Again, I liked this film for a decent part and while I'm not a fan of the whole "kids movies need to be no longer than around 90 minutes" shtick, the length felt appropriate here.

It's not brilliant, but I also don't see it as a pure exercise in corporatism either, and if you're a Mario fan who wanted to see the Mushroom Kingdom come to life as close to the games as possible while also delivering a fun rid, this will be your jam.

a-ha's "Take on Me" during the intro scene to the Kong Kingdom and I'm like... why is this here.

The final scene before the credits is accompanied with "Mr. Blue Sky", again... not a song I hate, but one that has become so prominent in pop culture recently it's pedestrian.

Same for "Holding Out For A Hero" during Mario's training montage and "Thunderstruck" during the Kart select bit.

It's pedestrian and it drags the movie down the most for me.

The use of popular tracks stops being good right after No Sleep Til Brooklyn - which actually fits the scene for a change - but then we move right into "ironic use of Bizet" which in my book was played out by the 2000s.

From here on out, every montage is underlaid with a pop song and the choices are so pedestrian it hurts, even though I like most of these songs.

And it's not even like... cover songs. It's the originals. There's a Bates/Kondo remix of a DK track that's been replace with...

Tyler Bates did a great job with the actual soundtrack, so I'm not going to muse on that, but what really annoyed me was the pop music needledrops.

Holy, they suck and are unnecessary, but apparently this is what Illumination just... DOES? I'm not familiar with their catalogue beyond knowing they exist (this is the first movie of theirs I ever saw, so...)

Apparently Bates and Kondo had made music for the scenes where they occur but some exec decided to just... not use them?

But let's be real, the show-stopper as far as the VAs go was Jack Black as Bowser.

He goes from goofy to menacing and is able to portray Bowser really well in both instances and having him sing that goofy-ass song showed they utilized their Jack Black to the fullest.

Like, why wouldn't you get the guy who is known to be funny AND a legit musician not be funny on occasion and sing?

But the music is another subject altogether and boy oh boy this is where the movie dipped for me.