Will Nintendo Spoil the Zelda Movie After Super Mario Galaxy’s Marketing Misstep?

The Super Mario Galaxy Movie is the highest-grossing film of 2026 so far, pushing the film series past $2 billion worldwide. With this in mind, it would be silly to suggest that Nintendo needs a lesson in movie marketing. But while the company doesn't need help pulling in the high numbers, there is something simple it could do in its promotional material to make its cinema-going fans much happier.

The Legend of Zelda is next in line to get the silver-screen treatment, and will no doubt be another box office smash for Nintendo in 2027. The action-adventure franchise is bigger than ever following the legendary one-two punch of Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom, meaning a theatrical adaptation will draw millions regardless of how much is shown. The Zelda movie's marketing doesn't need to lay out an onslaught of plot reveals, character cameos, and game references to sell tickets — in fact, it needs to show some restraint.

Mario's Cosmic Spoiler Problem

Two weeks before The Super Mario Galaxy Movie's theatrical release, Nintendo and Illumination published a promotional video featuring close-up shots of the film's many faces. The video speeds up as it goes on, eventually going so fast that it's impossible to catch all the characters without pausing the video. It's a very clever marketing move, as it encouraged viewers to engage with it far beyond a single viewing. Naturally, social media users also posted screenshots of each character they spotted, fueling the discussion further.

The roster pulled plenty of obscure allies and enemies from across the Mario series to keep diehard fans spreading their excitement online. There were also two significant crossover characters from Nintendo’s history: Pikmin, the titular alien creatures from Nintendo's strategy-exploration franchise, and R.O.B., a real-life '80s accessory for the NES. Both have made frequent cameo appearances across Nintendo games, and are perhaps best known these days for their fighting antics in the Super Smash Bros. series. Pikmin and R.O.B. can be excused as minor cameos better left unspoiled, but Nintendo and Illumination crossed a line the following week with the release of an official Fox McCloud poster.

Fox's reveal got plenty of Nintendo fans talking, but that online spark could have been a full-blown firework moment in the theatre. Star Fox hasn't had a new game release for almost a decade, and the franchise's long dormancy would have only made the gasps and cheers even louder had no one been prepared for Fox's introduction. It could have enhanced the experience for millions of fans, and benefited Nintendo, too — the first wave of moviegoers and reviewers could have excited the masses even more by telling them, "You won't believe who's in this movie."

That moment was robbed from us for the sake of some social media marketing that was unlikely to make much of a difference — Nintendo fans were already invested in the film, and it was always going to be a billion-dollar success. Of course, modern film marketing thrives on shareable moments, with trailers and posters designed to dominate social feeds and spark instant reactions. It’s easy to see why studios lean into big reveals, but that doesn’t mean every surprise needs to be sacrificed in advance. Hopefully, that same mistake won't be made for the next big-screen Nintendo project.

The Zelda Film Could Have the Same Terrible Fate

Nintendo crossovers may be more unlikely in the more serious, grounded universe of Zelda, especially given the limitations of the live-action format — we're not likely to see Kirby inhale some Stalfos, or Captain Falcon uppercut Ganondorf. But that doesn't mean that there isn't potential for Biggoron-sized surprises. Green-garbed adventurer Link is almost as old as Mario, with the original Legend of Zelda game debuting just one year after Super Mario Bros. Zelda's history is just as rich as Mario's, with 40 years of lore, dozens of games, and hundreds of characters, creatures, and curiosities. The filmmakers have an endless supply of material to choose from, so we truly have no idea what to expect.

A big pool of possibilities, unfortunately, could mean an even bigger temptation for Nintendo to jingle its keys early again. The consequences of official marketing spoilers could also be greater this time around, as the Zelda series is much more story-driven than Mario. No one expects narrative depth from the Galaxy Movie, but there are millions of Zelda fans obsessed with the classic story arcs, branching timelines, and unforgettable characters.

If the film is done right, it should have many moments that deserve to be discovered in the cinema, not dissected weeks in advance on social media. The core appeal of Zelda games is discovery, after all — the anticipation of what rewards and dangers await inside chests, hidden in secret caves, and beyond distant mountaintops. In fact, Nintendo would do well to look back at what made the franchise so successful as it prepares for the movie.

Open Your Eyes, Nintendo: You Already Have the Answer

Nintendo doesn't need to look too far for a solution, as it already mastered the art of Zelda marketing a decade ago. In 2016, a trailer for Breath of the Wild debuted during the Electronic Entertainment Expo. It opened with a simple phrase, "Open your eyes", before showing multiple shots of nature in the game's vast open world. The remaining minutes showed little more than Link climbing tall mountains, traversing terrain across multiple locales, and fighting some enemies.

Even the game's final trailer, published a year later right before Breath of the Wild's release, raised more questions than answers despite showing so much. We saw full-throttle action sequences without knowing the stakes, heard lines of dialogue without knowing their context, and witnessed dramatic scenes without knowing what they could mean. The trailers revealed very little about the story, characters, shrines, Divine Beasts, boss fights, or even its main villain — because they didn't need to. They set the tone and promised adventure, and despite years of waiting for the game's long development cycle to complete, that was all fans needed.

You could argue that a marketing team only has so much to work with when it comes to a Zelda movie — promoting a video game with hundreds of hours of gameplay is quite different to marketing a movie that's over in a single sitting. But that doesn't mean that Nintendo can't use a similar approach when cutting its trailers. Show landscapes rather than key story scenes. Include dialogue that sounds vague when stripped of context. And if there are characters, monsters, weapons, or locations that would make a Zelda fan drop their jaw, don't show them at all.

We've waited 40 years for Link, Zelda, and Ganon to appear on the big screen — at this point, we can wait a few extra weeks for the big reveals if it means they get to shine even brighter. Nintendo, if you have something special like we're all hoping you do, then please, keep it "a secret to everybody."