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Main Characters
Meat Boy
A skinless boy who looks like a hunk of meat. He's on a mission to save Bandage Girl, his girlfriend, from Dr. Fetus, despite the many dangers (and deaths) he'll have to face along the way.
- Ambiguously Human: He's described as a "skinless boy", but his mere lack of skin, cube shape, superhuman agility and ability to climb walls, regenerative factor, and the fact that he never dies of blood loss seems to suggest that he's definitely anything but a normal human. In Forever, his elderly self, despite not having skin, grows a beard. He's also revealed to have superhuman strength, being able to punch pretty hard at enemies and somewhat lift up giant rocks.
- Amusing Injuries: Often prone to this. His invulnerability makes it justified though.
- Anthropomorphic Food: Or so it seems. He's actually a boy without skin as stated above.
- Battle Couple: He fights alongside Bandage Girl to rescue their daughter in Super Meat Boy Forever.
- Beware the Nice Ones: He may be happy and smiling most of the time, but he definitely doesn’t put up with any crap when someone endangers his family.
- Body Horror: For whatever reason he lacks skin, but never dies of blood loss.
- The Cameo: He has made appearances in other video games, such as BIT.TRIP, The Binding of Isaac, and Spelunky.
- Cool Old Guy: As the elderly Meat Ninja.
- Determinator: Things might slow him down, but they never stop him. Not buzzsaws, syringes, salt, hell, the rapture, or even really hard platforming and boss battles will stop him from getting to Bandage Girl.
- Dented Iron: His future self in Forever looks noticeably more scarred and weathered.
- Distressed Dude: During Cotton Alley.
- Everyone Has Standards: Played for laughs. When Nugget inadvertently learns how to do the middle finger from watching Dr. Fetus in Super Meat Boy Forever, Bandage Girl finds it funny and laughs. Meat Boy, on the other hand, looks on in shocked disapproval while wagging his finger as if saying, "Oi, don't do that!"
- Fragile Speedster: Extremely fast, yet unable to survive more than one hit.
- Future Badass: One of the unlockable characters is Meat Ninja, who is implied to be a future version of Meat Boy.
- Iron Butt Monkey: He suffers to no end, and most artworks of him show him injured in some way. However, he still takes it like a badass and is still often shown with that happy grin.
- Glass Cannon: In the sequel. While he still retains his One-Hit-Point Wonder defense, he gains a powerful punching attack that allows him to mow through enemies.
- Good Is Not Soft: Especially in the sequel, where he straight-up attacks enemies just to get to his daughter.
- Huge Guy, Tiny Girl: The huge guy to Bandage Girl's tiny girl, as Meat Boy is noticeably bigger than Bandage Girl. Averted in Super Meat Boy Forever, as cutscenes show that they are the same height.
- Keet: His signature pose is a huge grin and a thumbs ups and he is happy most of the time, of course unless his loved ones are in danger.
- Logical Weakness: Meat Boy has no skin. Therefore, salt hurts him a lot.
- Made of Plasticine: As speedy and acrobatic as he is, he's extremely fragile, immediately exploding into blood at the slightest touch of a sharp object, enemy, or pile of salt. Luckily, he has Resurrective Immortality to make up for it.
- VERY downplayed in Forever, where he can pass through some obstacles for a short time before he eventually dies if the meter above his sprite fills up.
- Nice Guy: Not only a loving boyfriend/husband to Bandage Girl and good father to Nugget, but according to the Ultra Edition Handbook he's courteous in general, donating books to libraries, helping people out, and tipping.
- Non-Indicative Name: He's a skinless boy, not an anthropomorphic cube of animal meat, although possibly downplayed as his solid design makes him look more like minced meat rather than human muscle.
- Overdrawn at the Blood Bank: Just moving around coats the area surrounding him in blood.
- Toothy Issue: Part of his look whenever he is drawn in detail.
- Red Is Heroic: He's a crimson color due to being skinless.
- Resurrective Immortality: Every time he dies, he immediately reforms with a new body, but the blood left by his previous incarnations remains, including on the obstacles where he died. Sometimes you can even briefly see the shredded remains of his previous incarnation raining down as he respawns.
- Precision F-Strike: Does this twice. Once in Super Meat Boy where he says "Oh, fuck" (though it's only mouthed) and once in Super Meat Boy Forever where he flips Dr. Fetus off.
- Screw This, I'm Out of Here!: His way of dealing with Dr. Fetus or the monsters in the first game? Simply run away from them until their weakened or killed. Although when you burst into pieces even at the slightest touch of a dangerous object, there isn't really much you can do anyway. Averted in Forever, where he and Bandage Girl chase after and attack Dr. Fetus and the monsters all in order to get to Nugget.
- Silent Snarker: Has his moments, particularly his This Is Gonna Suck reaction to the Salt Factory in the flash game and bewildered expressions during his encounter with shrunken C.H.A.D.
- Shoot the Dog: In the final cutscene in The Hospital, Meat Boy is forced to euthanize C.H.A.D. after accidently leaving him in a messed-up state, and even seems remorseful of the decision.
- Stripped to the Bone: In the flash game, Meat Boy is reduced to a skeleton whenever he dies.
- They Killed Kenny Again: Even when being torn apart by buzzsaws, burnt by fire, drowned in toxic blood, impaled by syringes, or doused in salt, Meat Boy always comes back to life immediately afterwards.
- Vague Age: Referred to as a "boy", yet he's old enough to have a child. He's most likely either a young adult or a teenager.
- Weaksauce Weakness: Salt, due to him having no skin. Ouch.
Bandage Girl
A pink wad of gauze who loves Meat Boy. She spends most of the game suffering abuse at the hands of Dr. Fetus while waiting for Meat Boy to save her.
- Action Girl: Two words: Cotton Alley. She fully becomes this in the sequel, teaming up with Meat Boy in an attempt to save their daughter.
- Alien Blood: As opposed to Meat Boy who has normal-looking blood, Bandage Girl instead leaves a trail of calamine lotion behind her and explodes into pink goo whenever she hits a hazard.
- Animate Inanimate Object: She's an anthropomorphic wad of bandages.
- Badass Adorable: She's mainly a Damsel in Distress in the game, yet can be just as badass as her boyfriend as shown at the end of the Dark World and in Cotton Alley. In Super Meat Boy Forever, she even gets to battle alongside Meat Boy.
- Battle Couple: She fights alongside Meat Boy in Super Meat Boy Forever to rescue their daughter.
- Beware the Nice Ones: After spending the whole game being a helpless Damsel in Distress, she finally strikes back at Dr. Fetus in the ending cutscene to the Dark World, stomping on Dr. Fetus to a pulp.
- Blush Sticker: Gains these in Super Meat Boy Forever.
- Braids of Action: Her future counterpart, Bandage Ripper, has this.
- Butt-Monkey: She spends the entirety of the first game getting kidnapped and beat up routinely by Dr. Fetus, and even gets beat up by Meat Boy at one point (albeit by accident). In Cotton Alley, she gains Meat Boy's role and constantly has to suffer being torn apart by buzzsaws while trying to rescue her boyfriend.
- Cool Old Lady: As Bandage Ripper.
- Cute Bruiser: Small and cute, and despite her previous role, she's just as powerful as Meat Boy and proves this in Cotton Alley and Super Meat Boy Forever.
- Damsel in Distress: For most of the first game.
- Eyepatch of Power: Her future counterpart, Bandage Ripper, ends up getting one, apparently as a result of taking more and more damage to her eye as she got older.
- Flowers of Femininity: Well, gauze actually... it's the same basic idea though.
- Future Badass: Becomes Bandage Ripper in a future timeline.
- Good Is Not Soft: Her way of dealing with Dr. Fetus is stomping on him.
- Guys Smash, Girls Shoot: She gains the ability to shoot as Mega Bandage.
- Huge Guy, Tiny Girl: The tiny girl to Meat Boy's huge guy, as Bandage Girl is noticeably smaller than Meat Boy. Averted in Super Meat Boy Forever, as cutscenes show that they are the same height.
- Kick Chick: As opposed to Meat Boy punching stuff in Forever, she doles out kicks to attack with.
- Pink Means Feminine: The flower and long eyelashes help too.
- Revenge: After an entire game of abuse at the hands of Dr. Fetus, she stomps on him until all that is left is a bloody smear.
- Sudden Name Change: In the original flash game, she was named Bandaid Girl. However her name was changed to Bandage Girl in later games due to "Band-Aid" being trademarked.
- Took a Level in Badass: Her role as the hero in the Cotton Alley stage, as well as Meat Boy's sidekick in Super Meat Boy Forever breaks her free from her Damsel in Distress role.
- Tertiary Sexual Characteristics: Her original design looks similar to Meat Boy except with a pink color and flower hairclip.
- Vague Age: Like her boyfriend, she's a "girl" but is old enough to conceive and give birth to Nugget, likely putting her around the teenager or young adult ages.
Dr. Fetus
"Some teenagers messed up my car."
An evil fetus in a jar with a suit and monocle. He serves as the Big Bad of the game and sets off the plot by beating up Meat Boy and kidnapping Bandage Girl.
- All of the Other Reindeer: Possibly the reason why he's evil. The opening cutscene straight-up says that nobody likes him, and there's a cutscene where a Laugh Track plays as he starts to become depressed, implying that people make fun of him as well.
- Ambiguously Human: He looks like a human fetus, but is intelligent, has superpowers like teleportation, flight, multiplying, and creating energy balls out of thin air, and presumably doesn't age.
- Asshole Victim: Gets brutally stomped on by Bandage Girl not once, but twice (both at the end of the flash game and the end of the main game) Though subverted in that he's shown to be alive by the next game each time, either because he shares Meat Boy's regenerative ability, or because for whatever reason he survived both times.
- Ax-Crazy: Big time.
- Badass in a Nice Suit/Sharp-Dressed Man: He's the Big Bad, and carries out many evil feats all while in a stylish tux.
- Bad People Abuse Animals: He has no qualms about slaughtering a population of innocent squirrels if it means overpowering Meat Boy.
- Bald of Evil: Lacks any sort of hair (other than Big Ol' Eyebrows in the sequel), though justified as he's an unborn baby.
- Big Bad: Has been the main antagonist in every game so far, and most of the problems in the games have been caused by him.
- Big Ol' Eyebrows: He gains bigger eyebrows in Super Meat Boy Forever. In Super Meat Boy, it's just one angry eyebrow on his monocle.
- Brain in a Jar: Or rather fetus in a jar, but he works the same way.
- Brainy Baby: Well, fetus. It still counts.
- The Bully: Dr. Fetus constantly victimizes Meat Boy and anyone associated with him.
- The Cameo:
- He's a playable character in BIT.TRIP Presents... Runner2: Future Legend Of Rhythm Alien in where he rides a buzzsaw-themed unicycle.
- He also makes an appearance in the first scenario of Creepy Castle, where he laments that the castle has no buzzsaws before seeing the player and deciding to attack them to vent his frustration.
- Casanova Wannabe: He's constantly trying to score ladies, but nobody wants to be around him for obvious reasons; the Steam description of Super Meat Boy Forever even describes him as "an incel version of Tony Stark".
- Character Blog: Has a Twitter account
. - Character Development: He ever so slightly grows out of his misanthropy at the end of Super Meat Boy Forever, having genuinely come to care about Nugget and appreciating her for wanting to be friends with him.
- Crazy-Prepared: In Super Meat Boy Forever, Dr. Fetus puts a remote self-destruct system on Big Slugger in case someone tries to use his machine against him. When Squirrel, Manic, and the other woodland animals use Big Slugger to get revenge on Dr. Fetus, he presses a button to blow up his robot suit, and the explosion easily wipes the army out.
- Cute Is Evil: Because of his simple design, he comes off more cute than threatening. That doesn't stop him from actually being a threat to the duo. In the final cutscene, Dr. Fetus even tries use his cuteness to charm Bandage Girl after he's relegated to nothing but a fetus. Bandage Girl doesn't buy it though.
- Dastardly Whiplash: Has the clothing, personality, and kidnapping Damsels in Distress shtick. According to creator Edmund McMillen in an interview, Dr. Fetus was based on this character archetype.
- Death Glare: Has a pretty menacing one.
- Determinator: Just like Meat Boy, he refuses to give up. Even when his jar gets broken, he still jumps on and attacks Bandage Girl; of course, by that point, she's had enough of his crap...
- Doppelgänger Attack: In Forever, he creates a horde of duplicates to fight you, and during the fight he constantly spawns more offscreen. They always respawn during the fight, meaning you have to attack the real one to do any damage.
- Ecocidal Antagonist: He likes to burn down forests whenever he can. That comes back to bite him in ’'Forever'' when the animals who live in one try to get even.
- Even Evil Has Standards: Despite being belligerent at best towards Nugget throughout Meat Boy Forever, he actually freaks out and attempts to comfort her after he makes her cry by killing the woodland animals that attempted to get their revenge on him.
- Evil Genius: His intelligence and ability to build contraptions and hazards to use against Meat Boy make him a serious threat.
- Evil Is Petty: Not just a dick to Meat Boy and Bandage Girl, but in general. One game manual even details some of his Kick the Dog moments, such as destroying a girl's sandcastle, pushing down an old lady, and poking a baby with thumb tacks.
- Evil Laugh: Yes, Dr. Fetus has one. He visibly laughs during the opening cutscene to the C.H.A.D. boss battle and the opening cutscene to the Salt Factory stage, and does it even more in Super Meat Boy Forever. In fact, the sounds files for the first game even contain a deep and mechanical-sounding laugh that was meant for Dr. Fetus, that was
Dummied Out for whatever reason. - Evil Overlooker: On the box art of Forever, he's depicted as massive and looming over Meat Boy and Bandage girl while surrounded by fire, and also dangling Nugget from one hand.
- Evil Wears Black: He wears a black tuxedo.
- Expressive Accessory: For some reason his monocle is able to reflect his expressions. Especially prominent in Super Meat Boy Forever.
- Expy: He greatly resembles the title character from Spewer, especially when he's not in his jar.
- Fetus Terrible: He destroyed a forest, flooded a hospital and a salt factory, kidnapped someone's girlfriend while beating her up routinely, kidnaps that same person's daughter in the sequel, and even sets off a nuclear bomb, and he's not even born.
- Final Boss: The last hurdle in both Super Meat Boy and Super Meat Boy Forever.
- Flipping the Bird: Really, really loves doing this gesture. As he does it way too often, in Super Meat Boy Forever when he attacks he just flips the bird and when making his Big Slugger Tank explode it has a screen that shows him flipping the bird.
- Most biometric locks require the user to place the palm of their hand on the scanner. The one in Dr. Fetus' base requires him to place the back of his hand and flip off the scanner.
- Floating Limbs: Gains these in the sequel.
- Four-Fingered Hands: In Super Meat Boy Forever. In Super Meat Boy, it was just Powerpuff-Girl Hands with retractable fingers. For some reason, he can still flip people off.
- Gadgeteer Genius: He lives in a preservative jar which he most likely built himself, and the first boss is a giant chainsaw mecha that he also constructed.
- Generic Doomsday Villain: Has no motivations or goals other than wanting to be a jerk, particularly to Meat Boy. Becomes a literal example when he starts causing a doomsday towards the second half of the game.
- Genius Bruiser: Of a sort; While his actual body is as frail as a fetus typically is, the mechanized suit he uses to be more Meat Boy's size is still every bit as formidable as Meat Boy himself while still being able to create advanced technology and genetically engineered lifeforms.
- Hated by All: "Nobody loves Dr. Fetus..."note
- Heads I Win, Tails You Lose: Even after Meat Boy and Bandage Girl manage to overcome him in the final fight of Forever, it doesn't stick. He just comes back less than a minute later with renewed anger and nearly crushes them to death.
- He-Man Woman Hater: Although he hates everyone, he seems to lean more towards being misogynistic, given that he beats Bandage Girl up when kidnapping her, yet doesn't do anything to Meat Boy when kidnapping him.
- High-Class Glass: He wears a monocle on his mecha suit.
- I Just Want to Be Loved: Nobody loves Dr. Fetus, and that's why Dr. Fetus hates you. And that's precisely how Nugget saves her parents from his One-Winged Angel Unstoppable Rage in the end of Forever, by showing him likely the first genuine kindness he's ever experienced in life. Right before her parents dole out a well-deserved assbeating.
- It's All About Me/Small Name, Big Ego: If the Collector's Edition manual and his Character Blog are anything to go by, he's a narcissist with a massive god complex. Though it could just be Dr. Fetus hiding insecurities over being a fetus in a jar and apparent lack of love he receives from anyone.
- Jerkass: His signature pose is him flipping you off, for starters. Just about everything he does, when it's not straight villainy, is just petty assholery.
- Karmic Death: Subverted. He's supposedly killed after Bandage Girl crushes him to death, but comes back to life for Cotton Alley and the sequel, proving that Death Is Cheap in the Meat Boy universe.
- Kick the Dog: Every time he appears!
- Laughably Evil: Well, what else do you expect from a villain who's literally a fetus in a jar wearing a suit, top hat, and monocle?
- Mad Scientist: A quintessential antagonistic one.
- Meaningful Name: On the surface, a subversion; He really is a fetus, but he isn't actually a recognized doctor. His One-Winged Angel form, Omega Alpha, posits that he is the end-all, be-all of beginnings, or the Ultimate Fetus.
- Misanthrope Supreme: It's established that Dr. Fetus hates everyone and he seems to go beyond Does Not Like People, to point of setting a forest on fire, causing all sorts of structural damage and devastation, and persistently ruining some random person's life just for the crime of existing.
- The only person he doesn't hate is Nugget around the end of Super Meat Boy Forever, and even then it's the situation of a literal child being unable to comprehend just how badly he's treated her showing him that not everyone has the same reservoir of hate for him that he does for everyone else for hating him.
- Not-So-Harmless Villain: At the beginning of the game, he seems like a comical Jerkass whose worst crime is kidnapping the hero's girlfriend. Then by the end of the Forest stage, he starts causing destruction everywhere.
- Older Than They Look: Given that he's still a fetus by the time Nugget is born, he's likely this.
- One-Winged Angel: In the final act of Forever, thanks to the Time Crash, he cascades into a gigantic cosmic storm called Omega Alpha, with a galaxy for his monocle, a hypergiant for an eye, and two huge hands out of cosmic debris.note
- Psychopathic Manchild: Dr. Fetus has the mind of an adult, an extremely intelligent one no less, yet still behaves like an immature Bratty Half-Pint. Granted, he is still a fetus.
- Put the "Laughter" in "Slaughter": Befitting of a Sadist like himself, he laughs after killing a perfect clone of Meat Boy (who he despises) in Dr. Fetus' Mean Meat Machine.
- Sadist: He seems to have no reason for kidnapping Bandage Girl (who he also attacks) and luring Meat Boy into dangerous paths other than the fact that he hates him and wants to see him suffer. In Dr. Fetus' Mean Meat Machine, his motive for creating clones of Meat Boy is so he can feel like he's killing Meat Boy multiple times. He even laughs after killing the first perfect a clone of him and tries to kill many others.
- Sir Swears Alot: While mute like all the other characters in the actual games, his canon Twitter account reveals that he has a raunchy/dark sense of humor and quite the filthy mouth, fitting for his crass Jerkass personality. He also flips the middle finger rampantly throughout the games, making him an odd visual case of this trope too.
- Slasher Smile: Sports one just before making his castle self-destruct as a last resort after his jar breaks, and when he tries to attack Bandage Girl.
- Species Surname: A seeming parody of it and evil geniuses with biology-related surnames.
- Stupid Evil: Even after his jar breaks and he's left completely defenseless, he still tries to attack Meat Boy and Bandage Girl. As expected, this doesn't turn out well for him.
- Straight Gay: Word of God stated he's actually gay, but he's really deep in the closet.
- Toilet Humor: Seems to be the major source of it, if Super Meat Boy has any. The ending cutscene to the flash game has him take a dump right in front of Meat Boy, and the Ultra Edition Handbook has a gag where he craps on the floor of a restaurant, not even bothering to head to the restroom. And of course there's also Brownie, a "Frankenstein's monster" of his made from his own poop.
- Unstoppable Rage: As Omega Alpha, he's filled with so much psychotic anger that he doesn't stay dead when Meat Ninja and Bandage Ripper defeat him. He quickly reforms and attempts to crush them, all while bellowing in rage. Nugget ends up calming him down with her offering of her pacifier.
- Tom the Dark Lord: Yes, he actually does have a first name, and it's Keith.
- Vague Age: How long he's been a fetus is left unknown, though it's implied that he's been that way for a while and that he's technically an adult.
- Villainous Breakdown: After all of his plans have failed and he's left without a jar, he savagely jumps on Bandage Girl and tries to beat her up, doing so with a Slasher Smile.
- In Forever, he's undergoing this as Omega Alpha. He's so incensed and enraged by Meat Ninja and Bandage Ripper continuing to survive that he manifests as a humongous cosmic storm with debris forming his hands to attack them. And even after he gets defeated, he reforms shortly after to try and crush them again while letting out roars of undiluted rage and hate.
- Villain Protagonist: He's a sadistic Evil Genius and Dr. Fetus' Mean Meat Machine centers on him trying to perfectly clone Meat Boy (his hated enemy) plus killing any imperfect clones.
- Villain Song: "Power of the Meat", which wasn't in the game itself but is still part of the official soundtrack, is pretty much the closest Dr. Fetus has to one, since most of the verses are sung by him while Meat Boy and Bandage Girl just sing in the background about their turmoil.
- Villain Teleportation: Catching up to Bandage Girl will prompt him to teleport with her to another location.
- Why Don't You Just Shoot Him?: Tries this in the last level, but it fails due to Meat Boy's ability to reform himself.
- Would Hit a Girl: Oh yes. He beats the crap out of Bandage Girl at the end of every single level! Bizarrely contrasted in levels where you play as Bandage Girl having to save Meat Boy, where Dr. Fetus doesn't beat him up when you save him, only using the animation where he just grabs the hostage and warps out every time.
- Would Hurt a Child: In Super Meat Boy Forever, he switches to beating up Nugget at the end of every level. Unlike Bandage Girl, Nugget doesn't seem all too fazed however.
Nugget
Meat Boy and Bandage Girl's daughter, who is kidnapped by Dr. Fetus in Super Meat Boy Forever.
- All-Loving Hero: She holds no ill-will towards Dr. Fetus, even after everything he’s done in the game.
- Animal Motifs: Rabbits, as her pajamas illustrate.
- The Baby of the Bunch: Literally, as she is Meat Boy and Bandage Girl's baby.
- Baby See, Baby Do: In one cutscene, she copies Dr. Fetus' habit of Flipping the Bird by giving the middle finger to some butterflies, much to her father's shock and her mother's amusement.
- Big Damn Heroes: In the ending of Forever, Dr. Fetus has become a monumental cosmic storm that her parents just can't finish off. As they are seconds away from being forcibly crushed, she realizes her pacifier calms her down, and offers it the the raging transformed Dr. Fetus without any reservations. The actually stuns Fetus out of his nigh-on perpetual hatred, stopping his assault, and gratefully accepting it from her.
- Big Eyes, Little Eyes: Her eyes are very large in proportion to her size, increasing her cuteness and innocence.
- Brainy Baby: Downplayed. She's far from being as intelligent as Dr. Fetus, but she's still shown to be pretty competant and fully aware of her surroundings.
- Break the Cutie: The normally cheerful, unfazed Nugget starts bursting into a crying fit upon seeing woodland animals die, and becomes even more distressed upon getting sent to an alternate dimension and seeing her parents nearly crushed by a fallen rock. Fortunately she gets better after everything goes back to normal.
- Cheerful Child: Meat Boy and Bandage Girl's "little bundle of joy".
- The Cutie: She is Bandage Girl and Meat Boy's kid, and very much adorable.
- Damsel in Distress: In the sequel, to where Meat Boy and now Bandage Girl have to save her. Justified as she's just a baby.
- Fearless Infant: Nugget manages to remain calm and optimistic even while in the hands of a violent kidnapper. Most interactions has her expose the boss' weakness
- While accompanying Dr. Fetus in the Chipper Grove cutscenes, instead of being scared, she just plays with a Big Red Button in his mecha. Guess what happens eventually...
- In the Clinic, she keeps messing with the switch, blowing the brain monster's shrapnel away before being pulled away by an angered Fetus.
- In the Tower, she throws a monster at one of the Lab Guardian's drones before throwing a saw blade as well.
- Friend to All Living Things: She is shown to adore animals and watching them get killed is exactly what finally causes her to snap.
- Genki Girl: A happy and playful baby.
- Half-Human Hybrid: Sort of. Meat Boy is Ambiguously Human while Bandage Girl is a wad of gauze, making Nugget essentially half-meat person, half-bandage.
- Kid Hero: She's only a baby and yet ends up saving the day, being able to calm down Dr. Fetus during his Unstoppable Rage.
- Made of Iron: For a baby, she's surprisingly durable, being able to get tossed around only to bounce back a second later like it's no problem, in contrast to Meat Boy and Bandage Girl who suffer Amusing Injuries.
- The Millstone: She regularly causes problems for Dr. Fetus in regards to the boss fights before the Lab. She forces the control pod of Big Slugger to eject, reveals to her parents that the fan system of the Clinic will expose Manic Manipulator, and exposes Rust Golem's weakness of relying on his drones to keep his shield up.
- Morality Pet: Despite Dr. Fetus beating her up regularly throughout the game, Nugget ends up becoming this to him by the end of Super Meat Boy Forever.
- Perpetual Smiler: There doesn't seem to be a moment where this baby is upset. With the exception of seeing a bunch of woodland creatures die right before her eyes.
- Pink Means Feminine: Although she inherits her father's red color, she wears pink bunny pajamas to reflect her mother.
- Strong Family Resemblance: Aside from the bunny pajamas which is her most distinguishing trait, she looks just like her father.
- Token Mini-Moe: Serves as youngest of the bunch, as well as The Cutie.
- Voice Grunting: Makes the most noise out of any character, with her mostly giggling and even crying at one point. In the intro, you can also vaguely hear her voice as she descends into panic while being kidnapped, albeit it's unintelligible.
Introduced in Super Meat Boy
Super Meat Boy Enemies
The enemies of Super Meat Boy, which include Betuses, Dust Bunnies, Black Maws, Maggots, Burnt Boys, and Oobs.
- Airborne Mooks: Oobs and Dust Bunnies.
- Big Creepy-Crawlies: Maggots, albeit they're only the size of Meat Boy. Oobs appear to resemble giant flies.
- Blob Monster: Betuses, red-colored slime enemies who look like miniature versions of C.H.A.D.
- Dark Is Evil: Black Maws are pitch black colored and leap from shadowy portals.
- Eldritch Abomination: Black Maws.
- Expy Oobs are this to The Langoliers.
- The Goomba: Betuses and Maggots are the most simple enemies in the game and don't have any special power other than crawling in a straight line. What makes them hard to maneuver through is when they're in large groups.
- Homing Projectile: Black Maws are essentially an even worse version of the rockets in the Salt Factory stage. Not only do they home in on you, but they also break into nine smaller pieces.
- Our Demons Are Different: Black Maws appear to be demons, or at least demon-like. They live in Hell which supports the idea.
- Our Zombies Are Different: Burnt Boys, zombie versions of the dead Meat Boys.
- Perpetual Smiler: Betuses and Maggots are always seen with a happy smile.
- Scary Teeth: The Oobs have sharp fangs and kill you by chomping down on you.
Lil' Slugger/Big Slugger
A robot suit made by Dr. Fetus that is equipped with a large chainsaw. In Super Meat Boy, it's known as Lil' Slugger, while an upgrade to it, Big Slugger, appears in Super Meat Boy Forever.
- Advancing Boss of Doom: It chases you through a gauntlet of buzzsaws.
- Attack Its Weak Point: Has weak points in the sequel, in the form of big, red globes that you have to destroy.
- Bigger Is Better: Becomes Big Slugger in the sequel.
- Chainsaw Good: Lil' Slugger has a massive one. Big Slugger tops that by Dual Wielding two!
- Flash of Pain: At some point in the level, Lil' Slugger starts flashing multiple colors, indicating that it's taking damage.
- Humongous Mecha: Or at least giant compared to the characters.
- Non-Indicative Name: You'd think he was some sort of small baseball-themed boss judging by his name, but no, he's a giant mech with a chainsaw.
- Tank Goodness: Big Slugger replaces the long legs with tank treads.
- Took a Level in Badass: Played with. Lil' Slugger was a boss that couldn't be directly fought, forcing Meat Boy to run until it crashes. Chasing Meat Boy is all it does. By comparison, Big Slugger is able to more directly try and attack Meat Boy and Bandage Girl and scale a cliff while doing so, but has four crystal points exposed that let the duo deal immense damage. That said, they never actually destroy it, it's only when Nugget forces Dr. Fetus to eject that it's dealt with, and they rush to The Clinic once it's over.
- Wake-Up Call Boss: The boss where the difficulty increases, as well as the start of the game's Cerebus Syndrome. And it's only the first boss.
- Walking Tank: In the first game, at least. In the second game, it gains a steamroller-like design.
C.H.A.D.
A strange fish-like thing that Meat Boy fights at the end of the Hospital level.
- Abhorrent Admirer: Is seemingly this towards Meat Boy. While he's looking for Bandage Girl, C.H.A.D sneaks over to try to get a kiss from him, only for Meat Boy to kick him away. Doesn't stop him from trying again until Meat Boy grabs a pillow and seemingly kills him offscreen. The epilogue shows that C.H.A.D. is fine.
- Adorable Abomination: Initially he's far from this, but once exposed to sunlight, he shrinks, and this trope comes into full effect.
- Bloody Murder: In addition to the rising level of lethal blood during his boss stage, C.H.A.D. himself seems to be made out of deadly blood... or at least coated in a shell of clotted blood. In any case, touching him is (like everything else) an instant kill.
- Expy: Of the monsters from C.H.U.D.
- King Mook: He is essentially a giant Betus.
- Muck Monster: A giant mass of medical waste, more specifically contaminated blood and tissue.
- Obliviously Evil: His attacks during his boss fight seem to be more C.H.A.D. playing around rather than him actually trying to kill Meat Boy. He just happens to be so massive that he kills Meat Boy by accident. His behavior after the boss fight lends credence to this, as C.H.A.D. is simply trying to get Meat Boy's attention and affection like a small puppy.
- Right-Hand Attack Dog: Word of God says that C.H.A.D. was originally meant to be this to Dr. Fetus. He still serves as basically a sic monster toward Meat Boy in the game.
- Weakened by the Light: The entire boss fight has Meat Boy running around collecting keys that eventually unlock the roof, which was blocking out the sun. Once it gets opened, C.H.A.D. shrinks to a weaker, smaller form of himself.
Brownie
A giant poo who "fights" Meat Boy in the Salt Factory by attempting to outrun him and leave him at the mercy of a rising pile of salt. He makes a return in Forever.
- Ambiguously Evil: He's one of the bosses in the game used by Dr. Fetus to stop Meat Boy, but he doesn't outwardly fight Meat Boy, instead attempting to race him in escaping the rapidly flooding salt factory. He even sacrifices his life to rescue Meat Boy and Bandage Girl at the end of the game.
- Artificial Human: He's a humanoid pile of waste created and given life to by Dr. Fetus, likely through scientific means.
- Bait-and-Switch Boss: At first, he's ready to throw down with Meat Boy. But then Dr. Fetus floods the factory with salt, at which point Brownie decides that getting out alive is more important. The "fight" then plays out more like a regular level, as Brownie never attempts to attack in any way.
- Conspicuous Trenchcoat: Wears one in Forever, as an homage to the Old Man in the End of Time from Chrono Trigger.
- Disney Death: Appears to die by falling to his death after Dr. Fetus tosses bricks at his head to prevent Meat Boy from pulling him to safety. Apparently, he survived this and was able to return at the last second and save Meat Boy from dying in Dr. Fetus' collapsing lair.
- Evil Knockoff: Designed to look like Meat Boy, except he's made out of Dr. Fetus' excrement.
- Friendly Rival: Becomes one towards Meat Boy in Forever, where they decide to have a friendly race for old times sake.
- Gasshole: He lets out a fart during a cameo in Super Meat Boy Forever.
- Gonk: Not in the first game, as he's merely just a Palette Swap of Meat Boy, but Forever makes him much uglier, with Big Ol Eye Brows, a ragged-looking face, and more detail to his design, making him stand out quite a bit from the usually moe-ish cast of characters.
- Heel–Face Turn: After Meat Boy attempts to save him from falling to his (supposed) death.
- Heroic Sacrifice: Saves Meat Boy in the ending at the cost of being left behind.
- Nose Nuggets: He picks his nose as an idle animation in Forever.
- Talking Poo: Okay, he doesn't actually talk, but he IS a giant living poo...
- Technicolor Eyes: He has yellow eyes, most likely corn.
- Toilet Humor: Ewwww...
- Wink "Ding!": Does this after his race with Meat Boy in Forever.
Little Horn
A massive monster made up of all the dead Meat Boys that fell into Hell.
- Body of Bodies: His body is made up of all the dead Meat Boys.
- The Brute: The largest and most intimidating boss in the game, who deals with Meat Boy by smashing him.
- Dumb Muscle: Seems to think that using the same pattern of moves and hitting your head against the ground is the best way to deal with Meat Boy.
- Fireball Eyeballs: He appears to perpetually have these, though it could just be the reflection of the fire surrounding the boss arena.
- Gameplay and Story Segregation: His appearance doesn't change based on how many times you've died so far. In fact, he exists even if you haven't died once.
- Glowing Eyes of Doom: His eyes glow a hellish red.
- Hard Head: MASSIVELY averted, after just 3 hits he goes down for the count.
- Hoist by His Own Petard: The only thing his headbutts end up hurting is himself.
- Non-Indicative Name: Similar to the first boss. He doesn't have horns and he is most certainly NOT little.
- Trial-and-Error Gameplay: Little Horn has a fixed attack pattern, but because he barely telegraphs his attacks, be ready to die a bunch until you figure it out.
- Use Your Head: Attempts to use this form of attack, only to end up injuring himself in the process.
Larries Lament
Three giant maggots that battle with Meat Boy at the end of the Rapture level.
- Big Creepy-Crawlies: Giant bloodthirsty maggots!
- Bullfight Boss: The only way to kill them is to use Meat Boy as bait and lure them into nearby sawblades.
- Fluffy the Terrible: Monstrous maggots each named Larry.
- Gonk: As you can tell by the picture, they're pretty ugly.
- Sand Worm: They burrow underground, only rising up to attack Meat Boy.
- Tactical Suicide Boss: Those buzzsaws placed about finally end up being useful instead of just annoying...
Introduced in Super Meat Boy Forever
Squirrel
- All for Nothing: What their revenge scheme amounts to. The mech they try and use against Dr. Fetus self-destructs, and in the new timeline, they're left satisfied with Dr. Fetus already being defeated. Downplayed, however, due to causing the Time Crash that resulted in creating the new timeline.
- Badass Adorable: Exactly what you'd expect from a tiny squirrel trying to avenge his friends and habitat.
- Eye Scream: Downplayed. Squirrel's left eye got scarred from Dr. Fetus' Big Slugger rampage and wears an eyepatch to cover it, but aside from the scar itself going across Squirrel's eyelid, there doesn't seem to be wrong with the eye itself.
- Flipping the Bird: Squirrel does this to Dr. Fetus right before he presses the button on his throne.
- Improbable Weapon User: Uses a knife made from tightly-coiled vines and a shard of glass as a player character.
- It's Personal: After Dr. Fetus rampages through Chipper Grove in Big Slugger, wiping most of it out and killing several animals, Squirrel declares vengeance against the mad fetus and goes after him with a small army.
- Miles to Go Before I Sleep: After the Big Slugger explosion wipes the army out, a mortally wounded Squirrel manages to hold out long enough to open the button next to Dr. Fetus' throne before finally dying, his body falling over and pressing the button.
- Shout-Out: He starts out as a squirrel that has lost an arm and an eye. By the end of the fourth chapter, he has acquired a bandana, an eyepatch, a beard, face war paint, a prosthetic arm, and a mecha - basically becoming an Expy of Venom Snake.
Manic Manipulator
- Brain in a Jar: Is a genetically-modified brain with two eyestalks attached.
- Mind over Matter: His psychic abilities allow him to manipulate shards of glass and take on a more threatening appearance.
- Mistreatment-Induced Betrayal: Held out hope beyond hope Dr. Fetus would return to reclaim him after his defeat, but after it became clear he was never coming back and barely valued anything he made if it failed to start with, he threw in his chips with the animals and became the primary control mechanism for the discarded Big Slugger.
- Nightmare Face: Forms a rather striking visage from shards of glass, syringes, a hear rate monitor, and pieces of piping.
Rust Golem
- Deflector Shields: He's protected by an energy barrier powered by two drones. Attacking him while it's up does nothing but kill you, so you need to destroy the drones to bring it down and expose him to damage.
- The Dragon: He serves as basically Dr. Fetus' security system, proving to be a big threat to Meat Boy and Bandage Girl before they can even enter Dr. Fetus's lab.
- Killer Robot: An A.I. that guards Dr. Fetus' lair.
- Stationary Boss: He is fixed to the door of the Lab.
