After Critics Panned Super Mario Galaxy Movie, Maybe Sony's Legend of Zelda Film Can Pull It Back

The sad state of cinema means the bad films that make millions are more important than the good ones that are a commercial failure.

Don't know why, but I think this will be a good movie, my source? trust me bro

Soon as the film releases it gets good reviews but Nintendo sues any cinema showing the film and everyone else because they want to.

Like Mario, all I really hope is that my kids enjoy it. If it is also a good film, that is a bonus.

I took my kids to see the Mario galaxy movie. We all loved it

Sometimes critics and audiences are worlds (or galaxies) apart

I think the amount of money the Mario movie has made, shows how little the critics are valued by the wider audience

Sony has the opportunity to do the funniest thing. Release the Horizon Zero Dawn film the same week as this.

Since when did we listen to critics?

Whether it’s the Mario Galaxy Movie or Crimson Desert (or the many other examples of out of touch critics). It’s time we remembered that the audience knows best.

Hopefully this turns out well. At the very least Link and Zelda look on point.

@rusty82 Glad you liked it. The movie's still bad.

@Kienda Or more that kids have a very low bar for enjoying a film with flashy colours. Galaxy was a terrible film and a terrible kids film.

Do critics opinions even matter when it comes to the Mario movie? Its making tons of money and its a kids movie. Mission successful.

Those Mario movies are not designed for critics and I promise you, Nintendo could not possibly care less about its reviews. Did they make bucket loads ofmoney? Yes? Mission accomplished!

Mario Galaxy was bad. The wife fell asleep halfway through.

Critics should be banned from reviewing any movie based on a game or comic book. Or literally anything that refers to itself as a "movie". Let the film critics stick to films, no one cares what they think about our movies. Pompous so & so's. 😂

Mario movie was perfectly fine. Dunno what people expect from a game series with zero story. Expecting it to be Citizen Kane all of a sudden? The Zelda movie would be lucky to have half the success Mario has.

Mario Galaxy is a movie in the same way Candy Crush is a video game: technically, I guess, and profitable. I have no real expectations for Zelda, but it will probably be less of a relentless assault on our brain cells

I dunno, I thought the Galaxy movie was fun. It was junk food for the soul.

I'll stick to Lynch, Tarkovsky, and Kurosawa when I need "cinema"

Is Link still going be a silent protagonist in the film?

@Dragoon1994 post credits scene will just be excuse me princess

”Did you say the critics didn’t like it? Sorry, I couldn’t hear you over the sound of box office success!”

Back where? Even though I liked it way less than the first movie, Mario Galaxy movie is enormous success, noone gives a sheet about critics.

The film industry, at the current state, needs ticket sales. Like it or not, the Super Mario movie, today, is doing more for the industry than the vast majority of this year's Oscar nominees.

@rusty82 critics complaining about to much easter eggs in a videogame movie is so crazy.
Smells like critics have some underlying hate towards the mario movie.
This will not be different for zelda because they didn't use the euphoria actor.

If anything it has less of a chance of appeasing muh critics. Mario had the opportunity to be an amazing animated film and they chose to make slop twice. Live action video game and anime movies are always bad and the pics of link and zelda don't inspire any confidence that it'll be different. I'm still gonna watch it tho cause it's zelda on the big screen lol

Yeah the Galaxy movie was weak (with the exception of mini Bowser) but for some reason with Zelda being live action I have a small amount of optimism it'll end up better.

Really hope so anyway!

I don't care what critics think. For something like the Super Mario Galaxy Movie, they aren't the target audience. My kids absolutely loved it.

Critics are irrelevant.

idk, if I'm watching a kids movie I ain't expecting ***** Titanic, Schindler's List, Citizen Kane and so on.
Critics must be high, or rather must be off some substances when they review kids movies.

Mario movies are for toddlers. The Sonic movies are perfection because the series is crafted for kids, teens, adults, fans and critics.

Critics? Nobody gives a duck about what critics think, they praise the most boring, coma inducing ***** imaginable.
The Galaxy movie was fun!

According to critics I should be hating myself playing the 9/10 Marathon and not enjoying myself playing the 6/10 Crimson Desert.

Yeah...critics....

Everyone ive talked to loves the new mario movie. I think critics just kinda...dont get things sometimes. Its a story as old as time.

Saw the Galaxy movie on opening night, in a theater packed with kids, and they all loved it. Who gives a ***** about what critics think about something not made for them?

Critics for movies specifically are meaningless, just look at Emilia Perez, a heavy contender for the Oscar and winner of countless awards last year when the movie is absolute and irremediably trash with a nonsensical plot and laughable performances that couldn’t even speak in the portrayed language but were nominated for awards…

@Kienda "It’s time we remembered that the audience knows best"

No, the audiences doesn't always knows best. If that's true, they would showed up for The Iron Giant, Dredd, Blade Runner & 2049, Shawshank Redemption, Battle Angel Alita, Scott Pilgrim vs the World, Furiosa, Children of Men, The Thing, Doctor Sleep and so many solid to great movies that ended as a flop...

Mario Galaxy made so much money in 72 hours it was the highest grossing film this year by a large margin. Video game movies are different and we the gamer support them. I hope Nintendo continues to do these movies, as for it keeps their audience coming back for more. I know i want a Starfox movie and game now and rumors are we are getting both.

Mario galaxy was awesome. I dont want them to make a movie that panders to critics.

@PuppetMaster These people think the audience 100% trustworthy and couldn't be wrong when that is far from the truth.

@Oram77 Nintendo is quite protective of it's IP's that is why I think the same.

@PuppetMaster That is quite the list of fantastic movies.

Let's be honest, studios don't REALLY care about critical reception. If it was your movie, would you rather win an Oscar and lose money, or get horrible reviews and bring in $629 million on an estimated budget of $110 million. Gee...I wonder.....

Super mario galaxy movie yeah critics panned it but it still made more money than the artsy fartsy movies no one's ever heard of that critics adore. And critics opinions don't matter, their freeloaders who don't have to pay to see it. But only good thing in the movie was fox mcloud. Fox being something that most of the critics don't even know about among other things because movie critics aren't gamers, their overpayed freeloaders looking for a free buffet table rather than at the movie

@IOI you say that as if this galaxy movie is good. As a long time Mario fan I am not mad I went to see it but I am mad at how they handled it. Such a waste of brain cells trying to salvage what was shown on the big screen. Unfortunately critics are right, but since it’s a kids movie and Mario all of a sudden the “kids movies don’t have to be dumb” talking point has somehow faded away lol. It’s just not a good movie

I don't think Nintendo gives a **** if critics didn't like it, the movie will definitely make over 1 billion at the box office. They're too busy printing money to care about critics who don't matter.

I liked the first Mario Movie quite a lot. It wasn't great but it was fun.

The Mario Galaxy Movie could have had all its dialog removed and nothing would have been lost. Mario has like five lines in the movie named after him.

I read a lot of games reviews, frequenting many different sites to see the vibe about certain games.
With movies, I never search for or read critical reviews. I just tend to read a synopsis of a movie and decide whether or not I want to see it, or go on word of mouth from friends etc. And if I don't like the movie, its no big deal. Only a couple of hours out of my life. Unlike gaming, which is a larger financial and time investment.
I 'm glad that the kids enjoyed the Mario movie. Not entirely sure why 'serious' film critics would review it anyway. Or anything with Jason Statham in it 😉

Mario was a blast. Just a silly and shallow as the first one. Still a great time and my 4 year old daughter (the real target audience) loved it.

@carlos82 if it manages to perform as well as the first one, then you're probably right. We'll see.

@TheDarts well that's peaked my curiosity, is it Iliberal in a particular way?

@PuppetMaster finally. A sensible comment here. What a breath of fresh air!

@Hyena_socks "everything I don't like or understand is liberal". "Everything that isn't black, must be white". For some people there is no thing as nuance.

This will definitely suck

@DennisReynolds it was a good movie. Stop being so negative.

Ofc the Mario movie 2 was bad, the first one was.

Illumination make meme moments, they don't tell stories.

@PuppetMaster

Two things:

1. You kinda just proved my point.

I said “it’s time we remembered…”

Many of those movies you mentioned were loved by audiences. Some by critics and audience. But some flopped because of critics panning them.

2. Not everything that is good will be successful. The most popular songs in the charts right now are not the best, for example.

It should have been Studio Ghibli or Ponoc.

Push clearly still hasn’t come to the realization that both film critics and gaming journalists don’t matter anymore. Hence Mario’s 600+ million and Crimson Deserts (now) 5 million copies sold.

Man, an awful lot of people on here unfairly bashing a well-established profession; you do realise that these "so called critics" are working on this very site, right? So you're saying that game critics matter, but not film critics? Many film critics, at least well established ones, are brilliant writers - they're not telling you not to see a film, they're expressing their opinion in a form of creative analysis.

Just because a film is based on a gaming IP doesn't mean it's free from criticism - Mario Galaxy Movie is lazy and derivative, they went for the easiest, low hanging fruit; didn't bother to put in an ounce of effort in the narrative department, which, if I remember correctly, is what makes up a FILM.... narrative; character arcs; themes - things which this film just doesn't bother with. A film should be judged on its own merits, despite what the source material is. I go to the cinema A LOT, and see many films; both blockbusters and the "arty-farty" stuff, and guess what, usually the art-house films end up being far more fulfilling - but that's probably because I'm a grown adult with a working brain.

Animated films CAN and SHOULD be better, they can both be fun/zany and have clever writing and rich characters (I mean just look at almost any Pixar/Ghibli/Disney/even Dreamworks films). Mario Galaxy just doesn't even try.

Box office records are really easy if you up the prices by alot of tickets. I payed 17 euros for a ticket and 14 per ticket for my kids to see Mario Galaxy. I remember a time it was less then half that price.

It was a fun movie to see, especially if you grew up with the games, but they could and should have done more with story. My kids have already forgotten most of it, just because of the lack of a story. In comparison they can tell me everything about movies like Ratatouille, Luca, Frozen, Toy story, etc. The Mario movies feel more like a celebration then a actual attempt of a movie with a story. Wich is fine for most fans and kids, but i get why it's get critized for it.

I do think Zelda movie will have that though, it's aimed at a older audiance.

Did it not only start filming? I am not hopeful

There's only one anatomical orifice for critical reception, whether scathing or awestruck. As for Zelda, I don't consider its fantasy world a manageable environment for live action and don't have enough interest in seeing it to generate any expectations whatsoever. At least Bloodborne has reportedly had better luck; for all I know, I might even end up seeing its adaptation instead someday.

@1UP-HUSKY my backlog priorities haven't had me rewatch the first Mario movie in a year or so, but I still remember what transpired therein. It wasn't TLK or even Sing tier but a worthwhile chronicle in its own right, and I expect the same from SMGM. Remembering stuff is a product of resonance in kids and adults alike; by the time I came across an opinion about The Road to El Dorado having "not a single memorable song", I could quote any of them if woken up at 4 a.m. As for box offices, they're a dice roll this decade, and I don't consider them ultimately indicative either, but if the earned money is channeled into expanding (or, as is fashionable to say online, "milking") the respective franchise and fictionverse further, cheers - regardless of my own affinity. I've never cared much for Minions that Illumination cooks by similar recipes, but those movies' existence is no skin off my back either. And the same would have applied to the studio's take on Mario if it had rubbed me against the fur - to paraphrase a Frozen character, my childhood is not fragile.

@JB_Whiting I, for one, definitely "you do realise that these "so called critics" are working on this very site" and stick to the belief that both NL and PS reviewers can take their reviews and shove them; in case this crosses the boundaries of civility, I will certainly not contest a ban, but if you ever see me say that "game critics matter", then the mods also better immediately ban my account as hacked.😆 I have my own shameful baggage in this accursed field, and even getting a degree in actual critique (aka honest fiction studies where "creative analysis" isn't a fancy hijacked name for verbosely expressed admiration/boredom) failed to promptly put a lid on it way back when; I can't even guarantee no relapse in this regard, but I don't look forward to one and I lack incentive to bridle my general sociopathy towards the yellow-papered buffoonery in question. There are unarguably more deplorable "well-established professions" out there, but it says something when TV Tropes manages to be tangibly closer to serious critique than all the "professionals" involved - and it's a site with reported roots in imageboards! Like I said above, somehow processing the previous Mario movie wasn't rocket science for me either, and I'm neither too much of a kid in my cynical 39 nor too obsessed with the franchise I have played through maybe a half dozen early entries from.

In the end, being underwhelmed by stuff like SMG is nothing to bash either - unlike pseudocritical fanbloid behaviour directed at underwhelming entertainment experiences, especially the one you're expected to profit in any way from. For all of my own obscene fanhead past, I do make attempts to follow the golden rule - "I have the right to dislike what a fiction work does as long as the fiction work has the right to do what I dislike".

@JB_Whiting (this was one comment before the system decided to debate its size😄)

As far as Zelda goes... the questionably chosen medium doesn't make it a movie aimed at an older audience per se, but it's not like the "well-established professionals" haven't been known for flinging your own list of accusations towards the latter kind of movies either. Dogs and caravans are a universal and timeless image.

@Kienda No it really wasn't. It was pretty damn awful and the critics nailed it.

I don't think much of Illumination movies anyways anymore so to me eh. I had my fun with Mario Galaxy on Wii for cheap. I don't need a movie that's got dialogue I won't even like and plenty of the galaxies/story in Galaxy 1 (not played Galaxy 2) to enjoy, I don't need a movie to market the game and not be that great anyway to tolerate.

It's probably a fine film, same with the first but they aren't my type of things, many western things aren't tolerable to me anymore.

A fair amount sure, but in animated movies, no I don't enjoy western ones that much anymore.

Zelda movie if they pull it off and don't put excuses sure, but it's the kind of IP they should be able to nail it's just if the staff choose not to and make it annoying to watch that's on them and I will skip it.

The IPs deserve better that's for sure and the staff working on them just put me off wanting to see them and will just play the games instead.

Yeah, Sony's film division is where the quality is...

@DennisReynolds I watched it with my two kids and my niece and nephew, all of whom have played a lot of Mario games, and the smiles on their faces proved the critics were wrong.

Like I said. The audience knows best.

@Kienda "A children's story that can only be enjoyed by children is not a good children's story in the slightest."

This quote by C.S. Lewis sums it perfectly.