Rumor: Animation studio behind Despicable Me wants to make Mario movie

Illumination Entertainment and Universal Pictures appear to be negotiating with Nintendo to make a movie of Mario, the popular mascot of the Japanese video game company. Unlike the earlier Mario film from 1993, it is an animated film.

The rumor comes from The Wall Street Journal. The newspaper writes that publisher Universal Pictures is close to an agreement with Nintendo and the film is in an early stage of development. The companies have been negotiating for a year now.

The film was to be made by Illumination Entertainment. This studio has previously made the successful Despicable Me movies and spin-offs. Other successful animated films, such as The Secret Life of Pets and Sing, have also been developed by the studio.

Whether the rumor is completely reliable is not entirely certain. In 2015, The Wall Street Journal reported that a Netflix series of The Legend of Zelda was on the way. To date, however, nothing has been confirmed about that, making it unlikely that this series will appear again.

If the rumor is true, it wouldn’t be the first movie based on the Mario franchise. In 1993, the movie Super Mario Bros was released, which received bad reviews. Also, in the late 1980s, an animated series appeared on television, called The Super Mario Bros Super Show. Production on this series has been discontinued after a single season.