For years now, fans of Super Mario 64 have been wondering just what Mario is saying when he throws Bowser by his tail. The debate has raged on all these years, but we finally have an answer from Mario himself.
So long kinga Bowser!
— Charles Martinet (@CharlesMartinet) April 29, 2019
I have to admit, even after knowing what Mario is saying, I still don't hear it. I can hear King Bowser, but I can't here 'Kinga Bowser.' What do you think of Mr. Martinet's explanation?
It's always going to be "So long, gay Bowser" to me. Mario never meant to be offensive or hateful with these words, and he loves gay folk the same as anybody. That's just how he was in the 90's... it was an era when you'd grab that lizard by the tail, throw him onto some explosives, and call him gay.
The "a" in "kinga" is not enunciated enough and/or the audio sample in the game is really poor.
Or maybe he did a bunch of "kinga" takes and doesn't know that Nintendo went with "king" line instead.
Maybe they just cut the audio down a little, either to fit with the length of the cutscene, or to save space on the cartridge. I mean, they could have gone over all sampled audio in the game and cut away everything that weren't necessary.
So long and Bowser were easy to hear. Much more difficult to understand are the speeches in the original Star Fox, at least in my opinion.
It's always going to be "So long, gay Bowser" to me. Mario never meant to be offensive or hateful with these words, and he loves gay folk the same as anybody. That's just how he was in the 90's... it was an era when you'd grab that lizard by the tail, throw him onto some explosives, and call him gay.
I thought it was "big Bowser", though my brain always processes it as the german word "Gedanke" (which makes zero sense, though).
The only logical assessment I could make all this time is that he was throwing out an exaggerated "e" (pronounced as you typically would in "Pokémon") sound at the end of "long" as a stereotypical Italian-esque flourish. Just a bit of playful accenting. "So longé Bowser!"
Another somewhat reasonable suggestion I've heard is that it's a chummy taunt in the form of a question from Mario: "So long, eh Bowser?"
Anything else I've seen is completely out of touch with the actual voice clip to a degree that astonishes me. People pulling sounds and syllables from nowhere.
He is definitely not saying "Kinga". (Unless it was edited out after the recording session, which is weird but possible.)
I don’t care what martinet tweeted there. That’s clearly not what’s said. There’s no kinga in there. It’s a single syllable. It seems to be he forgot what he said. It’s likely “so long-a bowser”. He remembered it was a bad Italian accent but not what word.
I'm more concerned that it seemed to take us almost 25 years just to simply ask the guy what he said.
Weirdly respectful of Mario to recognise Bowser's legitimacy as a monarch as he's blowing his face off.
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