Supper Mario Broth: Special Zone, Issue 19 (Patreon)

Welcome, everyone, to the 19th issue of Supper Mario Broth: Special Zone.  

Today, I will take a look at a few Mario manga that include a section where all of a Mario game's enemies are drawn together as a reference guide.

Manga Enemy Glossary Pages

Most Mario manga follows what is known as a "4koma" format; a Japanese term that is best translated as "four-panel gag". In four panels arranged vertically, a joke is set up and delivered, without any continuity to previous or following sets of four panels. These usually come in two varieties: telling a generic joke that would work with many characters, but using characters from a specific Mario game to do it, like here:

Here, the joke of smaller characters wanting to play with a larger character but the larger character not being of the correct size for the activities to turn out correctly has nothing to do with Super Mario World or Yoshis specifically, but the characters are used as this joke is something their personalities/sizes fit for.

The other variety is closer to contemporary Internet video game comic humor in that it takes in-game situations and applies real-world physics or logic to them, which is done to underscore the absurdity of the game world or to make the reader imagine a game world in which the logic was closer to the real world:

Here, the duel glove item from Mario Party 2 is suddenly subject to real world physics, accidentally hitting more than one person, resulting in Luigi being forced to duel all of them at once.

These manga have in common that there is no continuity and no attempt to cover as much material from the base game as possible. Thus, almost no backstory or appearances by obscure game elements can be expected.

On the other hand are the rarer "adventure" manga. These attempt to tell a story set in the game's world that both explains events from the game and expands on them. They often include dramatic scenes like this:

In this Super Mario 64 manga, Mario fights Bowser in Rainbow Ride (here, he just threw Bowser into the Big House in the Sky), which doesn't happen in the game, in addition to characters like Luigi, Yoshi, Eyerok and Dorrie (on the airship) being present. The game uses in-game elements to tell a more elaborate version of the events compared to what is seen in the actual game.

In these manga, sometimes there are pages near the beginning that introduce all characters (which in the case of Mario games are mostly enemies). What makes these particularly interesting is that due to covering all of the game's enemies, these are often one of the very few cases of obscure enemies appearing in any kind of media outside the base game at all. 

Here, I will showcase all of these pages I have access to. The book name and ISBN are on the bottom left of each image. Due to the size, you may want to right-click the images and select "open image in new tab" or the equivalent for your browser or device in order to be able to see the small details.

We will start with the 5-part Super Mario 64 adventure manga. Three of them include a two-page spread at the beginning of the book, showing the relevant characters. This is the first:

Here, characters from all courses up to Cool, Cool Mountain are included. This is a rare instance of a Bomp receiving artwork (the wall segments that move out to push Mario off the ledge in Whomp's Fortress, middle of the right edge). Note also that due to the art style, the Goomba looks uncannily like the spin-susceptible Goomba variation from Super Mario Galaxy, which came out 11 years after this manga:

In the second issue, we see characters from courses up to Dire, Dire Docks:

Reader Platitudinous has informed me that the two characters in the lower right of the first page are Ai Iiyama, an actress with an early history in adult video, and Mamiya Rinzō, an explorer of the Edo period. The significance of the characters to the manga is likely some play on words.

Here, we see rarely-drawn haunted book enemies (called Bookends) from Big Boo's Haunt, as well as what is to my knowledge the only instance of a Super Mario 64 Swooper/Swoop being drawn anywhere (top right on the left page, very stylized). Note how the Big Boo is drawn very blocky due to the artist making fun of the low polygon count of some of the enemies in the game.

The rest of the characters appear in the third issue:

Here, the Fwoosh cloud enemy, the Chill Bully, and the Super Mario 64 Moneybags design are enemies not drawn much in any capacity elsewhere.  

This is the enemy spread from a 1993 Super Mario Bros. 2 manga. The reason it was released so late is, as you doubtlessly know, the international Super Mario Bros. 2 is known as Super Mario USA in Japan and is not the original Japanese Super Mario Bros. 2, which is known internationally as The Lost Levels. Due to Super Mario Bros. 2 needing to be re-imported into Japan, it came out much later there, in 1992 - two years after the release of the next generation and less than a year before its remake in Super Mario All-Stars.

Here, the designs are much more in line with official art of the enemies, however, of note are the eyelashes on the Panser (flower enemy that shoots projectiles, bottom left). Here is what Panser official art looks like, from the NES manual of the game:

As you can see, there are no eyelashes here. But comparing it to artwork from the original Doki Doki Panic shows:

The artist actually modeled the manga design on the Doki Doki Panic design instead of on the SMB2 design, which is a very peculiar decision given how all other enemies whose designs changed between the games are depicted in their SMB2 designs.

Next up, Yoshi's Island enemies:

Again, some very obscure characters are drawn here, such as Muddy Buddy (first page, right edge, above the Lantern Ghost), who appears only in a side area of a single level, 5-4. There is also Barney Bubble (first page, diagonally left of the Crazee Dayzee), who is for some reason depicted as lumpy. On the second page, the Little Mouser without a skull mask is shown wearing shades, which I personally believe was a sprite misinterpretation on part of the artist:

Although we now know this is a thief mask, it is possible to interpret it as sunglasses , as well.

Here are enemies from Yoshi's Story:

These are again drawn more off-model, due to official art of them being present only as 3D renders and those not being easily transferable to the regular manga style. Of interest is one particular character that is completely different from the game: the Power Bee (to the right of the Fuzzy Wiggler on the second page). I have actually made a separate post about this on my Twitter account in the past, but it merits comparing them again:

As you can see, the original Power Bee is a vaguely anthropomorphic insect in the vein of Chameleon Twist/Bomberman characters in terms of design; however, the manga Power Bee is a traditional fairy that is basically a human with wings and antennae. The reason for this is unknown.

The Fuzzy Wiggler next to the Power Bee is also very off-model due to being angry; while the in-game Fuzzy Wiggler is one of the few variations of the Wiggler that never get angry, instead simply changing color when stomped but otherwise not reacting. 

Finally, in the upper right corner is a Slug, standing up (insofar as a legless creature can be said to stand; it is oriented with the underside of its body visible), which they do not do in-game. Compare the official artwork:

The manga gives it a mouth and visible eyestalks, making it resemble an actual slug more.

Here are the enemies from a Super Mario Land manga:

The human characters in the lower left corner, the woman in tropical clothing to the top left of Mario, and the robot to the top right of Mario are original characters created just for this manga. Most of the enemies are drawn on-model to the guide/manual images, although some are more elaborate, such as Dragonzamasu (the seahorse boss) in the top right.

One of the most obscure enemies here is Ganchan, the rock being held by Hiyoihoi (the sunglasses-wearing Easter Island statue) on the second page. The in-game sprite for Ganchan does not show any eyes or signs of sentience, so guides must be consulted to learn that this enemy is alive in the first place and not just a rock projectile.

Here are the enemies from one of several Super Mario Land 2 manga:

Most of the enemies in that game would qualify as obscure by today's standards, having never reappeared in any other game, so by my estimate, at least twenty of the ones depicted here have never appeared anywhere else but on this page and in the Super Mario Perfect Encyclopedia, a 1994 book that provided official art for all of them.

Of particular interest is that the manga shows Genkottsu, the giant fist wearing brass knuckles from Wario's Castle, to be Wario's actual fist, and not a construct. The manga's story explains this as Wario temporarily growing giant when Mario passes through that room.

Also note that the Three Little Pigs have individual names here unlike in the English localization: they are called Buro, Bucho and Bupon. 

Finally, a look at the enemy spread from a Wario Land manga:

The same goes for this game, with the only other source of illustrations of these being the encyclopedia.

Interestingly, there is only one enemy that appears in both of these games. It is the fly enemy that flies away when Mario/Wario approach, however, for an unknown reason, it has different names and different official art in both games - despite sharing the exact same sprite and behavior. In Super Mario Land 2, it is called "B-Fly" (top left corner under the star in the previous image), while in Wario Land, it is called "Be" (top right corner, above the Thwomp-like "Pouncer" enemy). Note how the artwork looks different here, as well.

Also, the fruit in the top left corner may look like decoration (especially since it has no label), but it is also an enemy (or at least an obstacle) from the game. The encyclopedia calls it "Big" and it falls from trees in Course No. 26, near the SS Tea Cup. The dedication of the artist to include even these objects is noteworthy.

I hope this artwork was able to provide a unique view of these enemies.

This concludes today's issue. Thank you very much for reading.