SNL's Dystopian Mario Kart Trailer Starring Pedro Pascal Is One Of Their Best Sketches Of The Last Several Years

Matt Fitzgerald2/05/2023 7:30 PM

As if he's already not cool enough as the titular galactic gunslinger in The Mandalorian, Pedro Pascal is also anchoring the universally acclaimed HBO series The Last of Us and finding time to be an absolute delight on Saturday Night Live.

I know the popular take is to shit on SNL these days, but even the most hardline "I REMEMBER THE GOOD OLE DAYS" critics have to admit that this Mario Kart trailer is laugh-out-loud funny. It's a clear spoof of the backdrop for The Last of Us, yet it also weaves in some other awesome influences, or so I think. Kenan Thompson gripping the wheel with a lifetime of rage in his eyes as Bowser while a voiceover plays gave me low-key Sin City vibes.

The way that they tie in the "fungus" bit of The Last of Us' storyline with some of the fantastical elements of Mario Kart is nothing short of genius. Pascal's line delivery as Mario is both hilarious and also a subtle dig at the controversy surrounding The Super Mario Bros Movie, wherein Chris Pratt leads the all-star voice cast.

I don't know how they managed to throw together a video with this caliber of production quality in such a short amount of time. Maybe I don't pay attention to SNL enough, but this was so well-shot, well-executed, and they even had to do multiple chase/action scenes in go-karts. Couldn't have been easy at all on such a tight turnaround. However, this seems like one of those lightning-strike ideas when Pascal's appearance is in the pipeline, The Last of Us is taking the streaming world by storm, and you're gearing up for this well in advance. In any event, I'm blown away.

My absolute favorite bit: Toad is on his kart and Bowser shoots a shell at him. Mario says, "YOU CAN DODGE IT!" Toad replies with a longing sadness as he spreads out his arms, waiting for his inevitable demise, "No. It's red."

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A close second is when Mario explains how when karts crash, "some guy in a cloud comes and uses a fishing pole to put you back on the road."

Liiiiike…this is an instant classic. You can't tell me otherwise. Fuck the new Super Mario Bros flick. Give me like a 90-minute version of this. It sounds like one of those "so bad it's good" ideas a la The Lego Movie or something. Get some of the SNL writers and Lord and Miller on this shit.

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I should probably get on watching The Last of Us, but I've enjoyed the first three episodes of Apple TV+'s Shrinking so much that I legit watched them twice all the way through. It's not that much of a commitment, and hey, I wrote about it here and the co-creator Bill Lawrence retweeted it, which was pretty dope NGL:

What other movie parody sketches from SNL have I enjoyed in recent years, you ask? Well, David Harbour's spin on Joker was amazing, as was Adam Driver's Undercover Boss turn as Kylo Ren. Also basically anything Ryan Gosling has done. Drop some more in the comments and check out the latest Last of Us breakdown from Robbie Fox and Clem on My Mom's Basement as well. Good time to do it with the next episode premiering tonight!