From brotherly love, to rivals-turned-allies, to even one-sided romances - simply put,
the Mushroom Kingdom is filled with relationships of all kinds! So,
let’s see which ones rank the best in terms of healthiness and which ones could use some work.
I’m Kyle from WickedBinge, and this is Mario Movie Relationships: Healthy to Toxic.
As always, MAJOR spoilers ahead for the Super Mario Bros. Movie.
Starting off, we have the relationships that manage
to shine as the film’s brightests. These relationships are The Healthy.
For our Gold Medal of Healthiness, we’re giving it to the brotherly relationship between Mario
and Luigi. In many ways, their relationship is the true heart of the film, being at the center
of both its opening and its grand finale. As we see both through their interactions with Spike
and through a brief flashback from Luigi, Mario has always been there for his little brother,
often being very protective of him. Naturally, when it looks like he’s about to fall into lava,
it’s Mario who saves Luigi’s life. Although he’s not as much of a fighter, Luigi is able
to return the love through a more supportive role, such as when he brings Mario leftovers
after he leaves dinner early or when he ends up shielding Mario from one of Bowser’s fireballs,
saving Mario’s life and giving them both a chance to grab the Power Star. The brothers also
encourage each other, have fun with each other - as seen with the making of their super charming
commercial - and seem to just have an incredibly wholesome dynamic overall, being both a great
team and each other’s best friend. With these brothers working together, anything is possible!
Moving onto our Silver Medal of Healthiness, we have Mario and Peach. While the film
doesn’t confirm a romance between these two, Mario and Peach at the very least
end up having a strong friendship with each other. Despite him being a stranger,
Peach still gives Mario a chance when she sees how determined he is to save his brother. Later on,
when Mario is unable to complete the training course, Peach still acknowledges his potential and
encourages him to keep at it. The two continue to bond throughout their journey together,
having a lot of respect for one another and working together just as well as Mario and
Luigi do. You just end up just getting the feeling that if they do end up becoming romantic one day,
it’ll likely go pretty well given the strong foundation of friendship they already have.
Next up, the Bronze Medal of Healthiness is going to Peach and Toad. You can’t imagine
Princess Peach without her loyal Toads, and while this Toad may just be a humble chef,
he certainly goes above and beyond the call of duty for his princess. When he first hears about
Mario and Peach heading to the Jungle Kingdom, Toad insists that he come along to help out,
promising that he “fears nothing”. While Peach could have just dismissed him, given
how small and weak toads tend to be, she instead actually respects his bravery and determination,
allowing him to come along. Even if Toad isn’t able to give much more than optimism
and emotional support at first, Peach still enjoys his company and even saves him when he
gets knocked off Rainbow Road. Later on, when it looks like the Mushroom Kingdom is doomed,
Peach tells Toad to evacuate along with the others. Toad, however, refuses and restates
his promise, sticking around even through torture by Kamek. He also helps Peach with
her secret plan during her and Bowser’s wedding, once again showing how much help he’s able to give
Peach and how much respect and gratitude Peach gives in return. It’s just incredibly sweet.
Finishing off the healthy tier is the friendship between Toad and Mario. While
we can’t say that there’s anything necessarily bad or concerning about this friendship, we still have
to acknowledge that it’s fairly shallow and even one-sided at times. Sure, Toad helps Mario reach
the castle and distracts the guards so he can get inside, but Mario makes a good point later
on that the two of them aren’t really ‘best friends’ as Toad claims, given that they had
only known each other for a few minutes at that point. Still, we appreciate Toad’s willingness to
help and to be a friend to Mario, and while Mario may not necessarily return the favor,
he still acknowledges Toad’s kindness enough that it doesn’t seem like Mario is taking advantage of
it or just tolerating Toad’s friendship, even if he does get a bit embarrassed when Toad sticks
up for him during Donkey Kong’s mockery of Mario so-called ‘flirting skills’. Still,
it is a bit of a shame that these two don’t end up bonding nearly as much as Mario and Peach do.
Moving on, we have relationships that may have some rocky aspects but still
have enough good in them to stay out of toxic. Welcome to the Grey Area.
Starting off, we have the more diplomatic relationship between Peach and Cranky Kong.
Simply put, Peach and Cranky Kong are two VERY different types of royals. While Peach remains
respectful and logical when she asks for the Jungle Kingdom’s help in the fight against Bowser,
Cranky doesn’t give her the same courtesy and is very rude and dismissive towards both
her and Mario. Thankfully, after the princess’ chosen hero proves himself,
Cranky relents and actually does a lot to help Peach out, which Peach is of course grateful
for. We can’t say that these two will be sharing tea time together anytime soon,
but sometimes it's just good to know you’ve got an ally in another kingdom.
Next up, we have the rarely seen but still fairly interesting relationships between Mario,
Donkey Kong and their fathers. It’s actually become pretty common for animated movies to
focus on the relationships between the protagonists and their parents. While
this aspect doesn’t get a ton of focus, we still see elements of it. Mario’s father is shown to
be concerned about his son’s choice to quit his well-paying job and start a business of his own,
saying that Mario was “nuts” to do so and that his potential failure was dragging Luigi down with
him. While we can’t say that it was intentional, we learn during the scene in the giant eel that
these comments do make Mario feel like his father only sees him as a joke. As it turns out,
Donkey Kong feels a similar way regarding his dad, given how much Cranky disapproves of his
showboating and is often chiding Donkey for just being himself. Eventually though,
these two relationships are able to make a bit of a turn-around. We see Cranky
be concerned about his son when Donkey and Mario get blasted off Rainbow Road,
and then later when Donkey rescues him, he praises his son for being so heroic. Mario’s father,
meanwhile, is amazed by his own son’s heroics and lets him know how proud he is of him. It may
not be the deepest familial conflicts, but we’re still happy to see them be resolved.
Sticking with the classic rivals, let’s shine a spotlight on Mario and Donkey Kong’s own
relationship with each other. Simply put, these two do not like each other at first,
being fairly hostile towards each other both inside and outside of the arena. Between Donkey
Kong being a sore loser and Mario being a bit of a hot-head, it takes a bit for their
rivalry to actually start to become friendly. Mario does end up saving Donkey Kong’s life,
and after that the two of them prove that they can work together very well. But even after they
start to become actual friends, that rivalry aspect of their relationship still remains
given that we still see them lightly arguing and throwing verbal jabs at each other. Still,
if these two have to keep their rivalry with each other, we’re just glad that it
doesn’t stay hostile enough to prevent these two from becoming true allies.
Last in this tier, we have Bowser and Kamek. It’s the classic dynamic of an evil boss and
his right hand man. Usually with this dynamic, we tend to see a lot more verbal and physical
mistreatment - see Robotnik and Agent Stone from the Sonic the Hedgehog movies. Thankfully, while
there are a couple of small moments of that - such as when Bowser slams the piano cover on Kamek’s
hands - it’s not a huge part of their dynamic. If anything, they seem to have a nice rapport
with each other, with Kamek even helping Bowser practice his proposal to Peach. Unfortunately,
we still can’t rank this relationship any higher as it’s made very clear that Kamek
is enabling Bowser’s evil behavior, using his magic to help add to his king’s overall power
and threat level. We also don’t really get any indication that Bowser would care enough
about Kamek to actually keep him around should the wizard lose access to his incredibly useful magic.
Finally, we have relationships that have very
little positive aspects to them. These relationships are the Toxic.
Just outside our Podium of Toxicity, we have the relationship between Foreman
Spike and the Mario Bros. Man, talk about toxic bosses… All Mario and Luigi do is
decide to strike out on their own and start their own business, and Spike still goes out
of his way to insult their commercial AND them before trying to push them around,
simply because he’s bigger and his own company is more well-established. It’s obvious that there’s
a lot of hostility and not-so-good feelings going on with this relationship - at least when
it comes to Mario and Spike specifically. Luigi, while still being a bit intimidated by the guy,
doesn’t seem to hate Spike as much as his brother does. He even saves Spike from some of Bowser’s
minions during the Power Star sequence. We doubt these guys will ever be close friends, but it’s
still admittedly nice to see Spike cheering the brothers on when they end up saving the day.
For our Bronze Medal of Toxicity, we’re giving it to Bowser and Luigi. Filling in the role of the
‘dude in distress’, Luigi is captured by Bowser’s men and is used by the koopa king as a means to
get information about Mario. For Bowser’s part, he doesn’t care about Luigi at all,
being incredibly rough with him and just tossing him aside once he has what he
needs. He even states that he’ll kill Luigi if it’ll help him stop Mario. Luigi, meanwhile,
doesn’t form much of a personal relationship with Bowser, given that he only interacts with
him during that one scene before being thrown in a cage. Still, while there’s not as much tension
as there could be there, Luigi still steps up and helps fight off Bowser once he and Mario get the
Power Star, showing that he was still willing to try and stop him despite being terrified of him.
The Silver Medal of Toxicity is going to Mario and Bowser. Despite not meeting face-to-face until the
very end of the movie, Mario and Bowser already have a lot of tension between them. For Mario,
Bowser is the guy that’s gonna hurt his little brother if he doesn’t stop him. For Bowser,
Mario is his romantic rival and the guy who’s going to possibly get with Peach
if Bowser doesn’t destroy him first, showing himself to be incredibly jealous of the red
plumber. When the two finally clash, it’s both dramatic and action-packed,
with both of them being willing to do whatever it takes to try and stop the other. Bowser even
states that he wants Mario to “suffer” as he chases him and punches him around the streets
of Brooklyn. It’s not the deepest enemy relationship we’ve ever seen, but it does
capture that classic Mario and Bowser rivalry well - and all the toxicity that comes with it.
Finally (and perhaps unsurprisingly), our Gold Medal of Toxicity is going to the one-sided
romance between Bowser and Peach. Yeahhh, no matter how charming an adorkable Jack Black-voiced
turtle may be, Bowser still comes off as pretty monstrous when it comes to his crush. Peach makes
it clear multiple times that she sees Bowser as a monster and that she could never love him,
nor could she ever truly want to marry him. Bowser, however, doesn’t necessarily need his love
to be returned, he just needs a bride - hence why he threatens both the destruction of her kingdom
and the death of Toad if Peach doesn’t agree to marry him. When this plan ends up failing,
it essentially looks like Bowser is ready to take out everyone with him - including
Peach - and when he’s finally defeated for good, Bowser can’t even give a proper apology, instead
just asking for another chance. As funny and dramatic as this whole dynamic can be at times,
it's still without a doubt the most toxic relationship in the Super Mario Bros. movie.
But let us know in the comment section if you agree with our ranking,
and tell us what we should cover next! Remember to hit that notification bell
and binge more of our videos. But most importantly, stay wicked!