Wario

"“Greed is good! Greed makes you do great things! Greed loves all people. Gold coins and puppies! It will get you everything! Even if you have to PILE DRIVE your enemies to do so!” ― Wario, Wario World commercial"Wario (Japanese: ワリオ) is the titular main protagonist of his own series and a recurring character in the Super Mario franchise. He is portrayed as an self-righteous anti-hero and the evil and greedy version of his arch-rival Mario. He made his first appearance in Super Mario Land 2: 6 Golden Coins as the game's final boss.

Why He's Number One

 * 1) He is one of the most famous anti-heroes in video game history, rivaling the portly Italian plumber himself.
 * 2) Despite being greedy and self-serving, these traits are presented in a really goofily entertaining manner. It can also be considered a breath of fresh air after all the "goody-two-shoes" heroes.
 * 3) Unlike most fat characters in fiction, Wario actually has a muscular physique to show off. That said, he does display a high amount of physical strength, being capable of defeating multiple genies and demons in combat.
 * 4) *Wario can be seen lifting weights and dumbells in Wario Land 4 and in Mario Power Tennis ' blooper reel, he is capable of lifting a huge weight with only one hand.
 * 5) *In Wario World, Wario can piledrive dinosaurs far larger than he is with minimal effort.
 * 6) He's easily one of the toughest and most persistent Nintendo characters; getting crushed flat, setting himself on fire, eating bombs, even literally turning into a zombie, all of it has zero effect on Wario, who purposefully lets all of that happen to him in order to progress levels in the Wario Land games. He can practically come back from anything. According to himself, this apparent immortality is because he just doesn't feel like dying.
 * 7) He's an amazing treasure hunter and explorer. He's a successful video game developer and business owner, owning an entire mountain and gold mine. These traits set him apart from his red-clad rival.
 * 8) What makes Wario unique is that despite his name literally translating to "Bad Mario", his character has evolved far beyond that. He has only ever actually fought Mario as a villain once, in his first game (Super Mario Land 2: Six Golden Coins), and every major appearance after that is in his own games, such as Wario Land and WarioWare, where Mario barely appears, and in some cases, is completely absent altogether. Wario is his own person and has his own life outside of antagonizing Mario.
 * 9) Charles Martinet's performance is just as awesome as his portrayal of the Mario Bros., being at its best in WarioWare Gold.

Bad Qualities

 * 1) He is still considered unlikable to some fans.
 * 2) In Super Smash Bros. Brawl and onwards, he provides a bit of toilet humor with his "Wario Waft".

Trivia

 * His name is a portmanteau of "warui" (悪い), meaning "bad" in Japanese, and Mario's name; hence, Wario is a "bad Mario".
 * He was created by Hiroji Kiyotake, who also desgined Foreman Spike from Wrecking Crew and various Metroid characters (including its protagonist).
 * Yoichi Kotabe, the artist who designed Wario, has said that his design was inspired by Bluto from Popeye the Sailor, and also partially based on Stromboli, the evil circus owner in Disney's Pinocchio.
 * In the Japanese version of Mario Kart 64 as well as in all versions of Mario Party and Mario Party 2, Wario is voiced by German translator Thomas Spindler and speaks two lines in German, most notably "So ein Mist!" (German for "oh crap!"). According to a comment left by Spindler, Wario was envisioned to be German by Nintendo staff and he was directed to voice Wario accordingly. Charles Martinet has stated on November 6, 2020 that he did record a "Doh! I missed!" voice clip for Wario. Though Spindler recorded Wario's lines for the Japanese market after being told Wario was originally thought of as German, Martinet did not receive this information when recording Wario's lines for English and portrayed Wario as Italian similar to Mario and Luigi.
 * Despite this aspect of Wario's character having been ignored since the release of these games and Charles Martinet taking over the role, with Martinet's portrayal adopting a thick Italian accent similar to Mario and Luigi's, Wario's theme song in Mario Strikers Charged is in a style reminiscent of Germanic folk songs.