Not Hooked on the Brothers

December 5, 2009 Patrick Hickey Jr. DVD & Blu-Ray 0

Super_Mario_Bros_Super_Show_TitleIn 1989, two fictional brothers from Brooklyn managed to transcend the video game universe and become pop culture icons. A small television show had a huge role in that development, which not only showcased the characters, thanks to “Captain” Lou Albano as Mario and Danny Wells as Luigi, but brought in celebrities like Cyndi Lauper, Nicole Eggert and Sgt. Slaughter, in a children-friendly format, which ended up increasing the spectrum for their parent company Nintendo.

The rest, they say, is history.

Nevertheless, while “The Super Mario Bros. Super Show” was a blast when you were a kid, it hasn’t aged well now that it’s on DVD. After watching 12 hours of the show on four discs, it’s fair to sat you’ll never want to watch the show again. The fact that it’s currently available on the Netflix Instant Queue as well means you technically don’t have to spend your money on it to get your ’80s fix either.

It’s not that the show is bad, it’s the fact that most of the jokes and jargon aren’t prevalent today and everything about the show is so entrenched in ’80s pop culture. The same way you can still listen to a band like Squeeze and appreciate the music and the message, but laugh your innards off at their videos, is the same feeling you’ll get from this show.

You’ll want to play the song or watch the show, but the time in between from when the show was aired and where we are today make it so tough to do so. You’ll just end up with another nail in your heart that is desperately trying to reclaim a part of your youth by watching the show- to remember the times when it was cool to play your Nintendo with a bunch of pals until 2 A.M. And forget about life.

Or the times when the chick from “Wonder Years” was hot.

Sadly, this DVD compilation can not make that dream a reality. As a result, watching this set proves the ’80s were great, but they are never coming back.

Beneath the ’80s feel that will remind many of their childhood, the live action sequences have aged much worse than the cartoon, which was nothing fantastic when it was originally released anyway. In 10-20 minute bursts, the show still has some nostalgia, but after that, there’s little reason to watch. Great with a group of friends, it’s easy to provide your own commentary to the show and the cartoon, a-la “Mystery Science Theater 3000.”

That alone may be the best reason to pick this up.

However, if doesn’t prove how poorly the hands of time have handled this show, nothing else will.

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About Patrick Hickey Jr. 14251 Articles
Patrick Hickey Jr. is a full-time Assistant Professor of Communication & Performing Arts and Director of the Journalism program at Kingsborough Community College and is the chairman of the City University of New York Journalism Council. He is the Founder and Editor-In-Chief of ReviewFix.com. He's also a former News Editor at NBC Local Integrated Media and National Video Games Writer at Examiner.com where his work was mentioned in National Ad campaigns by Disney, Nintendo and EA Sports. Hickey was also the Editor-In-Chief of two College Newspapers before he received his BA in Journalism from Brooklyn College. Hickey's work has been published in The New York Daily News, The New York Times, Complex, The Hockey Writers, Yahoo!, Broadway World, Examiner, NYSportScene Magazine, ProHockeyNews.com, GothamBaseball.com, The Syracuse Post-Standard, Scout.com and the official sites of the Brooklyn Aces and New York Islanders. His first book, The Minds Behind the Games: Interviews With Cult And Classic Video Game Developers was released in April 2018 and is chock full of interviews with legendary developers. His second book in the series, The Minds Behind Adventures Games, was released in December 2019. His third book, The Minds Behind Sports Games, was released in September 2020. His fourth book, The Minds Behind Shooter Games, was released in March 2021. The Minds Behind Sega Genesis Games and The Minds Behind PlayStation Games were released in 2022 and The Minds Behind PlayStation 2 was published in January 2023. Hickey is also a contracted comic book writer, currently penning his original series, "Condrey," as well as "The Job," "Brooklyn Bleeds" "Dem Gulls" and "KROOM" for Legacy Comix, where he serves as founder, owner and Editor-in-Chief. Hickey Jr. is also a voice actor, having starred in the 2018 indie hit and 2019 Switch, PS4 and Xbox One release, The Padre (also serving as English language Story Editor), from Shotgun With Glitters. The sequel, The Padre: One Shell Straight to Hell was released in February 2021- Hickey also served as a Story Editor and Lead Voiceover performer. He has also done narration and trailers for several other titles including The Kaiju Offensive, Relentless Rex and Roniu’s Tale. Hickey is also the lead voiceover performer on Mega Cat Studios’ upcoming title WrestleQuest, responsible for nearly 90 characters in the game, as well as Skybound's Renfield: Bring Your Own Blood, where he voices both Dracula and Renfield, as well as several other characters. He also stars in Ziggurat Interactive’s World Championship Boxing Manager 2, where he performs the VO of nearly every male character in the game. He also worked on the Atari VCS’s BPM Boy.

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