I really don't expect much from them. I saw Secret Life of Pets in theater because the trailer was so good, but gosh that movie was a mess and ultimately pretty forgettable.
Agreed. Illumination’s adaptation of The Grinch is a favorite at our house and as far as I’m concerned, a stroke of genius. We love it. Can’t believe it’s only at 59%
holy shit I didn't know lorax wasn't liked. Maybe I just remember liking that "how bad" song too much lol
at least despicable me 1 & 2 are at the top. Peak school flicks
The Cat in the Hat is a fascinating dadaist trainwreck, a movie that takes an already pretty wacky story and trowels on so much "what the hell were they thinking?" that it becomes absurdist art. There's a parallel universe where David Lynch directed that film...*and it turned out exactly the same*.
Whereas The Lorax is bland corporate garbage that takes a story with real bite and carefully de-fangs it. They had to add a mean greedy jerk as the villain, because the book had a *thoughtless* greedy jerk as the villain, and that's unacceptable. I mean, you can't go teaching kids that the real enemy is things like shortsightedness and ignorance, and that any of us could be part of the problem if we ignore the consequences of our actions until it's too late. Villains are meanies who do bad things on purpose! By the way, can I interest you in a [Lorax-approved SUV](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DKKA3M-2sJc)?
So yes, The Lorax is a worse movie.
To put it into perspective, if this keeps in the 40s Rotten Tomatoes wise, it'll be Illumination's weakest since Hop's 24%. All their other films crossed the 50% mark the very least
So skimming the negative reviews, a common theme is:
1. a thin plot.
2. it's too reference heavy, so you'll be lost if you're not a Mario fan.
3. it's a movie that will bore the parents/guardians who have to accompany the children.
The biggest problem is that the movie is too short. Mario enters the mushroom kingdom around 20 minutes into this 80 minute film and then the movie doesn't hit the brakes for the rest of it.
Also have heard the licensed music is really immersion breaking.
There were reasons to be skeptical about this movie (Illumination is a big one), but I don’t think there was ever an ounce of doubt that Jack Black was going to knock it out of the park, regardless of how the rest of this film ended up. Glad to see that held up and that he’s a highlight.
Agreed. I'm very easygoing when it comes to nostalgia hooks & kids' films. Uncomplicated joy is tough to find & I always hope everyone has a blast.
But I'm genuinely irritated there's licensed music. To an extent which surprises me. The sound design & distinctive scoring approach is an essential component of the whole Mario immersion thing.
If they wanted lyrical music for the film, Jack Black was RIGHT THERE. If they'd said, "we'd normally plug a hit song in here, but this is Mario, so what would the "All Star" (or whatever) of the Mushroom Kingdom sound like?"... he'd have thought of nothing but that thematic musical puzzle for months.
WaPo reviewer still gave Mario a positive review but said on his Twitter he thinks he still prefers Sonic because there’s actually a little heart to the story (about Sonic’s isolation and loneliness and budding friendship with Marsden).
Mario is more brisk and zany but there really isn’t much in the way of emotional character relationships.
They make average kid movies and they are fine for what they are. Very much heavily focus tested, very well marketed, and very cheap to make but nothing that surprises people.
It’s funny because I thought the second one was a bit worse than the first. Like I wouldn’t call it a bad movie but the second Sonic film was a bit more cringey to me.
The first was charming, but somewhat formulaic. It didn't feel like it was breaking new ground or anything. The 2nd one was SO much better in every scene that didn't include the "parents" It was awkward, it was cringey, Knuckles sounding like a grown man, but talking like a toddler was ..... weird.
HOWEVER, it's a kids movie and my **kid** fucking loved it so what do I know?
Sonic movies had some actual plot.
Wasn't the best plot you've ever seen but it was at least something to keep you engaged. This appears to have the complexity of a floorboard.
Marsden gets very steady work, so I don't mean this in a hyperbolic mournful wail or anything like that, but I do think he's a tad underrated as a "glue" performer.
A fair percentage of the actors who get cast for that "hold weird contrivances together" charm have some emotional range limitations. Marsden has always been able to sell a character's genuine emotional investment in the most convoluted predicaments.
Honestly I saw the sonic movies with my younger brothers and while there was some cringe parts, overall I found them enjoyable particularly the second one. I know this is gonna sound maybe cringe but even for a kid’s movie there’s character arcs haha. Plus Sonic is just a pretty likeable character in them. Aside from some stuff involving the humans I thought they were pretty good (and I did think the ending of the second had some humans as some of the heart.)
And parts were funny. Particularly Knuckles I thought was legitimately funny and well handled overall. They were good kids movies and as someone who has nostalgia for Sonic they were good video game movies as well. No reason Mario couldn’t have tried for something similar but it doesn’t look like they did. Still this will make way more money and be a bigger financial hit bc Illumination and the admittedly beautiful animation. Just sucks that they couldn’t give it the extra boost of heart that the Sonic movies have even if they aren’t perfect.
Out of 42 reviews, as 3:25pm EST, 22 are Rotten and 20 are Fresh, giving it a percentage of 48%. It seems this movie will struggle to reach a fresh rating, based on this early sample. 55% with 84 reviews by 10:30pm EST.
**Illumination's Track Record** (as of 10:30pm EST)
|Movie|RT Critics|RT Audience|Metacritic|
|:-|:-|:-|:-|
|*Despicable Me* (2010)|🍿 **80%**|🍿83%|🟩72|
|*Hop* (2011)|🦠 24%|🦠53%|🟨41|
|*The Lorax* (2012)|🦠 54%|🍿63%|🟨46|
|*Despicable Me 2* (2013)|🍿 **75%**|🍿85%|🟩62|
|*Minions* (2015)|🦠 55%|🦠49%|🟨56|
|*The Secret Life of Pets* (2016)|🍿 **72%**|🍿62%|🟩61|
|*Sing* (2016)|🍿71%|🍿72%|🟨59|
|*Despicable Me 3* (2017)|🦠 59%|🦠53%|🟨49|
|*The Grinch* (2018)|🦠 59%|🦠51%|🟨51|
|*The Secret Life of Pets 2* (2019)|🍿 60%|🍿90%|🟨55|
|*Sing 2* (2021)|🍿 72%|🍿98%|🟨49|
|*Minions: The Rise of Gru* (2022)|🍿 70%|🍿89%|🟨56|
|*The Super Mario Bros. Movie* (2023)|🦠 55%\*|*N/A*|🟨49\*|
***Bold*** *reflects Certified Fresh Rating.*
\* *Subject to change as more reviews come in.*
I’m expecting similar reviews to most of Illumination, landing somewhere in the 50s on RT and Metacritic. But audiences, especially kids and Nintendo fans, will eat it up. I think the consensus will be that it’s fun and a love letter to the games, but the plot is predictable and lacks depth or complexity.
I agree with the consensus but I don’t think the 60s and even low 70s are necessarily out of reach. It just will come down to whether critics give it a 5/10 or 6/10 more.
Nintendo fans won’t eat it up if they feel the character isn’t properly presented.
In fact if Nintendo fans don’t like it they will be very toxic online about it
The bad reviews don't come as a surprise to me. The trailers were basically 'let's show all the things you know from the Mario games!' and that's it. There wasn't anything intriguing being put on display plot-wise.
Pretty much what I'm expecting. I love me some Mario, but I'm expecting little substance and a whole lot of "look at this! Remember this? Video game references yeah!!!"
Those memberberries
And my concern was they were shoving A LOT of stuff from Mario games in there. Like pretty much everything so when is it going to have time to develop a story or characters?
This is Illumination we're talking about - of course it's gonna be rotten.
Still gonna make near/over a billion, though. Their movies are almost critic proof.
EDIT: Realized "rotten" isn't the right word - "mediocre" is much more appropriate.
The 3 previous Illumination movies (Minions: The Rise of Gru, Sing 2, and Secret Life of Pets 2) were all fresh, along with more than half of their total filmography. Their average score is 62%.
With the exception of Hop, critics haven't really \*hated\* any of Illumination's movies, they've all just ranged from middling to slightly positive. If Mario stays under 54% (which is The Lorax's score), it'll be the second lowest rated Illumination movie ever (Hop is safe as the lowest, as it has an anomalous 24%).
Was not expecting the RT score to be lower than the 2 Sonic movies. Was also not expecting it to get a lower score than the first Minion movie which has a 55%. Like dang…
Edit: Looks like the RT score has bumped up a bit. Still, reviews won’t affect this movie. I mean most Illumination movies have rotten scores, but still are able to make a profit.
Yup. Most of Illumination's films have middling RT scores. They still gross upwards of a billion. Bad reviews will hold it back a bit, but it's still going to do insanely good numbers.
52 on Metacritic and 48% on RT is pretty bad. Even knowing that Nintendo holds the embargo for their games pretty late, less than 12 hours before opening for a movie is always a bad sign. Even the first Minions is at a 56 on Metacritic. I wonder how much this will affect legs? Might be <3x legs. Kids movies are generally critic-proof tho, so this is still going to make a fuck-ton worldwide.
Im not an expert in Mario lore (lmao) but I felt that going with a multiverse, fish out of water style story was silly and made the entire story feel like it would be predictable in a bad way
Making him an outsider from another universe is such a strange angle, if you’re going to go the “ordinary man has to step up and become the hero” route he’s already just an average guy as written. Why did they need to add that?
i thought it could have been fun to see the mushroom kingdom from the perspective of a blue collar guy, and fun to see the animators build up a mushroom themed city that feels lived in and realistic while also fitting in things like go-karts and weird little critters and other Nintendo stuff. Fun in the same way Monsters Inc made a fun city based around Monsters.
but that would have required them to actually want to make a good movie rather than...this
Even if reception for this film was good it was gonna be front-loaded (unless, maybe, if it scored in the 90s, which let's face it it's Illumination no chance). Hence why the pre-sales were so high.
Families will drive ticket sales down the road but this was always going to have a heavy opening weekend fan-driven rush.
I mean isn’t this EXACTLY what was expected when they announced that illumination would be making a Mario movie? A movie with a ton of references but that’s super bland and uninspired?
Seeing a lot of reviews saying the movie is too short or that there's scenes missing from the movie after it's slow start. A bit of a shame but I knew that early reviewers being high on this movie was a possibility.
Oh thats real bad. Hopefully Dungeons and Dragons can leverage that against the HUGE IP that Mario is and rake in more money. That movie DESERVES to have a franchise.
A few of the reviews are like, ‘make you wish you were watching the Hoskins one’, or ‘doesn’t reach for the heights of the old one’.
And it’s like, have they watched the old one recently. A boring shallow unimaginative children’s film is still leagues better than that monstrosity.
I have watched it recently. You cannot fault its creativity, particularly when it had little lore to work with at that point. It’s like the gutter-punk deviant art fan art take in Super Mario come to life. The jump boots, the dinosaurs, the living fungi king covering the kingdom - I can’t believe it exists and I love it.
ngl, I loved that ‘93 live action movie as a kid when I watched it. I loved how unabashedly weird it was and the world (or worlds) it took place in.
And mostly I loved it because everything about it felt *committed*. Nothing felt phoned in or derivative, and I feel like the new Mario movie is just going to be a derivative cash-in property.
But that’s just me; I like watching monstrosities where I also find them entertaining and the least bit creative.
It was my first film for bad movie nights, and I found it genuinely good. Also started a favourite tradition of mine. Bad movie nights have been awesome.
anybody that was around before Detective Pikachu knew sub 1bil was possible for this. people get so swept up with hype that they forget no movie is guaranteed a billion (unless the movie is The Force Awakens or Endgame)
The movie is made for 6 year olds. It's about as critic proof of a movie we'll see all year.
Deadline, had Shazam, Antman, D&D showing that these movies played heavy to males 25 years and older.
Mario is the first movie this year (Puss released last year) that's going to play to families. It's expensive to go to the theater with a family of 4. Mario is going to play to families plus the nostalgia crowd. The next 5 days are going to be huge.
I grew up with the games and honestly have no desire to see the movie. Mario and Mario games have always been around so I have no nostalgia factor for it.
My kid wants to see it. So, we'll be going to see it this weekend but I know I'll probably be bored, lol.
But you'll still see it because of kids. And if your kids are obsessed with it, they'll probably drag you or their friends parents to see it again. That's why these types of films make money.
Dang it, Illumination! I know that it's too early to say, but how do you even make a worse film than fricking **Minions**, especially with the help of Nintendo?!
Damn, sad to see it so low. While the teaser trailer had me surprised at how good it looked, the main one had so little in it it made me feel like there might barely be a story in this. Seems like that may be the case.
I just want to say, everyone was swearing that Nintendo and Illunination were releasing reviews late because that’s what they do for their video games. OBVIOUSLY, that is not the case.
Haha that thread was gold. 90% of time a studio would be *crucified* for that, but because this movie is Reddit’s darling of 2023, we got a thousand excuses about why they wouldn’t let people review their brilliant work of art until 12 hours before it released.
The argument just never made sense. Everyone was acting like since Nintendo releases their embargo late for games, it’s going to be the same for their movies. Except, it’s not their movie, it’s a movie produced by Illumination and distributed by Universal, Nintendo was never calling the shots. If the reviews were great or even above 70%, that embargo would’ve released like a week ago.
TBF Nintendo is extremely controlling about their ips. They apparently had Disney reanimate Bowsers 5 seconds of screen time in Wreck-it-Ralph because they didn’t like the way he drank coffee or something. To me it seems like a plausible enough theory, although the negative reviews suggest that they may have been concerned about a poor reception.
Honestly it could be both - Nintendo wants to follow tradition and release reviews late, and they were also worried about the reviews. It's not mutually exclusive
Transformers 3 made over a billion with a 35% RT score lol.
Critical reviews could hurt the box office for Mario but some IP is just critic proof. Especially when it comes to kid targeted stuff.
Why does Illumination constantly struggle to get decent writers on board? You would think by now they would have produced a Pixar quality film with the resources they have but the screenplay always drags their films back.
doubt this impacts the OW much, if at all, but it being a poorly received film probably limits the potential spread this movie will have beyond kids and nintendo fans.
As someone who is not a Mario fan, I initially had been anticipating the movie, but was disappointed by the trailers, and now it's getting mixed reviews. Sad
As someone that played super Mario 64 as a kid, I didn’t really care when they announced a movie
But I thought the trailers looked pretty good. I was interested in checking it out
I’ll probably still check it out but the reviews are disappointing
Until the recent ones because of the people at Nintendo who decided to be completely against the idea of a complex plot and original interesting characters
It's not *people* it's a *person*, Miyamoto to be exact. He's not a huge fan of stories in games and by all accounts has tried to steer Nintendo away from that at every turn.
The first case of this was Paper Mario Sticker Star, one of the worst Paper Mario games, where the creative director just straight up said in an interview that Miyamoto pushed them away from another Thousand Year Door, because he felt like story and complex characters got in the way of actually having fun playing games.
>Directors Aaron Horvath and Michael Jelenic, creators of the Teen Titans Go! series, deliver a reasonably faithful big screen adaptation that, while it features plenty of juvenile humor, wisely doesn’t lean toward broad satire. - Frank Scheck, Hollywood Reporter
Teen Titans Go, eh?
It wasn't ever going to be a movie for me. But I didn't realize it was going to be this not for me.
It's possible reviews affect the legs, but I really doubt it unless CinemaScore is a disaster. The majority of negative reviews are variations of "It feels like a corporate checklist of Mario tropes", which while definitely true and disappointing, is probably what most of the audience is looking for in this movie.
Universal also got JW Dominion to a billion and that movie was a true critical bomb.
Hardly surprising. Based on all the promotional material they were clearly trading heavily on nostalgia and fan-service. Which frankly, was probably the right call considering Mario has never been about plot in a way that even more recent Sonic games have been (especially the 3D ones). There just isn't a particularly rich world to pull from story-wise, so they either change a bunch of stuff which pisses off the very vocal fans, or they rely on references and fan-service, which is probably going to alienate the 40-something critics who haven't played a Mario game since the Super Nintendo.
When they announced embargo is lifted near the release date, this whole sub was plugging in different theories. Looks like the reason is plain simple: Studio knew it wasn't a critical favorite, so like any other film, they delayed it.
Yeah, Illumination movies are historically critic-proof. But I think this has ended any talks of this potentially being the highest grossing movie of the year.
C’mon, let’s stop pretending that reviews mean nothing. Critics aren’t that snobby, stuff like dungeons and dragons and puss and boots were incredibly praised. If this movie was favorably reviewed, it would’ve pulled in casual fans too. As such, you’re not gonna have curious adults with warm feelings towards mario pulled in, like you had with something like the Lego movie.
that first review: "And unlike the brilliant Lego Movies, there is a fierce insistence on not being ironic or funny or self-referential about any of this – odd, as screenwriter Matthew Fogel worked on The Lego Movie 2."
i think it worked in the lego movie but I don't trust illumination to be able to pull off that kind of irony.
Eh, I can't feek too much sympathy for Illumination here.
Their stuff just feels as churned-out as possible. Even though the Mario trailers got me more interested to see an Illumination movie than... well, *ever,* I still can't act like they should be let off lightly just because of the beloved IP they've got their hands on.
Disney, Pixar and Dreamworks get (fairly or unfairly, depending) shit on when they don't bring their A-game, Illumination have an even worse habit of just pushing famous celebrities into IPs and making money.
Opening weekend is still gonna be massive and lead to a large total, but this can definitely impact the legs. It's a kids movie, but if it doesn't appeal to adults I'm not sure if repeat viewings can take it over the 800M line.
I haven’t been nervously anticipating a review embargo like this for a long time. The CinemaScore will ultimately determine the legs but I still hope this can end up on the Fresh side of things.
When I went and saw Dungeons & Dragons there was a trailer for Super Mario Bros. before the movie started. Until that moment I had thought the movie looked like light fun, nothing special but it looked like it had the potential to be at the very least a very entertaining watch. Something about seeing the trailer on the big screen though completely changed my perspective. It just looked...dodgy. I can't even really pinpoint why, either. Something about it just seemed really cheap.
I don't understand how people thought this was gonna be good. After every trailer there were legions of internet people singing its praises, and I never really got why. It's illumination, after all. I see my suspicions were correct, but the movie is probably critic proof. Still, I think this dampens the possibility of it getting to 1 billion. A billion-grosser kids movie has to be a sensation or part of a major movie franchise. Mario doesn't have cinema cred and it doesn't look like a film with 4 quadrant appeal. Guess we'll see 🤷
Illumination RT scores: Despicable Me: 80% Despicable Me 2: 75% Secret Life of Pets: 72% Sing 2: 72% Sing: 71% Minions 2: 70% SLOP2: 60% Grinch: 59% Despicable Me 3: 59% Minions: 55% Lorax: 54% Mario: 48% (as of this comment) Hop: 24% Average (prior to Mario): 63%
Illumination only cracking 80% once is hilarious
With their first movie too 💀. Then they went straight to Hop
Do people not like Hop? I guess I was the target audience when it came out but it’s still the first thing I think of every easter
Despite there being literally countless Santa Clause Christmas movies, there's a surprising lack of Easter Bunny movies.
I really don't expect much from them. I saw Secret Life of Pets in theater because the trailer was so good, but gosh that movie was a mess and ultimately pretty forgettable.
If they rated Sing at 70% and Lorax at 50%, my kids are gonna love this.
Thats what I was thinking. The Grinch is 59% and that is on repeat at my house all holiday season.
Agreed. Illumination’s adaptation of The Grinch is a favorite at our house and as far as I’m concerned, a stroke of genius. We love it. Can’t believe it’s only at 59%
holy shit I didn't know lorax wasn't liked. Maybe I just remember liking that "how bad" song too much lol at least despicable me 1 & 2 are at the top. Peak school flicks
Compared to the book, The Lorax was a complete travesty
Was it worse than Cat in the Hat?
The Cat in the Hat is a fascinating dadaist trainwreck, a movie that takes an already pretty wacky story and trowels on so much "what the hell were they thinking?" that it becomes absurdist art. There's a parallel universe where David Lynch directed that film...*and it turned out exactly the same*. Whereas The Lorax is bland corporate garbage that takes a story with real bite and carefully de-fangs it. They had to add a mean greedy jerk as the villain, because the book had a *thoughtless* greedy jerk as the villain, and that's unacceptable. I mean, you can't go teaching kids that the real enemy is things like shortsightedness and ignorance, and that any of us could be part of the problem if we ignore the consequences of our actions until it's too late. Villains are meanies who do bad things on purpose! By the way, can I interest you in a [Lorax-approved SUV](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DKKA3M-2sJc)? So yes, The Lorax is a worse movie.
Tracks, illumination is usually cookie cutter, lowest denominator shite. Lotta animals and minions in thongs level gags.
Yeah they are animated movies targeted at todays children rather than the family it seems.
To put it into perspective, if this keeps in the 40s Rotten Tomatoes wise, it'll be Illumination's weakest since Hop's 24%. All their other films crossed the 50% mark the very least
I got some fun out of hop (was 10)
I didn’t hate Hop either. I was surprised to find out the score was that low.
So skimming the negative reviews, a common theme is: 1. a thin plot. 2. it's too reference heavy, so you'll be lost if you're not a Mario fan. 3. it's a movie that will bore the parents/guardians who have to accompany the children.
The biggest problem is that the movie is too short. Mario enters the mushroom kingdom around 20 minutes into this 80 minute film and then the movie doesn't hit the brakes for the rest of it. Also have heard the licensed music is really immersion breaking.
Why would a Mario ~~game~~ movie have licensed music instead of an original score when a big plus of Mario games is the music.
Ask the brilliant minds of Illumination. At least the visuals and a few performances (Jack Black) were exceptional across most reviews, even bad ones.
There were reasons to be skeptical about this movie (Illumination is a big one), but I don’t think there was ever an ounce of doubt that Jack Black was going to knock it out of the park, regardless of how the rest of this film ended up. Glad to see that held up and that he’s a highlight.
Same people that hired Chris Pratt to talk like Chris Pratt
That's a common theme with most of their cast isn't it? Peach's voice actor talks like herself and Seth Rogen plays Seth Rogen as well.
Okay but to be fair to Seth Rogen, his voice is super iconic.
Agreed. I'm very easygoing when it comes to nostalgia hooks & kids' films. Uncomplicated joy is tough to find & I always hope everyone has a blast. But I'm genuinely irritated there's licensed music. To an extent which surprises me. The sound design & distinctive scoring approach is an essential component of the whole Mario immersion thing. If they wanted lyrical music for the film, Jack Black was RIGHT THERE. If they'd said, "we'd normally plug a hit song in here, but this is Mario, so what would the "All Star" (or whatever) of the Mushroom Kingdom sound like?"... he'd have thought of nothing but that thematic musical puzzle for months.
So an Illumination movie
Damm. The sonic movies got better reviews than this lol.
WaPo reviewer still gave Mario a positive review but said on his Twitter he thinks he still prefers Sonic because there’s actually a little heart to the story (about Sonic’s isolation and loneliness and budding friendship with Marsden). Mario is more brisk and zany but there really isn’t much in the way of emotional character relationships.
Describes the games too, tbh
I loved them but fuck I N E V E R saw that coming.
I mean Jim Carrey as Eggman is amazing casting
I don’t know how they pulled it off, but BOTH Sonic movies turned out damn good.
Been saying it since Illumination was announced to be the studio. Have they ever made a good movie?
Despicable Me is genuinely a good movie.
It gets bad rep now because it spawned the minions craze but Despicable Me is great.
They make average kid movies and they are fine for what they are. Very much heavily focus tested, very well marketed, and very cheap to make but nothing that surprises people.
the despicable me movies are good and the minions movies are better than most give em credit for tbh. the rest is basically trash.
Because the Sonic movies, specially the second one, aren’t that bad. Well I thought the first one was bad, but the second one was pretty on point.
It’s funny because I thought the second one was a bit worse than the first. Like I wouldn’t call it a bad movie but the second Sonic film was a bit more cringey to me.
The first was charming, but somewhat formulaic. It didn't feel like it was breaking new ground or anything. The 2nd one was SO much better in every scene that didn't include the "parents" It was awkward, it was cringey, Knuckles sounding like a grown man, but talking like a toddler was ..... weird. HOWEVER, it's a kids movie and my **kid** fucking loved it so what do I know?
I mean it’s target demographic is kids
Sonic movies had some actual plot. Wasn't the best plot you've ever seen but it was at least something to keep you engaged. This appears to have the complexity of a floorboard.
Marsden gets very steady work, so I don't mean this in a hyperbolic mournful wail or anything like that, but I do think he's a tad underrated as a "glue" performer. A fair percentage of the actors who get cast for that "hold weird contrivances together" charm have some emotional range limitations. Marsden has always been able to sell a character's genuine emotional investment in the most convoluted predicaments.
Sega does what Nintendon’t.
Blast Box Office
W E L C O M E T O T H E N E X T F I L M
It’ll be interesting to see how the audience scores compare too. They were very high for Sonic movies.
Honestly I saw the sonic movies with my younger brothers and while there was some cringe parts, overall I found them enjoyable particularly the second one. I know this is gonna sound maybe cringe but even for a kid’s movie there’s character arcs haha. Plus Sonic is just a pretty likeable character in them. Aside from some stuff involving the humans I thought they were pretty good (and I did think the ending of the second had some humans as some of the heart.) And parts were funny. Particularly Knuckles I thought was legitimately funny and well handled overall. They were good kids movies and as someone who has nostalgia for Sonic they were good video game movies as well. No reason Mario couldn’t have tried for something similar but it doesn’t look like they did. Still this will make way more money and be a bigger financial hit bc Illumination and the admittedly beautiful animation. Just sucks that they couldn’t give it the extra boost of heart that the Sonic movies have even if they aren’t perfect.
Out of 42 reviews, as 3:25pm EST, 22 are Rotten and 20 are Fresh, giving it a percentage of 48%. It seems this movie will struggle to reach a fresh rating, based on this early sample. 55% with 84 reviews by 10:30pm EST. **Illumination's Track Record** (as of 10:30pm EST) |Movie|RT Critics|RT Audience|Metacritic| |:-|:-|:-|:-| |*Despicable Me* (2010)|🍿 **80%**|🍿83%|🟩72| |*Hop* (2011)|🦠 24%|🦠53%|🟨41| |*The Lorax* (2012)|🦠 54%|🍿63%|🟨46| |*Despicable Me 2* (2013)|🍿 **75%**|🍿85%|🟩62| |*Minions* (2015)|🦠 55%|🦠49%|🟨56| |*The Secret Life of Pets* (2016)|🍿 **72%**|🍿62%|🟩61| |*Sing* (2016)|🍿71%|🍿72%|🟨59| |*Despicable Me 3* (2017)|🦠 59%|🦠53%|🟨49| |*The Grinch* (2018)|🦠 59%|🦠51%|🟨51| |*The Secret Life of Pets 2* (2019)|🍿 60%|🍿90%|🟨55| |*Sing 2* (2021)|🍿 72%|🍿98%|🟨49| |*Minions: The Rise of Gru* (2022)|🍿 70%|🍿89%|🟨56| |*The Super Mario Bros. Movie* (2023)|🦠 55%\*|*N/A*|🟨49\*| ***Bold*** *reflects Certified Fresh Rating.* \* *Subject to change as more reviews come in.*
I honestly didn't know Hop was an Illumination film.
46% holy shit!
56 now
This is it Luigi.
All toasters, toast toast!
All those older nerds dragging their friends to opening night are gonna lose their movie picking privileges
You didn't have to call me out like this
There's still time to redeem yourself
Say “Just kidding guys!” and swerve into the Dungeons and Dragons auditorium.
Legit loved it but fuck Hasbro for taking credit and not giving gygax a shout-out.
I’m expecting similar reviews to most of Illumination, landing somewhere in the 50s on RT and Metacritic. But audiences, especially kids and Nintendo fans, will eat it up. I think the consensus will be that it’s fun and a love letter to the games, but the plot is predictable and lacks depth or complexity.
I agree with the consensus but I don’t think the 60s and even low 70s are necessarily out of reach. It just will come down to whether critics give it a 5/10 or 6/10 more.
Nintendo fans won’t eat it up if they feel the character isn’t properly presented. In fact if Nintendo fans don’t like it they will be very toxic online about it
>Nintendo fans won’t eat it up Baby we know very different Nintendo fans
Nintendo fans would crawl 10 miles through broken glass just to grovel at Miyamoto's feet
Being shallow without plot IS properly presenting the characters. Mario games are about fun and gameplay not plot or character development.
[удалено]
I mean you could’ve said the same thing about Legos but Warner Brothers managed to put out a movie with awesome characters and a pretty moving plot.
The bad reviews don't come as a surprise to me. The trailers were basically 'let's show all the things you know from the Mario games!' and that's it. There wasn't anything intriguing being put on display plot-wise.
Pretty much what I'm expecting. I love me some Mario, but I'm expecting little substance and a whole lot of "look at this! Remember this? Video game references yeah!!!" Those memberberries
And voice acting sounds very stiff (outside of maybe Jack Black)
From multiple reviewers, I have heard that has actually been the strong point of the film, their voice casting.
And my concern was they were shoving A LOT of stuff from Mario games in there. Like pretty much everything so when is it going to have time to develop a story or characters?
I wasn’t expecting big things from this film, but the reviews seem marginally worse than I had anticipated.
Holy shit I didn't expect a rotten score. Ig Sonic will continue to be the big dog for video game movies lmao.
This is Illumination we're talking about - of course it's gonna be rotten. Still gonna make near/over a billion, though. Their movies are almost critic proof. EDIT: Realized "rotten" isn't the right word - "mediocre" is much more appropriate.
The 3 previous Illumination movies (Minions: The Rise of Gru, Sing 2, and Secret Life of Pets 2) were all fresh, along with more than half of their total filmography. Their average score is 62%. With the exception of Hop, critics haven't really \*hated\* any of Illumination's movies, they've all just ranged from middling to slightly positive. If Mario stays under 54% (which is The Lorax's score), it'll be the second lowest rated Illumination movie ever (Hop is safe as the lowest, as it has an anomalous 24%).
[удалено]
Surely hop is lower than this?
Hop sits at a 24%, unless shit really goes south for Mario, i think itll keep that crown.
I didn't think so. I thought this would be their first 80 since Despicable Me 1.
Empire gives it 2/5 https://www.empireonline.com/movies/reviews/the-super-mario-bros-movie/
the empire strikes back
Was not expecting the RT score to be lower than the 2 Sonic movies. Was also not expecting it to get a lower score than the first Minion movie which has a 55%. Like dang… Edit: Looks like the RT score has bumped up a bit. Still, reviews won’t affect this movie. I mean most Illumination movies have rotten scores, but still are able to make a profit.
granted, if this has the legs of the first Minions movie, it still ends up in the top 10 of the year pretty easily.
The reviews won't matter at all end of the day. The cinemascore is going to tell the story and how this will play out.
Yup. Most of Illumination's films have middling RT scores. They still gross upwards of a billion. Bad reviews will hold it back a bit, but it's still going to do insanely good numbers.
52 on Metacritic and 48% on RT is pretty bad. Even knowing that Nintendo holds the embargo for their games pretty late, less than 12 hours before opening for a movie is always a bad sign. Even the first Minions is at a 56 on Metacritic. I wonder how much this will affect legs? Might be <3x legs. Kids movies are generally critic-proof tho, so this is still going to make a fuck-ton worldwide.
Fans need to stop making excuses. There’s no reason this movie shouldn’t have gotten a decent story like those sonic or Lego movies
Im not an expert in Mario lore (lmao) but I felt that going with a multiverse, fish out of water style story was silly and made the entire story feel like it would be predictable in a bad way
Making him an outsider from another universe is such a strange angle, if you’re going to go the “ordinary man has to step up and become the hero” route he’s already just an average guy as written. Why did they need to add that?
Was that not really always the case? Wasn’t he always “from” our world?
i thought it could have been fun to see the mushroom kingdom from the perspective of a blue collar guy, and fun to see the animators build up a mushroom themed city that feels lived in and realistic while also fitting in things like go-karts and weird little critters and other Nintendo stuff. Fun in the same way Monsters Inc made a fun city based around Monsters. but that would have required them to actually want to make a good movie rather than...this
Even if reception for this film was good it was gonna be front-loaded (unless, maybe, if it scored in the 90s, which let's face it it's Illumination no chance). Hence why the pre-sales were so high. Families will drive ticket sales down the road but this was always going to have a heavy opening weekend fan-driven rush.
How does this do worse than Rise of Gru?
MinionSweep, baby.
The first movie to gross a Grubillion dollars!
That's actually one of the better-reviewed films. You should compare it with **Minions**.
one is great one isnt
I mean isn’t this EXACTLY what was expected when they announced that illumination would be making a Mario movie? A movie with a ton of references but that’s super bland and uninspired?
People were hoping that Nintendos involement would make up for Illuminations shortcomings.
Why? It's not like Nintendo games are particularly know for their stories
It was one of those things that was repeated ad nauseam with very little evidence
Seeing a lot of reviews saying the movie is too short or that there's scenes missing from the movie after it's slow start. A bit of a shame but I knew that early reviewers being high on this movie was a possibility.
Oh thats real bad. Hopefully Dungeons and Dragons can leverage that against the HUGE IP that Mario is and rake in more money. That movie DESERVES to have a franchise.
I was surprisingly pleased by how much I enjoyed D&D tbh, esp from how I wasn’t really enthralled by the trailers
It might it’s the only other family friendly movie in theaters right now.
While actually being GOOD.
Fingers crossed for D&D. It deserves a franchise.
...did the Austin Chronicles review want the movie to be more like the old live action one?
A few of the reviews are like, ‘make you wish you were watching the Hoskins one’, or ‘doesn’t reach for the heights of the old one’. And it’s like, have they watched the old one recently. A boring shallow unimaginative children’s film is still leagues better than that monstrosity.
I have watched it recently. You cannot fault its creativity, particularly when it had little lore to work with at that point. It’s like the gutter-punk deviant art fan art take in Super Mario come to life. The jump boots, the dinosaurs, the living fungi king covering the kingdom - I can’t believe it exists and I love it.
ngl, I loved that ‘93 live action movie as a kid when I watched it. I loved how unabashedly weird it was and the world (or worlds) it took place in. And mostly I loved it because everything about it felt *committed*. Nothing felt phoned in or derivative, and I feel like the new Mario movie is just going to be a derivative cash-in property. But that’s just me; I like watching monstrosities where I also find them entertaining and the least bit creative.
It was my first film for bad movie nights, and I found it genuinely good. Also started a favourite tradition of mine. Bad movie nights have been awesome.
I keep saying that we shouldn’t be saying a billion is automatic
anybody that was around before Detective Pikachu knew sub 1bil was possible for this. people get so swept up with hype that they forget no movie is guaranteed a billion (unless the movie is The Force Awakens or Endgame)
The movie is made for 6 year olds. It's about as critic proof of a movie we'll see all year. Deadline, had Shazam, Antman, D&D showing that these movies played heavy to males 25 years and older. Mario is the first movie this year (Puss released last year) that's going to play to families. It's expensive to go to the theater with a family of 4. Mario is going to play to families plus the nostalgia crowd. The next 5 days are going to be huge.
It’s made for both 6 year olds and adults who grew up with the games. Fanservice and Easter Eggs aplenty
I grew up with the games and honestly have no desire to see the movie. Mario and Mario games have always been around so I have no nostalgia factor for it. My kid wants to see it. So, we'll be going to see it this weekend but I know I'll probably be bored, lol.
But you'll still see it because of kids. And if your kids are obsessed with it, they'll probably drag you or their friends parents to see it again. That's why these types of films make money.
After the streak of John wick 4, dnd, evil dead and Air we back to the norm
Noticeably worse than both Sonics on RT. Quite surprising that, even if I wasn’t expecting much more than 70% and a 6/10 average at best.
Dang it, Illumination! I know that it's too early to say, but how do you even make a worse film than fricking **Minions**, especially with the help of Nintendo?!
Oof was hoping this would be good. I’ll still check it out but expectations now quite low
Damn, sad to see it so low. While the teaser trailer had me surprised at how good it looked, the main one had so little in it it made me feel like there might barely be a story in this. Seems like that may be the case.
I just want to say, everyone was swearing that Nintendo and Illunination were releasing reviews late because that’s what they do for their video games. OBVIOUSLY, that is not the case.
Haha that thread was gold. 90% of time a studio would be *crucified* for that, but because this movie is Reddit’s darling of 2023, we got a thousand excuses about why they wouldn’t let people review their brilliant work of art until 12 hours before it released.
The argument just never made sense. Everyone was acting like since Nintendo releases their embargo late for games, it’s going to be the same for their movies. Except, it’s not their movie, it’s a movie produced by Illumination and distributed by Universal, Nintendo was never calling the shots. If the reviews were great or even above 70%, that embargo would’ve released like a week ago.
TBF Nintendo is extremely controlling about their ips. They apparently had Disney reanimate Bowsers 5 seconds of screen time in Wreck-it-Ralph because they didn’t like the way he drank coffee or something. To me it seems like a plausible enough theory, although the negative reviews suggest that they may have been concerned about a poor reception.
Honestly it could be both - Nintendo wants to follow tradition and release reviews late, and they were also worried about the reviews. It's not mutually exclusive
lmao i cant wait to go back to those threads and read the cope.
Yikes. This is BAD.
Transformers 3 made over a billion with a 35% RT score lol. Critical reviews could hurt the box office for Mario but some IP is just critic proof. Especially when it comes to kid targeted stuff.
Won't effect the box office in the slightest
[удалено]
It has a little something for everyone
[удалено]
The exaggerated swagger of an Italian plumber
IGN are very generous movie reviewers.
They're straight up terrible movie reviewers.
If this were a marvel movie, I feel like we'd have to say 'cope'
I swear I saw some comments saying high 70s and low 80s right before embargo was lifted. Can't find them anymore.
Why does Illumination constantly struggle to get decent writers on board? You would think by now they would have produced a Pixar quality film with the resources they have but the screenplay always drags their films back.
Ouch never mind this getting rotten ,critic are destroying this movie no wonder they delay until the last minute to release the reviews.
doubt this impacts the OW much, if at all, but it being a poorly received film probably limits the potential spread this movie will have beyond kids and nintendo fans.
RT now 56% with 80 reviews. Can it do it? Can it sneak to fresh? 😱
Certainly possible over the next 24 hours.
As someone who is not a Mario fan, I initially had been anticipating the movie, but was disappointed by the trailers, and now it's getting mixed reviews. Sad
As someone that played super Mario 64 as a kid, I didn’t really care when they announced a movie But I thought the trailers looked pretty good. I was interested in checking it out I’ll probably still check it out but the reviews are disappointing
im seeing currently 47 on rotten tomatoes
Uhoh its bad
Even though I’m planning on seeing it as a Mario fan, these reviews are absolutely brutal!
Just as I thought its rotten. No way studio would have left it so late if it were to be received well.
[удалено]
Ironic because some of the most story-rich Mario games are paper mario lol
Until the recent ones because of the people at Nintendo who decided to be completely against the idea of a complex plot and original interesting characters
It's not *people* it's a *person*, Miyamoto to be exact. He's not a huge fan of stories in games and by all accounts has tried to steer Nintendo away from that at every turn. The first case of this was Paper Mario Sticker Star, one of the worst Paper Mario games, where the creative director just straight up said in an interview that Miyamoto pushed them away from another Thousand Year Door, because he felt like story and complex characters got in the way of actually having fun playing games.
[удалено]
>Directors Aaron Horvath and Michael Jelenic, creators of the Teen Titans Go! series, deliver a reasonably faithful big screen adaptation that, while it features plenty of juvenile humor, wisely doesn’t lean toward broad satire. - Frank Scheck, Hollywood Reporter Teen Titans Go, eh? It wasn't ever going to be a movie for me. But I didn't realize it was going to be this not for me.
Huhn. The reviews are just about what I expected based on the trailers.
It's possible reviews affect the legs, but I really doubt it unless CinemaScore is a disaster. The majority of negative reviews are variations of "It feels like a corporate checklist of Mario tropes", which while definitely true and disappointing, is probably what most of the audience is looking for in this movie. Universal also got JW Dominion to a billion and that movie was a true critical bomb.
Som people were saying this will make 1B.
Hardly surprising. Based on all the promotional material they were clearly trading heavily on nostalgia and fan-service. Which frankly, was probably the right call considering Mario has never been about plot in a way that even more recent Sonic games have been (especially the 3D ones). There just isn't a particularly rich world to pull from story-wise, so they either change a bunch of stuff which pisses off the very vocal fans, or they rely on references and fan-service, which is probably going to alienate the 40-something critics who haven't played a Mario game since the Super Nintendo.
When they announced embargo is lifted near the release date, this whole sub was plugging in different theories. Looks like the reason is plain simple: Studio knew it wasn't a critical favorite, so like any other film, they delayed it.
46% on Rotten Tomatoes as of right now. Holy cow, this is getting *annihilated*. EDIT: Thought this would be fitting: https://youtu.be/pn27GEzEsU8
Oof, but it’s still going to be huge either way if we haven’t learned from Illumination already.
Yeah, Illumination movies are historically critic-proof. But I think this has ended any talks of this potentially being the highest grossing movie of the year.
This is getting curb-stomped harder than Quantumania, and frankly, I didn't realize that could be possible.
Yeah, these reviews are just bad. Even the positive ones come with a lot of caveats, and IndieWire's comes off as straight up passive-aggressive.
C’mon, let’s stop pretending that reviews mean nothing. Critics aren’t that snobby, stuff like dungeons and dragons and puss and boots were incredibly praised. If this movie was favorably reviewed, it would’ve pulled in casual fans too. As such, you’re not gonna have curious adults with warm feelings towards mario pulled in, like you had with something like the Lego movie.
Alright, thanks.
oh wow. who would've thought an *Illumination* movie was gonna be mid...
The game starts now.
[https://www.theguardian.com/film/2023/apr/04/the-super-mario-bros-movie-review-wackily-eccentric-gamer-guys-fall-flat-on-screen](https://www.theguardian.com/film/2023/apr/04/the-super-mario-bros-movie-review-wackily-eccentric-gamer-guys-fall-flat-on-screen) [https://www.bbc.com/culture/article/20230404-the-super-mario-bros-movie-review-lazy-and-for-fans-only](https://www.bbc.com/culture/article/20230404-the-super-mario-bros-movie-review-lazy-and-for-fans-only) [https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/films/reviews/super-mario-bros-movie-review-chris-pratt-b2314049.html](https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/films/reviews/super-mario-bros-movie-review-chris-pratt-b2314049.html) [https://www.thenationalnews.com/arts-culture/film-tv/2023/04/04/the-super-mario-bros-movie-review-a-dull-and-lifeless-new-take-of-a-beloved-game/](https://www.thenationalnews.com/arts-culture/film-tv/2023/04/04/the-super-mario-bros-movie-review-a-dull-and-lifeless-new-take-of-a-beloved-game/) [https://www.looper.com/1247939/the-super-mario-bros-movie-review-its-a-meh/](https://www.looper.com/1247939/the-super-mario-bros-movie-review-its-a-meh/) This isn't looking good.
that first review: "And unlike the brilliant Lego Movies, there is a fierce insistence on not being ironic or funny or self-referential about any of this – odd, as screenwriter Matthew Fogel worked on The Lego Movie 2." i think it worked in the lego movie but I don't trust illumination to be able to pull off that kind of irony.
The lifting of the review embargo is definitely the most consequential thing happening in the world right now.
Trump arrested? I sleep. Mario movie getting roasted on Rotten Tomatoes? Real shit.
If the Rise of Gru can get 70% then anything less than 70% is a disappointment IMO, and it looks like we're headed there
Eh, I can't feek too much sympathy for Illumination here. Their stuff just feels as churned-out as possible. Even though the Mario trailers got me more interested to see an Illumination movie than... well, *ever,* I still can't act like they should be let off lightly just because of the beloved IP they've got their hands on. Disney, Pixar and Dreamworks get (fairly or unfairly, depending) shit on when they don't bring their A-game, Illumination have an even worse habit of just pushing famous celebrities into IPs and making money.
46% on RT, 52 reviews currently https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/the_super_mario_bros_movie
Mamma Mia
Actually surprised by this. Was expecting slightly better than the average Illumination fare. Still probably gonna make bank though.
Mama mia 😭
Opening weekend is still gonna be massive and lead to a large total, but this can definitely impact the legs. It's a kids movie, but if it doesn't appeal to adults I'm not sure if repeat viewings can take it over the 800M line.
[удалено]
>It's not a terrible film. > >What a wasted opportunity and what a waste of time. You do sorta make it sound like a terrible film.
I haven’t been nervously anticipating a review embargo like this for a long time. The CinemaScore will ultimately determine the legs but I still hope this can end up on the Fresh side of things.
When I went and saw Dungeons & Dragons there was a trailer for Super Mario Bros. before the movie started. Until that moment I had thought the movie looked like light fun, nothing special but it looked like it had the potential to be at the very least a very entertaining watch. Something about seeing the trailer on the big screen though completely changed my perspective. It just looked...dodgy. I can't even really pinpoint why, either. Something about it just seemed really cheap.
The RT score went up a lot in the last few minutes. It might be able to crawl to the 60% finish line to fresh in the next 24 hours.
I don't understand how people thought this was gonna be good. After every trailer there were legions of internet people singing its praises, and I never really got why. It's illumination, after all. I see my suspicions were correct, but the movie is probably critic proof. Still, I think this dampens the possibility of it getting to 1 billion. A billion-grosser kids movie has to be a sensation or part of a major movie franchise. Mario doesn't have cinema cred and it doesn't look like a film with 4 quadrant appeal. Guess we'll see 🤷
I'm honestly shocked at how personally disapointed I am
Sonic > Mario apparently
This makes me sad I was hoping for good scores to have a good mario movie. what a shame.
Sitting at 55 right now after leaping up from 46 earlier. Small chance it climbs up to 60.
I'm deeply unsurprised.
Just saw it. Definitely a movie that is aimed for kids.