Charles Martinet On His New Role As Mario Ambassador: "I Don't Know What That Is Yet"

Whatever it is I’m sure he’ll do great!

LEGEND in every meaning of the word

Well, considering that ambassador basically means to help someone through something that they are not good at, don't know what this means. I "wonder" what it could mean......

Sounds like Nintendo tossed him to the road.

He'll probably shape it to mean what it'll mean the next time Nintendo needs a "Mario Ambassador"

I thought this was a parody article when I saw the headline and I chuckled. That's actually funny that he straight up has no clue what it is either.

Hopefully it was somewhat mutual that they moved on from having him voice Mario, and if not, then hopefully they didn’t do him dirty and that he can appreciate the way things are moving forward.

I definitely had a feeling that this would turn to a big controversy down the road where Martinet was basically fired or not even informed that there would be nee voice actors for Wonder. Hopefully thats not the case because the pitchforks would be out more than ever before.

There's no reason to get rid of Charles if they're basically recreating his voice so I assume the decision came from his side in some way.

The writing may have been on the wall when they reined in his performance in WarioWare: Get It Together, since in the proper cutscenes, they only had Wario grunting with subtitles while the other characters instead said the lines that were subtitled. Maybe it's just too much for him to try and do that sort of voice acting, as Martinet says he's not stepping away from doing so entirely. People's vocal chords change. I distinctly remember seeing people say Mario and Luigi sounded a bit different in Luigi's Mansion 3. I imagine both Nintendo and Charles were in agreement it was time for a recast.

@Hero-of-WiiU If they had replaced him with Chris Pratt then it would certainly be a controversy.

Speaking of which if they make a Mario movie sequel I hope Charles still gets to voice his characters.

Someone on the audience after hearing this: So what is it you "do," now that you're an ambassador Mr. Martinet?

Oof. I think it was Kit and Krysta who said in their podcast Nintendo probably came up with the "Mario ambassador" title to soften the blow of Martinet being replaced. Nintendo themselves probably have no idea what it means yet, either. It's just something they devised so Charles wouldn't feel as bad about getting axed. That really sucks if so.

It means you sit quietly in the corner until people stop talking about you being replaced at which time you’ll be quietly let go.

"idfk man, they said I was too old or some ****"

Why are people treating it like Nintendo shafted Charles Martinet rather than him voluntarily retiring from voicing Mario (and related characters)? Who started that line of negative speculation to begin with?

It's almost cartoonish how he was moved to a role that apparently has no meaning yet

To me it sounds like he'll keep advertising mario? Hyping him up? Strange title indeed

@ModdedInkling Remember that tweet a year ago, around the time the actors for the Mario Movie where announced?

https://www.nintendolife.com/news/2022/10/voice-of-mario-charles-martinet-thanks-fans-for-all-the-love-and-kindness

We never got any more info on the situation, so most people assumed it had something to do with him not voicing Mario.

Even some of Tara’s tweets where angry towards (supposedly) Nintendo for treating someone who spend decades of his life for a company this bad. Ofcourse not with so many words.

I now believe that stuff was about Charles being informed he would no longer voice Mario. Ofcourse it’s all speculation, but the timeline makes sense in my opinion.

@MetalMan It sure seems that way. An utter shame.

It's a polite way to say "we kicked you out of the movie and now we're kicking you out of the games, but you can tell people you voiced Mario for the past 30 years".

I think it means he gets 10 free NES games and 10 free GBA games on his 3ds. 🤷‍♂️

@AG_Awesome But he only gets access to them until the service shuts down. Then they become bricked like Mario 35.

I wonder if the Mario voice has become too taxing for Charles and that's why he's stepping down but still staying active with Nintendo. Otherwise, I'd imagine him to continue voicing Mario for at least a few more years.

@Not_Soos I think it's along those lines. And they don't care about him really. I think the "ambassador" title is to keep the fans from raging about his departure. I doubt they care much about his feelings.

Don't get the negativity.Previous VA is old and retired from voicing the characters.And new VA sounds so good people could barely tell it was someone else.I only agree that the ambassador thing is odd.

I wonder if it's like being a "3DS Ambassador."

@Hero-of-WiiU Less than two years ago he said, "I want to voice Mario until I drop dead” so I don’t think it was exactly mutual.

@Synecdoche Then why doesn't he say they replaced him as Mario and moved him to a different position.

Negotiating trade deals between the Mushroom Kingdom and other world powers, hosting state dinners, helping stranded Toads recover lost passports.

@GinMiguel For the same reason Nintendo didn’t say “We replaced him as Mario” — it’s just more diplomatic this way.

he'll travel to every country and do the mario voice for world leaders

Is it possible that he may just want to be done and enjoy life?

Last time Nintendo did an ambassador programme it was just something to pacify those impacted by a business decision they’d had to make. I think we know what’s going on, it’s a title to cushion the blow.

It means he's basically retired in all but name and they gave him a special title to make it look like he still has a job.

It probably means he'll appear on occasional videos or at live events promoting Mario. To be honest, if the role is appropriately paid it's not a bad way to enjoy his part in Mario's legacy. He's not getting any younger and this feels like a good way to ease into retirement while still being part of the extended Nintendo family.

It's a way of slowly and painlessly moving him away from the company, rather than just announce he is being replaced, Nintendo have opted for the sideways move, out or respect for his many years service.

@blindsquarel,

Then he would just simply announce his retirement, and would not be confused as to what his new role is.

@Paddle1,

Apart from not wanting an over the top stereotypical faux Italian accent, in the more progressive modern landscape. Even the latest Mario movie touched upon this, when the brothers were mocking their over the top Italian accents, in their commercial.

"I am now, you might have seen the news, I'm a Mario Ambassador, I don't know what that is yet, I'm not retired as it were, but I'm an ambassador and as we step forward into the future I will learn, we'll all learn what exactly that is but in the meantime...I'm always an ambassador of Nintendo and Mario and all of these events because I just cherish every moment of it, and I hope your love of the games continues and grows the way mine does, so thank you so much."

I think we all know what it means Charles, and I bet deep down so do you.

Dude is a millionaire and will always be able to make money out of being the original voice of Mario. So no matter whose decision this was, he will be perfectly fine. He doesn't need anyone's pity.

@blindsquarel good point, it must be tough doing 15 minutes of work every few years..

I hope this Charles/Miyamoto video is going to be Charles announcing his retirement in general and not just from Mario. Just wouldn’t make sense for him to continue doing VA but not for his most popular/regular roles.

Maybe they’ll both be announcing their retirements 😬

@Paddle1 I figured that Nintendo noticed him getting older, and Charles noticed it as well. His voice for Luigi in Luigi's Mansion 3 was sort of rough, and it felt like his voices for Mario, Luigi, Wario, and Waluigi were starting to blend together as he got older.

I don't think they just kicked him to the curb like others here. He's been the voice for years, and I doubt Nintendo would let him go unless he really wanted to do so. As for the Mario Ambassador stuff, who knows what thats about.

@Madao,

Some people on here, it's like one of their family members had had just got fired.

The question is, is he still getting paid anything or not? Cos if he's not, then it's basically 'We've ended our working relationship with Charles but really hope he doesn't bad mouth us.

If he is getting paid then it means 'We don't want you to voice our characters anymore, but you're not gonna bad mouth us, m'kay?'.

@Axecon I doubt it's too taxing for him, he does the voice quite often when he's a guest at a convention or other fan meet n greets where he doesn't "have to", and he is a voice actor, so unless he is retiring, which he has stated he is not, then he's likely still doing voices.

@johnvboy If that was the case they probably wouldn't have recreated Charles' accents in Mario Wonder and the Wario trailer. If they wanted to change them they could've.

Typically a company will cut you loose with no ceremony no matter how tenured or how personal your job was. Business has no feelings to give (and no feelings to hurt.. people often forget that). In this case they gave a little ceremony to cutting Martinet with the ambassador line. But obviously with his comment here about not knowing the meaning of it, it wasn’t worth much. But for sure the man deserves better.

@Paddle1,

Who knows what will happen, perhaps Nintendo are going to go with a more subtle approach going forward. the immense popularity of the movie, could mean a more general voice, across all platforms in the future.

He's already bad at it.

@NinChocolate,

Not sure that he deserves more, pretty sure Nintendo have paid him for all his years of service, he will have also made money of the back of all this, speaking engagements and appearances etc. Yes we can believe Nintendo could handle things differently, but if they are going to get rid of him, the end result will always be the same. And nobody has a right of a job for life, it's just not how any of this works.

Nintendo are doing this in the kindest way possible, in my honest opinion.

He'll be the menu sounds of the upcoming Mario Red OLED Switch. A "Wahoo!" for every shift of the selection box.

It means he’ll do 2-3 trade show/convention appearances every year where he does the voice for a few minutes and Miyamoto waits in the front row to hand him a million dollars as he walks off the stage

Charles: I don't know what Mario Ambassador roles involves yet
Fans: So they made up a title that means nothing
Me: Not necessarily. There's a role called creative fellow that Miyamo..
Fans: I bet Nintendo copyrighted Mario's voice and forcefully removed Martinets voice box from his throat. That has to be the reason. It makes so much sense.

You do nothing other than endorse

Nofriendo 64

I think that Nintendo will pay Charles for use of his voice as Mario in perpetuity and use AI to create his voice

He's not retiring, which means other companies can hire him to voice their characters.

Of course he isn't retired yet, he has the job of Mario Ambassador.

@Orpheus79V A job he doesn't know anything of what he'll be doing.

It sounds like what he’s saying without saying is that he first heard about the ambassador role the same time we did, this also explains why they’re sitting on that video with Miyamoto instead of just releasing it with the announcement because it wasn’t filmed yet and this was all pre-emptive damage control, they realized they couldn’t just wait for Wonder to release and let the credit’s reveal it because a journalist was bound to snoop into this hard before then so they had to get ahead of that.

@Synecdoche They both could've been upfront about it.