About

Call Luigi is a series of memes using a graphic from Super Mario Maker 2 that tells players they can "call Luigi" for assistance if they're having trouble playing the game. The graphic first became the subject of memes in July 2019 and became increasingly popular throughout the 2020s, seeing a resurgence in popularity in 2024 alongside other Luigi-themed memes following the discourse surrounding Luigi Mangione and the assassination of Brian Thompson.

Origin

On December 2nd, 2019, DeviantArt^[1] user delightfuldiamond7 posted a Nobody: meme in which they place a screenshot of the "call Luigi" screen from Super Mario Maker 2 after the word "nobody:," garnering over 3,100 views in five years. This is the earliest known meme to use the image.

Spread

Later on December 2nd, 2019, X^[2] user @nocontextluigi posted another meme using the "call Luigi" image, captioning it, "what if at the end of your long life, after you've drawn your last breath and phased out of reality, the next thing you see is this message," garnering over 2,800 likes in five years.

On July 3rd, u/Rylanater posted another meme using the image to /r/dankmemes,^[3] in which they replace the text on the image, writing, "Oh no… You've lost a substantial amount of blood and will bleed out soon," garnering over 13,000 upvotes in five years.

On November 5th, 2020, u/OctagonalDefence22 posted a version of the meme to /r/dankmemes^[4] reading "options left in 2020" cutting Luigi out of the image and simply showing the options for calling Luigi, garnering over 32,000 upvotes in four years. On April 11th, 2021, u/TurtleSemenSenpai posted a similar meme to /r/okbuddyretard,^[5] garnering over 4,500 upvotes in three years.

On December 8th, 2024, X^[6] user @equine__dentist posted the cropped version of the meme, writing, "not giving up or trying again, but a third, more sinister option," garnering over 11,000 likes in two weeks. On December 9th, the same X^[7] user quote-reposted their own post, writing, "POV: your insurance claim was denied by UnitedHealthcare," garnering over 373,000 likes in the same span of time.

On December 12th, Threads^[8] user @rainbowblight37 posted a meme turning the latter @equine__dentist post into an image macro, garnering over 9,600 likes in a week.

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References