Onward now to stage 4-8. Hard to believe it’s day 40 already. Jesus! Time for me to once again square off against D.K., as I attempt to make it through another one of his Mario-killing devices. As usual, he and Pauline are perched in the top lefthand corner of the screen. Directly below them, on the left side of the screen, are a series of vines, or, as I call them, “danglers.” I climb the danglers until I’m high enough to take the slow moving platform in the center of the screen. This platform will carry me all the way to the right side of the screen, where I can reach another low-hanging dangler, which, if you think about it, sounds like a medical condition. (“He suffered from a severe case of low-hanging danglers.”) Climbing this dangler will take me into a vertical maze of sorts that’s filled with more danglers and platforms. Patrolling this maze is a mechanical alligator jaw contraption. Getting through this mini maze isn’t especially challenging. In fact, this entire level wouldn’t be challenging at all, if not for the fact that D.K. is hurling these weird mushroom-shaped objects at Mario.

These mushroom things can move through walls. I tell you, they are kind of eerie and ghost-like, the way they hover and float, and seem to home in on Mario’s position, wherever he is. No, the mushrooms won’t kill Mario. But what they will do is shrink him down to the size of a thimble. And once you’re the size of a thimble, there’s nothing to do except wait around for the effects of the mushroom to finally wear off.

Doot, de doot, de doot, etc.

For the most part, the mushrooms are easy enough to avoid. But one did clip me at one point. Then I had to wait around for what felt like an eternity for it to wear, but it was probably, in reality, only five or six seconds. (Five or six seconds, in game time, is an eternity.)

Anyway, the stage ends when I take the final mini-maze dangler up to Pauline. D.K. grabs her, bolts, and I’m done. Here are the totals for this particular section of the game:

Stage 4-5: 125 seconds

Stage 4-6: 70 seconds (a.k.a. “The Hell Stage”)

Stage 4-7: 131 seconds

Stage 4-8: 99 seconds

Totals for this round: 425 seconds. Number of Marios remaining: 35.