Not the who lives in the Mushroom Kingdom and saves the princess, but the Super Mario who loiters around Times Square and leeches off of tourists.
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People who live and work in NYC all uniformly hate Times Square. The reasons are numerous, but high on the list are the miscreants who dress up as cartoon, comic book, and video game characters. But tourists love these jack offs, and are willing to give them money to be in pictures with them (despite the fact that their attire is so low rent, which is my primary point of contention).
You’ll find Hello Kitty, Batman, and various members of the Family Guy clan, but no Super Mario. At least for the time being. Why? Because the guy who normally plays that part (once again, poorly) has just been arrested for groping a woman.
Gothamist has the details: the individual who also owes Nintendo a sh*t ton of money is 34-year-old Damon Torres of New Jersey (figures). He’s accused of accosting an unidentified 58-year-old woman, who immediately told a Times Square security guard, and that person called the cops. Torres was arrested for forcible touching and possession of marijuana (but no mushrooms, alas).
Such behavior should be hardly shocking to any resident of the Big Apple, though it’s nice to know this one street vendor’s opinion of Torres and his ilk, which further validates all our assumptions: “They’re always putting their hands on you… Half of them are drunk. The police should keep them all out.”
Another calls them: “… nothing but bums in costumes. They should get real jobs. I can’t believe people let them near their kids.” Hey, how much do you want to bet that Torres probably thought that anti-Semitic Elmo got a bum rap?