Bowletta

Bowletta
Species	Koopa
First appearance	Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga (2003)
Latest appearance	Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga + Bowser's Minions (2017)
Latest portrayal	Kenny James (2017)

“My new country has no need for old superstars! It will do just fine with only one: the Great Bowletta!!!”

—Bowletta, Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga

Bowletta is the result of Cackletta's spirit inhabiting Bowser's body, who appears as the final boss of Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga and its remake, Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga + Bowser's Minions.

History

Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga / Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga + Bowser's Minions

Cackletta's spirit before it possesses Bowser's body

After the Mario Bros. beat Cackletta at Woohoo Hooniversity, Fawful sucks her spirit into his headgear. They later find Bowser unconscious in Stardust Fields after they are sent flying out of the university by Prince Peasley and the Beanstar exploded. Cackletta's ghost leaves the headgear to take over Bowser, creating Bowletta.

Bowletta in Little Fungitown

Bowletta and Fawful kidnap Princess Peach in Little Fungitown while Mario is sick with Bean Fever and Luigi is out to find the cure in Guffawha Ruins; it is revealed when Luigi returns to the place with the Crabbie Grass. Luigi initially mistakes Bowletta for Bowser when he first sees her. When Luigi and the newly cured Mario arrive at Beanbean Castle Town, Bowletta sends them a message telling them to bring her the four pieces of the destroyed Beanstar in exchange for Princess Peach.

Bowletta taunting Mario

After Mario and Luigi reassemble the Beanstar, Bowletta sends another message, telling them to meet her at Joke's End to give it to her. When the Mario Bros. arrive at Joke's End, they try to give Bowletta a fake Beanstar instead, but Fawful destroys it and takes the real Beanstar using his helmet. However, they soon after see Mario with another Princess Peach, who claims the one Bowletta has captured is an imposter. Believing this, they toss the Peach they have overboard and capture the one with Mario. As they are celebrating success back on the Koopa Cruiser, however, they find out that the Peach they have captured is actually Luigi in disguise, who manages to escape with the Beanstar.

Mario and Luigi encountering Bowletta at the end of Bowser's Castle in the remake.

Angered by the trick, Bowletta and Fawful head to the Mushroom Kingdom, where they fly Bowser's Castle back to the Beanbean Kingdom and attack the castle town. After Mario and Luigi reach the castle via Blablanadon and arrive at the throne room, where Bowletta is waiting, she reveals that she intends to take over the Mushroom Kingdom after she is done with the Beanbean Kingdom and battles the Mario Bros. When Bowletta is defeated, a Time Bob-omb appears and knocks Mario and Luigi out. Bowletta, having faked her defeat, then proceeds to inhale and swallow them. Inside her body, Mario and Luigi must face Cackletta's spirit, and when she is finally defeated, the Mario Bros. are returned to the castle, Bowser is returned to normal, and Cackletta's spirit vanishes into the afterlife.

Bowletta also appears in the Minion Quest: The Search for Bowser mode of the remake. After the captains defeat Fawful for the first time, Bowletta attempts to dupe them by using an illusionary spell to hide her features and disguise herself as an unpossessed Bowser, so that she can command them. However, Captain Goomba is able to deduce something's wrong, as she commands him to destroy Mario and Luigi, which is a step too far in even Bowser's book. After Captain Goomba leaves, Bowletta's disguise dissipates and she discusses her plan with Fawful; however, a Lakitu, hiding in the corner, overhears the conversation and returns to warn the rest of the minions (who deduced the matter independently of the Lakitu both due to "Bowser's" rather uncharacteristic command for them, as well as Fawful's earlier gloating). They then attempt to fight Bowletta and free Bowser. Unfortunately, Fawful, having anticipated that they would see through the earlier ruse, ended up activating a trap door to a Mecha-Fawful factory before the battle could commence.

General information

Bowletta's normal and dark form in Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga and Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga + Bowser's Minions.

Physical description

Bowletta retains Cackletta's facial appearance, including her purple eyes, large head and mouth, and horns (albeit pink instead of purple) replacing Bowser's own horns, although she has Bowser's red hair between them. Her body resembles Bowser's except that she has a smaller tail and light-colored breasts. Bowletta is also less round, but has a more hunched appearance, along with a taller shell. While their scales are the same color, Bowletta's green coloration is lighter than Bowser's. Bowletta wears both sets of Bowser's arm bracelets but lacks his collar in the original. In her artwork, her horns are purple, and it is shown that she completely lacks Bowser's claws.

In the Nintendo 3DS remake, her appearance is revamped with the collar now appearing around her neck unlike previously. Her horns are also now correctly colored, and her shell is no longer as tall in comparison to that of normal Bowser's. Her green scale coloration is additionally no longer subtly brighter than Bowser's own. Her tail is also the same length as Bowser's tail, and she now has Bowser's claws. Her breasts no longer replace Bowser's plastron, as the plastron is still visible as a duller color than the breasts. Her dark appearance is altered by removing her pupils and all pink and red areas outside her eyes and adding a few more yellow glowing areas.

Powers and abilities

Being the result of Cackletta's spirit possessing Bowser, Bowletta has the powers of Bowser; meaning she can shoot balls of fire, produce Flarets or fire a continuous blast of fire from her mouth. She also retained her ability of electrokinesis, shown when she appears for the first time as Bowletta, and can also create a rain of shooting stars when she transforms into her dark form. She can also inhale things into her body, shown when she inhales Mario and Luigi when they are knocked out from the Time Bob-omb after faking her defeat. Finally Bowletta also has limited shapeshifting abilities that she has preserved from her old form, as she appeared as Bowser in Minion Quest in an attempt to trick the Koopa Troop, only removing the disguise when she was sure no one was present.

Battle

Bowletta's most powerful attack in the remake

Bowletta's first attack uses Flarets aimed at the Bros. and fired randomly and rapidly. Three, however, will be used for Bowletta to use at a later turn to heal herself. In order to prevent this, the Bros. must hammer them (or jump on them with the proper badges equipped) in order to get rid of them when it is their turn. However, using fire or thunder will heal the Flarets. She can also summon blocks above the Bros.' heads. They must break the blocks with a required amount of five jumps (six when her health gets low) in three seconds in order to even be able to evade the fire stream she makes.

When Bowletta transforms into a darker form, she summons shooting stars to hit the brothers. Green stars will hit Luigi, red stars will hit Mario, and both stars will harm Bowletta if countered with a hammer; the purple stars (yellow in the remake) which also fall do not damage anyone. If Mario and Luigi do not counter the stars with their hammers, there is a chance that they may get dizzy. In the remake, Bowletta also winks one of her eyes to indicate which star will target one of the bros. This form of Bowletta is also hazardously-surfaced and will damage the Bros. if they try to use jumping attacks without the proper badges needed to damage Bowletta.

In Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga + Bowser's Minions, Bowletta gains the Fury status upon losing half of her HP, and will attack faster each turn.

Statistics

Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga

Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga enemy
Bowletta
	HP	500 (700)	POW	105-140 (110-145)	Defense	180 (140)
	Speed	150	Experience	5000 (0)	Coins	2004 (0)
	Location	Bowser's Castle	Jump	Normal	Hammer	Normal
	Hand	Normal	Fire	Heal	Thunder	Normal
	Stat down?	30%	Stun?	30%	Burn?	0%
	Level	40	Role	Boss	Item drop	None – 0% Max Nut – 61.29% (100%)
Notice Stats in parentheses are from the Japanese version (if they differ from the original American and European stats). Stats in gray are only found in the game's coding and are not available during "normal" gameplay.

Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga enemy
Bowletta (Dark)
	HP	500 (700)	POW	105-140 (110-145)	Defense	180 (200)
	Speed	80	Experience	5000 (0)	Coins	2004 (0)
	Location	Bowser's Castle	Jump	Spiny	Hammer	Normal
	Hand	Normal	Fire	Normal	Thunder	Heal
	Stat down?	0%	Stun?	0%	Burn?	0%
	Level	40	Role	Boss	Item drop	None – 0% None – 0% (Max Nut - 100%)
Notice Stats in parentheses are from the Japanese version (if they differ from the original American and European stats). Stats in gray are only found in the game's coding and are not available during "normal" gameplay.

Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga + Bowser's Minions

Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga + Bowser's Minions enemy
Bowletta
	HP	1200	POW	140	DEF	139	SPEED	116	Experience	0
	Fire	Heal	Thunder	Normal	Jump	Normal	Hammer	Normal	Coins	0
	Stat down	30%	Dizzy	30%	Burn	0%	Speed down	30%	Item drop	None (0%) None (0%) None (0%)
Level           40	Location(s)	Bowser's Castle

Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga + Bowser's Minions enemy
Bowletta (Dark)
	HP	1200	POW	180	DEF	160	SPEED	116	Experience	0
	Fire	Normal	Thunder	Heal	Jump	Spiny, Weak	Hammer	Normal	Coins	0
	Stat down	0%	Dizzy	0%	Burn	0%	Speed down	0%	Item drop	None (0%) None (0%) None (0%)
Level           40	Location(s)	Bowser's Castle

Gallery

• 

  4-koma Gag Battle

• 

  Encountering Bowletta at Bowser's Castle in the Game Boy Advance version

• 

  Bowletta attacking in the Game Boy Advance version

• 

  Cackletta's soul within Bowletta being destroyed

• 

  Early version from the data of the E3 2003 demo of Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga

Names in other languages

Language	Name	Meaning	Notes
Japanese	ゲラクッパ[?] Gerakuppa	Combination of「ゲラゲモーナ」(Geragemōna, Cackletta) and「クッパ」(Kuppa, Bowser)
Chinese (simplified)	咯咯酷霸王[?] Gēgē Kùbàwáng	From "咯咯莫纳" (Gēgēmònà, Cackletta) and "酷霸王" (Kùbàwáng, Bowser)
French	Bowsémona[?]	A mix between "Bowser" and "Graguémona", the French name of Cackletta
German	Bowsemilla[?]	A mix between "Bowser" and "Lugmilla", the German name of Cackletta
Italian	Ghigno Bowser[?]	Grin Bowser; "Ghigno" (Grin) can be seen as both the word itself or a shortened version for Cackletta's Italian name, Ghignarda
Korean	깔깔쿠파[?] Kkalkkal Kupa	From 깔깔 (kkalkkal, sound of laughter, also part of Cackletta's name) and 쿠파 (Kupa, Bowser)
Spanish	Bowser Jijí[?]	A mix between "Bowser" and "Bruja Jijí", the Spanish name of Cackletta

Trivia

• Bowletta's Star Strike move is similar to the Star Storm special move and the Shooting Star item in Paper Mario.
• In the 3DS remake, Bowletta seems to retain Bowser's voice during battle, but Cackletta's laughter.
• Mario and Luigi are terrified of her at the start of her battle in the original Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga, but in the remake, they assume their default "battle ready" stances as she breathes fire on them.
• If the Bros. can defeat Bowletta with her falling star attack, then die by getting hit by the remaining stars, the game will trigger both the Game Over sequence and Bowletta's "death" sequence at the same time. Restarting the game is required to get out of the glitch.