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That rewards as good as mine!
97 Pigma

Pigma Dengar was once a member of the legendary Star Fox team, but he betrayed his teammates James McCloud and Peppy Hare by leading them intro a trap to have them taken prisoners by the evil mad scientist Andross. During the Lylat Wars, Pigma cut his teeth on making a living by dealing in space piracy and bounty hunting when he became part of the first incarnation of the Star Wolf team, though after the war, he wore out his welcome and was kicked out by Wolf O'Donnell due to his greedy and untrustworthy personality. He became a freelance criminal afterwards, not deterred by the fact that he had been fired from a group he served with. His big goal in life is to become as rich as possible.

Biography

Pigma was one of the legendary members of the first Star Fox team, headed by James McCloud. Pigma's role on the team was well remembered by Peppy as being very a cunning pilot and never missing a trick. After the former chief scientist Andross was sentenced to permanent exile on the distant planet Venom, the Star Fox team was hired by General Pepper to investigate reports of strange biotechnology activity coming from the planet. Upon their arrival, Pigma's greed was exposed when Andross bribed him with the promise of riches, which caused him to commit treason against Corneria by betraying the original Star Fox team to Andross, by having delivered them into a deadly trap from which there was seemingly no escape. Only his wingmate Peppy Hare managed to escape and James was never seen again.

When the Lylat Wars erupted, Star Wolf was formed by Wolf O'Donnell after Pigma persuaded him to do so, then hired by Andross to bring Star Fox down, where he was hired to fly for Wolf O'Donnell, due to their mutual delight in Star Fox's doom, in which Pigma focused his attacks on Peppy, his former teammate.

Fichina

Pigma participated in The Battle of Fichina along with the rest of Star Wolf. He and the team flew in during the invasion on the planet and helped capture its main base. When Star Fox arrived to take back the outpost, as well as to diffuse a bomb recently discovered within the base, Pigma and the rest of Star Wolf attempted to stop them. Pigma set his sights on Peppy, and he proceeded to taunt his former teammate by gloating about the reward he was receiving for his mission. Star Fox managed to repel Star Wolf and recaptured the base, diffusing the bomb in the process. Upon being shot down, Pigma lamented the loss of his "beautiful" reward and screamed in anguish as he plummeted.

Bolse

Pigma and Star Wolf were later ordered to protect the Bolse station during the Cornerian offensive of Venom. Star Fox was sent to the station to destroy it, and open a route to Venom. Upon arriving, Pigma sneered at Fox, saying that the latter's father had screamed rather awfully before he finally succumbed to death, showing his extremely sadistic and cruel nature (In the Japanese version, Pigma instead says "Your daddy's waitin' for ya in hell!"). He continued attacking Peppy, but was again defeated. Star Wolf was again unsuccessful in stopping Star Fox, and the station was destroyed.

Venom

In the final Cornerian invasion of Venom, the Star Wolf team were ordered to protect Andross's palace using the advanced Wolfen II, serving as the final line of defense and the only thing standing between Star Fox and Andross. Pigma had suffered serious cranial and eye damage and had a protective helmet and goggles to protect and heal the injuries. His nose was also slightly crooked. Pigma had received his own Wolfen II and thought highly of it. Upon arrival, he also mock-pitied Fox about the fact that his dad would not be present to see Fox fail his mission. While attacking Peppy, he once again showed his sadistic side by expressing obvious relish at the opportunity to bust his prey up extensively. He only expressed disbelief that his Wolfen II, which was superior to the Arwing, was shot down.

Like the others, Pigma survived and after Andross's death, apparently recovered from all his injuries. Some time after their last battles with Star Fox, Wolf expelled Pigma from Star Wolf due to his incredible greed and distrustful nature (which might explain the claw marks Pigma now has on his head). He also gave a shoot on sight order to the various Ruffians in the Sargasso Space Zone, in case Pigma attempted to get near Wolf's territory. This did not negatively impact Pigma much, as it gave him the opportunity to satisfy his greed as a freelance criminal. Presumably because of his firing from Star Wolf, Pigma utilized a new, large yellow ship that possesses a tractor beam and nose art.

Katina

After the initial stages of the Aparoid invasion, Pigma hid away in the military base on Katina (occupied by Aparoids), sending distress beacons which the Cornerian Army soon picked up, leaving General Pepper to send the Star Fox team out to find it. After the Katina Base was cleansed of Aparoids and their leader, the Aparoid Ship, was destroyed, Pigma revealed himself to Fox, telling him how it was he who sent the distress call. Pigma then swooped down and stole the core memory from the dead Aparoid Walker, believing it would make him rich.

Sargasso Space Zone

In an interplanetary game of chicken, the Star Fox team invaded the Sargasso Hideout, having been led to believe that Pigma went in hiding there due to the last signal from Pigma originating from there. Just before they succeeded, Star Wolf entered the scene. When Fox tried to interrogate Wolf to surrender Pigma over to him after a short dogfight, Wolf revealed that Pigma was no longer part of Star Wolf, and admitted that it was unlikely Pigma actually hid at the hideout as Wolf himself had ordered his own men to kill him should he come close to entering his territory, but his newest teammate, Panther Caroso, was flirting with Krystal and he slip pointed the Star Fox team in the direction of Fichina, where Pigma may have been heading.

Fichina

The Star Fox team made way for Fichina after Panther gave his tip. Once there, they discovered that Pigma deactivated the climate control center, making Fichina a snowy wasteland. Upon investigating, they also found out that Pigma was leading the Aparoids somehow, although they were forced to let him escape after he infected a power generator into an Aparoid due to the control center going critical, with Krystal expressing disgust at his action. As they eliminated the Aparoids from Fichina and restore the climate control center, they uncovered another clue leading to the Meteo asteroid field.

Meanwhile, in his ship, Pigma had a nightmare about being assimilated by the Aparoids, in which, in his sleep he muttered "Obey us, Obey us, Obey us, Obey". Although he initially wondered if it was simply a dream, he attempted to fight their control, citing that he wasn't willing to obey them if it meant turning down a profit. This foreshadows the event of losing himself to Aparoidedation later on.

Asteroid Belt

When Team Star Fox arrived at the Asteroid Belt in pursuit of Pigma to retrieve the Core Memory, they noticed Pigma's ship discarded in space. It wasn't long before they then saw Pigma, horribly infected by the Aparoid Core Memory and attached to an inactive space station by Aparoid matter. Pigma then underwent a terrifying transformation, his body fusing with the space station and turning him into what appeared to be an enormous, Aparoid-mutilated face with the contaminated station as its hull and shielding with mechanical, six tentacle-like arms with claws on the end as weapons and bomb launchers circling his face, similar to Andross's Ultimate Space Weapon, the Gorgon. Aparoid Pigma had been born. Speaking in a plural idiosyncratic mannerism and ignoring Falco's insults, Aparoid Pigma warned Star Fox not to resist the Aparoid's "ultimate existence", which made Fox conclude that the Pigma they knew was already gone. Peppy advised Fox that Pigma's stolen Core Memory was inside of Aparoid Pigma, so they engaged the creature in battle. Eventually, after Fox had damaged the monstrosity enough, Aparoid Pigma emitted a strong roar of pain before exploding in a brilliant white flash, destroying him and ending Pigma's life. Fox could only look in silence as he watched the pig who'd possibly lead his father to die at Andross's hand vanish.

Pigma made a subsequent appearance two years later in Sector X and Sector Y, having been reincarnated into a mechanical cuboid puzzle box, and he referred to this form as "Neo Pigma" at least once. He referred to himself in normal tone, suggesting he had somehow regained his former sense of self, but seemed to have some difficulty when communicating. It is revealed that Pigma wanted Star Wolf to bring Star Fox to him, and that the plan to get them there was made by Krystal. Pigma explains that he spared Star Wolf because he once found them to be good friends, showing that he is indeed capable of having some amount of loyalty. Pigma also seemed to command some Anglar forces to destroy Star Fox, but he showed up himself after they are defeated.

  • After Pigma's final destruction and death, one of two endings ensue (where Falco Lombardi creates Star Falco, and Fox and Falco retire and join the G-Zero Grand Prix). Both endings have a more pyrrhic element to them (in the former, Falco beats Pigma, but ultimately misses out on taking out the Anglar Emperor; and in the latter, Star Wolf managed to destroy the Anglar Emperor instead of the Star Fox team, which ultimately had Fox doing races alongside Falco to take their minds off the betrayal).

Other appearances

Lylat Wars Comic

Pigma appears with the rest of Star Wolf in the Lylat Wars Comic, performing an even higher role than he does in the games. During the ambush on Star Fox at Meteo, Fox is enraged by Pigma's presence and treason towards his father, so he chases after the pig's badly damaged Wolfen, but Wolf delays Fox so that Pigma can escape back to Venom, threatening Fox to leave Pigma alone or he'll be sent to join his father, thus Fox believes in the rumors surrounding Wolf's involvement in the fate of James. Crash landing on Venom, Pigma and Andrew are terrified by Andross's appearance and fury at their failure, where they blame each other in fear. The emperor threatens them not to screw up again or he'll vaporize them, leaving Pigma swearing to take revenge on Star Fox. At Aquas, Pigma operates a multi-purpose craft, disguised as an Octopus and attacks Fox's Blue-Marine, latching onto it throughout the Bacoon battle and clings onto it until the sub docks at the Great Fox. Fooling everyone with the disguise, Falco is very interested in cooking it, but Fox elects to let it go free. With attentions off him, Pigma sabotages the Arwing's G-diffusers with time bombs, which each go off at the worst time possible during the Battle of Solar. As Fox, Falco and Slippy drop towards Solar's lava, Pigma arrives in his Octopus craft to watch the show until Katt Monroe appears to bring up the crippled Arwings with her tractor beam. Pigma and Andrew proceed to attack the Catspaw, but Wolf suddenly arrives and attacks them. Andrew asks why Wolf is attacking his own team as Wolf declares them traitors to his team for not acting with his approval and open fires on them, claiming their alliance is over. When Fox finally arrives at Venom, Andross is cruelly torturing and mocking Pigma for not keeping his word to finish Fox off, declaring him "once a traitor, always a traitor". Andross then electrocutes Pigma into a black/yellow silhouette. Fox ended up sympathizing with Pigma's suffering despite his grudge against him for murdering his father.

Trivia

  • As Shigeru Miyamoto states in issue 98 of Nintendo Power magazine, in the Japanese version of Star Fox 64, "Pigma speaks in the Kansai dialect of Japan. In Kansai, people end their sentences with the word 'dengar.' So, it's sort of a Japanese joke."
    • In Japan, people from this southern Kansai/Osaka region are characterized as rude, bad-mannered, and even criminal lowlifes, befitting of Pigma. However, this is an offensive stereotype, and people from the region do not like how they are often portrayed this way.
  • Pigma's first name is a spin on the word "Dogma", referring to Pigma's anti-dogmatic nature.
  • Pigma shares his surname with the Bounty Hunter Dengar, a character from the Star Wars series, which in turn shares many similarities and references with the Star Fox series. Pigma's role in James McCloud's presumed death also mirrors Obi-Wan's claim that Darth Vader betrayed and murdered Anakin Skywalker in A New Hope.
  • Pigma, along with Krystal, are the only characters to hold both Star Fox and Star Wolf memberships.
  • Although it was stated that Pigma betrayed his comrades for money, the Japanese manual for Star Fox 64 never stated a specific reason for wanting to serve Andross and betraying Star Fox. It is also to be noted that the Nintendo Power guide and the Keibunsha strategy guide implies that Pigma is the reason why Wolf and Fox have a rivalry in the first place, while his trophy from the fourth Smash Bros game supports the story.
  • Pigma can be compared to the similarly greedy Wario of the Mario universe.
  • Pigma is the only Star Wolf member with an in-game reason as to why he is no longer on the team; he was kicked out because of his incredible greed and distrustful nature, while the Lylat Wars Comic creates its own take on the story with both Pigma and Oikonny being kicked out by Wolf for disobedience.
  • Pigma betraying James and Peppy for Andross might be a reference to the latter's association with pigs in the Nintendo Power comics.
  • Daisuke Gouri, Pigma's voice actor in 64 and Assault, would later voice the character Cunningham from Metal Gear Solid: Portable Ops, who had a very similar characterization towards Pigma, including being somewhat sadistic as well as selling out his compatriots to a third party for his own objectives (though the main difference was in motive, as Pigma betrayed James McCloud and the Star Fox team out of greed, while Cunningham manipulated and betrayed the then-renegade FOX unit and their handlers, the CIA, out of revenge due to being confined to a desk job after his leg ended up amputated). Coincidentally, shortly before Cunningham's death and lamenting the protagonist, Snake's decision to go against his mission by the DOD, he explained that the two of them would have received "the highest honors a soldier can achieve" had Snake just obeyed his mission and returned to America, which was similar to Pigma's whining about the loss of his "beautiful reward" when shot down on Fichina and Bolse.

Names in Other Languages

Language Name
Japanese ピグマ・デンガー (Piguma Dengā)

References

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