Tippi

Tippi as seen in Super Paper Mario.

Tippi, real name Lady Tempani, is a fictional character in Nintendo's Mario franchise and Mario's first party member in Super Paper Mario. She was once human, but is now a Pixl, a member of a race of fairy-like creatures. She is introduced to Mario at the beginning of the game, teleporting him to Flipside to meet Merlon so that he can fulfill his destiny to save the worlds. She helps Mario in his quest by finding secrets, identifying enemies, and talking to him in cut scenes. The player can use Tippi by pointing the Wii Remote at the screen, causing her to tattle on enemies, search for hidden doors, and find other secrets. She resembles a butterfly, and is the first of many Pixls that Mario and team will find. Unlike the other Paper Mario tattle partners Mario has had, Tippi tattles in third person.

Character history

Human life

Before Tippi was a Pixl, she was a human girl, descended from the Tribe of Ancients. One day she found a man named Blumiere, a descendant from the Ancient's enemies, the Tribe of Darkness, who was badly injured. She helped him and nursed him back to health. They then fell in love and decided to get married. Blumiere's father, however, did not want his son to marry an Ancient, so Blumiere and Timpani decided to get married in secret. Blumiere's father found out and as punishment for falling in love with his son, he placed Timpani under a curse to wander the worlds endlessly. Merlon, a wizard, found her dying, and changed her into a Pixl so that she could survive. However, Timpani lost the memory of her previous life, and her name was changed to Tippi. However, Blumiere believed she had died, went positively insane, and became the evil, murderous, and suicidal Count Bleck. Believing life to be meaningless without Timpani, Count Bleck decides to open the Void and destroy all existing dimensions and everyone in them, including himself.

Meeting with Mario

After living in Merlon's home town, Flipside, for a while, Tippi met Mario. Mario had no idea where this strange 2-D land was. Merlon claims Mario is one of the four heroes prophesized to stop the sinister Count Bleck from using the Chaos Heart to destroy all worlds. Merlon tells Mario that in order to beat Count Bleck, he must find the Pure Hearts. Tippi decides to go with Mario to help him. Nothing of much interest happens to Tippi until Mario sets of the find the fourth Pure Heart. Upon arriving at the land the Pure Heart is in, a lizard named Francis appears and grabs Tippi. He then runs off with her to his home, Fort Francis. Mario and Princess Peach, who joined Mario and Tippi, chased Francis. While following him, they find Bowser who joins them on their quest. When the heroes reach Fort Francis, they attack Francis and beat him. Tippi thanks Mario for rescuing her and the Pure Heart emerges from her. It is later revealed that this happened because Pure Hearts are kept alive by happiness. By this time it is being heavily hinted that Tippi had fallen in love with Mario. After collecting several more Pure Hearts, Tippi begins to recall Blumiere. After finding the last Pure Heart, Tippi has regained most of her memory and has came to the conclusion that Count Bleck is her love, Blumiere. Mario, Bowser, Peach and Luigi, who has joined Mario on his quest, travel to the lair of Count Bleck. Tippi, who is now positive that Count Bleck is Blumiere, is reluctant to kill him but sees that there is no other way to save the world. After facing numerous challenges through the castle, they finally reach Count Bleck. Count Bleck confesses that he really is Blumiere and that the reason he wanted to destroy the world was to get revenge against what had taken Timpani away. Tippi tries to persuade Bleck to stop his plans but Bleck believes that he has gone to far to stop. After a challenging duel Bleck is defeated. Bleck asks Mario to finish him quickly but then, Count Bleck’s minion, Dimentio appears and steals the Chaos Heart. After sending Bleck and Tippi to a a Dimension of his own creation to dispose of them later, he merges Luigi, the Chaos heart and himself creating Super Dimentio. Meanwhile, in Dimentio’s dimension, Tippi and Bleck have a touching conversation. The Pure Heart than appear and Tippi takes them to Mario. Super Dimentio is weakened the the power of the Pure Hearts and his then defeated. Tippi marries Count Bleck to stop the Chaos Heart from destroying everything. Upon doing this, the Chaos Heart disappears along with the two of them, and the worlds are restored to their original state. Their fate is hinted at in two parts. The first is the dialogues the occurs after Mario and Co. leave Bleck's castle and before they return to Flipside. This dialogue between Bleck and Tippi, or, alternatively, Count Blumiere and Lady Timpani, includes a mention of going to a "place" where both could be happy together. The other occurs after the credits, a man and woman are seen on a grassy field, apparently Blumiere and Timpani living happily with each other until their "games are over". If this is to be thought of as true, what is seen of the actual Timpani is a thin, dress-clad woman slightly resembling Princess Peach.

Personality

Tippi has a somewhat reserved personality, which is shown by the fact that almost all of her sentences end with "...". She often talks to herself about her past life. She is shown to be very caring and kind. She is not easily embarrassed, this shown when she openly tells Mario of her love for Blumiere and makes it known that she "wants to be near Mario". However, she does get rather embarrassed when Luvbi makes fun of her for, what Luvbi interpets as, a crush on Mario and Luigi.

Powers and Abilities

Although Tippi has no known powers as a human, when she is a Pixl she can see invisible objects and make them visible for other people. Like all Pixls she can float in the air. She can also tell Mario about people and enemies with her tattle ability. She is also a good nurse, as she was able to heal Blumiere when he was broken and dying.

Trivia

• Her name derives from the word tip, as in Tips and Tricks.
• Tippi's real name is "Lady Timpani" which is derived from the Timpani, a large, drum-like instrument.
• She has the same ability as Goombario and Goombella.
• In the Japanese version, Tippi is called Anna the Farien, and her real name is Emma. Both of those names have similar name structures, Vowel-Double Consonant-Vowel.
• After Francis kidnaps her, he renames her "Francine", however, since he calls his robot of her, Tiptron, he must have learned her name, although how he did is uncertain. He most likely learned so when Princess Peach invaded his bedroom and demanded he release Tippi.
• Her Catch Card is found on the tenth floor of the Flipside Pit of 100 Trials.
• In Super Mario-kun, a fairy appears on the cover of the Super Paper Mario adaption. It is possible that this fairy is Tippi.