Super Mario Galaxy Movie: The critics' verdicts are in - and they're not looking good

Critic reviews for The Super Mario Galaxy Movie are in and they don't exactly paint the prettiest picture...

The Super Mario Galaxy Movie is the sequel to Super Mario Bros Movie which released in 2023. The new film is based on the Super Mario Galaxy and Super Mario Galaxy 2 games, which are considered among the best games ever made.

But it doesn't seem the movie hits anywhere near the heights of those two titles.

That's because at the time of wiring, The Super Mario Galaxy Movie has a MetaCritic score of 37 from 35 critic reviews and a Rotten Tomatoes score (Tomatometer) of 44 per cent from 84 reviews. It seems a similar theme is that there is great fan service throughout but the storyline and characters are quite weak.

In Clarisse Loughrey's review for The Independent, in which she gave it two stars out of five, she said: "There's barely a plot here. Not a single memorable character. Not even another piano ditty for Jack Black to sing.

"It's a series of large, vaguely connected explosions that Mario, his bro Luigi and his love interest Princess Peach can land in front of in a superhero pose."

However the user scores could end up being more favourable once they start coming in.

For comparison, Super Mario Bros Movie has a Metascore of 46 but a user score of 8.1. It's a similar picture on Rotten Tomatoes too as Super Mario Bros Movie has a Tomatometer of 59 per cent but a Popcornmeter (user score) of 95 per cent.

The Super Mario Galaxy Movie's MetaCritic score was posted in the Mario Subreddit and fans have been having their say, with the OP (original poster) saying "this hurts so much".

One said: "That's what I expected honestly."

Another commented: "Look, I already bought my tickets so I'm not gonna let critics' opinions affect my own decisions. But I'm still disappointed that these movies haven't strived to be more than fan-service fests."

A third added: "I mean, reviews weren't great for the first one either. It is 59 per cent now but it was lower when it was just the early reviews came out. For Galaxy, it could go up more as more reviews come in too. Although, I guess it could go down more as well."

"Eh I'll come to my own conclusions when I watch it myself," a fourth declared.

And a fifth said: "Guys, it's Illumination. They make 90 minute speedrun movies. It's mostly for kids but will be a pleasant run for people that aren't looking for anything 'meaningful'. It's pretty much the exact opposite type of movie that critics rate highly."

The Super Mario Bros Movie is out in cinemas now.

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