Happy Birthday to One of the Internet’s Thirstiest Memes Ever

There have been many, many thirsty internet memes over the years. Lady Dimitrescu? Hell yes. That girl forcing another girl to drink milk? Oh yeah. Not to mention, “Camel By Camel” has been absolutely ruined for me thanks to that dancing Ankha meme.

But there’s one meme that’s so iconically thirsty that, to be honest, we’d be doing the entire internet a disservice if we didn’t wish her a happy birthday. Bowsette, the definitely-not-canon Peachified version of Bowser, just turned five on Tuesday. Happy belated birthday my queen!

Read this if you don’t remember Bowsette

On Sept. 19, 2018, Malaysian artist Haniwa turned to Twitter with a simple comic premise: What if Peach rejected both Mario and Bowser? While that would certainly be a depressing turn of events for both eager bachelors, Haniwa’s comic depicts Bowser coming up with a brand new solution to solve both parties’ misery. Yes, the Super Crown.

The Super Crown was unveiled by Nintendo just a few days prior as a special transformation tool for Toadette, which turns her into a Princess Peach-like character named Peachette. Haniwa ran with the idea and decided, well, if Toadette can turn into Peachette, why can’t Bowser turn into a hot, edgy version of Peach?

The comic ends with Mario walking alongside a laughing Bowsette as Peach and Luigi stare dumbfounded at the new arrangement. Check out the original for yourself if you’ve never seen it.

The internet quickly fell in love with Bowsette. Twitter was soon flooded with all things Bowsette and Bowsette-adjacent. There were Bowsette variants, Bowsette cosplay, and even Bowsette ships. New characters quickly popped up too, like Boosette, the Peachified version of Boo. The internet was practically caught up in a feminization free fall, a perfectly horny display of FemBowser love in an age before free-wheeling “quarantine horniness” dominated the internet.

Sadly, Nintendo confirmed in 2019 that Bowsette isn’t canon, so don’t expect Nintendo to send our muscular babe a birthday card any time soon. In Miyamoto’s stead, we’ll do the honors instead. Happy fifth birthday to you, Bowsette. May you capture every princess of your dreams, marry every plumber of your wildest fantasies, and, I don’t know, light a castle or two on fire.

(featured image: Nintendo)