Quick synopsis: Mario, Luigi, Peach, and Bowser travel across the galaxy to rescue a princess.

At the time of writing, The Super Mario Galaxy Movie (TSMGM, pronounced Tis-mah-gum) is the second-highest-grossing movie of 2026, and the highest-grossing western movie. It has the biggest global opening at the box office in 2026, and has the fifth-biggest global opening for an animated movie of all time. That sounds incredible, and I don’t want to demean the work involved, but TSMGM does not deserve it. The biggest positive is that it makes the first film seem better by comparison. This is just more of the same, the good, and the bad.

The visual and audio references? They’ve increased, and are superb. The animators clearly love the franchise, with small references hidden everywhere; some more obvious than others. The story is somehow more generic than the ones in the video games, which is somewhat surprising considering the games aren’t exactly known for excellent stories. That’s the trouble with adapting video games to movies; often, it’s not the stories people enjoy. People often say there should be a Grand Theft Auto movie, but what would the point be? The fun in GTA is the stuff YOU do, the story, etc., is mostly inconsequential. A movie adaptation would just be a Guy Ritchie movie, and the world has enough of those. Mario game stories are simple, though: someone (usually Bowser) kidnaps someone, and Mario has to stop them.

Yes, it’s very basic. But there’s a lot you can do within that basic framework. But you have to do it well. This doesn’t really do it well. There’s no flow between one scene and the next: it’s just setpiece after setpiece. It doesn’t feel cohesive; it literally feels like they’re going from one level to the next. There are multiple moments which break when you think about them for more than a second. Particularly near the end, where the film makes references to the old 2D games, but in a manner you quickly realise is pointless in a world where high-tech cameras exist.

Other ways it’s similar to the first: the plot-based references to the franchise are too heavily shoe-horned in. The first one had the Karts, which felt unnecessary and more like an exercise in time-wasting than part of a narrative. This has baby Luigi/Mario. It feels like the writers said, “Okay, remember Super Mario World 2? When Mario was a baby? How do we fit that into this movie?” rather than writing a script and thinking “, Hang on, if we turn them into babies for this section, it fixes this plot problem we’ve been having”. One issue this plot has is how it handles Bowser. The character has said they’ve changed their ways and spends most of the film’s runtime trying to prove that. Until he meets his son, in which case he turns heel again. But that turn only happens in the final section. It’s obvious it’s going to happen, so the time with good Bowser feels wasted. It doesn’t allow the character to be any fun. The writers needed to either turn him much earlier, keep him good, or have him turn at the VERY end after his son has been defeated. Would it have been too much to ask for a bigger villain? Imagine how much fun a film adaptation of Wario could be. Would be much more dynamic and threatening than a kid with a magical paintbrush. Yeah, there’s also a world-destroying cannon, but weirdly, it always feels like the paintbrush is a bigger threat to the characters.

Of course, it’s not just the Mario franchise; Galaxy has started incorporating the wider Nintendo franchise with the introduction of Fox McCloud. Those hoping for an Infinity War-style crossover will be disappointed. There’s no Captain Falcon, Samus, Link, Kirby, etc. Don’t worry, we still have Minions, because Illumination will never let you forget those yellow fuckers. There’s also Pikmin, but they are placed in such a “hey look, this is a thing!” way that it’s actually kind of annoying. There’s a moment near the end which feels like it’s calling out for a surprise cameo of a character that will get everyone excited, but instead, it’s just the nihilistic star from the first movie. I enjoyed that character, but having him be the reveal of a build-up feels like a waste, especially in a world where much bigger villains still exist.

On the plus side: it looks absolutely gorgeous. The cast (except Chris Pratt) has improved their vocal work, especially Anya Taylor-Joy. The way they display the power of Rosalina is an almost perfect way to showcase her character. The introduction of Yoshi is a lot of fun. Evidently, kids will like it. And I appreciate how the filmmakers have gone out so strongly against AI. Ultimately, I love the original franchise. And if I were the kind of person who had hope and joy in his life, I’d have been looking forward to this and expecting greatness, so I would have been disappointed. Long-term fans deserve something better than this. They deserve something that will fill you with passion. Instead, they get something worse than bad: they get something mediocre. A film that is so scared of standing up for itself that it ends up attempting nothing. At least it succeeds in that aspect, I guess. I was so tempted to just repost the review of the first movie. I checked, and I would have needed to delete the paragraph about Bowser singing, and I would have had to change the “highest-grossing film of 2023” bit, and it would have meant neglecting specific issues I had with this movie. But it would have still worked. All of the criticisms are the same. The fact that I didn’t do that, that I instead wrote something original, means I put more effort in than the writers of this movie did.