Mario is one of the most iconic video game characters of all time. With Super Mario Bros for the NES being partially responsible for reviving video games after the video game crash of the early 80s, Mario found himself in a unique, enviable position. He was a hero for the Mushroom Kingdom and gamers on Earth.
However, Mario is far less interesting than his brother, Luigi. While the two often go on adventures together, Luigi has garnered an increasingly large fanbase that celebrates the often-overlooked green hero. But while many admire and respect Luigi, is he truly better than his iconic brother, Mario? The answer, of course, is yes.
Luigi's Personality
Most video game characters have easily identifiable personalities that make them immediately iconic. Sonic is a cool kid with an attitude. Samus Aran is a battle-hardened bounty hunter. Link is a dork in a green tunic who tries hard to be a hero. But by comparison, Mario has very little personality. The few moments that speak to his true nature, however, don't do him many favors.
Mario will often go out of his way to help others and save Princess Peach from the clutches of Bowser. However, in the Donkey Kong titles, we learn Mario kept Donkey Kong as a pet and tortured the poor animal. The game Donkey Kong serves as the great ape's revenge against Mario. In Donkey Kong Jr., we even see Mario cage and humiliate his ape, forcing his son to try and rescue him. In Super Mario World, to get Yoshi to stick his tongue out, Mario clobbers the poor dinosaur before abandoning him to get a little more air on his jump. Even Mario's motivations to save Princess Peach might be self-serving, as he often is rewarded with cake for his efforts.
By comparison, Luigi, despite working alongside his brother in almost every main title game, never receives any reward for his actions from Peach. We see in the Luigi's Mansion titles that Luigi is a naturally anxious person, which means he often puts himself in situations that are stressful for him to help his brother out. While Mario accepts cake as his reward, Luigi manages to use the money he earns along his journey to invest in real estate, proving he is a far more frugal, financially intelligent person. He is also far kinder to his pet ghost dog, Spooky, than Mario is to Yoshi, the species of animals that saved his life as a baby.
Luigi's Trial By Fire
However, when it comes right down to it, Mario has it way easier than Luigi. Mario often uses a lot of power-ups to fight Bowser and usually has the help of his brother to aid him. While Mario has other adversaries beyond Bowser -- such as Wario -- Luigi simply has to overcome more adversities than Mario has.
Luigi fights Bowser a lot, but he also has two villains of his own: King Boo and Waluigi. While Waluigi is a lovable dork who is consistently left out of Smash Bros. games, King Boo is a villain who beat Mario and imprisoned him in a portrait. Luigi had no power-ups other than prototype technology developed by a crazy old professor, E. Gadd, that functions similarly to a vacuum cleaner. Yet despite that, he's able to perform an exorcism on an entire house single-handedly. In contrast, when Mario faces the legions of the undead employed by Bowser, he runs away, unable to put them down.
This already makes Luigi a bigger threat than Mario, especially considering most of what Mario has accomplished was accomplished in part thanks to Luigi. But Mario takes all the credit, utterly erasing Luigi's many accomplishments. Peach doesn't even make cakes for Luigi unless Mario is there. To them, Luigi is barely a person. He's just treated as if he's an accessory to Mario, even though he's just as accomplished. There is nothing Mario has done that Luigi could not also do, but, as proven in the Luigi's Mansion games, there are many things Luigi can do that Mario can only dream of doing.