Character: vivian (mario)

post #2896308 post #1675866

Vivian is a major character in the GameCube RPG Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door, the second entry in the Paper Mario series of Mario Bros. spinoffs. Initially an antagonist, she was the youngest member of the villainous Shadow Sirens, a group of sibling witches working with the X-Nauts to gather the Crystal Stars as well as take the Magical Map from Mario. She is a purple female ghost with curly pink hair and a red and white striped witch hat that obscure where her eyes would be. She also wears white gloves and has two pink spots on her face that resemble a blush.

Unlike her sisters Beldam and Marilyn, Vivian is kind, compassionate, and gentle in her interactions with other people. She is consistently put down by her oldest sister, Beldam, and has had a poor relationship with both her sisters for quite some time when Mario meets her. This ingrained a deep-seated inferiority complex into her, and eventually gives her the conviction to abandon the Shadow Sirens and join Mario's party during the events of Chapter 4: For Pigs the Bell Tolls. As a member of Mario's party, she can use her ghostly abilities to make Mario intangible to damage or light enemies ablaze with fire magic.

Vivian's gender was the subject of hot debate ever since the game's release. In the Japanese, Spanish and French versions of the original game, Vivian was inconsistently depicted as either a transgender woman or a male-identifying crossdresser. In the original English and German localizations, any reference to her being transgender or a non-conforming male was changed, and treats Vivian as a non-transgender woman. The Italian localization in particular treated Vivian as transgender and gave her identity greater emphasis. The 2024 Nintendo Switch remake would treat Vivian as a transgender woman in all versions of the game.

For tagging purposes, gynomorph or male depictions of Vivian are to be considered crossgender. When using lore tags, make sure that the artist intended to portray the character one way or another.

This tag implicates paper_mario (learn more).

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