Super Mario World (TV series)

Synopsis

The animated series featured the same voice actors who had performed in The Adventures of Super Mario Bros. 3. Unlike its two predecessors, Toad is completely absent in this series (as he was in the Super Mario World game). An exclusive character not featured in the games called Oogtar, a clumsy caveboy, appears in his place (both characters voiced by John Stocker) and Yoshi appears as one of the main characters in the show. Episodes mainly focused on the Mario Bros. dealing with schemes by King Koopa, and made use of new elements introduced by the video game within the story, though involvement of the "real world" was reduced to mere references for this series.

Unlike previous Mario cartoons, the songs featured in Super Mario World were original tracks written exclusively for the series and are kept intact for syndication and home media releases.

Social issues

Certain episodes of the series were created to meet the newly implemented guidelines set forth by the Children's Television Act. Several exploits in this show became a serious matter at the time, including street gangs, obesity, capitalism, peer pressure, school bullying, and television addiction. Also following these mandates, Princess Toadstool's character is changed to a parental figure only for this show, but not everything about this change is ethically correct, including the scene where she forces the Marios and Yoshi to go on a strict diet by locking them up in the house in one episode, which is seen taken as corporal punishment, and another episode shows her scolding Oogtar like his fill-in mother despite her being a teacher. Furthermore, Tracey Moore's dialogues were auto-tuned in later episodes. Regarding this as a promotional failure, NBC ended the practice of Saturday morning cartoons in 1992 as these results were disputed by Federal Communications Commission.

Voice cast

• Walker Boone as Mario
• Tony Rosato as Luigi
• Tracey Moore as Princess Toadstool
• Andrew Sabiston as Yoshi
• Harvey Atkin as King Koopa
• Dan Hennessey as Bully Koopa
• James Rankin as Cheatsy Koopa
• Michael Stark as Kooky von Koopa
• Gordon Masten as Big Mouth Koopa
• Paulina Gillis as Kootie Pie Koopa
• Tara Charendoff as Hop Koopa
• Stuart Stone as Hip Koopa
• Catherine Gallant as Mama Fireplant
• John Stocker as Gophers, Koopa wizard, Wizardheimer, Oogtar
• Judy Marshak as minor characters

Episodes

Main article: List of Super Mario episodes

Syndication

In 1992, after finishing its run on NBC, Super Mario World was included as part of the Captain N and the Video Game Masters syndication package by Rysher Entertainment.

Home media

In 1994, Buena Vista Home Video released a VHS tape under their DIC Toon-Time Video label, titled Super Mario Bros. Super Christmas Adventures!, which contained the episode The Night Before Cave Christmas, which was the only episode released on VHS. No other episodes would be formatted on home media until 2007 due to legal complications with the use of the character Yoshi.

After resolving these issues, Shout! Factory and Vivendi Entertainment released a Complete Series DVD set of Captain N and the New Super Mario World in Region 1, featuring all 13 original, uncut broadcast episodes in November 2007. The series has also been released in Australia (Region 4) by MRA Entertainment.

NCircle Entertainment (under license from WildBrain) has also released the series in two volumes. They later released the complete series in one set, omitting the Captain N episodes likely due to likeness rights issues with the use of Bo Jackson in one episode, save for digital streaming.

Pidax released the complete series along Captain N: The Game Master Season 3 in Germany (with English audio included) in one boxset.

As of November 2023, it is available to stream on Amazon Prime Video, Tubi, Pluto TV and Paramount+.

Legacy

In 2006, after British satellite children's channel Pop began airing reruns of the series, the series gained a surge in popularity as being one of the major source materials for YouTube Poops alongside the other DIC Mario cartoons, video game Hotel Mario, Adventures of Sonic the Hedgehog, and multiple games animated by Animation Magic. The show produced multiple internet memes, most notably "Mama Luigi", referencing Luigi's quote in the episode of the same name.

In 2017, 227 animators collaborated to reanimate "Mama Luigi" in their own styles. Each of the 255 total scenes featured a unique animation style. It was dedicated to the memories of Canadian actors Tony Rosato and Harvey Atkin, who voiced Luigi and King Koopa respectively.

References

References

1. "Lumiere (Super Mario World; Director(s): John Grusd; Co-producing countries: US, CA; Production year: 1991)".
2. Los Angeles Times; 14 September 1991 and 7 December 1991 TV listings
3. (7 October 1992). "TV Stations Faulted for Dearth of Educational Fare". Education Week.
4. (1991). "King Scoopa Koopa".
5. (1991). "A Little Learning".
6. (1991). "Party Line".
7. Andrews, Edmund L.. (4 March 1993). "'Flintstones' and Programs Like It Aren't Educational, F.C.C. Says". The New York Times.
8. (3 October 2021). "Every Actor Who Played Mario In Movies & TV Shows". ScreenRant.
9. (13 January 2017). "Tony Rosato, The Cartoon Voice Of Luigi, Dead At 62". Kotaku Australia.
10. "Harvey Atkin, Voice Of King Koopa In Super Mario Bros. Cartoons, Passes Away". GAMING.
11. (13 January 1992). "A sampling of the programming wares at INTV". [[Broadcasting & Cable.
12. (8 October 2013). "Super Mario World: The Complete Series: Animated, NCircle Entertainment: Movies & TV".
13. (1991). "Battle of the Baseball Know-It-Alls".
14. (14 September 1991). "Super Mario World on Paramount+".
15. Pradeep, Malavika. (27 February 2022). "Inside YouTube Poop, the nonsensical genre that invented meme culture on the internet".
16. Feldman, Brian. (10 February 2020). "How Pingas Became One of Sonic the Hedgehog's Most Famous Memes".
17. Ahmed, Emad. (2018-05-09). "When Sonic and Mario dominated children's television".
18. (2009-07-22). "Break Yo' TV: YouTube Poop".
19. (4 September 2017). "227 Artists Remade An Episode Of Super Mario World's Cartoon".
20. Elias, Juan. "Super Mario World: Más de 200 artistas redibujan un episodio de la serie".
21. (30 August 2017). "The Mama Luigi Project - Super Mario World Reanimated Collab 2017 (OFFICIAL VIDEO)". Electronic Heroes.
22. Fennimore, Jack. (30 August 2017). "WATCH: Mama Luigi Reanimated By Over 227 Animators".