Robbie Rotten

"We are number one! HEY!"

- Robbie's famous quote during his song "We Are Number One". "I, Robbie Rotten, will not be beaten by a costumed Sportalooney and some pink cheerleader. I'll stop 'em, if it's the last thing I do. And then, Lazytown will stay lazy forever. AH HA HA—ah ha ha ow!"

- Robbie swearing to rid Lazytown of Sportacus. "IT'S DISGUISE TIME!"

- Robbie Rotten's catchphrase.

Robbie Rotten (also known as Glanni Glæpur in Icelandic) is the main antagonist of the Icelandic children's program LazyTown. He is the nemesis of the series' main protagonists, Sportacus and Stephanie Meanswell, who promote exercise, healthy eating and an active and healthy lifestyle.

Being extremely lazy, Robbie naturally opposes their attempts to spread a healthy influence to the people of Lazytown and employs various schemes to discredit healthy living and run "Sportaflop" out of Lazytown every episode, although his plans are always foiled in the end. He is based on his incarnation from the original musical.

He was portrayed by the late Stefán Karl Stefánsson.

History
Once, LazyTown (fitting its name) was full of people who did nothing but play videogames, eat junk food, and be generally unproductive. The man who encouraged this behavior and was an expert at doing so was Robbie Rotten, and he loved every single second of it. When Stephanie Meanswell tried to introduce sports and get people active and tried to make everyone try to eat healthy fruits and vegetables (or also known as "Sports Candy"), Robbie stopped her, but when she summoned the slightly-above-average hero Sportacus, he was unable to stop everyone from doing everything he despised.

Embittered that his lazy days were now spoiled by noise pollution, Robbie devises all sorts of plans to exact his vengeance, typically using some kind of disguise or gadget to inspire the kids of LazyTown to follow his lazy lifestyle or using them to try and get rid of Sportacus. Although he sometimes comes close to succeeding, in the end, like almost all villains in children's television programs, Robbie is always defeated by the show's protagonists.

Personality and Traits
"It's a perfect day to do nothing at all!"

- Robbie Rotten Robbie is an immature, conniving, egocentric, and manipulative trickster with many vices. He is very lazy, indolent, hateful, borderline sociopathic, selfish, acquisitive, covetous, sneaky, rude, and greedy. He is proud of these traits, and works hard at keeping his status as a villain. He has an awful diet, being a lover of sugary treats, such as ice cream and blue frosted cake (which he then tops with whipped cream), and even ate a cake containing sand. Despite his flaws, Robbie shows certain degrees of brilliance, though his presence is a children's show restricts his success and cruelty as a villain.

Nonetheless, he is a true mastermind inventing all manner of devices, and his cheap disguises actually fooling people. Despite his laziness and desire to inspire laziness in others, Robbie himself is slim and (when he has to be) hardworking, as well as intelligent. Though, he is also a very childish buffoon. He also has poor social skills when he isn't playing the villain. He has a strange and contrasting attitude towards everyone in town, but he deeply despises Sportacus and Stephanie the most. Generally, he seems extremely bitter, obnoxious, and vituperative towards Sportacus in particular, desiring to humiliate him and have him ostracized, so that he will leave. Towards other lazytowners, he is argumentative and grouchy, though in his disguise's, he is sociable, charming, and funny, all in his bid to make a slothful life seem like an attractive alternative to Sportacus's example.

He sometimes appears to be extremely friendly, empathetic, and compassionate on terms with the Lazytown residents at times. In the episode "The First Day of Summer", it is actually revealed he really likes everyone in Lazytown, including Sportacus, and has nothing to do if they are all gone. He even danced along with Stephanie and co. at the end of the episode, happy to see everyone return. In the very same episode, he actually becomes very good friends with a fly, and in another episode, he builds a robot dog, which he also really likes. Beneath their rivalry, Robbie has an underlying fascination and obsession with Sportacus, leaping into his arms and touching him at any given opportunity, and Robbie tends to spend a lot of time talking about Sportacus.

Internet Popularity
"Alright! I can see that I will have to teach you, how to be... VILLAINS!"

- Robbie preparing to sing "We Are Number One".

Robbie is constantly getting memes created around him, this is probably due to how over the top he's played. His first meme came from his song "You are a Pirate" which became "lol limewire". Robbie's second meme came from the episode Robbie's Dream Team from his song "We Are Number One". In the aforementioned episode, Robbie ordered three other villains like himself on the phone and is disappointed to find out that they are not "real villains" and trains them to catch Sportacus. While they eventually succeed, they let him go out of boredom. A music rip by the YouTube user "SiIvaGunner" was uploaded with the name "We Are Number One - Lazy Town : The Video Game". as for every music rip that was uploaded to the channel, it was a remix. There were several edits of the original song with a title of "We Are Number One but ________".

In later events, a GoFundMe foundation started for Stefan (The actor of Robbie) as he was diagnosed with cancer. The internet managed to reach many goals of the foundation, and as of that, Stefan and the actors of Bobby, Tobby and Flobby performed "We Are Number One" at a Facebook livestream.

By 2017, the song that was uploaded by the original LazyTown channel reached over 10 million views, and the song was awarded #1 meme of the year by Know Your Meme. In 2018, the song reached over 48 million views.

Trivia

 * "Glæpur" is an Icelandic term that means "crime", fitting his character.
 * It is rumored that Robbie's Character was inspired by The Grinch. They both live in secret lairs, they wear disguises to fool the townspeople, and they both hate noise. They both even have canine sidekicks to aid them, although Robbie's Robo-Dog only appeared in one episode.
 * Curiously, Robbie Rotten's actor, Stefán Karl Stefánsson also portrayed the Grinch in Dr. Seuss' How the Grinch Stole Christmas! The Musical in 2015.
 * Despite being the villain, the kids of LazyTown are sometimes nice to him, which probably speculates that Robbie has a softer or at least a good side.
 * One additional trait of how Robbie is the complete opposite of Sportacus is that, while Sportacus lives in a blimp in the sky, Robbie lives in an underground bunker.
 * Robbie chooses to sleep in a Lay-Z boy recliner chair rather than in a bed.
 * Robbie Rotten often eats junk food, such as blue cake richly covered in white frosting (which he then tops with whipped cream), and also has proven to enjoy pizza, cheeseburgers, French fries, salt water taffy, soda pop and ice cream. Despite this, Robbie has never gotten overweight or obese, and remains slim.
 * He may have a condition that makes him able to eat a lot without gaining weight, since it can happen in real life, or his constant work in planning his schemes actually burns the calories off his body (although this obviously wouldn't make him very lazy).
 * The most ironic thing about Robbie is that he wishes for LazyTown to be lazy again, but considering how much effort he puts into his evil schemes, he himself has become one of it's most active citizens.
 * During a Reddit AMA (ask me anything) Stefan Karl revealed that Robbie wishes he could be friends with the kids of LazyTown although it will never happen.
 * During the same AMA, he also states that both Robbie Rottens are "obviously related".
 * In the series LazyTown Extra, a bunch of comedic shorts starring Robbie, Robbie is usually trying to break some world record or tries to show off sports are not all that impressive by doing them himself. This proves that Robbie can be enthusiastic and energetic about something else than evil plots.
 * Robbie Rotten brought to a life-sized music-box figurine named "Rottenella" (portrayed by Kristjana Sæunn Olafsdóttir) after Robo-Robbie failed to cooperate, mainly because he rung with the wind-up key on his back every time. She was entered in the dance contest by Robbie Rotten to represent him, but only to lose to Stephanie (despite her stiffness at first).