This is part of a planned series of posts analyzing, discussing and generally having fun with Super Paper Mario, my favorite Wii game. If you find it ridiculous that I am spending so much time analyzing a very cheesy Mario game, you should probably ignore this.
MULTITUDES OF SPOILERS LURK WITHIN!!
Super Paper Mario may be a wonderful game, but even the best of stories have their plot holes. And so I’m sorry to say that the story of Super Paper Mario, which isn’t even the best in the first place, has rather has a lot. The best of stories also often have many unanswered questions, and Super Paper Mario, not being the best, has even more. But Super Paper Mario is good enough that I wanted to catalog all those plot holes and unanswered questions…mostly for my own use as I came up with insane theories filling the holes and answering the questions, but who knows, maybe you could find some use for this list too!
- Did Tippi fall in love with Mario? At the end of chapter 3, after the heroes save her, Tippi is very happy and is “full of concern,” thanking Mario for rescuing her. Then after chapter 4, Tippi says that she “could just hang around with Mario forever,” only to suddenly pass out. (Supernatural punishment for showing interest in someone other than Blumiere?) After she’s revived, she says, “I want to be near Mario…” And then we have chapter 7, where Luvbi teases Tippi mercilessly about being interested in Mario, and Tippi can only stammer and blush. (Though how a butterfly can blush is rather beyond me.) But after this it seems that she begins to remember her past and realize who Count Bleck is, so any feelings she had for Mario are set aside…or are they? Does she just decide to disregard any love she has for anybody else so she and Blumiere can save the world with the Power of Love™…?
- What exactly is the chronology of the whole story? Blumiere is supposed to have been part of the Tribe of Darkness, yet Nolrem, who is only a descendant of the Tribe, seems very old. Does that mean Count Bleck is even older? In that case, is Tippi quite old too? Perhaps she’ll die of age as soon as she gets transformed back into human form?
- Why did Count Bleck tell his minions to stay put before chapter 6? I quote Nastasia in the Castle Bleck scene after chapter 5: “YOU GO NOWHERE! We wait! It’s the count’s direct order! His word is absolute! Be a good little minion and DO NOT MOVE UNTIL TOLD!” (But then Dimentio shows up and convinces them to go and try to defeat Mario and co. anyways.) Why did Count Bleck order this? Was he afraid his minions would get destroyed if they went to Sammer’s Kingdom, since it was on the verge of being obliterated by the Void? Was he beginning to give up? (Particularly after the previous Castle Bleck scene, in which Nastasia said that she wasn’t sure they could succeed, and spoke of Timpani.) Or did he just want his minions to rest and regain their strength?
- Exactly who counts as a hero? Sometimes it seems like Mario is the central hero and the other members of his party are subordinate, but at other points it seems like they’re all heroes of the same rank.
- Why does Bleck do nothing to investigate the possibility of Timpani being alive after meeting Tippi in chapter 6 and beginning to wonder about her identity? Had he lost hope of finding her? Had he lost hope of stopping the prophecy? Both seem quite likely; he says in the Castle Bleck scene after chapter 6, “Could that Pixl have been…Timpani? No, no. Completely impossible. I should know that better than anyone. Besides, it’s far too late to do anything now.” And then after chapter 7, he says, “The prophecy can no longer be stopped by Count Bleck. No one can stop it.” But did he also give up hope of Timpani caring about him anymore after his conversation with her in chapter 6 (when she graced him with such lovely lines as “Why would you want to do something so…unspeakable?”, “That’s…horrible!”, “You’re wrong…and sick!”, etc.), and after he heard Dimentio report that Tippi had said, “I must stop Blumiere”? (By the way, that’s not actually what Tippi said. She said, “We have to stop that Blumiere.” But then, Dimentio is not known for his reliability.)
- Why, in the ending, does Bleck say (multiple times!) that he does not “have long to live”? Was he weakened enough by his fight with Mario that he would die soon? Perhaps he was being sustained by the power of the Chaos Heart or maybe the Dark Prognosticus, and so once he lost them he couldn’t stay alive for very long? Maybe this is because he’s very old as I hypothesized above?
- What happened to the Dark Prognosticus, anyways? The narrator says at the very end that “the Dark Prognosticus again faded into history.” But what happened to it?! The best answer I can come up with is the Awesome Nastasia Theory.
- Did Blumiere kill his father or destroy the Tribe of Darkness or something along that line of things? The only clues we have are that 1) the Tribe of Darkness disappeared at some point and 2) in the Blumiere and Timpani scene (for lack of a better name) before chapter 8, Blumiere says to his father after stealing the Dark Prognosticus, “I will erase every inch…of this blasted world!”, and then at the end of the scene we hear crashing and smashing sounds. But seriously, are sound effects canon? What if I had had my sound off? What if I had trouble hearing it? And what if, like I did when I first played the game, you thought that the crashing and smashing sounds were part of Tippi’s memory that she apparently recalled right after the Blumiere and Timpani scene, where she says, “No! Blumiere! You mustn’t! Darling… How could you… Oh… Darling… You… Why…”?
- How did Nastasia know that Bleck and Tippi would be in Dimension D in the ending, as she apparently said to O’Chunks and Mimi that she “felt” they’d be there? And how did she know to shield Count Bleck from Dimentio’s blow? Did she realize Dimentio’s scheme? Does she just have a fictional character’s near-perfect intuition? Or is the Awesome Nastasia Theory correct…?
- Who is the “sweet lass” that O’Chunks wished he had declared his love to in chapter 5? Nastasia? Presumably, from what he said at the end of the game and if you talk to him in Flipside after the game is finished…
- Did Dimentio write the Dark Prognosticus? This seems to be quite a popular theory among fans, despite the fact that the only evidence I can find for it is in Carson’s story about Dimentio. He says that Dimentio pursued Count Bleck of his own accord, but Bleck initially turned him away. Then the count read about someone like Dimentio in the Dark Prognosticus, and so he agreed to let Dimentio join him. Carson comments, “Why was he mentioned in the Dark Prognosticus? Sounds fishy to me!” So, obviously, Dimentio wrote the Dark Prognosticus so he could orchestrate his whole plan with having the heroes defeat Count Bleck and then destroying the world himself! Except why then did the Dark Prognosticus include prophecies of other events, as the prologue and quite a few of Garson and Carson’s stories indicate? How did Dimentio know so much about those other events, and about the power of the Chaos Heart and the Void, etc., for that matter? And then to have written the Dark Prog he would either need to be really old or be capable of time travel…
- Why on earth didn’t Mario respond or even look surprised when Tippi and Bleck had their dramatic conversation right before the fight with Bleck? Shouldn’t he be alarmed if the antagonist and his faithful sidekick start calling each other “dear Timpani” and “my Blumiere”? Is Mario just stupid? But then how come the other heroes (who were out of commission during that first conversation) weren’t surprised when Tippi and Bleck had another dramatic conversation after Bleck was defeated? Are they all just stupid? Or are they all just used to this kind of thing happening, since they live in stories? Or what?
There you have it. Let me know in the comments if you’ve come up with other explanations for these mysteries and plot holes, or if you’ve found some of your own!
Count bleck isnt old at all hes the last member because he did murder his father and he did destory his world. If he was old he would be dead by now. Remember in chapter 4 squirps. Hes 1500 but you now why hes still a child and still living. Its because he slept in a hibernation capsule. His father clearly said “even your ancestors could not handle that dark book.” His ancestors stole the book so his ancestors are the formal Tribe of Darkness. And i he said “i do not have long to live.” Because he needed to be killed before the void destroys existence.
Aha. I see how Count Bleck’s age could work now… Thanks for sharing!
Did you see he ending Blumiere said “But you Timpani. Its pains me to know this may cut your game short.” She and the count are quite i think to be even younger than Luigi. After the credits they were shown to be dead walking down a hill. I didnt see Timpani or Blumiere fall while they were walking. Even if they were still alive.
Actually, that’s very good evidence that both of them are young if Bleck thought Tippi’s game would be cut short if she died there. On the other hand, if someone you loved died, wouldn’t you always think their life was being cut short? 🙂
And i think super paper mario has the best story ever. Even better than romeo and juilet, or titanic.
Yeah, I usually don’t care that much for love stories, but I did enjoy SPM. A lot. I’m still not sure exactly why. 🙂
Anyways, thanks for commenting! I hope you enjoyed my list.
I completely agree, I feel like this game is one of the most underrated games of all time and deserves a lot more attention. But maybe that’s just because I was like 8 or something when I beat it? Eh, regardless I just find it interesting…
Do you think Blumiere cared about his minions i personally dont think he did but i wanna know your opinion
I think he did to some extent. Besides the bit before chapter 6 when he ordered them to stay put, keeping them out of trouble in the doomed Sammer’s Kingdom, there was the scene at the end where his minions showed up in Dimension D and he was touched by their concern for him. And in general, he never treated them badly and occasionally even joked around with them a bit. Sure, he did deceive them by saying that he would create a new perfect world after he had destroyed the old ones, but it seems likely that he thought the deception was ultimately for their good. So I think he did care about his minions, even if he didn’t always act on his care for them in a good way!
oh my god your theories are amazing and they make perfect sense! I love this game and I love your ‘awesome nastasia theory’ the most 🙂
Hey has anyone just spent hours looking eveywhere for tippi?
if you go to fort francis at the end of the game, you can buy tippitron. it’s extortionate but worth it
I have a theory for the plot hole about dimentio writing the dark prog. So in your awesome Nastasia theory (which was really awesome) you mentioned the dark prog might change over time. This may be because dimentio can time travel. He may be able to go back in time, and rewrite the book and go forward in time to see what will happen. This also explains why bleck didn’t notice Dementio in the dark prog until dementio went back and made it so it mentioned him. Also, dementio wrote this book while the future was still doomed, this is why he thought he could win. But the Herod changed the future, like in back to the future when 2015 is fixed. This also explains the dark prog “faiding into history, because the events in it are no longer changed because dementio was destroyed and now only has history in it. So far this thoery basicly makes sense to me, but tell me if it contradicts something.
Man, it’s been a while since I played SPM; the details of the plot are starting to fade from my mind. Anyways, nice theory! As far as I can tell, it does fit with the canon of the game. It could also provide an explanation for why the previous owners of the book never found happiness – Dimentio could have just been using the book to manipulate them for his own ends. The only issue is that, to me, it raises more questions than it answers. How can Dimentio time travel? (We never saw anything about this in the game.) And if he can, how come he didn’t foresee his own doom? And if he can travel to the past, how come he didn’t, say, target Mario as an infant to remove the threat? Maybe I’m thinking too logically for a story that isn’t really about logic. 🙂 Anyways, thanks for reading and commenting. It’s always fun to chat with fellow SPM fans.
One theory that I would really love to see is Mimi’s backstory. Even when you hear Carson’s section on her, he only throws out possible theories to explain what she really is. I’d love to hear different ideas on how she came to be the way she is!
Thanks for your support of my theory ?. Although it does make sense that if dementio can time travel that he would destroy Mario before hand although he needed peach, bowser, and luigi for his plan. Mario had saved peach many times before, so wiping him out early on would end his plan. He al may have wanted to “play with his food before he ate it”. Also restating what I said earlier, like in back to the future 2, when dementio looked into the future it could have been him winning. But sometime Mario gained an upper hand and the good future prevailed in the end. Perhaps dementio didn’t understand the concept that the future could change so he didn’t bother “checking it regularly”(does that make sense?). Also about Mimi’s backstory I would just go with some kind of failed experiment and leave it at that. But ya I hope that clears stuff up, and thanks again for responding to my comment (I didn’t think anyone would ?)
I seriously don’t think Dimentio can time travel. Dimentio most likely wrote the Dark Prognosticus to see his goals on becoming god to destroy the multiverses and make his own. The spell that Dimentio gave on the book was most likely broken in the end, since when Dimentio died and the universes were still going to be erased from his shadow of power. The Pure Hearts forming into the Purity heart would’ve most likely broke the spell. The Void was seconds away from destruction.
Hey guys, I just wanted to share a creepy thing I have found… After you complete the game and buy the replacement for Tippi, use her to study the lizard that sold her to you and she says something disturbing about him… Just wanted to throw that out there because I can’t seem to find anyone online that found that before me.
P.S. On the account of Dimentio writing the Dark Prognostics, maybe he only wrote some of it, maybe he just continued from the previous author’s stopping point and he couldn’t erase what had already been written.
Love your theorys! I recently picked up the game again after giving up after one chapter when I was younger (I couldn’t find Thorough :P). After restarting the game and paying full attention to the storyline, I realized how perfectly the plot fit toghether, in such a meaningful tale that, in the end, was almost a dramatic soap opera (lol) about Bleck and Tippi, rather an adventure game about Mario and the gang. I was wondering if you had any input about King Crocus (and his ancestry) and/or the Cragons. I always found them interesting but longed for more backstory about them. I know i’m kinda late to find this article, but it’d be great if you had something to mention!
Man, you left out the plot hole that bothers me the most. How, exactly, does Tippi recognize Dimentio in chapter 1? Has she seen him before? Where and when?