Kirby is not a jolly fellow right now.
As a Moments page, all entries are Spoilers Off.
Kirby: Right Back at Ya! has a few that come to mind.
- The backstory that's gradually revealed to us in the series is quite sad from Meta Knight's perspective. Nearly all of his friends are dead as a result of the previous war with Nightmare's monsters, he had to kill one of those friends himself when he was modified into a mindless monster and watch another sacrifice her life for him, and the only remnants of his old life as a warrior are an old general who's been stranded on an island for years away from the conflict (Kit Cosmos), two children that want to kill him as they believe him responsible for their parents' deaths (Knuckle Joe and Sirica), Sword and Blade, and a baby warrior that can barely speak, let alone fight without an Ability handy (Kirby). Wow..
- A Dark and Stormy Knight explains the entire reason Meta Knight even works for King Dedede despite him being a glutton thriving off the very company that wiped out his people: Because of their being the smallest chance another Star Warrior would arrive on Popstar. Star Warrior ships are drawn to Monsters, and with Dedede's spending habits Meta Knight had the greatest hope on Popstar that he wouldn't be the Last of His Kind.
- A rare one from King Dedede in the second episode. After Blocky falls into the sea and sinks, either drowning or being trapped under the sea, still alive, until it erodes away over presumably thousands of years, Dedede is genuinely devastated after Kirby resurfaces without the monster. It shows that, unlike most of the others he ordered, he grew attached to Blocky throughout the episode.(ENG) King Dedede: (Crying his eyes out) I'm gonna miss my little blocky!
- Kirby's Pet Peeve: Kirby's robotic dog — whom he had bonded with over the course of the episode — exploded. Even worse than that is when Kirby is sitting on the beach that night, looking almost as though he's unable to comprehend its death. He sees it as a constellation, running away from him.
- Meta Knight's stories of how Knuckle Joe's father and Sirica's mother Garlude both died. Knuckle Joe's father is stated to be one of Meta Knight's old friends from the Galaxy Soldier Army, whom he had to Mercy Kill after being turned into a monster by Nightmare, whilst Garlude was one of his closest allies in a mission to retrieve the legendary sword Galaxia from the great beast Kirisakin. The mission goes wrong when Kirisakin awakes and attacks the two, resulting in Garlude performing a Heroic Sacrifice to save Meta Knight — knowing that he was the one worthy to wield Galaxia — fighting off the great beast and throwing the legendary sword to him just before it kills her.
- The fate of Joe's dad is actually really sad. He died and was resurrected by Nightmare and brainwashed Mother 3-style into turning against his friends, shown by him coming home, eye sockets of his helmet gleaming red, his friends initially being overjoyed at seeing him, before he raises his sword and summonns a swarm of monsters. Then, Meta Knight is forced to kill him, and we get a gut-wrenching shot of the amulet holding baby Joe's picture tumbling out of his dead hand. Meta Knight assumes that Joe's father loved Joe to the very end, even through his brainwashing.
- Apply a bit of Fridge thinking, in the form of Dark Meta Knight, and you come to the conclusion that, deep down, Meta Knight thinks Joe and Sirica are right to blame him for their parents' deaths...
- A minor case with Escargoon. While his complete story isn’t fully explored, his relationship with his mother heavily implies he wasn’t always the Jerkass he is now. Years before the series started, he left home and vowed to his mother that he would be a “celebrated snail”, only to end up serving Dedede. Given that another flashback reveals that he’s been serving Dedede since Tiff was a baby, it’s likely his mean streak was a result of him being Dedede’s personal punching bag. What keeps this from becoming too tragic is that his mother will always be a celebrated snail in her book, even believing her son would be a better king than Dedede. It’s even more heartwarming in the original dub, where she admits she knew that he lied to her, but played along so as not to break his heart.
- Kirby tearfully trying in vain to wake the Baby Galbo he had become a surrogate parent to in Hatch Me If You Can after taking a direct hit from a Galbo's powerful fire breath to protect him. It becomes even more so after the Baby Galbo's apparent death causes Kirby to completely snap, transform into Fire Kirby, and defeat the adult Galbo in a Curb-Stomp Battle that ends with him incinerating the giant dragon from the inside with its own fire breath to avenge his child. Doubles as a Moment of Awesome.
- Sure, it turns out the Baby Galbo was OK in the end due to having a fireproof skin that it could molt off after some time, but the fact that Kirby was essentially its surrogate father made it one of the very few times in the whole series that he was utterly focussed on destroying a monster for what they did to it.
- Heck, the dream Kirby has while trying to keep the egg dry can count. Kirby dreams he's floating in space when suddenly his mouth turns into a beak and his arms become wings. A bright light beckons him and he happily flies towards it. The empty space suddenly changes into bright lights as Kirby flaps his wings. Then he sees the egg sitting on a island stump under the leaf. He flies over to it and rests on top of it, like a real mother bird. He smiles and sighs before he rests peacefully, with his would-be child... He's so innocent. He doesn't even know if he really laid the egg or not and yet he's fully prepared to be a parent and do his best to raise his kid... The Japanese version adds to the scene with a beautiful, slow instrumental version of the "Kirby of the Stars" theme that really helps turn on the waterworks.
- Episode 37 (Watermelon Felon). Using the power of Manipulative Editing, King Dedede has framed Kirby for various crimes against all of Cappy Town. Tiff tries her damndest to defend him on television and say that this is all the king's doing, but no one will listen. Never mind that they have been lied to by the king countless times in the past, and this is the 37th episode of the show. Matters were worse when the king plays commercials over her case specifically to not give her a chance to defend him. Things really got bad when he makes Kirby a giant, delicious meal specifically to make Kirby's case look worse. But the clincher has to be the scene where Tiff sulks at the castle's fountain. She felt truly and genuinely helpless and unable to protect Kirby. The dub takes this one step further, making it sound like she's quietly crying.
- Something important to note about this is how far King Dedede's anime-specific maliciousness has gotten, even without the help of Nightmare Enterprises. Almost every episode, he refers to a monster from them to help his evil schemes, but this is one of the few episodes where his evil schemes don't rely on anything sent from the company, unless you count their sponsoring of the commercials used to censor Tiff. Quite possibly, this might be the closest Dedede has come to defeating Kirby, with or without NME. Dedede likes to brag that he can handle just fine without having to rely on their services, and we clearly see here that he may not have to. Well, until the newspapers come to town.
- The entirety of Escar-Gone. Escargoon has been possessed by a monster known as Erasem. Whoever it possesses will be forgotten by everyone they know. Poor Escargoon has been looked upon as a stranger by everyone he knew, from King Dedede to the Waddle Dees to all the citizens of Cappy Town to even Meta Knight. The clincher is when he bumps into Kirby — who isn't the most fluent communicator in the world, to say the least — but his replies of "poyo" allow Escargoon (who was getting desperate by this point) to finally seek some comfort when it looked like Kirby knows who he is. By the time they bond at the beach, Escargoon sees Kirby as his kindred spirit.
- Of course, if you have a cruel enough mind, it's possible that Kirby really had forgotten Escargoon, and is just being nice because it's just in his nature to be kind to whoever he sees — but still speaking the way he always does. Not helping are the implications that this whole ordeal is making Escargoon feel suicidal.
Escargoon (JP): There's no point in living if no one knows who I am.- The music used in the original Japanese version? A somber version of My Friend and the Sunset — AKA the ending theme from Revenge of Meta Knight. As if that music wasn't a tearjerker already.
- Episode 40 (Monster Management) has Kirby ending up on the receiving end of a No-Holds-Barred Beatdown courtesy of Masher, one of Night Mare Enterprises' strongest monsters. Things only get even worse when Knuckle Joe, who had been appointed as Monster Manager at the time, joins in the fun and tag-teams his own attacks with it as the beatdown continues until Kirby isn't even able to stand up anymore, with both of them looming over him as he's backed into the wall of a cliffside with nowhere to run. To make things even worse, Meta Knight has taken heavy damage from one of Masher's attacks, with Blade and Sword having to tend to his injuries and watch helplessly as Kirby suffers from the beatdown, Tuff is left wondering in disbelief how the hell Kirby will be able to win a fight of two against one on his own, and his big sis, Tiff, with tears in her eyes, desperately tries to get the beatdown to stop, pleading for Joe not to murder poor Kirby. This truly was a Darkest Hour at its finest, and had Joe actually finished Kirby off instead of telling him to suck up his attack and turn into Fighter Kirby, and revealing that he was actually a Monster Hunter after Masher, he would've crossed the Moral Event Horizon this time, all hope for Popstar and the rest of the universe would've been lost for good, and the entire series itself would've ended on a really sad note THAT EARLY.
- When Mabel predicts the planet's destruction via collision with a giant meteor in Prediction Predicament (Part Two). As the meteor gets closer and closer, everyone resigns to their fates, and decide to all come together at Dedede's castle. There, they begin confessing and apologising amongst one another for past grievances and for anything they did wrong to each other. Doubles as a Heartwarming Moment.
- This also leads to one of Dedede's most humanising moments — when he decides that before he perishes, he wants to make at least one person happy. As such, he destroys his own statue to build a playground for the children of Cappy Town as he originally promised; and once he's finished, he immediately goes to Kirby's house and takes him there. As Kirby plays joyfully — blissfully unaware of the apocalypse to come, which makes it even worse — Dedede finally accepts his fate. With that, he quietly joins Kirby on the swings and sings sadly to himself, crying Tears of Joy at having finally succeeded in what he set out to do;
Escargoon: You did it! Ya loveable lug, ya! you finally listened to your heart for once!(Dedede begins to tear up and walks past Escargoon, joining Kirby on the swing next to him)Dedede: (Quietly singing) Swing away, swing away, save your cares for another day. Save 'em for another day...(Escargoon sadly watches on as the Waddle Dees begin to cry into each other silently.)- The Japanese version makes it even sadder; with Kirby playing while a tear-jerkingly beautiful music-box version of the Milky Way Wishes credits theme plays, and a poignant classic film shout-out, courtesy of King Dedede, as he goes over to join him.
Escargoon (JP): You did it! Your Majesty made someone happy for the first time in your life!(Dedede begins to tear up and walks past Escargoon, joining Kirby on the swing next to him)Dedede (JP): (Quietly singing) Sing a song, fall in love, Dedede... - Kirby Takes the Cake. Sure, the ending's upbeat, but Kirby still runs away from Cappy Town after he's led to believe nobody likes him by Tokkori, and then cries — yes, cries, tears and all, as seen in the page image — after remembering the good times he spent with his friends, whom he thinks have abandoned him.
- The death of Chilly the Snowman in Dedede's Snow Job. It was implied that Chilly would eventually return, but you still couldn't help but shed a tear at his apparent demise — particularly when we see his hat and bell sinking to the bottom of the sea after he melts completely.
- In the original Japanese, Tiff explains that with the water cycle, Chilly could possibly come back. However, in the dub, this dialogue is omitted completely, making it a case of Killed Off for Real.
- Made even worse with Kirby's desperate, determined attempt to get a tiny Chilly somewhere cold, picking him and his bell up in his hat, running to a cliff where an ice block breaks and floats off to sea, leaving him on the ice and covering Chilly with his hat to shield him from the sun. It ends up being all for nothing as the climate melts the ice anyway, the hat and bell sinking beyond recovery.
Kirby: (Wistfully) Chilly... - Some episodes that center around Escargoon can be considered rather pitiful, especially when Dedede doesn’t get any comeuppance.
- In the episode Right Hand Robot, he builds a robot to take his place for him to take a break from Dedede’s abuse, only for the latter to abuse this privilege by continuously attack Kirby. Escargoon spend many exhausting hours repairing it again and again, eventually being desperate enough to contact Nightmare Enterprises for help. When it ends up permanently destroyed, a devastates Escargoon mourns that all his efforts were for naught.
- In Shell-Shocked, Dedede decides to break open Escargoon’s shell for no reason other than morbid curiosity. By the end of the episode, Escargoon gets his shell fully repaired, only for Dedede to try again.
- The entire funeral scene in D'Preciation Day. The original Japanese version was even sadder because of the music and the somewhat realistic crying.
- The whole episode conveys Dedede as a Jerkass Woobie, when he realizes his mean attitude means no one wants to celebrate him, not even his minions. He gets a gift out of pity, but Kirby botches it, leaving Dedede in a massive tantrum. After the "funeral", he tries to appease for his mistakes and even gets some approval at last, but after NME's Monster of the Week attacks and directs all the attention back onto Kirby, Dedede is left sobbing in frustration.
Dedede: (sobbing angry tears) They only appreciate my money! - Episode 95 (Frog Wild) is the infamous one where Kirby turns evil because of a demon frog possessing him. He spends the first part of the episode tormenting the villagers and destroying their belongings, to the extend that some of them cry. To see the poor cappies being vandalized by someone to whom they were mostly kind to is indeed sad.
- Watching the whole town and Castle Dedede being absolutely totaled by the Destroya in Cappy Town Down. Especially sad is seeing the tree at the centre of Cappy Town — which had always been untouched by Dedede's schemes and the monster attacks — reduced to a smouldering wreck. And then the entire town briefly turns on Kirby because they blame him for being the Destroya's target.
- It gets even worse if you've seen all the episodes leading up to this. Seeing all of these supporting characters that the audience had more than likely grown attached to, after all the hardships they've been through, turn on their hero after losing their homes is a pretty tough pill to swallow. But it's not entirely unjustified, either. From their point of view, when they needed Kirby the most, he was too late to prevent tragedy from striking. They forgave everything in the past because it all turned out alright in the end, because Kirby was around to save them. But this time, he wasn't able to in time. And now, Cappy Town is a smoldering wreck.
- Watching the show end can bring a sad mood as well. Even though the adventures are never truly over in their world, they are over on TV. It's a bittersweet feeling, knowing that Nightmare is finally dealt with and Dream Land is safe at last, but being fully aware that the most we'll see of this anime are mere cameos and references in future games is pretty sad to think about.
- The complete absence of Tiff and Tuff in the games. Escargoon, the NME Salesguy, Chef Shiitake, Max Flexer, and eventually Octacon got a few brief appearances in later games. But the two siblings who were like the family Kirby never had? Haven't been properly seen since "Kirby 3D". Back in 2009 (2012 if you count the English dub, but still). It's pretty sad to see that two of the most prominent faces in the show never got so much as a one-second cameo.
