Ornament Review: Piranha Plant - 2019 Hallmark Ornament

Stars: 5 out of 5

Pros: Perfectly captures this video game nemesis

Cons: Only if you don’t time your jump just right

The Bottom Line:

A limited piece

Fun Mario nemesis

Glad to have this one

You’d Better Jump This Ornament Right to Your Tree

Once again, I started out the year by saying I was going to cut down on Hallmark ornament purchases.  And once again, I am completely failing.  But when I saw the Piranha Plant ornament, I knew there was no way I could resist.

If you aren’t familiar with the Piranha Plant, then you aren’t a fan of the Super Mario games.  These are the plants that pop out of some of the pipes, killing you on contact if you aren’t able to jump over them.  And this ornament looks just like them.  The plant has fully come out of the pipe, and has its mouth wide open.  We get the green pipe, green stem and leaves, and red plant with white spots with an open mouth and those teeth.  Heck, there’s even a tongue inside, which I don’t remember seeing before.  It looks just like the character does in the games.

And that’s why I had to have it.  I’ve loved the Mario characters since he and Luigi were just regular characters and not super.  I’ve spent many an hour over the years jumping over these plants, or timing things just right to run by them, so buying this ornament really was an obvious choice.  No, it isn’t a hero, which is what I normally gravitate to, but it was too much fun to ignore.  Honestly, I’m having too much of a hard time ignoring all of the Nintendo ornaments Hallmark has this year.  These games inspire such nostalgia, which seems to be my weakness when it comes to ornaments.

You might not think of a pipe as something that stands on its own, but in this case, that is true.  The pipe is solid enough and the base flat enough that you can set the ornament out to enjoy year round.  And maybe I need to do that since I have more ornaments than I can fit on a tree (or in my condo, but that’s another issue).

If you are brave, you can also hang this ornament on your tree.  Why do I say that?  Because the loop is in the middle of the plant’s mouth, so you’ll need to slip a loop in there quickly before the plant’s jaws shut.  Okay, so maybe this is really made from plastic and that won’t happen.  Anyway, the ornament does tip slightly, but you won’t be able to notice once you get it buried in the middle of tree branches.

No, I don’t regret adding Piranha Plant to my ornament collection.  No, to make sure I hang him on my tree away from my Mario ornament.

Original Price: $17.99