SPOILER WARNING: The following article gives away what happens after The Super Mario Bros. Movie end credits, so if you haven't seen the movie yet, we recommend you grab yourself a power-up and proceed with caution before you head down this pipeline.
Movies and TV shows inspired by games (either of the table-top or video variety) have not had the best track record, for the most part (with a few notable exceptions, of course). However I genuinely believe that Hollywood has finally found a nice sweet spot in this “genre” with the recent releases of the Sonic the Hedgehog movies, HBO’s The Last of Us TV series, and Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves. Despite some of the negative critical reactions it has inspired — including from one of our own — I would also firmly count The Super Mario Bros. Movie among these successes and would love to see a sequel, especially to ensure its post-credits scene receives a payoff.
The mid-credits scene for the latest attempt to bring Nintendo’s most iconic characters to the big screen following an ill-received live action movie in the early ‘90s (which some people do actually dig) sees an imprisoned Bowser (Jack Black, giving his all as the tyrannical turtle) reprising a ballad professing his love for Princess Peach (Anya Taylor-Joy). However, audiences who stayed past the subsequent scroll of credits were treated with a pleasant surprise in the form of a teaser for the eventual debut of a fan-favorite character in this new franchise.
Well, if The Super Mario Bros. Movie does turn out to, indeed, be the spark of a new franchise, allow us to help you prepare for when this character would appear in the follow-up with an explanation of who they are — starting with a description of exactly what happens in the post-credits scene.
What Happens In The Post-Credits Scene
After the scroll of credits concludes, we return to where the adventure at the center of The Super Mario Bros. Movie began: a forgotten area of the Brooklyn sewer system where Mario (Chris Pratt) and Luigi (Charlie Day) find a pipe that transports them to the Mushroom Kingdom. The scene takes us on a tour through the depths of this hidden room before pausing at the sight of a large, white egg with green spots. The screen fades to black just as its shell begins to crack open, from which Yoshi would have emerged.
Amid all of the many, many references to the Nintendo games littered throughout the film, I kept wondering when there might be, at least, one Easter Egg related to the character of Yoshi. In retrospect, I cannot think of a better way to introduce a Yoshi Easter Egg in the film than in the form of an actual egg, making for a fun, subtle post-credits stinger that likely satisfied die-hard fans of the original games who stayed until the very end. However, for any less-experienced viewers who had never heard of Yoshi (before another audience member likely shouted out the name during their screening) and would like to know more, read on.
Who Is Yoshi From The Games?
Created by graphics designer Shigefumi Hino with help from Takashi Tezuka, Yoshi is a creature descended from an eponymous, dinosaur-like species who made his first appearance in a Nintendo video game with 1990’s Super Mario World. The cute, green, boots-wearing reptile has acted as a reliable and important ally to Mario, Luigi, and the other heroic characters that from the Nintendo universe with the use of the character’s own special abilities — such as a long tongue used to catch and eat various forms of prey, laying eggs that reveal useful objects, and, of course, jumping.
Yoshi was initially developed as an animal that Mario and Luigi could ride, which developer Shigeru Miyamoto originally envisioned as a horse, until the idea of setting Super Mario World in a land occupied by dinosaurs inspired Tezuka and Hino to work on the art for a reptilian creature that would become Yoshi. The character first became playable in Super Mario World 2: Yoshi’s Island and later become the protagonist of a series of spin-off releases as early as 1991, with a self-titled puzzle game, and as recently as 2015, with Yoshi’s Crafted World for the Nintendo Switch. Yoshi has previously been adapted for screen in the animated Nintendo-inspired series Super Mario World, and in 1993’s live-action Super Mario Bros. movie as a kindly, animatronic dinosaur whom King Koopa (Dennis Hopper) keeps as a pet.
How Yoshi Could Be Introduced In A Sequel
Of the many classic Nintendo characters we hoped would appear in a sequel to The Super Mario Bros., Yoshi was undoubtedly among them. However whether the character will be utilized in a to-be-greenlit follow-up is a question that is sure to keep us on our toes until the film would be released. The easy answer is for Universal Studios and Illumination Entertainment to take inspiration from the video game in which Yoshi debuted, Super Mario World, and see Mario, Luigi, and Princess Peach cross paths with the creature after their Dinosaur Land vacation is interrupted by Bowser’s abduction of Princess Toadstool — another character who deserves to be introduced in the sequel, regardless of what the story turns out to be.
However, an idea that I think would be really fascinating is incorporating the story of the Super Mario World sequel, Yoshi’s Island. That game is actually a prequel in which an infant Luigi is abducted by Bowser, leaving baby Mario to team up with Yoshi, who carries him on a quest to rescue his brother. However, that is probably unlikely, as it would retcon the events of the new 2023 movie and would be a retread of the plot, too, if you swap Yoshi for Princess Peach and make them all grown-ups.
Regardless of how Yoshi is depicted in a sequel to The Super Mario Bros. Movie, it will certainly be a treat to see the character hatched and on the big screen again in the dinosaur’s proper form. I also hope that it will be a treat to see these characters in more upcoming video game movies, as long as they stay true to the tone of the games that inspired them.
