Pedro Pascal is Mario in cursed live-action reboot

Pedro Pascal really is the man of the moment. With roles in both Game of Thrones and The Mandalorian, Pedro has always been a pop culture king but his latest starring turn as Joel in HBO’s The Last of Us has undeniably sent the actor’s popularity soaring to new heights.

In case you hadn’t heard, The Last of Us is a pretty big deal right about now. The show marks HBO’s second-largest debut since 2010 and was renewed for a second season after airing just two episodes. Last week’s Bill and Frank centric tale was praised as the most triumphant episode to date while this week, the imminent arrival of a terrifying new Infected was teased. Let’s get back to Pedro though. On Saturday, the actor hosted Saturday Night Live and took part in a very cursed Mario skit.

The Last of Us Part I releases on PC on 28 March. Check out the remake compared to the original game.

The Saturday Night Live team thought it would be a good idea to imagine the Mario Kart franchise as a prestige dystopian TV series - and they kind of weren’t wrong. I watched this and thought, ‘That actually looks decent.’ I’m not sure what that reveals about me but anyway, Pedro stars as a very serious Mario who must transport the valuable Princess Peach across the country via the Rainbow Road.

Pedro delivers what is perhaps the most serious “It’s a-me, Mario,” and “Let's-a-go,” you’ll ever hear. Throughout their journey, the duo encounter Luigi, Yoshi, and Toad. At one point, the sketch replicates the Clicker museum scene from The Last of Us’ second episode except this time, it’s a giant Goomba. Take a look at the full sketch below.

It’s slightly unhinged but I’ve got to hand it to Saturday Night Live, it works. They really didn’t hold back on the budget this week, did they? This has to be one of the strongest SNL sketches of all-time. Good work Pedro.