Fawful

Fawful (also known as Lord Fawful to his minions) is an eccentric Beanish character and a major antagonist in the Mario & Luigi series. He is the secondary antagonist of Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga and its remake and the main antagonist of Mario & Luigi: Bowser's Inside Story and its remake. He also appears as the shopkeeper of Fawful's Bean 'n' Badge in Mario & Luigi: Partners in Time. He is notable for speaking in Engrish (grammatically incorrect English), as a parody of low-quality video game translations, and making obscure food metaphors (e.g. "And this battle shall be the delicious mustard on that bread! The mustard of your doom!"). Fawful is a mechanical genius, but his common sense suffers due to his uncontrollable anger, which often causes him to act in a delusional manner. His name comes from the words "guffaw" (a term that refers to powerful laughter) and "awful."

Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga / Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga + Bowser's Minions
"I am the Great Cackletta's most best pupil, who is named Fawful!"

- Fawful

Though his past is largely unknown, Fawful is implied to have been a long-time follower of Cackletta prior to the events of Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga and its 2017 3DS remake and names himself as a pupil of hers in-game. Because of his "evil genius", he is Cackletta's "favorite subordinate". He is the secondary antagonist of the game.

Fawful accompanies Cackletta, disguised as The Goodwill Ambassador from the Beanbean Kingdom, to the Mushroom Kingdom during the events of the game, where he aids her in stealing Princess Peach's voice, which was needed to awaken the Beanstar. While the two are on their way to the Beanbean Kingdom, their kingdom of residence, they encounter Mario, Luigi, and Bowser, who have formed a temporary alliance to stop the two villains. After taking care of Bowser, Fawful attacks the Mario Bros., who manage to destroy his Vacuum Helmet. However, Fawful summons another Vacuum Helmet after that and uses it to knock Bowser's Koopa Cruiser out of the sky before departing. He is later hinted by Beanbean guards to have kidnapped Prince Peasley, after they wrongly accused Mario and Luigi of doing so. He is not seen again until the brothers arrive on Hoohoo Mountain, where he blocks their path with a large stone. He later appears in Beanbean Castle, stealing the Beanstar alongside Cackletta and force-feeding Queen Bean, the kingdom's benevolent ruler, a Belly Blech worm to aid in their escape.

The villainous pair next assaults Woohoo Hooniversity, where he and Cackletta plan to awaken the Beanstar using several Peach-bots, which Fawful had designed. However, due to some planning on the princess's part, the voice used is that of Birdo, which irritates the Beanstar so much that it smashes through the floor and into the basement. Shortly afterward, the Mario Bros. arrive, and before he can do anything, Luigi knocks him into the ground. After dispatching him, they incapacitate Cackletta. Fawful soon recovers and sucks his mistress's energy into his Vacuum Helmet. Before he can attack the brothers again, he is sent flying through the roof by Prince Peasley. Landing in Stardust Fields, Fawful finds an unconscious Bowser, whose body Cackletta possesses. Cackletta then begins to call herself Bowletta. Fawful then accompanies her to Little Fungitown, where they abduct the princess.

The Mario Bros. later encounter Fawful at Joke's End under the pretense of exchanging the Beanstar for Peach, though they use a fake. Fawful recognizes this, however, and takes the real one as well as Princess Peach on board a repaired Koopa Cruiser. However, this Princess Peach is actually Luigi in disguise, who utilizes the pair's rage and shock to retrieve the Beanstar and escape. Fawful then follows Cackletta to Bowser's Castle, from which she plans to destroy both the Mushroom and Beanbean Kingdoms.

Fawful is encountered in the castle as the penultimate boss, clad in a pink outfit with wing-like cloth under his arms and a large V-neck, along with a large antenna replacing his hair. He can now attack with a large mechanism that resembles his head. After his defeat, he begins a final attack in desperation, entering a banter-fest with Prince Peasley, but is knocked out of the castle and explodes before Mario and Luigi engage his mistress and her soul, the latter of which conjures an apparition of Fawful as one of its attacks. This apparition of Fawful attacks similarly to how he does in his first battle.

He also appears as the main antagonist and final boss in the remake's new mode, Minion Quest: The Search for Bowser. He intended to enslave Bowser and work him to death. He also proceeded to brainwash the Koopalings into trying to conquer the Beanbean Kingdom over trying to rescue Bowser. The group encounters Fawful at Bowser's Castle, and although he taunts the squad mercilessly, they defeat him and make their way to Bowser's chamber, where Bowser (seemingly returned), immediately tells Captain Goomba to "destroy" Mario; it is presumed that the army turns its attention to the Mario Bros after this. After a while, it turns out "Bowser" was actually Bowletta in disguise, and when Captain Goomba confronts them about this, she and Fawful use a trapdoor to send the squad into a dungeon, which turns out to be a Mechawful factory. After a long final battle which tests all the skill levels, the minions defeat Fawful one last time and escape the dungeon.

In the remake, his second form was redesigned to have a more prominent collar, while the antennae has become massive and bulbous.

Mario & Luigi: Partners in Time
"I have boredom... Guests? Now I have... FURY!"

- Fawful

Fawful reappears in Mario & Luigi: Partners in Time, now wearing a white skin tight suit instead of pink, and still with an antenna; instead of an antagonist, he is a shopkeeper, running a shop called Fawful's Bean 'n' Badge that is located in the sewers of Princess Peach's Castle. Only the Babies can talk to him, whom he does not completely recognize as the younger versions of Mario and Luigi, though he does recall them as familiar. He sells them some of the rarest badges available in the game in exchange for beans. Fawful also goes on a long speech to them about how the brothers defeated him in the previous game, notably mentioning that he plans to return in the future (foreshadowing his major role as the main antagonist in Mario & Luigi: Bowser's Inside Story), creating a period of time in which "no baby's candy will have safety". He, demonstrating apparent clairvoyance, also suggests that the babies go to Princess Peach's Castle's viewing platform prior to the time they discover Gritzy Desert thus giving them a hint.

Mario & Luigi: Bowser's Inside Story / Mario & Luigi: Bowser's Inside Story + Bowser Jr.'s Journey
"A WINNER IS YOU!"

- Fawful

Fawful appears again as the main antagonist in Mario & Luigi: Bowser's Inside Story. He began the outbreak of the blorbs by selling "Blorb Mushrooms" to the citizens of Toad Town. Fawful brainwashes Bowser's minions to put them under his control and has them invade the Mushroom Kingdom.

Fawful is first seen in Dimble Wood disguised as a merchant. He sells Bowser a Vacuum Mushroom, advertising it as a "Lucky ? Shroom" that will help the Koopa King defeat his enemies. Instead, it causes Bowser to inhale everything around him, including Mario, Luigi, Princess Peach, Starlow, and other Mushroom Kingdom citizens.

Bowser later finds Fawful in Cavi Cape, where the villain reveals that he has captured Bowser's Castle. He then sends his brawny minion, Midbus, to battle Bowser and, during the fight, he teaches both combatants how to fight. Sometimes in the game, Fawful will communicate with Bowser via Fawfulcopter to manipulate his actions. He has Bowser fight the Sea Pipe Statue, only to later tell the victorious Koopa King that he has captured his minions.

Fawful then turns Bowser's Castle into Fawful Theater, where he performs on stage to Bowser's minions, who were under his control. Fawful arranges a VIP seat for Bowser and, when he falls for the Bean's latest plot, the Koopa King is catapulted onto the stage, where Fawful has Midbus fight him in a cage match. Bowser defeats Midbus, but he soon falls for Fawful's next trap by eating the "Victory Feast" his nemesis presents him with, which causes him to become bloated and get stuck in the floor (it is heavily implied afterward that he did this in order to draw Princess Peach out into the open so he could extract her from inside Bowser). Mario and Luigi have to travel to the Flab Zone after that.

Fawful appears again in the basement under Bowser. He uses his ray gun to remove Princess Peach from Bowser's body, as part of his new plan. When holding the princess, Fawful almost collapses, showing his lack of strength. Fawful's minion, Midbus, then places a treadmill under Bowser, causing him to (literally) burn off fat.

Fawful appears again under the Mushroom Kingdom stealing the Dark Star, which can give him the power to destroy the kingdom. At that point, the Mario Bros. realize that it is too late to stop him. After taunting the heroes, Fawful flies off to Peach's castle. Mario and co. chase him but are stopped by a barrier made by the Dark Star. The only way the Mario Bros. could break it is to get the Miracle Cure.

Fawful, along with Midbus, is found again inside Peach's castle, which he had taken over earlier. They are seen with a machine that sucks the princess's energy and brings it to the Dark Star. As they wait for the Dark Star to awaken, an alarm goes off because of Mario and Luigi's appearance outside the castle. Fawful, however, laughs at their "stupidity" and sends out a Fawfulcopter to speak to the bros., telling them his plans. He then leaves saying that he is going shopping at the Toad Town Mall.

Later, Mario and Luigi create the Miracle Cure, which breaks the blockade in front of Peach's castle. As they attempt to gain access to Peach's Castle through the back trash pit, Midbus appears and constructs a trash robot named "Junker", which the Bros. have to battle. After the battle, the player takes control of Bowser with his newly learned Spike Ball move. With the Marios inside of him, Bowser travels inside the castle, where he meets three Fawfulcopters which Fawful can communicate through. Fawful admits to Bowser that he is shocked at how he made it to the castle. However, that doesn't stop him from making another scheme. Fawful explains to Bowser that each of the Fawfulcopters hold a key and Bowser has to catch the copters to get to important rooms. Unable to break down the doors, Bowser must chase the Fawfulcopters to get to the next area.

After getting the keys and going through other obstacles, Bowser is shot into the sky and meets two giant Piranha Plants. However, Bowser falls back down and lands in the very top of Peach's Castle and the three Fawfulcopters seen earlier talk to Bowser, laughing at him because he can't fly, let alone destroy the giant Piranha Plants raised by Fawful. The Fawfulcopters then leave and make Bowser destroy the Piranha Plants and overcome more obstacles.

Fawful is once again seen in the room with the machine that sucks Peach's power into the Dark Star. The evil star had finally awakened, but Bowser came in the room at that time. Hating his timing, Fawful decides to help Midbus fight, but changes his mind because of Midbus's "pride". Instead, he powers up Midbus with his laser gun to make him become Blizzard Midbus, whom Bowser fights. After beating him, Midbus's body turns into an ice cube, leaving Fawful alone to carry out his plans. At that time, the Dark Star becomes fully awakened and Fawful, stunned, rushes over and drains its power. Bowser, however, punches Fawful away before he has all the star's power. Afterwards, the Dark Star flies into Bowser's body.

Fawful appears again outside of Peach's Castle, looking for the Dark Star. There, he was in his dark form, Dark Fawful, with greater powers, a newer attire (most notably red glasses and a Cackletta-esque cloak), and a headgear that seemingly has a life of its own. Bowser confronts him but Dark Fawful, always having a new plan, powers up the castle to become the Super Peach Castle. The giant castle crushes Bowser, making the Mario Bros. inside his body revive him to have another Giant Bowser Battle.

After beating the behemoth castle, Bowser finds Dark Fawful in the castle's meeting room. The two villains begin to fight each other. Before the battle, Dark Fawful speaks much like he did in Superstar Saga, even saying 'fink-rat' once again and also the only time in the game. He also speaks of how Mario and Luigi 'always show up' (referring to Superstar Saga's events). After Bowser and the Mario Bros. manage to beat Dark Fawful, he collapses into a second bug-like form and escapes claiming he "has fury?", but gets inhaled by Dark Bowser.

During the final battle, Bowser makes Dark Bowser spit out the Dark Fawful Bug (Fawful's remains), and then he inhales it so that Mario and Luigi have the final battle against the Dark Fawful Bug and the Dark Star (with which Dark Fawful had fused when he was inhaled by Dark Bowser and now controls it) inside Bowser's stomach. They ultimately succeed in destroying both, thus weakening Dark Bowser enough for Bowser to deliver the final blows and destroy him.

Inside Bowser, a highly unstable Dark Fawful makes his last appearance, speaking of how Mario and Luigi will always show up and get in the way of his grand plans. In his final attempt to destroy the heroes, Dark Fawful explodes; however, he instead frees them from Bowser and seemingly cancels the effect of the vacuum shroom, undoing what started all the chaos in the first place. The Mushroom Kingdom returns to normal, thus bringing Dark Fawful's mad reign to an end, and ending the mad Beanish once and for all.

Super Mario-Kun
Fawful is also in the Super Mario-Kun manga, in volume 40, filling the same role as in Mario and Luigi: Bowser's Inside Story.

Personality
Fawful's motivation is usually driven by his anger, and he rarely shows concern for anyone else besides Cackletta, whom he served with blind devotion in Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga, and Midbus, who showed the same devotion to Fawful himself in Bowser's Inside Story. He enjoys taunting his enemies and thinks he is infallible. While initially content to be Cackletta's lackey, when Fawful becomes a villain in his own right, he proves to be incredibly narcissistic, building statues of himself, selling merchandise and pasting his likeness everywhere wherever he goes, hosting shows and delivering speeches about himself, and even having much of his army physically resemble him, typically with green coloration and his trademark wide grin. Even prior to Cackletta's final defeat, however, Fawful when about to fight the Mario Bros. for the final time briefly considers the possibility of rising beyond a "toady" of Cackletta's.

Speech
Fawful speaks in Engrish, often saying things that are redundant or hardly make sense (if at all). Fawful is made even stranger by his uses of several food metaphors and references throughout his speeches ("I drizzled rage dressing on the country next door. Rage dressing on a salad of evil!") or ("Two pieces of Fawful chortle bread get put together on Beanbean Kingdom, making a danger sandwich!") and refers to the Mario Bros. as "Fink-rats".

Fawful often speaks about himself in a third person point of view, only speaking in first person when saying phrases such as "I HAVE FURY!". In Mario & Luigi Bowser's Inside Story, he often replaces the word fury with other odd words, such as "chortles" or "excitement " or "uneasiness". When talking to Baby Mario and Baby Luigi in Partners in Time he often skips words such as do or are in the beginnings of sentences resulting in him saying things such as "You wearing this now?".

Fawful usually rhymes his sentences and/or sing-songilly says them, though there are times where not even he can think of a rhyme to his sentence. ("Fawful sings a song of bad! Mushroom Kingdom is so sad! All of it is for Fawful! And the... rhyme... with... that...")

In Japanese versions, Fawful adds strings of "ru" (る) onto every sentence, sometimes even saying "Fururururu" (ふるるるるるる﻿ ). In French versions, Fawful speaks with a strong accent, exaggerating when aspiring the letter R, and frequently saying "Fuyuyuyuyu" ; he also does strange metaphors. In German versions, he stutters. In the American Spanish Versions, he speaks a literal translation of English to Spanish. In the European Spanish versions, he speaks in a very refined Spanish with a lot of set phrases. He speaks, also, with a slight tone "enthusiastic". In the Italian versions he speaks with lots of invented words such as "disgustevole" (disgust able). A Sammer Guy named Mustard of Doom talks like Fawful, and is a reference to Fawful and his "Mustard of Doom!" quote. In Korean version, he talks in a similar way in Japanese version, adding strings of "rong" (롱) in every sentence as in "Rongrongrongrong" (롱롱롱롱). In the Russian version he speaks with many mistranslations and grammar and syntax errors, thus parodying 90s and early 2000s poor quality bootleg translations of video games.

Powers and abilities
Though he is a bit of a loon, Fawful is a genius, shown by how complex his Vacuum Helmet is. He uses the rocket-jets on his Vacuum Helmet to get around places. There is also a vacuum peripheral on the helmet, which can be used to shoot energy balls and was also used to suck in Cackletta's spirit to transfer to Bowser and create Bowletta. He also sports a laser gun which he can use to power up his minions or fire beams. In Bowser's Inside Story, many enemies have masks resembling Fawful's face, making it possible that they were invented by him.

Attacks
Fawful is the second boss of Superstar Saga. When fighting him, he has little HP. Being an early battle, Fawful does not have a large variety of attacks. In his first attack, he shoots green energy balls at the Mario Bros. from his Headgear. In order to avoid the attack, the player must look at the color of the text when he calls the heroes "Fink Rats". If the text is red, he shoots at Mario, but if the text is green, he shoots at Luigi. Then, later in the battle, Fawful will say "Have you readiness for this?!?", in which he will shoot two energy balls - one at each brother, although the color of "this" indicates which brother Fawful will target first. After 18 points of damage, the bean's helmet will fall off, making him unable to shoot fire balls. In this state, Fawful has only one other attack. He can run up to a bro. and try to roll into him. This can be countered by a well-timed jump.

Later at the end of the game, Fawful is fought again as the penultimate boss. This time, he is much stronger with more than 12 times his original health and fights from within a giant mecha resembling his head. This dome-shaped machine completely protects Fawful and shoots powerful lasers at both bros. Unlike in the first battle, Fawful has many different attacks, some of which can last for a long time. During the battle, he hides in his mecha, defending him from all attacks. He uses his mecha to perform some of his attacks. The main attack used by his mecha is shooting laser eye beams, which move around the bros., trying to hit them. As the battle progresses, this attack lasts longer. Sometimes when it is the bean's turn to attack, he exits his mecha for a short moment and shoots more laser bolts from his antenna. The shadows created by the bolts appear above one of the heroes, letting the player know which character is being targeted. To avoid the attack, the Marios need to hit the bolts with their hammers and send them flying at Fawful, giving him a small amount of damage. In addition, when the mecha gets hit four times, Fawful gets enraged and spins around, shooting more laser bolts at the heroes for them to counter with their hammers. After the bolts spin around the area twice, the Bros. are no longer able to use their hammers, making them jump over the remaining bolts. The mecha eventually overheats, causing Fawful to stay out of the device for three turns. When this happens, the bros. can deal more damage to him. After he gets hurt, he adds some more attacks to his possessions, such as charging a laser beam while putting a Fawfulized block over the heroes' heads, making them rapidly jump to break it. Shortly after the blocks appear, the laser beam swoops across the stage, trying to hit the Marios. If the blocks are still intact and above the two heroes, they are unable to jump over the beam. Fawful's final attacks is charging at the bros. The player has to hit his body with the brothers' hammers to counter him as he swoops down at the heroes. During the attack, he flaps his right arm when attacking Mario and flaps his left arm when attacking Luigi.

In Bowser's Inside Story, Fawful drains the Dark Star's power with his Vacuum Helmet and is fought by Bowser as Dark Fawful. He's shown to have many more abilities, including very high speed, dark magic and other powerful attacks. His Vacuum Helmet is also with him in this battle and can give him 300 HP when needed. After being beaten, Fawful collapses into the Dark Fawful Bug and escapes from Bowser. Despite all his genius, Fawful is physically frail, to the point of finding Princess Peach a huge burden. As such, it is logical to assume that Fawful meant Midbus to carry anything heavy for him.

Quotes

 * "Y-You again! You are the pair of fink-rats that swooped in with the Bowser that I hate!"
 * "I HAVE FURY!"
 * "And this battle shall be the delicious mustard on that bread! The mustard of your doom!"
 * "Now is the time where my true might shines, like many angry sunbeams of rage!"
 * " and a pair of Jumping Hammers in red and green who are looking like YOU!"
 * "I have boredom... Guests? Now I have... FURY!"
 * "A WINNER IS YOU!"
 * "I HAVE CHORTLES!"
 * "Beef? I am lacking in beef. Fawful is beefless."
 * "MUSHROOM KINGDOM WILL BE MINE!!"
 * "Fawfully-doo!♪ Where are you?!♪ Dark Star, needing you!♪ Dark power, yoo-hoo!♪ WHERE TO FIND YOU...♪"
 * "Fawful sings a song of bad!♪ Mushroom Kingdom is so sad!♪ All of it is for Fawful!♪ And the... rhyme... with... that...♪"
 * "You have gotten in Fawful's way at each of the turns... Just like the and  mustaches who I hate..."
 * "Fawful hates your faces!"
 * "Here Fawful goes...The disappearing...Forever disappearing... WITH YOU!"
 * "You are like a nuisance barge, barging in at a critical time!"
 * "Fink-rat!"
 * "Your leader is mine for the taking away! I will work him until his bones become dust and the dust has grown mold!"
 * "♪Bowser is not a thing that is here... Your tears make hee and har and cheer...♪ ♪He's gone! He's gone! Fawfully-doo! Just like, soon, the one who is you!♪"

Trivia

 * In Mario & Luigi: Bowser's Inside Story, before the Dark Fawful battle, the radar-devices he uses is shaped like a Nintendo DS Lite.
 * In the same scene, he also sing-songly asks the Dark Star's location in a similar manner to the Scooby Doo opening song.
 * Also in Mario & Luigi: Bowser's Inside Story, Fawful's first quote is "A WINNER IS YOU", possibly referencing popular NES title Pro Wrestling.
 * In Super Smash Bros. Brawl, one of the names that can be generated from pressing the "RANDOM NAME" button is FWFUL.
 * Using the same method, the name "Fawful" may be generated in Super Smash Bros. for Nintendo 3DS / Wii U.
 * In Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga, during the second fight with Fawful in Bowser's Castle, Popple's battle theme is playing instead of the normal boss theme. This is replaced with Cackletta's battle theme in the Japanese version and in the 3DS remake, as this theme is intended to be shared by Cackletta and Fawful, being a combination of their overworld themes and being titled "Fawful and Cackletta" in the remake.
 * In Mario & Luigi: Dream Team, a character in a Zeekeeper costume at the beginning of the game references Fawful by saying, "I have excitement!"