This time I'm going to do something a little different. I'm going to watch an episode of the Super Mario World cartoon and probably make fun of it. So basically it's not all that different, only it isn't directly about video games, it's just about a show based on one.

What a radical departure. Now, in order for this to work, the show has to suxx0r, and I don't know if it does. I saw five episodes of it or so, but that was ages ago. So hopefully it's sufficiently crappy for me to mock it, or I'll just look dumb.

This is the first episode, entitled "Fire Sale". I'm not sure how you can sell fire, but I guess I'm going to find out.

So we open on a fairly nice background, overlaid by the episode title and all that other stuff they always have at the start. This scrolls over to some kind of palace made of ice.

As the Omniscient Camera Viewpoint zooms in on the palace, an irritating voice begins extolling the virtues of its new palace (presumably this one). You know, I have to admire a society forward-thinking enough to allow disembodied voices to own property... oh wait. It's just Wendy O. Koopa from Super Mario World, the game (and Super Mario Bros. 3) looking at her reflection in the walls, which are acting as mirrors. That'd have to be some damn clean ice. Plus, isn't ice kind of translucent? I'm not sure it would make all that good a mirror, really.

Hey, check it out, it's the castle music from Super Mario World. Cool. At least this cartoon seems sufficiently Super Mario World-related so far. Anyway, Wendy starts complaining about being cold. If cold bothers you, why live in a palace made of ice anyway? Unless Bowser told her to or something.

She starts ordering Random T. Koopa Troopa to get her some fire and jumping up and down on his shell. Okay, we've established that she's vain, impatient, abusive to underlings and, if she was the one who chose to live in the ice palace, possibly stupid. Now that these character traits are established, ideally, she'll continue to act that way but not in such a way as to hammer the point into the viewers' heads. We'll see.

Anyway, she says something about a fire plant and bringing it to the palace, which I guess answers the question I was going to ask: how is she going to carry the fire to her palace without burning her hands (or more likely, the hands of some nameless Koopa Troopa she'd tell to carry the fire for her) off? So that's good.

We switch to a scene with Mario, Luigi, Yoshi, Princess Toadstool and a bunch of anonymous cave people. Apparently they're having some sort of barbecue.

Either Mario or Luigi describes the assorted foodstuffs on display (which sound like they should be in the flintstones or something) and then Yoshi starts eating them all. Mario stops him and Luigi tells him he has to go and get some fireballs from that fire plant. May I just point out that Yoshi's voice is pretty annoying, and the fact that they made him do that "baby voice" thing where you replace Rs with Ws realy doesn't help?

Also he's apparently scared of water. SInce when? I know these characters' personalities weren't really all that defined in the games, but Yoshi never seemed to have any problems swimming and such there. Maybe they're just making stuff up, I dunno.

Wendy and Anonymous K. Troopa enter the dome (with a big sign with lights on it) that Mama Fire Plant lives in, and Wendy tells her "you're coming with me, you stupid sprout". Wouldn't it be a better idea to try and abduct her just a bit more stealthily? Who goes up to someone and just says "I'm kidnapping you"? I guess if you outnumber them and they're not likely to be able to resist, but Wendy's backup consists entirely of Joe Bloggs the Koopa Troopa.

So Mama Fire Plant pukes some fire in Wendy's general direction and ends up hitting John Smith. Man, that guy is just constantly abused. Poor dude. Wendy throws John's shell into Mama Fire Plant's mouth to stop her from vomiting any more fire. I think he needs that shell, Wendy. You jerk.

Wendy and John start to abscond with Mama Fire Plant, and we briefly cut to Yoshi being afraid to cross the bridge over the river. Then Mama Fire Plant (man, I'm so sick of typing that out) spit out John's shell and tells Wendy and John to stop evicting her from her stupid dome thing.

By the way, what's with all the alliterative dialogue? It's all "repulsive robbing reptile" this and "stupid sprout" that. Don't these characters know how to insult each other without using words that start with the same letter?

Upon hearing MFP crying for help, Yoshi musters up the courage to cross the bridge, and subsequently trips over and falls in the water. Well done, Wisdom Tree. I mean Yoshi.

He gets there just in time for Wendy and John to have already escaped. Then Mario and the other arrive and try to lift the grate they escaped through. Mario lifts the grate and Luigi slips on some ice. Man, I had no idea the Mario characters were so clumsy. Anyway, the ice confuses everybody, as Mama Fire Plant apparently doesn't allow ice in her dome. Luigi says "the last time I saw ice was in Ice Land". No kidding. Because I expected you would've seen some in Fire Land, or maybe Dairy Products Land or something. Ice in Ice Land. How weird.

On the plus side, they let Toadstool say "die". Which, for some reason, doesn't always seem to be allowed in cartoons.

Yoshi: "Does ice mean there's water?".
Toadstool: "No, silly. Ice is frozen water."

Um, what? Yeah, she does specify that ice is solid, but how does "is there water? No, it's frozen water" make sense? It's still water. She even says it's water. I'm confused.

They jump down the pipe that's under the grate. Man, this show isn't giving me much to work with, here. This article's really gonna suck.

They fall through the sky and land on a moving platform, which then hits the edge of its rail thing. They fall s'more. I wish Yoshi would stop saying dumb nonsense words. Now that I think about it, if the other side of the pipe is up in the sky, how did Wendy and John Smith get there? Can they fly? Did they use a plane? Did they use Bowser's clown copter thing?

They land on another platform. Luigi almost falls but clings to the side, and some paragoombas swoop towards them and miss completely. Well that was dramatic. And then Mario drops Luigi. Idiot.

The paragoombas swoop back around. Mario claims that he will "goomba them". Dude, it's supposed to be "I'll goomba you in a minute". Get it right. He punches two of them, then falls through the sky. You could've tried, I dunno, standing on something while you punch them. Honestly.

Toadstool and Yoshi try to catch Mario, but this just results in them falling as well. They fall into a pipe. On the other side of the pipe is Ice Land, which seems to be melting. I thought Ice Land (or Iced Land) was supposed to be in Super Mario Bros. 3 anyway. Mario says they have to go back and find Luigi, who responds "you said it". After a bit of conversation, Mario realises that Luigi is under some of the melting ice and rescues him.

They talk briefly about how Ice Land melting will result in Dinosaur World being flooded, then the scene changes to Wendy in her ice palace, on a throne surrounded by fireballs. I dunno, they don't really look sufficient to warm the palace up that much. She says she'll sell fire to all the anonymous cave people and be rich. She also mentions the title of the cartoon.

Then, for some bizarre reason, Mama Fire Plant starts to rap. We also discover that Wendy is actually named "Kootie Pie" in this cartoon, which is a dumb name. Why couldn't they just use her original name? Some guy said they didn't have the rights to the Koopalings' names, but that seems a bit dumb to me. I guess it's possible, though...

Man, MC MFP has some weak rhyming skills. She's no Aesop Rock, that's for sure. Try harder next time! D--.

Mario, Luigi, Yoshi and Toadstool arrive. All but Yoshi get stung by these spiky things that are apparently porcupine fish. Yoshi says that they won't be able to move until it wears off. What kind of poison just wears off? I mean, I'm not that knowledgeable about poisons, but it seems odd to me. I dunno.

Yoshi and Wendootie Pie face off. Kootie Pendy manages to get stung by a porcupine fish. Man, what a dramatic showdown. I'm on the edge of my seat here. Why does everybody turn blue when they get immobilised, anyway?

MFP and Yoshi carry all the immobilised people home.

And then we get some hints for the "OMG Yoshi x Mama Fire Plant OTP 4eva". At least that's what it seems like to me. I mean, "you can light my fire any time"? Well, all you fanfic writers have something to work with, at least.

As an epilogue, we see Kootwendy Piewendykootie Whatever trapped in an ice block, and John Smith relaxing in a hammock. It's good to see he finally got a break and all that.

Well, that wasn't particularly good, but I don't know that it presented me with all that much material. I'm not sure if I'll do this again. But, then again, it would mean I don't have to come up with ideas for articles for a while...