Toad (species)
- This article is about the species. For the major character, see Toad. For other uses, see Toad (disambiguation).
- Not to be confused with Toady.
- “Thank you Mario! But our princess is in another castle!”
- —Toad, Super Mario Bros.
Toads, formerly known as the Mushroom People[2] (singular: Mushroom person or mushroom person) or simply Mushrooms,[3] are a peaceful race of mushroom-like, humanoid characters and the dominant species of the Mushroom Kingdom. Toads reside in many towns and cities throughout the entire kingdom and have a capital named after them called Toad Town. Most Toads are citizens of the Mushroom Kingdom, and many also work as loyal servants of the kingdom's ruler Princess Peach.
First appearing in Super Mario Bros., the Toads have continued to make appearances throughout the Super Mario franchise. Typically, they play the role as supporting characters who assist Mario and/or Luigi on their adventures. However, several Toads have also played starring roles on some titles, such as being playable heroes alongside Mario and Luigi in New Super Mario Bros. Wii and New Super Mario Bros. U. Captain Toad, who first appeared in Super Mario Galaxy and reappears in its Nintendo Switch port, stars in Captain Toad: Treasure Tracker, initially released for Wii U in 2014 and later released for Nintendo Switch and Nintendo 3DS in 2018.
The most recognizable member of the species is the character known as Toad, who is typically depicted as Peach's loyal servant; regardless, Toad has also adventured directly alongside Mario on several adventures since his debut in Super Mario Bros. 2. The character continues to appear as a playable representative for the species in various spin-offs in addition to his own starring roles in 1994's Wario's Woods and 1995's Kinopio Live. Other Toads such as Toadette, Toadsworth, and the Toad Brigade organization also make prominent appearances throughout the series. Members of this species other than the aforementioned main Toad character may also be referred to as simply "Toad" without the use of an indefinite article, one such instance being found in a video by Nintendo of America, where this name is used to refer to the Oarsman in Paper Mario: The Origami King.[4]
General information[edit]
Physical appearance[edit]
Toads are fairly short, humanoid mushroom creatures with human skin tones. Possessing the appearance of young human children, Toads are among the smaller races of Mushroom Kingdom. They have dark and beady eyes (which occasionally turn white whenever they are shocked starting in the Nintendo Switch 2 era) while they also possess stubby feet and typically possess no visible legs, although occasionally, some Toads may be depicted with visible legs, including in Super Mario Bros. 3, Excitebike: Bun Bun Mario Battle Stadium, and the Save Data Toad in Mario Party's village. Their most recognizable trait is their large mushroom caps and small bodies. Typically, Toads either have white caps with red, blue, green, yellow or purple spots. However, some games also introduced Toads with caps of inverse colors such as red, blue, green or pink caps with white spots or light brown caps with dark brown spots (in the case of Toadsworth). Although the Toad species resemble humanoid fungi, they may[5] or may not[6] actually be mushrooms.
According to two 2014 interviews with Koichi Hayashida and Shigeru Miyamoto, Toads were initially designed without specific genders in mind.[6][7] Many typical male Toads do not appear to have hair. However, many female Toads appear to grow hair under their caps as do some male Toads. Male Toads are shown to be able to grow facial hair. While Toads generally have no noses or ears, The Super Mario Bros. Super Show has some Toads with even more human-like appearances. The Starshade Bros. are also Toads that have prominent noses and visible ears.
Clothing[edit]
Toads generally wear simplistic clothing in the case of males, wearing vests that typically reflect off the color of the spots on their mushroom caps; these also reveal a portion of their chest. Some female Toads are shown to also sport vests (such as Toadette), but they also wear long dress-like shirts. However, in some games, such as Super Princess Peach and Super Mario Odyssey, red-capped Toads are depicted with said colored spots and wearing blue vests, making them appear identical to Toad himself. In Super Mario Galaxy, most red Toads (including the Toad Brigade captain) wear red vests, but in the introduction, Princess Peach is attended by two blue-vested red Toads (who also wear starry capes); blue-vested red Toads also appear in the opening storybook scenes. The Paper Mario games since Paper Mario: Sticker Star have multiple red Toads that wear either red or blue vests. However, some games, such as Mario Tennis Aces and Mario Kart 8, have made attempts to differentiate the Toads from the playable character Toad by making the only Toads with purple/blue/yellow/red/green spots with the matching vests. This also applies in The Super Mario Bros. Movie, where Toad himself is the only Toad that has red spots while wearing a blue vest, unlike the other Toad species in the movie that wear vests matching the colors of their spots, including red.
Toads also sport tall, white, underwear-like or Arabian-like pants (with ridges on the top visible below their open chest) that resemble the base of a mushroom or toadstool stalk, and in the Japanese box art for Super Mario Bros., these pants are low enough to show their belly button. Most Toads also sport common brown-colored footwear. Dryites from Paper Mario prove that some Toads possess different wardrobes based on the area they come from. These Toads wear tagelmusts and desert clothing while also possessing tanned skin.
Mushroom caps[edit]
All Toads have special mushroom caps on the top of their heads, just like actual mushrooms. Shinya Hiratake, the director of Captain Toad: Treasure Tracker, likened the shape of "Captain Toad's mushroom head" to a turban.[8]
According to Yoshiaki Koizumi, the producer of Super Mario Odyssey, a Toad's mushroom cap is not a hat, but a part of the Toad's head.[9] This is reflected in Mario Kart Tour, where Toad characters who do not wear something on their cap cannot win challenges involving characters wearing hats. In Super Mario Bros. Wonder, a loading screen tip (as well as an official Japanese news article) corroborates that Toads' caps "are their heads–not big hats";[10][11] when Blue Toad, Yellow Toad, and Toadette use the Parachute Cap badge, they do not use their caps as parachutes, instead pulling out fabric caps like Mario's and Luigi's.[12]
In The Super Mario Bros. Super Show! and The Adventures of Super Mario Bros. 3, the cap can safely be removed, suggesting that it is a hat; under Toad's cap is a round head with a few strands of hair. An unused design of a Toad conductor in Paper Mario depicts their hat (which itself is too small to house a mushroom cap) briefly coming off, revealing what could be a bald, capless head.[13] The description of the Anatomical Enigma treasure in Hey! Pikmin, which depicts a Toad amiibo, references the cap's visual ambiguity between a hat and a body part.
In Mario Strikers Charged, a Toad's skeleton is briefly seen when they are shocked, showing their cap is not a part of their skull. When Toads are hit, they seem to drop spores (as seen in Mario Tennis and the Super Smash Bros. series). Indeed, the Chancellor of Mushroom Kingdom claims to have "almost dropped [his] spores" after hearing Exor crash into Bowser's Keep in Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars. In Mario & Luigi: Brothership, a Toad left stranded during the sidequest The Left-Behind Toad complains about their cap drying out in the sun. Various Toads are also shown to have hair hanging down from underneath their caps, such as Toadofsky and Jolene, or even from the cap itself, such as the Excess Express waitress. Super Mario Run and Super Mario Odyssey both depict Toads wearing headphones on their caps, implying they can hear through them.
While most Toads have white mushroom caps with different colored spots, there are exceptions. Toadette has a pink-colored mushroom cap with white spots (another example being Toadiko), and Toadsworth has a yellowish-colored mushroom cap with brown spots. Some Toads even have caps that are an inverted version of the regular caps, like Toadbert, who has a blue cap with white spots. In New Super Mario Bros. Wii, the color of a Toad's cap can change via power-ups such as the Fire Flower, where Fire Yellow Toad's cap turns yellow with red spots, resembling that of a Mega Mushroom, and Fire Blue Toad's turns blue with red spots. Furthermore, some Toads have other shapes on their caps, such as the yellow stars on Dr. Toadley's cap; additionally, the Excess Express waitress and Vanna T. have hearts on their caps, while the Excess Express engineer has a much smaller cap without a mushroom shape at all.
Color variations[edit]
This section needs film improvement. Specifically:
- Many more variations from Super Mario Bros.: Peach-hime Kyūshutsu Dai Sakusen! are not listed
Toads come in many different colors. The following is a list of Toad colors and their first appearances.
| Image | Cap | Pattern | First appearance |
|---|---|---|---|
|
White | Red spots | Super Mario Bros. |
|
Pink | White spots | Super Mario Bros.: Peach-hime Kyūshutsu Dai Sakusen! |
|
Purple | Yellow stars | Super Mario Bros.: Peach-hime Kyūshutsu Dai Sakusen! |
|
White | Blue spots | Super Mario Bros. 2 (in-game) |
|
White | Cyan spots | The Super Mario Bros. Super Show! |
|
White | Pink spots | The Super Mario Bros. Super Show! |
|
Green | Brown spots | The Super Mario Bros. Super Show! |
|
Orange | Blue spots | The Super Mario Bros. Super Show! |
|
White | Yellow spots | The Super Mario Bros. Super Show! (as Mermushrooms) |
|
White | Purple spots | The Adventures of Super Mario Bros. 3 |
|
Orange | Red spots | Super Mario Bros. (Valiant Comics) |
|
White | No spot | Super Mario Bros. (Valiant Comics) |
|
Cyan | Red & white taijitu | Super Mario Adventures |
|
White | Green spots | Wario's Woods |
|
White | Brown spots | Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars |
|
White | Red diamonds | Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars |
|
White | Blue stripes | Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars |
|
White | Red stripes | Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars |
|
White | Pink stripes | Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars |
|
White | Purple stripes | Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars |
|
White | Yellow stripes | Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars |
|
White | Gray stripes | Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars |
|
Black | Red flames | Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars |
|
Red | White spots | Mario Party |
|
Green | White spots | Mario Party |
|
Yellow | White spots | Mario Party |
|
Gray | Yellow star spots | Mario Party |
|
White | Mint spots | Mario Party 2 |
|
Purple | Mint spots | Mario Party 3 |
|
Black | Yellow spots | Paper Mario |
|
Black | White spots | Paper Mario |
|
Dark gray | Dark red spots | Paper Mario |
|
Dark gray | Black spots | Paper Mario |
|
Dark gray | Dark green spots | Paper Mario |
|
Dark gray | Dark yellow spots | Paper Mario |
|
White | Red hearts | Paper Mario |
|
Beige | Brown spots | Super Mario Sunshine |
|
White | Red stars | Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga |
|
White | Green stars | Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga |
|
White | Orange spots | Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door |
|
Blue | White spots | Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door |
|
Blue-ish gray | Yellow spots | Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door |
|
Purple | White spots | Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door |
|
Black | Red spots | Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door |
|
Black | Blue spots | Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door |
|
White | Pink hearts | Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door |
|
Red | Brown spots | Mario & Luigi: Partners in Time |
|
Green | Pink spots | New Nintendo 3DS "Kisekae Plate" covers |
|
White | White spots | Paper Mario: The Origami King |
Personalities[edit]
- “Going to my happy place...Trying not to panic...”
- —Toad, Super Mario Galaxy
Toads, in general, are very loyal to Princess Peach and the Mushroom Kingdom, but tend to panic in dangerous situations. For example, during Bowser's attack on Peach's Castle in Super Mario Galaxy, many Toads begin to panic, mindlessly running around in circles and occasionally tripping, only to resume mindlessly running around in circles. Also, during the events of Mario & Luigi: Bowser's Inside Story, in the conference held by Princess Peach, a Toad suggests that the entire kingdom should "panic".
It is often due to their cowardice that many Toads are relatively non-violent; that notwithstanding, they may fight if it is by all means for self-defense. However, they seem to prefer running away and cowering before their foes. There are other Toads who develop tough natures, such as those who live in Rogueport, or adventurous natures, such as the Toad Brigade.
However, at most times, they are generally peaceful characters who are happy to assist the heroes. The Super Smash Bros. Brawl trophy for Toad even mentions the aspect of Toads "giving off a strong sense of peace". They are usually characters who remain on the good side in the games as well. At the more peaceful of times, Toads are generally seen as cheerful characters who often have almost childish personalities.
Powers and abilities[edit]
While the Toads are often shown to be fleeing at the first sign of danger during the games, some situations prove that they are more than capable of protecting themselves during battle. In Super Mario Bros. 2 (the first game that has a Toad as a playable character), Toad is revealed to be even stronger than the Mario brothers themselves and he is also shown to be very speedy as well. The Mario Baseball games also prove the strength of the playable Toads as they are shown to be considerably powerful, despite their size. The Mario soccer games also have the Toads being able to use powerful head butts as an offensive attack, a trait further emphasized in Luigi's Mansion: Dark Moon and Luigi's Mansion 3, where they are shown to be quite durable, capable of surviving a throw into walls or breakable objects (often head-first) without sustaining any injuries. Additionally, the Toads are capable of performing a fiery and powerful skillshot known as the Fire Meteor in Mario Strikers Charged. In Mario Sports Mix, Toad's strongest stat was his speed while his power and technique stats were slightly below average. Additionally, Toad is capable of using his spores to creating a reflective shield as well as gargantuan mushrooms that Toad is capable of controlling to attack opponents for his special move. These attributes are also present for Toad's alternate colorations.
In New Super Mario Bros. Wii, the two playable Toads are shown to have stats that rival Mario and Luigi's own powers and abilities. The Toads are also capable of using the same power-ups (such as the Fire Flower) that are available to be used by the Mario brothers in order to gain new forms. The Toads are also shown to be skilled in riding Yoshis in this game as well. In Super Mario 3D Land, the three Toads that help Mario on his journey are shown to be just as capable as Mario himself when it comes to adventuring around the Mushroom Kingdom. They are also shown to be very speedy as they were capable of easily outrunning Mario throughout the game since the introduction. The three Toads and Toad himself are also capable of using various Power-Ups in this game such as the Propeller Box (which serves the same purpose as the block from New Super Mario Bros. Wii) and the Super Leaf (to become Tanooki Toads and fly alongside Mario during the ending of the game).
In the anime Super Mario Shirayuki-hime, the seven Toads are able to function similarly as Super Mushrooms as they are able to power up Mario after he has been weakened. However, this ability has not been shown in the actual games or any other portion of the Mario series after this OVA.
Toad guards[edit]
Toad guards serve as the protectors of the Mushroom Kingdom and Princess Peach. They typically wield spears and shields, their uniforms is a classic mantle. In Super Mario Galaxy these shields have Peach's symbol, her crown, emblazoned on the front. Like normal Toad citizens, Toad guards are not particularly brave, often asking Mario or other heroes to complete dangerous missions instead of doing so themselves. For example, when Bowser launches an attack on Peach's Castle during the centennial Star Festival, the Toad guards request Mario to protect the Princess, although that is the Toads' official duty as royal guards. One of Peach's bodyguards even hides behind Peach when Bowser hovers in front of her balcony.
Initially, the Toads' original names are referred to as mushroom retainers, which can mean that they are a specific group of Toad characters that help guard Princess Peach. They have appeared at the end of each world in Super Mario Bros., thanking Mario for saving them while informing him that Peach is still missing. Despite this early name, the term "mushroom retainer" has rarely been used since the original NES game, having only recurred in the video game series with the enhanced Game Boy Color port Super Mario Bros. Deluxe. "Mushroom retainer" is intended to be an early localized name for the Toads as a species, along with Mushroom People, which has been inserted in the digital manuals of Virtual Console re-releases. The name and role that goes with it does make an appearance in other early media; for example, the Nintendo Adventure Books and the Super Mario Bros. comics' introductory story "The Legend" describes Toad as the royal mushroom retainer. The more reserved Wooster holds a similar position in the series, but is instead called the "royal mushroom assistant" and (somewhat regretfully) directly serves the Mushroom King rather than the princess.
History[edit]
- Main article: History of the Toad species
The Toad species has appeared several times in Super Mario franchise since their debut in Super Mario Bros. Generic Toads most often appear as friendly non-playable characters or as spectators seen in the backgrounds of Mario Kart courses and other sports venues. Several named Toads appear as individual characters in series such as Paper Mario and Mario & Luigi. Some of them, such as the main Toad, Toadsworth, Captain Toad, and Toadette, would go on to become recurring characters in the franchise.