5 Best Movies Based On Nintendo Games, Ranked

Video game movies are becoming more and more popular in recent years, and game publishing Titan Nintendo has finally caught onto that fact. Nintendo has sparingly made movies throughout the years, but its movie development cycle has increased its output immensely in the 2020s. While there are more to come, let’s look back on the five best movies based on Nintendo games so far.

For decades, video game movie and TV adaptations were almost surefire failures. Films like Resident Evil, House of the Dead, Mortal Kombat: Annihilation, and more proved this time and time again. However, things started to improve in the late 2010s. 2019’s Detective Pikachu was hailed as the first great video game movie, and later movies and TV shows like the live-action Sonic the Hedgehog series and HBO’s The Last of Us proved that things were improving. Now, with The Super Mario Galaxy Movie and The Legend of Zelda movie on the way, Nintendo is projecting confidence that they, too, have cracked the video game code.

5) Super Mario Bros.

The live-action Super Mario Bros. movie being in the top five best Nintendo movies proves how bad things have been throughout the years. The film is a notoriously poor adaptation, turning the fun and colorful world of Super Mario into a gritty action movie. However, it isn’t as bad as people think.

In a world that has The Super Mario Bros. Movie, a less-faithful adaptation can now be appreciated. The gritty take on Mario and Luigi is pretty fun, showing a more adventurous and risky side of Nintendo that is rarely seen today.

4) Pokémon: The First Movie

Before the 2020s, the most successful Nintendo movies were the Pokémon movies. Out of them all, Pokémon: The First Movie is one of the best. The iconic film brings the anime series to a much grander scale, following Ash and the gang as they take on Mewtwo. It famously ends with a surprisingly emotional moment that still brings Pokémon fans to tears, and is one of the most well-remembered Pokémon stories to this day.

Pokémon: The First Movie started the long line of Pokémon animated films, with it being the first of 23. Although it does have some of the same problems as the original anime, it also has all of the show’s strengths. It is undoubtedly a great adaptation of its source material, helping to further shape the Pokémon world in the height of Pokemania.

3) Pokémon: The Movie 2000

While Pokémon: The First Movie is great, an even better Pokémon movie exists in the form of Pokémon: The Movie 2000. Taking place during the second season of the original Pokémon anime, the film tells the story of Ash and his friends getting beached on an island, where they hear the story of Moltres, Zapdos, and Articuno.

Pokémon: The Movie 2000 still carries over some of the issues with the first film and the anime, such as the cheap animation and stilted voice acting. However, it tells a slightly more complex story, making it more fun for fans of the franchise.

2) Detective Pikachu

Unsurprisingly, another Pokémon movie has made it into the top five Nintendo films. This time, however, it isn’t animated. 2019’s Detective Pikachu is one of the oddest Pokémon films. Based on the spinoff game of the same name, Detective Pikachu stars Justice Smith as the son of a missing detective who goes on an adventure with a talking Pikachu (voiced by Ryan Reynolds) to find out what happened to his father.

Detective Pikachu does a fantastic job translating the world of Pokémon into live-action. It features surprisingly great-looking realistic Pokémon, something that had many fans worried in the lead-up to the film’s release. The movie also provides a unique take on the typical Pokémon story, following a detective story in the big city rather than a trainer going on a Pokémon adventure.

1) The Super Mario Bros. Movie

It only makes sense for the best Nintendo movie to be part of the company’s most popular franchise, Super Mario Bros. The Super Mario Bros. Movie follows Mario and Luigi as they get sucked into the Mushroom Kingdom. Once there, Luigi is kidnapped by Bowser, forcing Mario to team up with Princess Peach, Toad, Donkey Kong, and more friends in order to rescue him.

Of all of the movies on this list, The Super Mario Bros. Movie is the most accurate to its original video games. The character designs and worlds are almost a one-to-one translation, creating a film that actually feels like a Nintendo game. With the exception of the near-constant pop songs, The Super Mario Bros. Movie manages to capture the spirit, humor, and fun of the games, and the upcoming sequel, The Super Mario Galaxy Movie, looks like it will do so again.

Which Nintendo movie do you think is best? Leave a comment below and join the conversation now in the ComicBook Forum!

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