Why Super Mario Bros. > Who Framed Roger Rabbit

[MarioValiant]

MY OFFICIALLY FIRST POST! ALRIGHT!

Alright, I'm pretty sure some of you are gonna disagree with me on this, but I can think of some good ways in which "Super Mario Bros." fares a little better than "Who Framed Roger Rabbit", despite the latter movie being more well-known:

1. It is a somewhat cleaner movie, as it certainly doesn't rely heavily on what WFRR (short for "Who Framed Roger Rabbit") is notorious for, including crass, dirty humor, strong sexuality, constant swearing, and heavy drinking. Despite SMB having a few adult elements, they're rather tame compared to WFRR.

2. Bob Hoskin's character in this movie, Mario, is a better, much more likable character than than his character in WFRR, Eddie Valiant. Unlike Eddie who is bitter and edgy and prejudiced, Mario is a decent guy to be around, displaying some of the same traits as in the games: heroic, fairly intelligent, and somewhat witty. In the long run, I'd consider Mario to be a much better role model than Eddie. Despite the fact that Bob didn't enjoy his experience on this movie, I think he did a great job making Mario somewhat an improvement over Eddie. Plus, unlike Eddie, Mario got a chance to kiss his girl!

3. Further speaking of Mario and Eddie, while poor Eddie lost his brother, Mario is very fortunate to have his brother Luigi still alive and breathing.

4. Now this is somewhat of a personal reason, but since I am a devout Christian, I've managed to find some elements which I think Christians can relate to, such as dedication, trust, servanthood, concern for others, and yep, even teamwork. Plus, I can't help but find some Christian parallels which I might talk about in a future post.

Of course, with that being said, I still prefer the fanedit of this movie all courtesy of Happy Russia.

[SolitaryPoet]

There isn't any doubt that "Mario Bros." is superior to "Who Framed Roger Rabbit," but I will still give this some thought and get back to you tomorrow.

[Serum]

Interesting first post. I've often thought of the faith/science parallels in Super Mario Bros., myself. Koopa resembles science, one man sitting in his towers based on a complex he saw as a young man in a parallel universe, using his devices to make what may or may not be the only society in his world conform to his will by the means of genetic manipulation, building a massive army out of the societal rejects who live in high tech squalor.

Where as the Mario Brothers and Daisy resemble faith, the constant battle between believing and doubt-- Mario is a character who I've always felt is a lapsed Catholic, questioning the obvious bizarre reality around him but by the end of the movie he's found something to believe in again, which can be a big part of spirituality. Luigi resembles innocent, yet blind but unquestioning faith and Daisy quite literally is the higher power. Koopa, a man of science, struggles with the fact that only Daisy can properly merge the dimensions (for reasons that are never completely revealed), Lena believes she can merge them, but is killed in the attempt-- she dies a heretic's death.

As for the parallels between Mario Mario and Eddie Valiant, I think you're heart is in the right place, but you're failing to acknowledge that Mario and Eddie are two very different people. Like you said, Eddie has lost his brother and fallen deep into a well of solopsistic alcoholism and late nights of unsavory detective work whereas Mario is a traditional fellow who, despite having a bit of a chip on his shoulder is a strongheaded man with a firm set of values.

But the thing about Eddie is he's a character who starts off not unlike Ebenezer Scrooge, he's pitiful, a bit unlikable and definitely not a good role model. But Eddie's story is different than Mario's in that Mario's story is a story of a spiritual awakening where Eddie's is a story of redemption. Eddie has to learn to get passed his prejudice of toons because his brother was killed by a toon, sending him down a long path of the aforementioned depression and unscrupulous gumshoe work where he'll take any case so long as it gets him more money to feed his habit, his habit being the bottle.

When Eddie Valiant is about to drive through the tunnel into Toon Town, he goes to take a swig of his whisky, but at that moment, he realizes that even if downs the whole bottle prior to returning to the scene of his brother's tragic death, ultimately it's not going to help him-- so what does he do? He pours the whisky out and throws the bottle up in the air, whips out the toon gun and fires the Indian bullet at, who breaks it in half with a tomahawk-- this is Valiant's turning point, and at the end of the movie, he saves the entire toon world-- something he probably would have never done if the events that lead up to the warehouse confrontation with Judge Doom had never conspired.

Mario is a bit more like Tevye from Fiddler on the Roof, but maybe from the opposite angle, at least in a spiritual sense. Mario is a deep believer in tradition and is comfortable with things just the way they are, so much to a point that he hates the sight of change (Scapelli--they beat us to it, AGAIN!) but he realizes he has a much higher calling as soon as he falls through the transdimensional gate and finds himself in the Mushroom Kingdom, prior to his adventure there, Mario took everything at face value, he believed that everything was exactly as it seemed and was highly skeptical of anything bigger than him.

Mario's journey shows him that not only are there forces at work around him all the time that are far more powerful than him, but that sometimes you have to fight to maintain the balance of order and chaos-- two ideas that pre-Mushroom Kingdom Mario probably doesn't have a very firm grasp on and likely would scoff at the very mention of.

As far as which movie is better? Well, let's just say they're two totally different films, but there are some parallels, but I think Eddie Valiant and Mario Mario are radically different characters that can't be compared so easily.

[MarioValiant]

Interesting first post. I've often thought of the faith/science parallels in Super Mario Bros., myself. Koopa resembles science, one man sitting in his towers based on a complex he saw as a young man in a parallel universe, using his devices to make what may or may not be the only society in his world conform to his will by the means of genetic manipulation, building a massive army out of the societal rejects who live in high tech squalor.

Where as the Mario Brothers and Daisy resemble faith, the constant battle between believing and doubt-- Mario is a character who I've always felt is a lapsed Catholic, questioning the obvious bizarre reality around him but by the end of the movie he's found something to believe in again, which can be a big part of spirituality. Luigi resembles innocent, yet blind but unquestioning faith and Daisy quite literally is the higher power. Koopa, a man of science, struggles with the fact that only Daisy can properly merge the dimensions (for reasons that are never completely revealed), Lena believes she can merge them, but is killed in the attempt-- she dies a heretic's death.

As for the parallels between Mario Mario and Eddie Valiant, I think you're heart is in the right place, but you're failing to acknowledge that Mario and Eddie are two very different people. Like you said, Eddie has lost his brother and fallen deep into a well of solopsistic alcoholism and late nights of unsavory detective work whereas Mario is a traditional fellow who, despite having a bit of a chip on his shoulder is a strongheaded man with a firm set of values.

But the thing about Eddie is he's a character who starts off not unlike Ebenezer Scrooge, he's pitiful, a bit unlikable and definitely not a good role model. But Eddie's story is different than Mario's in that Mario's story is a story of a spiritual awakening where Eddie's is a story of redemption. Eddie has to learn to get passed his prejudice of toons because his brother was killed by a toon, sending him down a long path of the aforementioned depression and unscrupulous gumshoe work where he'll take any case so long as it gets him more money to feed his habit, his habit being the bottle.

When Eddie Valiant is about to drive through the tunnel into Toon Town, he goes to take a swig of his whisky, but at that moment, he realizes that even if downs the whole bottle prior to returning to the scene of his brother's tragic death, ultimately it's not going to help him-- so what does he do? He pours the whisky out and throws the bottle up in the air, whips out the toon gun and fires the Indian bullet at, who breaks it in half with a tomahawk-- this is Valiant's turning point, and at the end of the movie, he saves the entire toon world-- something he probably would have never done if the events that lead up to the warehouse confrontation with Judge Doom had never conspired.

Mario is a bit more like Tevye from Fiddler on the Roof, but maybe from the opposite angle, at least in a spiritual sense. Mario is a deep believer in tradition and is comfortable with things just the way they are, so much to a point that he hates the sight of change (Scapelli--they beat us to it, AGAIN!) but he realizes he has a much higher calling as soon as he falls through the transdimensional gate and finds himself in the Mushroom Kingdom, prior to his adventure there, Mario took everything at face value, he believed that everything was exactly as it seemed and was highly skeptical of anything bigger than him.

Mario's journey shows him that not only are there forces at work around him all the time that are far more powerful than him, but that sometimes you have to fight to maintain the balance of order and chaos-- two ideas that pre-Mushroom Kingdom Mario probably doesn't have a very firm grasp on and likely would scoff at the very mention of.

As far as which movie is better? Well, let's just say they're two totally different films, but there are some parallels, but I think Eddie Valiant and Mario Mario are radically different characters that can't be compared so easily.

If my failure to delve deeper into the separate personalities of Mario and Eddie has bothered you in any way, I apologize. Of course, I am amazed at how you managed to interpret not only their different characters, but also the somewhat spiritual standpoints which I think Christians can definitely relate to in a sense. In simpler terms, I can see that Mario became something like a born again Christian towards the end hence his line "I believe." I'm not saying his character is Christian, though; I'm just saying it's somewhat understandable from my point of view since, as I stated before, I'm a devout Christian, indicating that I had been Born Again at some point in my life. Of course, I will admit that Eddie's story about redemption is another element that Christians can relate to, my prime example of course being Paul the Apostle (aka Saul of Tarsus). Hope that helps.

[Serum]

I'm not bothered at all, I welcome all interpretations. I was just giving mine. I've seen both movies so many times and I've had a long, long time to think about it.

[MarioValiant]

I'm not bothered at all, I welcome all interpretations. I was just giving mine. I've seen both movies so many times and I've had a long, long time to think about it.

Oh, good. God bless you!

[Serum]

I can talk about this all day (and sometimes I do, while annoying the clerks at coffee shops), I hadn't taken into account there are some similarities to Eddie's salvation and the Saul's becoming Paul, though I think Paul's case was a bit more... severe than Eddie's. Saul needed the assistance of an otherworldly force to change, and while it could be argued that Eddie's redemption was caused by divine intervention, I'd have to say that there's always a chance Eddie could have worked things out for himself in the end if he hadn't been hired to take the damning pictures of Marvin Acme and Jessica Rabbit.

Take into consideration the novel Who Censored Roger Rabbit, the basis for the film-- Eddie in the novel is in an even worse place than the movie. Where Eddie in the movie has the loss of his brother, something that gives him drive, the novel's version of Eddie is a complete and utter cynic who'll take any case for a buck and in the end he doesn't defeat any of his personal demons, but it's loosely implied he's learned something about the oddity of the world around him when he looks out his window at the LA skyline in the finale. But ultimately, the book's Eddie isn't the same character in almost any respect.

Now, with Super Mario Bros., yes, at the end Mario says "I believe," his cynicism neutralized, his skepticism lifted. We don't know as much about Mario as we do about Eddie, but we can make a power assumption that at some point in the past something happened to Mario that made him skeptical of the world. In some early scripts we see it's the death of his father that's brought on his nihilistic take on fantastic ideas, forcing him only to believe in tradition and a static routine which takes a trip to another dimension to show him that he's just a player on a stage so massive he can't even begin to fathom it--

--but he knows in the end, because he believes, that there are things worth fighting for. Prior to his trip to Dinohattan, Mario only believed in fighting for things to stay the same, but when he went to the Mushroom Kingdom, whether he liked it or not, he fought for change and in turn liberated an entire species from the reigns of a man who had an idea of keeping things as unchanging for himself as possible (Koopa) until he absolutely needed change by merging the two dimensions. It's obvious that over the years Koopa tried alternative solutions but they all failed and Mario is the Yin to Koopa's Yang.

So what I find is that there are parallels and similarities in every character of the movie (Super Mario Bros.) which show that only by working together can we fully understand what's going on, what needs to happen, if it needs to happen and how to make it happen. In Who Framed Roger Rabbit, while Eddie does save the toons, he, more importantly to the plot, saves him from himself with the help of Roger, Jessica, Benny and to an extent, Judge Doom, who killed his brother and sent him down the wrong path, but ultimately set him on the right path once again in the end.