Posing, in true butch stance

In the final boss scene of Nintendo’s 1996 hit classic game Super Mario 64, the short moustachioed protagonist is tasked with spinning lead villain Bowser by the tail and throwing the monster into spike-covered bombs in the night sky. As Bowser hits a bomb, Mario utters one of his few lines—aside from grunts and ya-hoos!—in the game: “So long, King Bowser.” But for years, the line has been misheard—likely thanks to the poor Italian accent of Mario’s voice actor Charles Martinet—as “So long, Gay Bowser.”

While it is unlikely, in a game tailored to large youth markets in both Japan and North America, that Nintendo would pejoratively refer to what some have called “the most successful video game character” as gay (though, in my research I have not found confirmation of the actual line), it left me wondering: What if Bowser was gay this entire time? How would it change the Mario universe and the storylines we’ve become so accustomed to?

“So long, Gay Bowser”

Feminist readings of the traditional story arc in Mario games suggest its characters fall into typical patriarchal roles: Princess Peach is the “damsel in distress” in need of saving from a big bad, and Mario is the only man macho enough to help her. Peach is draped in pastel pink from head to toe, with blonde hair and blue eyes—the picture of “white purity.” Mario is a man’s man, a plumber whose worth is determined based on his physical abilities. Much like Snow White, Peach awaits her prince, Mario, to rescue her when she is kidnapped by Bowser. Mario’s reward is, almost always, a kiss.

But what if we flip the narrative on its head? In an alternative reading of Mario games, perhaps we can suggest that Peach’s need for rescue and her obligatory end-of-game kiss comes down not just to a woman bound by patriarchal norms, but also of compulsory heterosexuality. She must act certain ways because she must fit into a specific role; that is, her distress and need of saving and her physical reward to Mario are part of an act to conform to the straight narrative we expect of her.

In an even further stretch, perhaps we can dream up something even queerer: Bowser, an amorphous turtle monster, is actually butch, or identifies outside of the gender binary. While most official Nintendo sources identify Bowser as male and as using male pronouns, there are no true markers of Bowser’s gender in-game—aside from references to the villain’s heterosexually driven kidnapping of Princess Peach. But, if we step aside and consider the Mario narrative from a queer perspective, Bowser’s identity becomes far more blurry.

This theory that Bowser is the strong gay woman we’ve all wanted in video games would posit that Peach, always thought to have been in need of rescue, is actually happily living with Bowser. She hasn’t been kidnapped at all.

But, from Mario’s perspective, from which every game is played, queer Bowser is still viewed as a big bad. Queerness is to be eliminated—particularly when it seeps into the life of a pretty femme like Peach. In this way Mario parallels the stereotype of a straight man insistent on “flipping” gay women, especially those viewed as straight-passing, like Peach. He sets out to save her from this queer hell—and from Bowser, the monstrous villain who has “turned” her.

Bowser is also one of the few characters in the Mario universe—aside from personified plants, animals, and objects that exist as enemies, and maybe Toad—whose appearance isn’t tied to specific gender expectations. As previously mentioned, Peach is adorned in a bright pink dress and wears her hair long. Mario wears a moustache to denote his manliness. But Bowser dresses explicitly queer, with a red mohawk and a spiked collar and sleeves. Bowser does not conform to what is deemed societally acceptable in the Mario universe, but rather subverts these norms.

In a list of quotes found by my pal Megan Jones, Bowser further reveals a queer side: