Pedro Pascal ain’t doing so bad lately with plenty of irons in the fire. The Mandalorian shall soon return for Season 3 on Disney+, and The Last Of Us is already a juggernaut for HBO. The latter has proven to be a rarely successful video-game-to-TV adaptation, and SNL decided to try and do the same for another video game: Mario Kart.
In other words, Chris Pratt’s “it’s a me” voice has got some competition, and here’s something even better: this sketch can finally put a fork in the bad aftertaste that still lingers after Elon Musk brought us a live-action Wario while hosting in 2021.
This SNL spoof harbors no illusions of this also being a successful video game adaptation (hence the bad faux-reviews), but it does feed into the tendency for showbiz to keep trying to crank out what’s proven to already work. So, we’ve got a gritty Mario who’s attempting to also deal with a fungus that happens to be this production’s version of Goombas. He’s attempting to smuggle Princess Peach (Chloe Fineman) down Rainbow Road (what’s left of it), and of course, he’s pulling out firearms and not at all enjoying this ride.
Some joy can be found here in Bowen Yang’s Yoshi, who quickly announces himself as bisexual, and Kenan Thompson as Bowser. Yet one cannot forget that Mario is kind-of hating this task, as evidenced by his dreary “let’s a-go” exclamation. It’s a tough gig.