Leo Leonardo III

“Oh he's the king of the idiots. A veritable sultan of stupidity.” 
- Aeris, Behind the Scenes Part 1
Leo Leonardo III (The 3rd) is one of the two main characters of VG Cats, with the other being his fellow co-star Aeris, who continuously abuses him on a daily basis, due to his extreme idiocy.
== Appearance ==
Leo is an anthropomorphic male green-eyed cat with light gray fur, with white fur by the lower part of his face going down to his abdomen. Unlike Aeris, whose hands match her fur color (pink), Leo's hands are white. He is usually seen wearing a comically large cat bell around his neck, which is one of the two parts his style consists of. His younger versions have a dark blue collar and a light blue shirt, while his older and current self wears a dark blue shirt and a light blue or white collar. He always has variations of his outfit for different types of time of year, but most of the time he wears a dark blue long sleeve shirt. He also has different colored bells for different outfits.
His first main outfit consisted of just a simple shirt and pants, but later developed over time into his more iconic outfit after he was first seen with the bell on his neck in Virtua Smasher 4. By 2009, variations of the main outfit would be seen with jackets and hoodies, different shirts, or a different colored bell, but he's also been seen swapping back to his regular outfit.
==Background==
Leo was born to Leo Leonardo II and Mrs. Leonardo in Canada. Despite his idiocy, Leo is capable of functioning well enough in society. At some point during his childhood, he met his friend and fellow schoolmate, Aeris, who at the time was being bullied by a young Solid Snake. However, he quickly got rid of the bully and told her not to worry, leaving Aeris walking away blushing, and starting from some point after that, he hasn't left her alone. If the events in the other webcomic VG Kitties are true, there is a possibility Leo met Aeris when they were just kittens. 
Strips #334 to #336 show Leo and Aeris as kids. In it, Leo kills his hamster, Harvey by putting it in a painted hamster ball made to look like a Pokéball, which ends up in Leo throwing the ball with Harvey inside. Aeris comes over to cheer him up by playing Super Metroid together. It is also implied in #336 - Epilogue that Leo and Aeris were friends before this, as well.
Leo had an aunt named Leona, as mentioned in the comic Look at this Photograph. Leo has a sister called April Leonardo who first appears within a family photo in Next on the History Channel, and is later confirmed to be a sister in a flashback in Skillz. 
== Personality ==
Leo is a flaming idiot who somehow manages to get by in society without ending up in a mental institution. Despite this, he does sometimes show signs of deeper intelligence, or at least some common sense. He is extremely gullible, and often falls prey to the schemes of the other characters, from Johnny Evilguy's scams, such as the monkey paws Leo bought from him in Comes with a Free Frogurt, to the insane ramblings of the drunk Dr. Hobo. He even believes in chain mail as seen in Hogaaan!!!, however, in this case the chain mail really was telling the truth. Leo was also tricked by PantsMan into becoming his sidekick, but in reality, had only made him popcorn and had to join in on playing pranks on the Justice Squad. In a game of Dungeons & Dragons in the comic Skittles, Aeris kills a dead rat for him in the game to give him the experience. He ties the rat's tail to a stick, calling it the rat-flail.
Leo has also developed a taste for killing other living things such as electrifying orphans, burning Sims, and performing a vivisection on Winnie the Pooh. Even in earlier comics, Leo has a thing for hurting others. When Aeris talked badly about Hitman, he strangled her, as seen in the early comic, She's Just Sleeping, and even shot somebody while trick or treating in Blow it Out Your ass. Not often, he seems to sometimes have rather rude behavior and is seen to be impatient. He seems to have gotten more sympathetic since The Perfect Gift; only time will tell if this is just temporary. However, it seems Leo and Aeris are now able to make have conversations without Aeris raising her fist, even in later comics. 
Leo occasionally enjoys making jokes, especially towards Aeris. His favorite type of joke is making fun of Aeris' mom. An example of this can be seen in the comic Bizzaro, where he jokes about killing and sexually assaulting Aeris' mother. It seems as time has gone on, Aeris has started caring less about his dumb remarks due to years of having to deal with him, but still has to snap at him sometimes, such as it getting to the point where she has to abort him from time. He later also makes a joke in An Outsiders Perspective, comparing women to vampires because of 'the blood.' 
Leo even has a bit of a perverted side to him, and sometimes will make weird comments, but it is especially common in his jokes. The first instance of this would be in the comic Mariooooooo?, where Leo, either intentionally or accidentally, stole Aeris’ pants. In the second VG Kitties comic, which shows Aeris and Leo meeting as kittens for the first time, Leo makes a perverted joke to Aeris, saying "boi-oi-oing," which caused her to beat him. Much later, while playing Metal Gear Online in the strip Fonzie, he says that he is "Solid Snaking it in the bush" as an obvious sexual innuendo. 
It appears that Leo is too dumb to simply understand that his actions can be seen as incredibly questionable. 
==== Interests ====
Leo enjoys gaming, and usually likes just about everything. He commonly appears in strips that parody Super Mario and The Legend of Zelda, and also seen outside to enjoy fighting games and first person shooter games. Leo claims that he is a Nintendo die-hard in the comic ....Just Walk Away.... He and Aeris also enjoy figure painting, as seen in the comic Next on the History Channel.
==Other relationships==
Leo is good friends with most of the VG Cats cast, a stark contrast from Aeris' usual hatred. It's most likely that Leo is simply too stupid to figure out the people he hangs out with are weird, or he bonds with them over that. His most notable friendship is the one he has with Dr. Hobo, a homeless drunkard who was actually once a licensed doctor. Leo is seen with Dr. Hobo in his alleyway, with Dr. Hobo often giving him his bad advice and wisdom, which really is just nonsense from his mind. He convinced Leo that Canada existed because of the efforts from vikings who were attacked by 50 foot atomic ninja robots in the comic Oh Canadia!, and even took a look at Leo's brain using a knife in Two robots walk into a bar.... It's clear that Dr. Hobo is a bad influence for Leo, but he continues hanging out with him either way.
As it is very easy for him to believe lies, he has also been scammed by Johnny Evilguy in the comics Comes with a Free Frogurt and Magic beans. In Magic beans, he is scammed by Johnny after purchasing the 'orange sapphire of might', which in reality wasn't anything special, and most likely just a rock. It's advertised as being able to kill any enemy you encounter, so Leo tries it out on a bear, which causes him to get beaten up horrifically. 
Leo is the one who introduces PantsMan, the VG Cats creator Scott Ramsoomair's superhero identity in the comic I Like Bunnies, but immediately refers to him as a 'lazy bastard', with PantsMan replying back saying that Leo should go fuck himself. Leo would be confused as to why Ternaldo showed up at their house uninvited when they were playing Dungeons & Dragons. An incident in Number One shows that Ternaldo left his 'smelly leavings' in the toilet without flushing, causing the toilet to clog while Leo was peeing, and getting his own pee all over himself. Because of this, it probably strained their friendship.
==Role==
Leo often plays the main male characters in most of the video games VG Cats make fun of. These characters are usually Link and Mario. He is also seen as characters such as Cloud Strife from Final Fantasy or Solid Snake from Metal Gear.
==Running gags==
Leo is usually the brunt of all the scenes where people die in VG Cats. These usually manifest themselves in very gory deaths, from being mauled by a bear as seen in Legal Matters, his ass exploding after Worms from the video game series, Worms went to war in it, to even being aborted from time by Aeris in The Comedian. Aeris, when rightfully confused about why Leo is suddenly back, he responds with "I got better." He is always fine by the next comic. 
Due to Leo's stupidity, he does things that are obviously stupid that will result in dire consequences such as death but he does them anyway. His stupidity also makes him vulnerable to Dr. Hobo's stories and the schemes of other characters.
Leo also has a thing for being naked, and even went as far as to dance for gil in only his underwear as seen in So very Wrong.
==Trivia==
*Leo's full name, Leo Leonardo III, was revealed in the comic Behind the Scenes Part 1. The first part, "Leo Leonardo" was originally seen on the cast page on the VG Cats site sometime around late 2003, before Behind the Scenes Part 1 had released.http://web.archive.org/web/20031204075435/http://www.vgcats.com/misc/cast.php 
* His favorite console is the GameCube.http://web.archive.org/web/20030617142235/vgcats.com/misc/cast.php
* Leo was assaulted once by an alien face hugger in That's Saying a Mouthful.
* In Technical Problems, Leo has a Rotom haunting his (or his and Aeris') house.
* In I Am Gross, it is confirmed that he and Aeris live together.
** Also in I Am Gross, it is revealed that Leo will eat barely edible bread from the litter box. As well as that he does his business in the litter box (the one he just took said bread from) rather than a toilet and that he seems to prefer the litter box to the toilet.
* On the official VG Cats YouTube channel, Leo states that when he does use the toilet he turns the lights off to feel like a spy.
* Leo was PantsMan's sidekick, or rather, personal costumed butler who has done nothing but make him popcorn since becoming his sidekick other than egging Batman's Batmobile.
* According to The Comedian, Leo never suffered a red ring of death on his Xbox. He got his first one in Conglaturation! however.
* Leo is seen on a 'wanted' poster in the comic Da Bomb in a panel featuring Mr. Shwatzencop, who also killed Leo earlier for owning The Chronicles of Riddick: Escape from Butcher Bay in the strip The thin blue line. 
* Leo is both a cheapskate and a spendthrift, refusing to spend his own money while frivolously spending anyone else's.
==Gallery==
==References==
Category:Main characters
Category:VG Cats characters
Category:Characters