Mario flicking his nose while thinking in PiT was incredible! I wanted to make Baby Mario go away so he would keep doing it!
I don't get why Partners in Time was such a "disgrace." It was a good game. Not like its predecessor in terms of plot, execution, and, being second, originality--but in style, it really built on the foundation Superstar Saga made.
The third game has a lot of room to top PiT though, I guess. I hope it does, and I'm looking forward to it. This isn't really worth noting, but I had this weird delusion in a semi-sleeping state some Sundays ago that it was confirmed that the main villains were both Fawful and Popple who were not teamed up, but being equally destructive in their attempts to achieve some goal before the other. Right now I am awake, and I can see that this sounds really lame.