Super Mario Galaxy movie announced: Mario heads to space in 2026

Nintendo finally went all-in during the September Direct. The teaser starts calm; Mario is napping under a tree, a butterfly flutters by Peach’s Castle, and then suddenly he’s floating in space. Logo appears, release date pops up, and you can hear fans collectively saying “finally.”

This movie will follow the Super Mario Galaxy games from 2007 so expect weird planets, floating platforms, and maybe a few Lumas just popping in to wave at the audience. Basically, Interstellar, but with more Goombas and fewer existential crises.

Cast & crew

Returning after the first entry in the series are Chris Pratt as Mario, Anya Taylor-Joy as Peach, Charlie Day as Luigi, Jack Black as Bowser, and Kevin Michael Richardson as Kamek.

Directing duties once again are filled by the duo of Aaron Horvath and Michael Jelenic, along with Matthew Fogel, who is back on script duty. Illumination is producing with Nintendo. The first Mario movie grossed over $1.3 billion worldwide, which clearly prompted a "don’t fix what isn’t broken" mindset from the studio and Japanese video game giant.

What it means for the franchise

What sets this film apart from the first one, is not just the fact that our hero is going to space, but that the film team is finally ready to move on from what was safe in the first movie: Mushroom Kingdom nostalgia everywhere, classic tunes, anda few fan-service jokes. This one is bigger; If they craft the world anything like the Super Mario Galaxy games, expect gravity flips, floating platforms, and moments where you’ll think “wait, how is he even standing?”

This foray seems to be the next in a line of a potential larger franchise which will introduce more characters, more locations and most of all - more spectacle. This is all, of course, dependant on Illumination's ability to pull off stellar visuals and a fantastic landscape. Who knows? Kids might get the closest thing to actually playing a Super Mario game without breaking a controller.