Bowser Jr., the prince of the koopas who debuted in Super Mario Sunshine, is an objectively cute little guy. He takes his father’s fearsome, dragon-like qualities and smooshes them into a sweet baby boy, shrinking his dad’s viciousness into his own brand of feistiness. I love this little bastard, and I was so stoked to see him show up in the Super Mario Galaxy Movie trailer this morning…until I got a good look at him. Why do my precious child’s eyes look like he’s tweaking out?
I’m not the only person who’s noticed that Bowser Jr. has some weirdly grotesque bloodshot eyes, unlike anyone else in the film. What little characterization he gets in the trailer does paint him as having an almost crazed need to save his father from Mario and Luigi’s clutches, so that might be what they’re going for. But the actual visual of this little guy’s uncomfortably realistic, distressed eyes is enough to make a grown man wince. Earlier in the trailer, Bowser mentions that he needs a solid eight hours of sleep lest he turn into a real monster, so maybe this is what happens when a koopa doesn’t get some shut-eye and instead spends days plotting revenge against a Brooklyn plumber. Still, it’s unpleasant to look at, and everyone is struggling to look him in the eye.
bro his eyes are so weirdly detailed LMAO pic.twitter.com/552zSp8a0c
— TCNick3 (@TCNick3) November 12, 2025
What is wrong with his eyes???? pic.twitter.com/2geVN1bpP5
— SuperWiiBros08 (@SuperWiiBros08) November 12, 2025
Besides Bowser Jr’s disgusting looking eyes, this movie looks phenomenal man pic.twitter.com/ayVhDp9qeq
— Nin10doland (@nin10doland) November 12, 2025
BOWSER JR LOOKS LIKE A CRACKHEAD HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA pic.twitter.com/M0WbZaGPfj
— EPICNESS (COMMS OPEN) (@ABitofEpicness) November 12, 2025
they kinda did this with movie Bowser jr’s eyes pic.twitter.com/JhAEa1WWyY
— Cyber👀 (@Cyberlord1109) November 12, 2025
Bowser Jr.’s eyes in the movie are so weird to me cuz like, Illumination showed they were perfectly capable of making characters with seed eyes with Baby Mario and Luigi but here’s crackfiend Jr. I guess 😭 pic.twitter.com/kQg8TnwCwd
— Mari the Cat (@MaritheKity) November 12, 2025
Maybe by the end of the movie, Bowser Jr. will reunite with his dad, chill out, and get some proper rest so he won’t look like this for the entirety of Super Mario Galaxy’s runtime. If not, I don’t know, could Illumination and Nintendo pull a Sonic movie and update his look before the movie premieres on April 3? Maybe. It certainly wouldn’t be as large a lift as completely redesigning the character like Paramount did for the blue blur. Or they might do nothing. This seems like such a departure from the character design in the rest of this movie that it feels like an artistic choice, rather than an oversight. If they want Bowser Jr. to be a crazy sicko in the movie, this is one way to communicate that, I suppose.