Thursday, June 23, 2016

Super Mario: Profile of a Plumber


If you were alive in 1985, you were playing Super Mario Bros. on the NES. stomping on Goombas, dropping Bowser into lava and finding Warp Zones. This was pre-internet, so one of the only ways to find out the most valuable game secrets was by word of mouth. Sometimes these tips were total crap other times they were as valuable as gold. Who would have thought that over 30 years later these Italian plumber Brothers from Brooklyn would still be as popular and recognizable all over the world. Back in the 80s you had Mario's face on everything from t-shirts to fruit snacks and today you can still find him on...t-shirts and fruit snacks. Looking around my house, I guess I didn't realize how much stuff I owned with the Super Mario branding on it. Here are a few selections from the collection:
 World of Nintendo: 8-Bit Mario (JAKKS Pacific, 2015)
 Happy Meal: Mario Ball (McDonald's, 2006)
 Mario Kart R/C Racecar (Tomy, 2010)
 Super Mario Bros. Movie Card Box (Skybox, 1993)
 Super Mario Candy Filled Barrel (Au'some Candy, 2013)
Nintendo Comics System: Gameboy #1 Comic (Valiant, 1990)
Mario is such an endearing character. I loved reading the Nintendo comics from Valiant. These included Mario, Legend of Zelda & Captain N: The Game Master. I used to study those books, looking for recognizable characters. Ohhh, there's a Shy Guy! The art was great, the stories were fun and the characters are classic. Someone should really look into putting out a collected version of these comics sometime soon. I would pick that up in a second! Maybe this will happen around the same time they re-release Nintendo Cereal System?

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