanted to make sure Koopa would easily be able to capture them in a little bit?

For the moment, though, King President Koopa continues to lounge around in his $50 Office Depot executive's chair, until Police Chief MacMustache (probably not his real name) pops up on his screen and informs him that, as per his orders, the police have "mobilized the troops to de-evolve the mammals". B-but....he didn't give that order at all! But MacMustache is totally sure that they MUST be his orders, because Lena said as much! And, well, it finally starts to dawn on him that the woman who has been glaring and leering and sneering and generally staring daggers in his general direction lately might actually be someone who might not entirely like him anymore. :(

Putting the pieces together, he realises she has the "rock", and orders the police to "ARREST HER!", because arresting people has consistently worked for him so far in this motion picture. And, while the cops are off doing that, he decides to pay a visit to Luigi and Daisy, since they were so generous in staying behind for him and all. "Heidi ho, mammals!" (It's to Dennis Hopper's credit that he even still bothers trying to act after encountering a line like THAT.) And now that he's gotten the Princess recaptured, "Ready the troops, we're going down!", if you know what I mean.

The police, by the way, have an easy time apprehending Lena, for she subscribes to the Mario school of avoiding arrest. As alarms alarm and sirens siren, she wanders into a restricted area and parades around in front of cops. It works out as well for her as it has for Mario in the past, which is to say, Koopa gets the crystal back, as part of the continuing shell game that this movie uses in lieu of plot.

But, enough about that. You wanted to know if Mario found his girlfriend-experience escort, right? Well, he has! He's found "Daniella", and all the other probable prostitutes in King El Presidente Koopa's ladies' prison as well. Unfortunately, they're being guarded by intimidating Goombas, who are intimidatingly doing intimidating things, like pacing around, and glaring with their lizardy eyes, and colouring OUTSIDE THE LINES.

So, yeah. You can imagine how well they handle flamethrowers.

Mario swings into action, literally, taking down the Goombas with a patented Kung Fu Bob Hoskins Flying Kick! With the guards incapacitated, it's time to escape, so he orders "Daniella" and the other not-Daisies to bring him the bed from the cell. "The Goomba bed", he pauses to clarify. I'm not sure if he means that Goombas sleep on beds that are somehow different from normal ones, or if it's a bed that is actually made out of Goombas. Perhaps he just means it's a bed that has been de-evolved into a genetically inferior bed. Whatever the case, they're using it to slide down a giant frozen pipeline, which is accessible directly from the prison cell, for some unfathomable reason.

They're being pursued by Toboggoombas, too! It's the perfect excuse for some TOTALLY RAD early 90's mattress-shreddin' rock!

By yet another convenient convenience, their TOTALLY RAD mattressled lands right next to President King Koopa, who had just gone outside to start taking over the world and junk, using Luigi and Daisy. Except, silly Koopa, Luigi obviously isn't part of your plan at all, and he's kind of just a liability to have around. Especially now that he's been reunited with his brother. Especially especially now that, in the post-mattress commotion, he's managed to find a cute wee Banzai Bill!

Maybe Morton and Jenkel misread it as Bonsai Bill?

They load it into the exhaust hole of one of Mario's Thwomp Stompers, and somehow this allows them to launch said boot right into Koopa's chest. As you can imagine, being struck in the ribcage with a missile-powered hunk of hard plastic is pretty heavy trauma for a human body to endure, human or not. Heavy enough, in fact, that Koopa is immobilized for nearly FIVE WHOLE SECONDS. Ouchies. But, seriously, the impact doesn't even make him drop the crystal, which he was carrying in his mouth, because Dennis Hopper is an adorable Labrador Retriever now, I guess. Don't you just wanna scritch him behind the ear, everyone???

He DOES, however, drop it after taking a perfectly normal non-missile-powered kick in the back from Mario. What a perfectly reasonable way to reference Koopa's weak point from the games! His weak point is his impenetrable spiky-shell-armoured back, right? Yeah, it totally is. Totally.

Conveniently, it falls right into the hands of......Lena, again, because she just conveniently happened to be walking under the weird grungy street chandelier he was in? Let me just say, I am thoroughly impressed at what a freakin' awesome job Rocky Morton and Jenkelbel have done at adapting the classic children's game Hot Potato for the big screen. Everyone told them it couldn't be done, and yet, here we are!

But Mario's not concerned about that. He just wants to focus on keeping Koopa away from Daisy, "Daniella", and the prisonerettes, whom I hope also have D names. So, he grabs a strand of fungus, and tricks Koopa into thinking it's the loopy necklace thingy attached to the crystal, distracting the totally legitimate president-monarch with yet another chase scene through the streets, which culminates in a dramatic staredown on an elevated walkway. Mario has an ace up his gross sweaty sleeve, though - the Bob-Omb, that.....Luigi grabbed some time ago, and we never saw him give to Mario, but.....whatever. It doesn't even seem to matter. Mario winds it up, sets it down, and it promptly proceeds to fall through some grating. Fucking idiot.

With Koopa distracted, Luigi tasks himself with saving the ladies. "Who are you?", they ask. "Luigi Mario! You got a problem with that?"

From the look of things, Front Lady very much has a problem with that, whereas Back Lady could care less about that, being entirely too focused on that deeply fascinating cigarette. Right Lady and Left Lady, meanwhile, have reached bipartisan agreement in their indifference to that.

Luigi and the Luigettes follow Lena to the meteorite site, where she prepares to jam the crystal into its hole, so they can finally become one again. Though, she seems to be having trouble getting it in there. It's okay, Lena. It happens to ALL guys. No, really. It's fine. *sighs passive-aggressively*

"It's not too late, we've gotta stop her", Daisy offers, helpfully. So, Luigi decides to.....ignore that, and lead the ladies back through the rock portal to where they came from. (Remember that thing?) If I were him, I would've held off on that for a bit longer. I'm pretty sure a squad of one dude and five prison bitches could've easily taken down one woman who's distracted by her, um, performance anxiety. But, y'know, we can wait, too. What's the worst that could happen?

Oh, right, she could actually manage to get the thing wedged in there in the meantime. It doesn't go so very well for her, though. Luigi tastefully notes that she "makes a good impression".

And you simply must agree, without all that pesky flesh, she's considerably Lena now.

Daisy analyses the situation and finally realises why Koopa needed her. Being of royal blood, she's the only one who can "withstand the force", because that totally makes sense. So, she's gonna try to save the world by yanking it back out. I wish you luck with that, Princess, but for now, I wanna pay attention to someone else.

Like Mario and Koopa, who are disintegrating, apparently as a result of the worlds merging, or something. Even in the face of this, Koopa takes entirely too long to realise that this means, no, Mario doesn't actually have the real crystal. He's kind of slack-jawed when he DOES get it. "You filthy mammal!"

King President Koopa, mid-disintegration. Now, off to bed, kiddies. Enjoy your nightmares!

It's not like they're ceasing to exist or anything, though. They're just fading into a "merged" real-world New York, where the World Trade Center towers "merge" with the more dilapidated Koopa Towers. "They'll do anything for publicity," mutters Scapelli (remember him?) when he sees this. What does that even mean? Who are "they"? With any luck, he had a less confusingly ambiguous one-liner at the ready 8½ years later.

Koopa immediately gets to work brandishing his de-evolution gun in the "merged" dimension. He misses Mario, but it still hits Scapelli, at least.

It's a Mafia chimp in a suit! All this movie's sins can now be forgiven.

Koopa readjusts his aim squarely at Mario this time, insisting that "now I'm gonna make a monkey out of YOU, plumber". (Oh, yeah, Koopa's one of THOSE people, who doesn't get the difference between monkeys and apes. Tsk tsk.) And, yes, this time his aim is spot on, but Mario manages to shield himself from the blast with the mushroom, um......again, that Luigi took earlier, and then never gave to Mario, on-screen anyway. Should I just assume that their pockets are mystically linked somehow? Is that what it's like to have a twin brother? Do you have to dress in outfits with magickally shared pockets? If so, I'm glad I don't have a twin brother. That would make fondling myself a thoroughly awkward experience.

Anyway, for some reason, the de-evolution beam just makes the mushroom grow, and Mario chucks the enlarged shroom at Koopa's face, like a frisbee. What a badass! It's a shame Nintendo hasn't yet gotten around to making Mario Frolf.

Also, none of this matters, because Luigi and Daisy have successfully extracted the shard from the meteorite at large with some sort of plumbing corkscrew, and thus the dimensions split apart just as quickly as they came together. Plopped back in Dinohattan, Lord King President makes a pathetic last-ditch effort at salvaging a victory, but it's all for naught, because Goomba-Toad distracts the rest of Koopa's Goomba army with a charming harmonica melody. And then Luigi flies into the fray in a new pair of Thwomp Stompers that says he got from Big Bertha, to replace the ones they Bonsai Billed earlier. Is that, like, her day job? She's just a lowly shoe salesman? That explains the unreasonable hostility!

Of course, Koopa tries, and fails, to shoot Luigi down. In the process, he tragically destroys this lovely campaign billboard depicting him making out with a baby's forehead...

Oh, hey, also, remember that Bob-Omb that Mario totally fucked up with earlier? Apparently it just kept going and going, and it survived the merging and the un-merging of the dimensions, and now it's standing on the bottom of some grating, directly underneath Koopa. Now Mario can repair his wounded self-esteem by telling himself this was the plan all along...

Why isn't Reebok making their magical ceiling-walking shoes available to the general public? Why why why???

The Bob-Ombsplosion, combined with continued fire from some de-evolution guns provided by Goomba-Toad, finally prove to be the corrupt autopresicratident's undoing. Yeah, yeah, I know, for some reason he was apparently immune to de-evolution earlier. But not now, I guess? And you'd think an actual Unicellular T-Rex would be even more capable of kicking their asses, but maybe he was still winded from the explosion? That would be completely justifiable, actually, I'd figure. Mario and Luigi keep firing until, finally, he is reduced to the most primitive evolutionary stage possible - several bucketfuls of antifreeze that some stagehand dumped on the ground. Well, that takes care of that!

Immediately, everything is just so much better. The Dinohattanites are so pleased to be rid of Koopa that they are literally dancing in the streets! And, for reasons unexplained, Koopa's defeat means that the REAL King is automatically re-evolved! Our first introduction to his human form involves seeing him vomit up the last remaining bit of fungus from his lung(u)s. Classy, guys.

"Hey you! How about lending me a barf bag! No dice? What a drag!"

Alas, having succeeded at their mission, it's time for the brothers to return to the human world of suit-wearing chimps. Sadly, Daisy realises that she can't go with them, for she's a princess, and she'd like to finally get to know her dad, who hopefully isn't *too* into emetophilia. But Luigi and his erect peanuts would rather not leave her behind. He pleads with her. "Donchu know how I feel abouchu?" Mario, however, steps in to explain that truly loving Daisy means giving her the time to figure out where she belongs. Truly wise words, for a guy who clearly partakes in female rental services. Perhaps "Daniella" gives him a slight discount because he's such a sweetieheart perv.

Three weeks later, in Brooklyn, Luigi is still pretty mopey, though his spirits are lifted when Our Miraculous World tells their story. It must be thrilling to know that, all across the country, people are incredulously dismissing their incredible adventure as sensationalist claptrap!

And then, we have our infamous sequel hook, that never came to fruition. Daisy bursts into Mario and Luigi's apartment, flamethrower in hand, and exclaims, "You're never gonna believe this!" And, together, they rush off on another exciting adventure, that we sadly never got to see. What could it have possibly been? Well, since this adaptation of Hot Potato went so very well, personally, I would've cast my vote for a "Button, Button, Who's Got the Button?"-inspired adventure next.

In summary and in conclusion, I....well, I completely apologise for how ridiculously long it is. It makes Kevin's Barbie Princess Charm School review look downright sane! (Sane in terms of its length, I mean. Not at all sane in the sense that it's, y'know.....a dude watching Barbie Princess Charm School.) You see, this is a movie with a lot of plot, for a movie that doesn't really have much of a plot at all. That's just one of the many contradictions it finds itself struggling with, too. Does it want to be a family film? Or is a more, erm, "adult" take on the Marioverse? Nobody involved with it seems to have decided. There's some good fun to be had, I suppose, with taking in the wildly inaccurate adaptations of familiar things from some truly beloved video games, but it's far less successful, ironically or not, as a standalone viewing experience. As such, on my personal arbitrary rating scale, I've seen fit to award Super Mario Bros. a none-too-impressive....

TWO SATANIC INVERTED POWER STARS OUT OF FIVE!

...thanks for enduring this, everybody! Coming up in the second half of this cinematolympic showdown, we'll be taking a look at what his eternal rival Sonic the Hedgehog has to offer, in the form of a dubbed OVA that's nearly half as long as Mario's entry. But will it be only nearly half as good, too? Or will brevity truly be the soul of, erm, what passes for wit in this contest? Only time will tell, so I'll see you back here soonish, hopefully!