Recycled Koopa

"Recycled Koopa" is the twenty-fourth episode of The Adventures of Super Mario Bros. 3; it aired alongside another episode of The Adventures of Super Mario Bros. 3 entitled "True Colors". The episode is a social commentary on pollution and the importance of recycling.

Plot synopsis
At Kastle Koopa, King Koopa himself is in the middle of marching Bully, Kootie Pie, Big Mouth, Hop, and Hip Koopa outside his castle, which is surrounded by assorted trash and garbage. While the Koopalings stand at attention, Koopa informs them that, unless they get rid of all the junk surrounding the castle, they will be banned from doing anything mischievous for an entire week.

As Koopa leaves the Koopalings, Bully, not wanting to work, jumps into a nearby hammock and begins to relax, telling the others to start cleaning. Big Mouth, angered by Bully's display of laziness, begins to bad mouth him and threatens to tell Koopa on him, which Bully is completely indifferent to. As Big Mouth and Bully argue, Kootie Pie picks up an old tin can, only to throw it aside, claiming she's broken a nail and also exclaiming she is too magnificent to be doing any kind of work. Hearing Kootie Pie's complaints, Bully approaches her and insults her, claiming she is not beautiful and that he thought she was a part of the garbage. Kootie Pie, highly offended, subsequently throws a handful of cold sludge on Bully's face, to which Bully retaliates to by trying to hit Kootie Pie with a nearby Green Shell, only to hit the nearby Big Mouth instead. As a dazed Big Mouth shakes his head, Koopa's voice echoes from nearby, telling the Koopalings that he hopes they're getting rid of the junk around the castle. Hearing Koopa, Bully slyly claims that they are and begins throwing trash into a nearby Warp Pipe.

At Princess Toadstool's Castle, Mario, Luigi, Toad, and Princess Toadstool are walking in the castle's garden; as they walk, they find themselves bombarded with a stream of garbage, which is being dumped from a nearby Warp Pipe. Eventually, garbage stops pouring from the Warp Pipe and, as Princess Toadstool inquires as to who would pour garbage into a beautiful garden, Mario finds a statuette of Koopa, inscribed with the sentence "World's Repulsivest Reptile," in the garbage pile. As Mario surmises that Koopa is behind this garbage dumping, Princess Toadstool laments that all this garbage could choke the life out of the Mushroom Kingdom. Hearing Princess Toadstool, Luigi asks what they should do and sarcastically suggests using a magic wand. Thinking Luigi's comment to be a good idea, Mario formulates the plan of obtaining a Koopaling's Magic Wand and using it to send all the surrounding garbage back to Kastle Koopa. After explaining this, Mario, along with Luigi, Princess Toadstool, and Toad, jump into the Warp Pipe that deposited the garbage.

Back at Kastle Koopa, Big Mouth, Bully, Kootie Pie, Hip, and Hop are in the midst of showing King Koopa that they got rid of all the garbage, with both Big Mouth and Kootie Pie claiming that they were the ones to get rid of the most trash; as Koopa tells Kootie Pie and Big Mouth that he does not care who got rid of the most garbage, he notices Mario, Luigi, Toad, and Princess Toadstool exiting a nearby Warp Pipe and quickly orders the Koopalings to capture them. Fleeing from Koopa and the Koopalings, Mario, Luigi, Toad, and Princess Toadstool enter the castle; inside, Luigi notices a large suit of armor and tells Mario, Toad, and Princess Toadstool to hide behind it with him. Doing so, the group goes unnoticed by Koopa and the Koopalings, with Mario grabbing Hip's wand as he passes by.

With Hip's Magic Wand in their possession, Mario, Luigi, Toad, and Princess Toadstool flee from the castle, only to be noticed by Koopa, Bully, and Hip, who also notice Mario is clutching Hip's Magic Wand. As Bowser, Bully, and Hip chase them, Mario, Luigi, Toad, and Princess Toadstool, who, after finding some Super Leaves in some Brick Blocks and a Jump Block, gain Raccoon Suits and quickly fly away. Seeing the group flying into the distance, an enraged Koopa exclaims that he will get his Doomship and hunt them down.

In the Mushroom Kingdom, which has multiple, large piles of trash covering it, Mario, Luigi, Toad, and Princess Toadstool continue to fly through the air, only to notice the Doomship, is chasing them, shooting volleys of Bob-ombs. After successfully hitting Luigi with a Bob-omb (though he does not lose his Raccoon powers), Koopa orders his Paragoomba minions to attack them; after he and Princess Toadstool dodge a pair of Paragoombas, Toad notices that the trash that has been dumped in Princess Toadstool's garden has begun to emit a horrible smell, which is beginning to spread to the rest of the Mushroom Kingdom, which Princess Toadstool believes will be decimated by the horrid odor of Koopa's garbage.

As King Koopa, through a megaphone, orders Mario to give back Hip's Magic Wand, claiming it's rightfully his, Mario, after saying he will, says an incantation and zaps the nearby garbage in Princess Toadstool's garden with the wand. After being zapped, the garbage begins to be sucked together into a giant ball, which also absorbs the Magic Wand after pulling it out of Mario's hand. After reaching its maximum size, the ball of garbage flings itself at the Doomship, hitting the vessel with enough force to fling it all the way back to Dark Land. After his Doomship and the ball of garbage crash into his castle, King Koopa, digging himself out of a pile of waste, instantly tells the nearby Big Mouth to shut up when the talkative Koopaling begins to say how neat all the garbage is, not realizing it is the same garbage from before. After quieting Big Mouth, Koopa tells him and Bully to get rid of the garbage again and to this time, put it somewhere where it won't come back.

In Princess Toadstool's Castle, Mario, Luigi, and Princess Toadstool are going on another walk, with Toadstool saying she hopes Koopa learned his lesson about keeping his garbage to himself. As the princess says this, Toad suddenly appears, carrying a box with Luigi's Plumber's Periscope in it. After Luigi grabs the periscope, Toad says that he should check up on King Koopa, which Mario proceeds to do, using Luigi's Plumber's Periscope to look into a nearby Warp Pipe which leads to Kastle Koopa. Through this Warp Pipe, Mario sees several Sledge Brothers unloading boxes of garbage into a nearby Warp Pipe, as Bully, Kootie Pie, and Big Mouth sit nearby. After retracting Luigi's Plumber's Periscope, Mario informs Luigi, Toad, and Princess Toadstool that the Koopalings are unloading their trash into someone else's land now. Hearing Mario say this, Princess Toadstool tells him and Luigi to go and stop the Koopalings, while she and Toad stay behind to guard the Mushroom Kingdom.

At Kastle Koopa, Bully, after directing Sledge Brothers to dump garbage into a Warp Pipe, yawns and exclaims that it's hard work ordering the Sledge Brothers around. Nearby, Mario and Luigi, from behind a heap of trash, decide to look into the Warp Pipe to see where all the Koopalings' garbage is being dumped. Hiding in some boxes of garbage, Mario and Luigi are accidentally dropped into the Warp Pipe by some Sledge Brothers.

After being deposited from the Warp Pipe, Mario and Luigi find themselves in a garbage filled street, which Mario instantly recognizes as being a part of Brooklyn. As litter falls from the sky, Mario and Luigi grab a pair of trashcan lids and use them as makeshift umbrellas. Looking around, Luigi sees what appears to be the wriggling tail of King Koopa sticking out from behind a corner; rushing to this twitching tail, Mario and Luigi grab onto it and begin tugging on it, only to notice that the tail is not attached to Koopa, rather a lookalike wearing a business suit and carrying a briefcase. As Mario and Luigi stare, shocked, at this Koopa doppelgänger, the creature, apparently not noticing Mario and Luigi, wonders away, moaning "Koopa" in a monotone voice.

Afterward, Luigi, seeing a nearby cab driver touch some of the Koopaling's garbage and mutate into a Koopa lookalike, realizes that all of the Koopalings' trash is changing people into Koopa Zombies. The brothers rush to the city hall of New York City, where the mayor, who Mario and Luigi believe can help them, resides. Reaching the door of the city hall, Mario and Luigi are shocked to see that the mayor of New York has been changed into a Koopa Zombie, who quickly flees the scene and joins his zombified brethren. Realizing that the mutating trash of the Koopalings can spread to all of Earth, Mario and Luigi begin to collect with plungers and bags.

Elsewhere, on the Doomship, Bully is pointing out to King Koopa the various, chanting zombies on the Doomship's monitors. Seeing the zombies, Big Mouth begins to rant about how they want Koopa to be their leader, only to be quieted by Bowser, who stuffs a can on Big Mouth's head. As Big Mouth struggles to remove the can from his head, Koopa orders him, Bully, and Kootie Pie to continue dumping garbage on Earth, which he intends to conquer.

Having traveled to Dark Land in his Doomship, King Koopa, through a megaphone, orders the zombies, after showing them a picture of Mario and Luigi, to attack them; to aid the zombies in their mission, Koopa opens a hatch on his Doomship and dumps a load of garbage and weaponry (as well as Bloobers) on them. Noticing Mario and Luigi nearby, the zombies charge after them, while unleashing various monsters, such as Bloobers, Firesnakes, Bob-ombs and Dry Bones; after being chased through the sewers and across a rooftop, Mario and Luigi manage to escape the attacking zombies by hiding in an alley, under some garbage.

After leaving the pile of garbage, Mario says that this is another fine mess Koopa has gotten him and Luigi into. As Mario says this, Luigi notices that Mario has grown a Koopa tail, which a shocked Luigi reveals to Mario, who instantly begins to panic. As Mario exclaims that they need to get rid of all the garbage in Brooklyn, Luigi asks him how, saying when magic was used, the garbage only came back worse; after Luigi says this, Mario gets an idea, which Luigi seems to get as well.

At the Statue of Liberty, which has been warped to resemble King Koopa, Koopa, aboard his Doomship, has begun to use his new Crud Cannon to launch garbage all over Brooklyn, as he plans to strike Manhattan, Queens, and the Bronx next; as the Crud Cannon spews garbage everywhere, mutating humans into Koopa Zombies, gulls into Paragoombas, and fish into Spiny Cheep-Cheeps, Mario and Luigi work frantically on their Trash Smasher. As he works on the Trash Smasher, Mario is hit by a wayward ball of garbage, which fully mutates him into a Koopa Zombie. Before his transformation is complete, Mario tells Luigi that he has to finish constructing the Trash Smasher.

As Luigi tells the now fully-zombified Mario to hang in there, he enters the cockpit of the Trash Smasher and uses it to suck up all the garbage in Brooklyn, which the Trash Smasher recycles into new appliances and turning passing Koopa Zombies back into people. After passing by Mario with the Trash Smasher, returning him to normal, Luigi exits the device and greets Mario; unfortunately, Luigi's trash cleaning efforts appear to be in vain, as Koopa simply begins to dump more garbage from his Doomship on to Brooklyn.

Deciding to stop Koopa once and for all, Mario and Luigi enter the Trash Smasher, which, after sprouting helicopter blades, takes flight and begins to fly towards the Doomship. Seeing Mario, Luigi, and the Trash Smasher approaching, Koopa panics and begins trying to fly away in his Doomship, only to have Mario and Luigi catch up with him and begin to chase him out of Brooklyn, with the nearby Statue of Liberty commenting "Those Mario brothers are super!", ending the episode.

Characters

 * Mario
 * Luigi
 * Princess Toadstool
 * Toad
 * King Koopa
 * Bully Koopa
 * Big Mouth Koopa
 * Kootie Pie Koopa
 * Hip Koopa (no dialogue)
 * Hop Koopa (no dialogue)
 * Sledge Brothers
 * Koopa Zombies
 * Mayor of New York City
 * Statue of Liberty

Cast

 * Walker Boone &mdash; Mario
 * Tony Rosato &mdash; Luigi
 * Tracey Moore &mdash; Princess Toadstool, Statue of Liberty
 * John Stocker &mdash; Toad
 * Harvey Atkin &mdash; King Bowser Koopa, zombie #2, zombie #3
 * James Rankin &mdash; singer #1
 * Dan Hennessey &mdash; Bully Koopa, zombie #1, zombie #4, singer #2
 * Gordon Masten &mdash; Big Mouth Koopa, mayor singer #3
 * Paulina Gillis &mdash; Kootie Pie Koopa, female singer

Animation and continuity errors

 * When King Koopa goes to the Doomship after Hip's magic wand is stolen, the garbage is already back at his castle.
 * When the Koopalings are viewing what the garbage is doing to the real word, Big Mouth's head turns green.
 * When King Koopa leaves after ordering the Koopalings to clean up the garbage, Hop and Big Mouth become orange for a few frames.
 * Koopa's arm is orange when he puts the can on Big Mouth's head. Furthermore, Big Mouth's mumbling while the can is on his head is identical to the speech he gave when Bully laid on the cot.
 * Like in "7 Continents for 7 Koopas," Hop has Hip's hair when they first notice Mario, Luigi, the Princess and Toad.
 * Luigi is harmed by a bomb while in Raccoon form, but does not lose his Raccoon powers like he should.
 * When Luigi cleans up all the trash, Mario's tail does not disappear until he turns so it can be seen.
 * At some points, King Koopa's snout flashes light green.
 * When Mario is turned back to normal, he still has a tail for a few seconds.
 * When Kootie Pie says that cleaning the garbage is no job for her, her shell is green.
 * Shortly after the gang returns the garbage to Koopa, Luigi is seen turning light green to green.
 * When a Koopa Kid is seen on Luigi's periscope the Koopa Kid next to them cannot be seen seen; they reappear when they speak, but disappear again afterwards.
 * As King Koopa is instructing the Koopa Kids to clean up the garbage at the beginning of the episode, Bully's head turns backwards for a few seconds then becomes normal.
 * After King Koopa and his Koopalings were chasing Mario, Luigi, Princess Toadstool, and Toad, who hid behind a knight, they were trying to look for them, but then only Hip and Hop were shown following King Koopa.
 * When King Koopa puts the can on Big Mouth's head, Bully and Kootie Pie disappear.
 * When Hip, Hop, Big Mouth, Kootie Pie, and Bully are marching at start of the episode, Hop's hair is yellow and his glasses lens are the same color as his head.
 * This also happens when Bully is on the hammock.
 * When King Koopa is walking away at the beginning of the episode, Big Mouth and Hop's bodies are both dark orange, also Hop's glasses lens turn blue.
 * When Bully says "We're on it, King Dad." Kootie Pie is shown worried.
 * When the episode first shows Princess Toadstool's castle, a dot appears.
 * When Mario, Luigi, Princess Toadstool and Toad are walking through Princess Toadstool's garden, the warp pipe is shown purple, but in the next shot, it is shown grey.
 * In several shots, Dark Land's sky is shown a like normal blue sky.
 * When King Koopa spots Mario, Luigi, Princess Toadstool, and Toad, Big Mouth and Bully are strangely going up and down while the latter is shown with dark skin.
 * When Hip and Hop are running after King Koopa, Hop's hair is pink.
 * In some shots, Hip's wand changes color.
 * In some shots, Mario is not shown holding Hip's wand.
 * When the Doomship was chasing Mario, Luigi, Princess Toadstool, and Toad, the parts on the Doomship were shown floating.
 * When Mario was sending the trash back to King Koopa, Princess Toadstool's broach was colored incorrectly.
 * When the trash was back at Castle Koopa, Big Mouth's star was white.
 * When Mario, Luigi, and Princess Toadstool were walking, Luigi's hat and overalls were flashing.
 * When Luigi got his periscope, Mario's "M" was really thin.
 * In some shots of this episode, Mario and Luigi have no symbols on their hats.
 * When the trash is falling from the sky in Brooklyn, Mario and Luigi are shown on the sidewalk, but in the next shot, they are shown in the street.
 * On the screen in the Doomship, the Koopafied people are walking forward, but in the next shot, they are shown going backwards.
 * When Mario is swimming in the sewers, the Koopafied person squirts two Bloopers out of his bottles, but when Mario goes in the pipe, three Bloopers are shown.
 * The Koopafied person chasing Luigi through a rooftop has a red hat and a black suit, but when he lets Firesnakes out of his briefcase, his hat and suit are black.
 * After Mario grows a Koopa tail, the screen is shaking.
 * When the scene starts with the Doomship parked at the Koopa designed Statue of Liberty, the lever for the Crud Cannon is all orange, but in the next shot, the top is blue.
 * When the Crud Cannon turned the birds into Paragoombas, it was grey, but when it turned the fish into Boss Bass, it was orange.
 * The chains on the Koopafied Mario just appear out of nowhere.
 * The spikes on the chains of the Koopafied Mario are orange, but when he gets Unkoopafied, they are white.
 * When Luigi says "Hey! Now you're being recycled!" His mouth wasn't moving.

Trivia

 * The taxi cab driver's appearance bears a very close resemblance to the one from "Flatbush Koopa".
 * In the original NBC airing alongside its Captain N episode, "The Feud of Faxanadu", Big Mouth narrates the teaser promo saying, "Trash problem! Trash problem! We have took all the toxic Koopa trash, and dumped it into a Warp Zone! It's horrific! Right on the Mario Bros.'s heads! What a way to conquer the world!"