[Short Film] The Four Players
Hollywood screenwriter Evan Daugherty (Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles) has taken the Super Mario Bros. series and adapted them into four gritty, realistic short films centered on the series' four protagonists: Mario, Luigi, Princess Peach, and Toad. Each short reimagines the aforementioned characters into specific character roles. For example, Mario is the hard-working, always training "Fixer" that is called upon to fix the world's problems; Luigi is characterized as an "Addict" who may or may not have hallucinated that the plants he uses for his drugs imbue him with fire powers; Princess Peach is the "Star" singing a sad power ballad about her captivity by the Koopa Troopas; a Toad represents his life as a "Soldier" endowed with the responsibility to watch over the kingdom... no matter the cost.
Bob Hoskins, John Leguizamo, and Dennis Hopper, this is not. However, much like the ample (ample!) problems I had with the original film adaptation of Super Mario Bros. in 1993, The Four Players has to stretch to make semblance of an interesting plot out of the series. Do all modern film adaptations of Super Mario Bros. have to go the gritty, realistic route to be compelling? I speak out of a bias against the Mario games, and while I actually REALLY liked these four short films and wouldn't mind seeing more, I just wish their wasn't this inherent necessity to make a vastly dark depiction of Super Mario mythos for it to work in a medium outside of video games and cartoons.
Nevertheless, watch The Four Players below!