Blog | Zenkaikon, A Philadelphia Area Anime Convention

Late on Friday night of Zenkaikon V, video game fans and panelists Tony, Elise, and Christian presented their thoroughly entertaining panel entitled “AHHH! Video Game Cartoons!” The panel was designed to display the horrors that Nintendo inflicted on the impressionable youth who spent their childhood in the late 1980s and early 1990s, namely: cartoons based off of their (soon-to-be-not-so-)favorite video game characters.

In between the three video game cartoon episodes broadcast by the trio, a series of contests were held, much to the amusement of audience members as well as the panelists and contestants themselves. For example, one particular contest challenged a contestant to pose as a video game character for the duration of the first animated feature; whoever managed to do this the longest won a prize (“from Wal-Mart,” a panelist noted). The two other contests were straight trivia challenges, testing the knowledge of the contestants until only one was left standing; those lucky winners were happy to wave their winnings in the faces of their former competitors (“winnings” included candy, a DVD copy of the “Super Mario Bros.” movie, and posters).

The above paragraph detailed the lighthearted moments of the panel. The dark, horrific part (which was, of course, no fault of the panelists) lay encoded in a series of DVDs in their possession: cartoons inspired by popular video games of the time.

I will admit that, as a youngster, I would race through homework in record time (though not always record accuracy) in order to plop myself down on the floor of my parents’ living room by 4PM. The giant Magnavox TV set that acted as one of my parents’ bulkier pieces of furniture well into the twilight years of the 20th century would entertain (term used VERY loosely) my younger sisters and I for the next hour with such fare as “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles” (we’re talking the 1987 series here, not the current mess that features eyeball-lacking turtles with sharp edges), “The Adventures of Captain N,” and, of course, “The Super Mario Bros. Super Show!” For the first time since that period of time, my eyes were subject to those relics.

The first screening was an episode of “The Legend of Zelda” (this was quite appropriate, as it was a Friday; back in the days of “The Super Mario Bros. Super Show!,” each Friday featured a “Zelda” cartoon, whereas the other weekdays were reserved for animated episodes featuring Mario, Luigi, and company). Entitled “The Moblins Are Revolting,” it followed common enemies from “The Legend of Zelda” becoming fed up with their fearless, ugly leader Ganon. Trapping him in an invincible bubble, they form the “Brotherhood of Underworld Monsters” and attempt to capture Link and Zelda. Their efforts, of course, are fruitless; they instead wind up inadvertently defeating each other. Our pointy-eared heroes make their way to Death Mountain, where they attempt to secure the Triforce of Power (“now we’ll have BOTH Triforces!,” the mathematically-challenged Zelda exclaims), but instead wind up proving themselves just as incompetent as Ganon’s underlings. This could very well be by “Zelda” sequels continued long after the game’s 1986 release date. Ganon of course escapes, recaptures his traitorous underlings, and makes them clean his semi-destroyed castle with their tongues. I personally would have opted for standard cleaning supplies, as I’m sure a Moblin tongue won’t do much to seal a cracked wall, but I suppose such things are in short supply in Hyrule.

Next up was an episode of “The Adventures of Captain N.” Captain N, forever trapped in video game world amongst a sea of Nintendo-licensed characters, receives the company of Gameboy, a son of whatever king is in charge of his planet (said king has a ton of biological problems if his reproductive system is churning out dot matrix video game consoles). Possessing a smiley face (something I don’t remember the *real* Game Boy doing; my personal one possessed a creamed-spinach-colored version of “Tetris”), he basically destroys the living quarters of Captain N, Simon Belmont, Mega Man, and others. Eventually, Mother Brain (of “Metroid” fame) has Gameboy kidnapped and reprograms him to send our heroes to the game world of “Burger Time,” where they are to be defeated. I swear that I am not making up one iota of this plot point. Of course, the plans go awry, Mother Brain is defeated until this exact same time next week, and Gameboy joins the squadron.

Finally, everyone’s favorite mustachioed plumber (and his brother Mario) surfaces in an episode of “Super Mario World.” Saving the worst for last, the panelists claim that, aside from this particular episode’s exceptionally annoying musical number, the downfall of the “Super Mario World” series can be traced directly to Yoshi’s voice. “Yoshi should never have talked, and you’ll see why,” they explain. The episode, entitled “Fire Sale,” finds popular “Koopaling” Wendy O. Koopa kidnapping a special fire plant to keep her warm in the ice world. The fact that “Super Mario World” did not even HAVE an ice world was lost on the writers; “Super Mario Bros. 3″ DID have an ice world, which was NOT guarded by Wendy O. Koopa. Logistics aside (to an exponential degree, of course), Yoshi must overcome his fear of water (another aspect that is not present in the source material) to rescue the fire plant. The inevitable happy ending ensues, with the fire plant actually saying to Yoshi “you can light my fire anytime.” I assume the infamous TV episode rating of this particular installment was at least a Y7, based on that line alone.

Despite my condescending reviews of animated Nintendo commercials that haven’t seen airtime since the 1990s, I still enjoyed wallowing in the nostalgia they helped to forge and, of course, the panel itself. With five years of panel hosting experience at such conventions as MangaNEXT and, of course, Zenkaikon, Tony, Keith, and Christian also host “The Super Mario Bros. Super Panel.”