A review by readingpicnic
Things I Learned from Mario's Butt by Laura Kate Dale

3.0

I did learn quite a lot about butts in video games and in general from reading this. I thought Vebjørn Strømmen and Tena Žigmundovac’s essays were the most interesting to read about, but I am familiar with Jimquisition, so I appreciated their work as well. I think I had very high hopes for Mario’s Butt, and it was a little bit of a let down in the very small blips of glossing over a game’s summary to include one paragraph about a character’s butt that doesn’t even get an accompanying illustration. The choice of characters to examine felt interesting and novel in some places, but repetitive and generalizing of what one’s butt size indicates about their gender or exercise levels at times? Much like the video game industry, the voices represented in this book were overwhelmingly white and male, with a few exceptions. I loved Laura’s writing in her memoir so I wish that it hadn’t fallen flat for me here. I just know it could have been so much more, but it feels like a fun project she did with friends that culminated in an interesting coffee table book…