Nintendo legend Shigeru Miyamoto has stated that the Super Mario Galaxy movie being so fast-paced was done on purpose, despite the backlash it caused.
As you've no doubt heard by now, The Super Mario Galaxy Movie is a pretty underwhelming sequel to a movie that most people thought was good. While there are certainly some good aspects of Galaxy (like the gorgeous animation), there are far more problems that outweigh the good and leave the film with a rather sour review score.
One of the main complaints leveled against The Super Mario Galaxy Movie is how fast-paced it is, overwhelming viewers with a non-stop stream of events from start to finish in its short runtime. While this is arguably one of the most criticized elements of the film, it has been confirmed to be a very deliberate choice.
According to Miyamoto, the Super Mario Galaxy movie should be that fast
Illumination wanted children and parents to “catch their breath”
Before the release of the Super Mario Galaxy movie, Miyamoto discussed it with Nintendo Dream and, as reported by Nintendo Everything, included a brief chat about the length of the movie. When asked by Nintendo Dream how so many jokes and references were included in the film, given its short running time, Miyamoto said that part of it is due to how much Illumination knows about Mario.
Miyamoto then goes into more detail, noting that one approach taken by the team was to create small, partial units, which is close to his own method of doing nothing unnecessary and therefore not throwing anything away. It goes some way to explaining why much of the Mario Galaxy movie feels so fast-paced and like it's jumping between scenes.
If that didn't make it clear that the fast pace is a purposeful design choice, Miyamoto went on to say that there's a difficult balance between parents going to a movie out of responsibility for their kids and a story that's involved for adults, but has kids running around the theater. With that in mind, he says it was good they decided to do a “quick 90 minutes that would be over in no time”.
As a counterargument, there is one pulp of movies with similar runtimes that manage to deliver for both parents and kids without feeling like sensory overload.
While Miyamoto has gone on to address some complaints about the Super Mario Galaxy movie, this interview was done before the negative reception became so apparent and has only resurfaced now, so it's less of an answer and more of an explanation. Still, it's good to know that Nintendo is at least aware of how fast Galaxy Movie is.
The Super Mario Galaxy Movie
- Release date
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April 1, 2026
- Driving
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98 minutes
- Director
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Aaron Horvath, Michael Jelenic, Pierre Leduc, Fabien Polack
- Author
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Matthew Fogel
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Anya Taylor-Joy
Princess Peach
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Ranking the Lush x Mario Galaxy Collection by how likely it is to defeat Bowser
In honor of the release of The Super Mario Galaxy Movie, Lush have thrown together a collection that is out of this world, but I just have one question.
