Ah, nostalgia. It’s the feeling that drives so many of my purchases. It’s one of the reasons I listen to chiptunes and am driven to buy old games every chance I get. It’s the reason I have a fantastic piece of ‘Golden Axe’ inspired artwork on my wall. It’s also the only possible reason to re-watch some of those “classic” Saturday morning cartoons.
When I was a kid, I would wake up at 8 AM every Saturday and spend my morning riding the USA Cartoon Express. ‘G.I. Joe,’ ‘Jem,’ ‘The Real Ghostbusters,’ and ‘Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles’ occupied the beginning of my day. As my tastes changed, I started to seek out other shows that were more relevant to my primary interest – video games. For me, that show was ‘The Adventures of Super Mario Bros. 3.’
It’s a long name, and a silly one at that. But that didn’t stop me from gobbling up every episode. Was I upset that the Koopa Kids had their names changed? Of course. Did it stop me from watching? Not at all.
If you go back and check out the show now, you might be surprised at one other big difference. Mario has a Bronx accent, rather than an Italian one. Since the show aired before Mario was given a voice in the games, there was no reason to go with anything but a bad Bob Hoskins impersonation.
Shout! Factory – the company that’s selling nearly everything I remember from my childhood – has a sweet deal on an ‘The Adventures of Super Mario Bros. 3’ DVD set that includes ‘Adventures of Sonic the Hedgehog’ with it for just $25.99.
I have to admit to never watching ‘Sonic’ because I was a Nintendo kid back in the day. The character of Sonic is voiced by none other than Jaleel “Urkel” White, though it’s hard to tell whether that’s a selling point or not.
William Henley
Sonic? There were two sonic series, one that aired on weekdays, and another one that just aired on ABC on weekends. The quality between the two shows were night and day, and, I am thinking, they were even produced by different animation houses, although I am not sure. I would like to know which is included. I would certainly pick it up if its the ABC series.
William Henley
Just realized that there were two Mario Bros shows as well. I am more familer with The Super Mario Bros Super Show, which was a weekday show. I bet this one is better. The Super Mario Bros Super Show has cheaply animated and had absolutely horrendious stories. They also interspearsed live-action, which was even worse than the animated stuff
Josh Zyber
Yes, but the Super Mario Bros. Super Show was hosted by Captain Lou Albano as Mario.
Do the Mario!
Swing your arms from side to side.
Come on, it’s time to go.
Do the Mario!
🙂
Alex
Let’s also not forget that the Super Mario Bros. Super Show had the weekly “Legend of Zelda” cartoons. Oh yeah, Zelda was a hottie. No way around that.
Dick Ward
AuthorThere was also a Super Mario World cartoon. Still, my favorite was ‘Captain N: The Game Master’.
I’d run around the house with an NES controller for my belt, trying to pause the world.
Rich Brooks
I loved the SMB Super show, especially when once a week they’d do a Zelda episode; however SMB 3 cartoon had an episode where they went to see Milli Vanilli. Can’t really beat that.
Josh Zyber
Hmmmm… That may even be better than Vanilla Ice doing the “Ninja Rap” in Teenage Mutant Ninja Turles II.
BambooLounge
Go Ninja! Go Ninja! Go!
Nate Boss
a fact that is in the upcoming TMNT box set review. Ninja, ninja…RAP!
a sad thought, though, when the most memorable parts of your film are two awful animal costumes and Vanilla Ice doing the most ridiculously “improv’d” song in film history.
at least it was better than “Whoomp (the addams family)…there it is!”
motorheadache
Oh, man. I tried watching an episode of the Super Mario Bros. Supershow a few weeks back on Netflix streaming and I could barely stand it for 10 minutes. That’s the risk of revisiting something you remember fondly from childhood.
I prefer the Nostalgia Critic’s review of the series (as well as Zelda) over actually seeing the shows nowadays.
Oh, and I too used to get excited on Fridays for Zelda. Friday after school was always great since you had the whole weekend before you, and Zelda was like the icing on the cake. Of course, now the best I can say about it is it was better than those Zelda CD-I cutscenes 🙂
William Henley
I totally agree! That first episode of TSMBSS on Netflix has Birdo capturing Toad, and is just horrible. But Zelda ROCKED! Toward the end, I got to where I only watche TSMBSS on Fridays, cause I HATED the Mario stuff.
“Well Excuse Me Princess!”
I guess what it boils down to is anything that came on on a weekly basis was better quality than the stuff that came on on a daily basis.