Welcome to another edition of Playing With Power. The review article that looks at all things Nintendo Entertainment System. By the late 80’s and early 90s, the NES had become not only a household name, but also was making it’s name into the world of popular culture. Hollywood was calling Nintendo’s name, and the great grey box would answer the call. There was of course The Wizard, a 1989 family film that was really a 90 minute Nintendo ad, but we’ll get into that at a later time. This week, we’re going to look at the world of Nintendo as it was given an animated touch. Three NES themed cartoons take the spotlight for this week’s Playing With Power article, as we delve into the Nintendo Toon Town.
The First of the bunch to cover is The Super Mario Bros Super Show, which debuted in September of 1989. This wasn’t the first cartoon to feature Mario though, as he would first appear in the Donkey Kong cartoon from Saturday Supercade years prior. But this was the first cartoon to feature any canon from the Mario Brothers universe.
The show was broken into what was essentially two different Mario-Themed shows. The first, and most dominant of the program was a live action comedy featuring a live action Luigi and Mario. Luigi was played by actor Danny Wells, while the most famous of the two in Mario was played by wrestling legend Captain Lou Albano. These segments were usually very simple comedy shorts with a bit of an Abbot and Costello flavor to them. It also featured many celebrity appearances like Cyndi Lauper, Sgt. Slaughter, and Magic Johnson.
Then there was the cartoon, which was somewhat based on Super Mario Bros 2. These featured Mario, the main plumber hero. He’s pretty much as expected, the fun loving hero. He and Luigi have Brooklyn accents as opposed to the Italian accents they would have later into the franchise. Mario also has an affinity for Italian food, often hungry for the likes of pasta and lasagna, while sometimes proudly proclaiming “pasta power”.
Luigi is usually a lot more cowardly than Mario, often not being fond of being involved in more dire situations. It’s questionable if this was what Nintendo would base the traits of Luigi on, or if this was just a happy coincidence.
Toad is somewhat the kid character of the group. He’s usually the one getting the gang into the bigger messes. He’s also got a rather annoying raspy voice that is grating to listen to. As for Princess Toadstool, she really doesn’t have too much that makes her all that unique. She’s adventurous, and not very prissy like most princess characters. But there’s really nothing that makes her memorable.
King Koopa is a pretty awesome villain. He has a great tough guy voice, and is always managing to get the best of the Marios, at least until they beat him by episode’s end. He commands the likes of Koopa Troopas, Goombas, and is also in command of TriClyde, Mouser, and Fryguy, characters who only appeared in Mario 2, and were controlled by Wart.
The show is pretty cheesy, and the animation does have its fair share of errors, but there’s nothing that really comes off as offensive, or harmful for a younger audience. There’s a lot of fun in the wacky adventures the Marios get into, even if it doesn’t always fit into the universe of the video games.
Of course, I can’t also talk about this show without mentioning the songs. The rap intro is classic 80’s cheese.
We’re the Mario Brothers, and plumbing’s our game
We’re not like the others that get all the fame
If your sink is in trouble
You can call us on the double
We’re faster than the others
You’ll be hooked on the brothers
And of course, who can forget “Do The Mario” the end credit song? A song so inane, yet catchy, it’s ingrained in the brain of any Nintendo kid of the 80’s. Even if the dance itself is simply swinging your arms from side to side, and taking two steps. It’s a classic. As is this cartoon.
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The Mario Bros cartoon wasn’t the only cartoon featured on the Super Show, as every Friday there would be an episode of The Legend of Zelda. The first and only major animated series based on the video game series. And with how hit and miss it is, it’s easy to see why that is.
The show bases around the land of Hyrule, as Link must protect Zelda, and the Triforce of Wisdom from the evil wizard Ganon, who weilds the Triforce of Power. Whoever has both Triforces will rule the land forever. And that’s what goes on for the majority of the series. Ganon sends monsters to try to defeat Link, get the Triforce, or kidnap Zelda, and in the end it’s Link who usually saves the day.
Animation for the show is definitely top notch for Dic standards, and the action is definitely great as well. The only real issue that plagues the show however is the characters themselves. Especially our protagonists. Link is more of the cocky jock character, more interested in being the hero and winning Zelda’s heart than protecting hyrule. He’s also known for having what is easily considered one of the most annoying catchphrases in the history of cartoons
And it’s a wonder why Link is pretty much a mute in the games.
Zelda is portrayed as the standard tough princess. She’s thankfully not just the patrician damsel in distress, and even manages to save Link on a few occasions. But she can be quite frigid to Link, and even for his multiple attempts of saving Hyrule and the Triforce, she still chastises him. There’s also a character named Sprite, who is a fairy that has feelings for Link. Kind of live Tinkerbell with less character.
Ganon is a decent villain with a great look, my only issue is his extremely annoying voice that sounds like he’s having some strange orgasmic scream practically every time he talks. But in comparison to the rest of the characters in the show, it’s definitely not as bad a representation.
The show is not the worst video game adaptation, but simply suffers from annoying characters, and some bland plots. It was easily the weakest part of the Super Mario Brothers Super Show.
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In the fall of 1990, NBC would capitalize on the popularity of Nintendo, and add some cartoons on their Saturday morning cartoon block. These included two cartoons. The Adventures of Super Mario Brothers 3, a sequel cartoon for the Super Mario Brothers Super Show. The other cartoon was Captain N: The Game Master. And that’s the next cartoon we’ll focus on.
Captain N was not a cartoon based on a video game, but instead a cartoon based on several video games from the NES library, not even limited to just Nintendo Franchises. Capcom, Konami, and other companies added their names to the hat for the series.
Captain N: The Game Master focused on the world known as Videoland, a universe where all of the video game characters live an co-exist. It all was peaceful until Mother Brain of the Metroid series would take over, causing mayhem in her wake. With no other hope left, Princess Lana, the remaining ruler of Videoland would send for a hero from the real world to save the day. That hero being a teenager named Kevin Keene, a master of all video games. He and his dog Duke get sent to the world of video games, and along with other classic game heroes must fight to stop Mother Brain and her any of evil.
This is an awesome idea on paper. Getting to see the video game characters you love given an animated treatment. It’s just too bad that it was crystal clear that nobody at Dic played a video game before, because oh man did they ever get these characters wrong.
The game heroes along for the ride with Kevin include Mega Man, who has been turned into a midget with a raspy chain smoker voice. He often uses Mega in most of his sentences. Another character is Kid Icarus, who has been turned into a runt kid, who often adds “Icus” or “Maximus” to his sentences because apparently that’s a gimmick they thought no one would find annoying at all.
But the worst character handling is definitely Simon Belmont. What in the heck happened here? Simon from the Castlevania series was portrayed as a bad ass warrior, who’d whip first and ask questions later. In this series, he was portrayed as a blonde pretty boy who’s more concerned about getting in Lana’s pants (Which is creepy considering he looks 40 and she’s gotta be 16 at least) than trying to save Videoland.
The villain side is a bit better handled, but not by much. Mother Brain for some reason sounds like Audrey II from Little Shop of Horrors. And she has a pair of bumbling henchmen in King Hippo from Punch-Out, and Eggplant Wizard from Kid Icarus. The show also would feature Dracula and Dr. Wily from their respective games as well.
Episodes based themselves on plenty of video games including Tetris, Metroid, Bayou Billy, Faxanadu, and more. There was even an episode that based itself off The Legend of Zelda, giving us another visit to the characters from that cartoon. While the premises were cool, most of the episodes were pretty cheesy and dumb. And when the later seasons added gimmicks like a new character in Game Boy, you could tell that this glorified commercial cartoon was starting to lose its steam.
I covered this cartoon (as well as Legend of Zelda) on my Tooncrap blog many years ago, and while I do think they’re bad, I don’t fully hate them. They’re extremely cheesy pieces of late 80’s/early 90’s nostalgia that can be enjoyed if not taken all too seriously. They’re glorified commercials, but nothing too horrible.
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And that was a look at three NES themed cartoons. Despite their silliness, they’re still great pieces of nostalgia from the age when the great grey box was dominating pop culture. If you can find these cartoons, give them a watch, even if they aren’t the greatest things ever, they’re still fun to watch on the nostalgia value at least.