Shigeru Miyamoto thought there would be "significant resistance" at Nintendo to Fox McCloud appearing in The Super Mario Galaxy Movie

Mario creator Shigeru Miyamoto expected pushback from Nintendo when Illumination asked to include Star Fox's Fox McCloud in The Super Mario Galaxy Movie – but he was pleasantly surprised that the idea was positively received.

“When I got the proposal from Chris [Meledandri, producer and Illumination CEO] about including Star Fox, in general, from Nintendo's perspective, we tend to avoid mixing IPs, except for the Pikmin cameo," Miyamoto told Forbes, referring to the plant-like critter which made a surprise appearance in the movie.

"With that said, though, as the creator of Star Fox and this movie taking place in space, I felt that I wanted to see that," he continued. "I wanted to see what it would be like, but I also felt that there may be significant resistance internally about that idea, so after I got this proposal, I contacted the necessary parties involved and started my lobbying activity here at Nintendo. However, I was surprised to find that a lot of people saw a lot of potential with it and were really excited to see what would come out of this."

Glen Powell voices Fox McCloud in the animated sequel, and Powell directly contacted Illumination and Nintendo to ask to be cast. "He explained that we had to understand how deeply he loved the character of Fox McCloud. His dream was one day to be part of a Star Fox movie," Meledandri told the publication.

However, some fans aren't happy that Fox has more screen time than a pivotal Super Mario Galaxy character: Princess Rosalina. "Larson's Rosalina is the main victim, being inexplicably sidelined for large chunks of The Super Mario Galaxy Movie instead of being an obvious focal point," reads our The Super Mario Galaxy Movie review.

The Super Mario Galaxy Movie is out now in theaters. For more, fill out your watchlist with our guide to the other upcoming video game movies.