Club Mario



Tommy Treehugger and Co-M.C. were the hosts – two twenty-somethings pretending to be teenagers who owned a big-screen TV "satellite surfed" between extreme sports clips and wacky interviews and showed Mario cartoons in their radical apartment.

Their "satellite" looked like an upside-down Chinese parasol, whenever they wanted to "satellite surf", they would make a big deal of adjusting the thing and there was a weird lady with big hair who occasionally appeared on their TV between clips.

The segments were shot to replace the live-action Mario and Luigi (Captain Lou Albano and Danny Wells) when the show ran into further syndication, It’s likely that they were trying to win over the Saturday morning audience that was, at the time, consumed with Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and the like with all-new “hip” hosts. By adding wrap-arounds only, DiC could save money by creating a new “series” while using existing cartoons.

The show opened the same way we expected with a purple holographic screen and Mario's smiling head exclaimed, "Hey, paisanos! It's the Super Mario Bros. Super Show!" But electric guitars came in with a heavy drum beat, then the camera angles went screwy, at one point, the digitized voice says "M-M-M-M-Mario", but it sounds like he's saying "Wario" (funny, because this was years before there even was a Wario).

No Captain Lou dance at all, No sign of the famous plumbing shop and basement apartment, In fact, the only thing Mario-related on the set was a Mario doll. they could have turned the set into "Club" Anything it was about as generic you can get.

On Fridays, Co-M.C. was replaced by his brother, Evil Eric, who loved to cause mayhem and Tammy Treehugger Tommy's "little" sister, who happened to be over six feet tall) also joined in the hijinx which involved ganging up on Tommy.

The Mario rap intro song was replaced by a completely different theme, something loud with cheesy lyrics and extreme guitar riffs.

Cast

 * Tommy Treehugger - Chris Coombs


 * Co-M.C. / Evil Eric - Michael Anthony Rawlins


 * Tammi Treehugger - Victoria Delany

Theme Song
Name any place that you wanna go-o We'll take you there, oh don't you know We're at the Club Club Mario Come join the Club C-C-C-Club M-M-Mario

Grab your seat, hold on to your ha-at Satellite Surfin' is where it's at Here at the Club Club Mario Come join the Club C-C-C-Club M-M-Mario

Why did they decide to change the classic Super Show opening for this tripe? Maybe it was an attempt to make Mario & Co more radical and extreme like rival mascot Sonic the Hedgehog. After all, Sonic was specifically designed to be everything Mario wasn't, and Sega's commercials said as much. There was a bitter rivalry between Nintendo and Sega in those days.

The segments aren't mentioned anywhere on the Super Mario Bros. Super Show! DVD collections from Shout! Factory.

Club Mario is a Super Mario Bros. Super Show DVD.

Original Air Date: 1990