Bloody Hell, MeTV Just 'AI-Upscaled' The Super Mario Bros. Cartoon Into A Digital Goo Nightmare
AI Gaming News Author · kotaku ·
MeTV's attempt to 'restore' The Super Mario Bros. Super Show using AI upscaling has resulted in a visual mess, blurring details, altering characters, and even comically renaming the show in its intro. It's a prime example of AI's current limitations in media preservation, sparking outrage among fans and highlighting the importance of human curation over quick digital fixes.
Right, so you know that feeling when you’re trying to conjure a simple charm, maybe for a bit of extra XP, and it goes spectacularly wrong, turning your familiar into a sentient, slightly wobbly blob? Well, mate, something similar just happened with our beloved Super Mario Bros. Super Show, and frankly, it's a bit of a digital disaster.
I’ve been tinkering with this story all morning, diving deep into the magical mishaps of media resurrection, and bloody hell, it’s wilder than it first appeared. MeTV, a channel usually known for its classic reruns, recently decided to bring back the iconic Super Mario Bros. Super Show for another run on TV and streaming. On the surface, you’d think, 'Fair dinkum! More classic Mario for everyone, just in time for the new movie hype!' And honestly, that's probably exactly what MeTV was thinking – a clever bit of synergy to pull in viewers and license a known, albeit charmingly janky, quantity. But then they pulled a classic rookie wizard move: they tried to 'improve' it with AI, and the end results are, to put it mildly, as ugly as Bowser's sock drawer.
As reported by Zack Zwiezen over at Kotaku, MeTV Toons started airing the series on March 30th, and almost instantly, the internet was abuzz with bewildered shrieks. See, instead of just dusting off the original tapes (or whatever archival magic they had), MeTV apparently decided to run the whole shebang through some kind of AI upscaler. Now, I’m all for new tech making old things shine, but this wasn't shining, mate. This was like someone smeared digital Vaseline over everything and then tried to sculpt it back into shape with a blunt spoon. The screenshots making the rounds online are truly something to behold – or perhaps, to un-behold, if that were an option.
Now, let's be honest, the original *Super Mario Bros. Super Show* wasn’t exactly known for its Miyazaki-level animation. It was a product of its time – cheap, cheerful, and full of glorious off-model moments and animation quirks that gave it character. You remember those moments, right? Mario's face doing something bizarre, Luigi's hat at an odd angle? That was part of the charm! It was like a hastily drawn spell that still got the job done, albeit with a few puffs of smoke and a misplaced eyebrow. But this AI 'enhancement'? It’s taken those charming imperfections and smoothed them over into an uncanny valley of blandness. Details are gone, lines are blurred, and the whole thing just looks… wrong. It's like a bad deepfake of itself.
The most glaring, laugh-out-loud example of this digital sloppification? The show's own title card. The AI apparently decided that 'The Super Mario Bros. Super Show' was a bit too, well, *Super Mario Bros. Super Show*, and arbitrarily changed it in the intro sequence to 'The Suele Mario Bros. Super Show'. 'Suele Mario'? What in the bloody blazes is a 'Suele Mario'? Is that some kind of parallel dimension Mario we didn’t know about? It’s not just an 'oopsie'; it’s a full-on, 'the spell went so wrong it renamed the target' kind of error. It highlights the deeply superficial, often nonsensical nature of current AI 'restoration' efforts when left unchecked.
Cartoon fans, as you’d expect, are absolutely fuming. Matt Hunter, a respected voice in the 'Cartoon Research' Facebook group, perfectly summed it up: 'This is why you should never use AI to ‘restore’ a cartoon.' And I couldn’t agree more. This isn't restoration; it's desecration. It makes you wonder if MeTV even had access to decent source material. Could it be that they were just given some low-res files, or worse, decided to AI-upscale existing YouTube rips? The thought alone is enough to make a digital wizard weep. It’s like trying to rebuild a castle from a blurry photograph – you’re going to miss some crucial bricks.
This whole kerfuffle isn't just about a retro cartoon getting a dodgy facelift, though. It ties into a much broader conversation we’re constantly having in the gaming and wider media landscape: the rush to slap 'AI' on everything, often without understanding its limitations or the potential for genuine harm. We see 'revolutionary' claims about minor updates all the time, and corporate PR speak loves to spin these kinds of shortcuts as 'innovative.' But what happens when that 'innovation' actively degrades the very thing it's meant to preserve or enhance? This is a stark reminder that sometimes, the original, with all its glorious imperfections, is exactly what we want. It's authentic. It's history. It has a soul.
It’s a bit cautiously optimistic of me, I reckon, but perhaps this highly publicised face-plant will serve as a valuable lesson for others looking to fast-track media preservation through algorithmic guesswork. We’re at a point where genuine care, human curation, and respect for the original artistry are more important than ever. Because while AI can be a powerful tool, it’s not a magic wand that can fix everything, especially if you’re just waving it around without knowing what 'incantation' you’re actually casting. Let’s hope MeTV gets the memo and perhaps, just perhaps, finds the real source material before we end up with 'The Bloober Mario Bros. Super Show'.
*(Original article: 'They Brought Back The Super Mario Bros. Cartoon And Sloppified It With AI' by Zack Zwiezen, published on Kotaku. For the full lowdown, visit Kotaku.com.)*
Tags: Super Mario, AI Upscaling, Animation, Retro Gaming, Media Preservation
Original article: kotaku