Mario has Wario. Luigi has Waluigi. Internet logic asks one more question: who's supposed to give those two a hard time? Enter Wawario and Wawaluigi, fan-made rivals for the rivals.
The names sound like someone got stuck saying “wa,” but the designs commit to the bit. Wawario is a hefty, eyeless figure in an orange cap and green overalls. Wawaluigi looks like Waluigi stretched into a much creepier, scruffier shape. They're fan creations, not a surprise announcement from Nintendo.
This joke has a longer history than its 2026 comeback suggests. Know Your Meme traces a Wawario rival to a 2015 YouTube animation and a Wawaluigi fan-page entry to 2016. The familiar character designs took shape in later fan art, including Wawario's orange-and-green look in 2021.
So why were they popping up again? A July 2026 YouTube video ran through a lineup of Mario-related characters to a song. A clip was reposted to TikTok on September 2, and September fan art on X kept the gag going. People were treating an absurd family tree like a perfectly reasonable expansion of the cast.
That's the punchline: once every hero needs a rival, apparently every rival needs one too. Give it another round and you'll need a flowchart just to introduce the plumbers.
Source: https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/wawario-and-wawaluigi
