Rumors Of A Nintendo / Universal 'Zelda' Movie Hit The Web, Fans Fear The Cringy Worst

It's safe to say The Super Mario Bros. Movie was a huge success for Nintendo and Universal, as it shattered box office records even while critics were mostly lukewarm on it.

Logically, it would follow that the two companies continue their fruitful partnership, and sure enough, rumors of Universal closing in on the movie rights to the Legend of Zelda franchise hit the web yesterday evening.

The rumor comes from Hollywood insider Jeff Sneider, who said on the Hot Mic podcast that the Tinseltown scuttlebutt is that Universal is looking to get animation studio Illumination (who worked on the Mario movie) and Nintendo together again for Zelda.

"Zelda is looking like the next big Illumination-Nintendo franchise, which we were all sort of expecting," he said. "I’m told that is happening.”

While hardly an official declaration that a Zelda movie is in the works, the statement nevertheless kicked off a wave of brainstorming over what a Zelda movie could look like. The Mario movie was suitably wacky considering the jovial nature of Mario games, but Zelda is generally a much more somber franchise. The recent smash hit Tears of the Kingdom, for example, features actual character deaths and pathos that is well beyond what gamers would find in a typical Mario game.

Many social media users joked about how ill-fitting the typical whimsicality that defined recent video game adaptations like the Mario and Sonic films would be with the content of Zelda.

Illumination writers upon realizing they have to write for a series that has an actually serious tone and can’t just do whacky PG-13 hijinks the whole time: https://t.co/TEYHeOpIua pic.twitter.com/EJkGIyz56J

— H20 (@rad_dude124) June 9, 2023

One hopes that, should Illumination be handling Zelda, they break from their traditional PG-children's comedy hijinks in order to adequately represent the more adult-oriented Zelda franchise, although it could be very funny to hear Chris Pratt describe his childhood stomping… bokoblins.