The Super Mario Bros. Movie certainly has its work cut out for it, adapting such a well-known and beloved piece of video game iconography. Mario technically has been seen on the big screen before, but it was a live-action adaptation that was poorly received and has since essentially just turned into a big joke. This new film feels like the first real adaptation of the Mario games, and the one that actually has some potential to be good and capture the story and the characters in the way they were meant to be seen.
There has been a mix of praise and criticism of the movie so far, based mainly on the trailers and teasers that have been released. The main problem that this movie will probably run into is that it's difficult to adapt a franchise that hasn't exactly been cinematic in the past, as well as one that has a silent protagonist. Mario, along with many of the other characters in the Mushroom Kingdom and beyond, doesn't have much of a personality in the games. This means that the writing needs to find ways to give these characters clear voices and motivations that are a little more complex than what shows up in the games. Fortunately, it seems that this is an approach that they have been directly trying to take with the character of Peach, as they are trying to take her out of her usual damsel-in-distress role.
How Will Peach and Luigi Switch Roles In The Super Mario Bros. Movie?
According to Aaron Horvath, co-director of The Super Mario Bros. Movie, Princess Peach and Luigi will be undergoing a bit of a role reversal in the film. Peach, who is usually just the love interest that Mario has to save from Bowser, will apparently have more of an active role, and will be a strong leader who helps Mario in his adventures. Luigi, on the other hand, will be the one that needs some saving, and will be taking on more of a scaredy-cat role. The movie will flip the script and have Mario rescue his brother from Bowser's clutches rather than Peach, which is going to be a welcome change for many fans of the franchise who want Peach to have more agency.
The filmmakers wanted Peach to be more of a fearless leader in this film, as she is technically canonically the ruler of a kingdom. Horvath explained, "She’s the monarch who leads this kingdom of hapless, adorable Toads. We were thinking how strong that person would need to be to protect those people. All that informed the idea for Peach’s character in our movie". Changes like this prove that the people behind the movie wanted to make sure it told the best story it could and wasn't just a lazy adaptation of all of the source material that came before it; they're clearly putting thought into how they can best represent these characters, even if it ends up being a little divisive for some fans.
Has Princess Peach Been The Hero In The Past?
The Super Mario Bros. Movie isn't even going to be the first time that Peach has had a larger role to play than simply the damsel-in-distress. There are obviously some games - Mario Kart, Mario Party, or Super Smash Bros., for instance - where Peach is a playable character, but these don't have narrative arcs and aren't really part of the mainline Mario games. The first non-party Mario title to have Peach as a playable character was Super Mario Bros. 2, released in 1988. However, it would be 17 years before Peach would headline her own game, Super Princess Peach, which was released for the Nintendo DS in 2005. In this game, Peach was the hero who had to save both Mario and Luigi from Bowser. The game unfortunately never got a sequel, but it was praised at the time for being a genuinely good Mario title.
Peach was also a playable character in Super Mario 3D World, which was a nice change of pace from her usual love interest role. However, in Super Mario Odyssey, there was a return to form as she was once again the damsel-in-distress who needed saving from Bowser. Luigi, on the other hand, started off as just a slightly different version of Mario, only to morph into a more unique character in his own right. The idea of Luigi being the character that needs saving isn't even that novel for the franchise; he's been branded as a bit of a coward for a while now, after the release of his own spin-off series, Luigi's Mansion. There is even a whole series of side quests in Super Mario Galaxy that requires Mario to save Luigi from various scrapes, so it's not that much of a stretch to imagine Luigi taking on that role in the upcoming movie.
Why Does Peach Make A Good Hero?
While it's not her usual role in the Mario franchise, it's nice to see Peach step outside of that and get to have more of a personality, especially since she's been such a staple in the series. Her normal role as the captured princess is to be expected at this point, as it's just the way that Mario games usually go and there's nothing necessarily wrong with that, but this decision gives the series the opportunity to explore how much more interesting she could be if she broke out of her normal role. She's a ruler, and it will be interesting to see her actively leading people in the new movie, showing that the "Princess" label isn't just an honorary title. Hopefully the movie will do right by Peach, and make her interesting and unique to a whole new generation of Mario fans.