Mario fans are afraid that Elephant Mario might crush Yoshi

In the new Super Mario Bros. Wonder Direct, we got a glimpse of a whole range of elephant characters. Daisy, Peach, Luigi, and even Toad are raising their trunks and crushing anything that gets in their way. And then there's Yoshi.

Poor, poor Yoshi. We haven't seen an elephant version of our favorite green companion, but we have seen Elephant Mario jumping on his back and crushing him under his weight, similar to Bane breaking Batman's spine over his knee.

"If Mario's Final Smash in the next Smash Bros. game doesn't involve transforming into an elephant and shattering his opponent's spine like Yoshi here, then Sakurai has completely failed as the game director," tweeted @IntroSpecktive.

"The Yoshis should organize themselves as a union," said @PlaystationBrah. "Dominant bottoms and submissive tops... The eternal struggle, as portrayed here in Super Mario Bros. Wonder," said @ShinobiPhoenix. "Starscourge Radahn," said BriHardGaming, referring to the boss from Elden Ring who uses gravitational magic to prevent his horse from collapsing under his enormous size. Perhaps Mario has utilized some of that sorcery.

It is not the first time that a 2D Mario game has subjected Yoshi to the advantage of the Italian plumber. In "World," there were multiple jumps over deep, bottomless pits where one could drop Yoshi to reach greater heights, sacrificing their green companion to death just to complete a level. Mario may have saved Princess Peach countless times, but he will never be able to wash the blood of all those Yoshis off his hands.

Admittedly, this time Yoshi is not being thrown into an abyss (at least as far as we know) to make jumps easier, but he is suffering under the weight of a literally three times larger elephant. It's not easy being Yoshi.

While many are concerned about Yoshi's safety when Mario clumsily forces himself onto his back, others have zoomed in on Yoshi's face and discovered not an expression of pain, but one of simmering disappointment. He is tired, annoyed, exhausted after being dragged into another adventure to play the role of Mario's mount.

Yoshi has been carrying this red-hatted destroyer of Goombas and scourge of Koopas since he was a baby, but Mario refuses to admit that he might, just maybe, be too big this time.

As tough as it may look and as painful as it may seem, others interpret this as further evidence of Yoshi's superhuman strength. Bowser is lucky he's not the one storming his castle. On the other hand, Bowser doesn't have an elephant crushing his spine. Life is full of ups and downs, isn't it?