King Dedede

King Dedede, also written as King DeDeDe, or King De De De (in certain older games), is Kirby's arch-rival in Nintendo and HAL Laboratory's long-running Kirby video game series. He (or something in his likeness) has appeared in every game in the series except Kirby & The Amazing Mirror. As such, he is the most recurring major character of the series besides Kirby and Waddle Dee. Due to his many roles as Kirby's main adversary, many consider King Dedede to be the series antagonist. Despite this, he has helped more than harmed since Kirby's Return to Dream Land, and Nintendo has even described Dedede as Kirby's "arch-frenemy.

He is the greedy self-proclaimed king of Dream Land, which is located on the quaint Planet Popstar. Due to an ambiguous description of the geography of Popstar, it is never made entirely clear how much of the planet King Dedede assumes leadership of, though he seems to have castles and fortresses all across the planet. Even so, he seems to perform no administrative functions, and for the most part, the planet seems to ignore any edicts that are issued by him.

King Dedede's trademark weapon is a large star-studded hammer which he can swing around with the greatest of ease. He is also able to inhale objects and spit them out in a manner similar to Kirby. According to Super Smash Bros. Melee, he underwent a series of rigorous training programs to learn and master the use of inhaled air to fly like Kirby at some point after the events of Kirby's Dream Land.

Kirby
For most episodes, Dedede sees Kirby as his enemy. For the first few, he is jealous of Kirby's social status. In the later episodes, Dedede's plots start to less involve defeating Kirby and more of humiliating him. In some episodes, such The Chill Factor, Dedede actually teams up with Kirby. In the episode Prediction Predicament - Part II, Dedede even swings peacefully with Kirby and doesn't even mind his presence. It is shown that Kirby might have a few harsh feelings for Dedede, too, as he sometimes shows he doesn't like his plans (mainly if it's against food), and seems to find pleasure in pulling pranks on him and scaring him. However, it is also to note Kirby was the only individual who was happy to come give King Dedede a present on his Appreciation Day (even though he ate it). King Dedede respects Kirby and admits he's a true hero, but doesn't show it. Dedede's respect for Kirby was fully shown in D'Preciation Day. After feeding Kirby bombs as a prank, Tiff got the town to agree to a pretend funeral. A letter was sent to King Dedede for Kirby's "memorial," driving Dedede into thinking that Kirby was dead, which resulted in King Dedede crying over the fake gravestone of Kirby, believing he unintentionally crossed the line. However, once he realized that Kirby wasn't dead, and Kirby's funeral was a counter-prank by the Cappies, Dedede was overjoyed, and instead of being angry at the Cappies for fooling him, claimed that he always needed Kirby as someone to compete with.