The Great Mission to Save Princess Peach
Before The Super Mario Bros Super Show, but after his run on The Saturday Supercade, Mario (voiced by Tohru Furuya) starred in this obscure Japanese film (Super Mario Bros.: Peach-Hime Kyushutsu Dai Sakusen!), a loose Animated Adaptation of Super Mario Bros.
One night, while playing his Famicom, Mario gets an unexpected visit from the lovely Princess Peach, who is on the run from evil tyrant Bowser Koopa. Bowser then shows up and kidnaps her, leaving behind her pendant. It's up to the Mario Bros., now sucked into the game, to Save the Princess.
Tropes used in The Great Mission to Save Princess Peach include:
- Affably Evil: Bowser seemed a pretty nice guy, albeit a bit too jealous when it came to Peach. Heck, at the end, he is seen working with Mario and liking it.
- Art Evolution: Luigi is designed with the taller and slimmer look he sported in the games since the U.S. version of Super Mario Bros. 2, but his color scheme is a bit different from his later look (he wears blue overalls and a hat with a yellow shirt in the actual film).
- Bittersweet Ending: The fact that Kibidango/Prince Hal is actually Peach's fiancé upsets not only Mario, but also the Mario/Peach fans. Needless to say, the fact that Prince Hal was never incorporated into the games should speak volumes about how many fans were upset by that revelation even back then, it could also explain why the movie has become so obscure, that it never had an overseas release.
- Masami Hata was the director. In retrospect, the ending could've been much, much worse.
- Cross-Dressing Voices: Amazingly, not Kibidango, but Bowser. The two Goombas and the Laikatu are also voiced by female actresses.
- Defeat Means Friendship: Bowser at the end
- Did Not Do the Research: Mario defeats some Buzzy Beetles using fireballs. In the Mario games, they're pretty much always immune to fire.
- Did Not Get the Girl
- Guess Who I'm Marrying: See Bittersweet Ending above.
- Product Placement: Besides Mario playing with his Famicom, we see the brothers smash some blocks later in the movie, and obtaining some Mario ramen cups out of them.
- The Stinger: One of Mario and Luigi's regular customers walks up to the counter and is shocked to find Bowser working there.
- Those Two Bad Guys: A pair of Goombas who continually try to impede on Mario and Luigi's progress.
- Why Do You Keep Changing Jobs?: Despite being dressed like plumbers, Mario and Luigi run a grocery store.